Board of Supervisors (bos) Agendas & Minutes - Regular Meeting

It is 6 o'clock. I will call the August 11, 2026 meeting of the Board of Supervisors, with County Board of Supervisors to order. I will note that we do have a quorum with all members present, with the exception of Supervisor Terry, who is out of town. If you would stand, tonight we have Pastor Darren Smith from Ignite Church, who is on retreat, to provide the invocation and remain standing for the pledge.

Thank you all for having us tonight, and Pastor Darren from McKnight Church, just want you all to know we're praying for you as our leaders. Romans 13.1 says, Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God. The authorities that exist are appointed by him, which puts a lot of responsibility on your shoulders, and we appreciate you. Let's pray. Father, tonight, what an honor it is to be here, in this beautiful county, Lord. We just pray for our leaders tonight. We pray that you'll use them. God, for every person that's represented here tonight, would you watch over them, give them guidance tonight. God, let wisdom reign in our hearts and minds tonight. And God, let your will be done as we give you glory and honor for all of it. God, we ask that your blessing be upon it. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

All right. The first item on the agenda is citizens' time. I will remind you, you have three minutes to persist and talk about issues for Wythe County. Ms. Crockett will be keeping the time. And again, I will remind everybody to be respectful to the speakers. Don't interrupt. If you have to have a conversation, please step outside. And it's free admission. We'll let you back in. So we just need to make sure that people speak and get their time, okay? The first person we have to speak is Mr. Joe DeBoer.

My name is Joe DeBoer, and I live at 158 Widener Way, Royal Creek, Virginia, 24368. I rise tonight on several different topics. The first of all, I think we all should remember a great Wythe Canyon. He and his family have served Wythe County well with distinction for years, going back generations. And that's known as Walter Sam Crockett. He is one of the pillars of our community, our county, and we certainly do appreciate what his life brought to Wythe County. He was a friend of mine, and I wanted to share that with you tonight. Now, we have a few problems we need to discuss tonight. First issue is the speed will feel. We need to get the lights turned on at the speed we'll feel. We understand there is a problem with regard to bureaucracy in our county government that has slowed this down tremendously. I suggest to you folks tonight that we can cut that bureaucracy easily. Number one, that field And the lights thereof were put together by the people of that community. Literally, they put them up. It's our duty to make sure that they burn for the people of that community and the whole county. That is the only place in Wythe County that we have a lighted field, period, other than Ager Park. Now, that is a combo field. In other words, you can use it for different things. It's big enough to do a lot of things with. Now, the problem we have, according to the bureaucrats, is that's a school property. Okay? That's true. But who uses that property is another issue in itself. And what I mean by that is, It is used for recreation after school lets out. The whole area right there. In fact, people have wanted to use that thing for games and stuff like that. So we need to make sure that those lights are turned on and I will work to make sure that happens. Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Mr. Board. Mr. Burr, what's the situation with the lights at Speedway Field?

To my knowledge, what the board said is correct. The lights were put up by citizens years ago. They were there. The county has never been involved with the lights on that field or anything like that. I advise them to talk to the school board about that to see what they are interested in doing if it's just a matter of replacing bulbs, if it's still functional lights. I do not know when the last time those lights worked, but I'll be glad to talk to the school board some more about it.

I was going to ask, I'll get with Mr. DeBorg after the meeting, but I know that we have a meeting scheduled next week with the school board, the vice chair and the chair. So if we can get that on our agenda and have that discussion with him or talk to Dr. Street. Sure. Thank you, sir. Next person we have to sign up is Mr. Bob Walton.

I live in Whitville. I spoke last week. And I'm talking in general about the data center, something that I know y'all have heard a lot about. The last time I talked to you, I talked about, you know, there had been discussion about the amount of water used, the closed loop system, and I discussed that a closed-loop system, yes, uses a lot less water. It transfers the heat dissipation to current, to electricity. So much electricity, a lot of electricity is used to dissipate the heat in lieu of the water, which can be a really good thing.

except for our grid.

So when I left, I said, well, let me see, what have we discussed? What's been discussed about that? Because I'm kind of coming in late on this. I've been out of the country and whatnot. So I submitted a FOIA request. for any communications with you all, with county employees regarding effect of the Progress Park project, data center project on the grid. The response was there was none. So I'm taking that according to your own records. There was no discussion, no written discussion, no documented discussion. Verbal discussion, I'm sure there was. And I think what happened is the company came in and said, hey, you've got a 90 megawatt substation there. That's more than enough power to power a data center, which is true. And that was it. Trust us. Let's go with that. No independent studies, no technical verification, just a sales pitch. I also was told that you all never entered into an NDA, so I've had some misinformation on that. If that's the case, I don't understand why all this was done in secret, or a lot of it was done in secret, because that really put you in a bad position, where a lot of the public right now feels like they've lost trust in you because you were working on something in secret, it came out later, and people didn't like it. So here we are. One thing, by choosing to do this in the dark, you've lost credibility. Two, Governor Spanberger pushed on the SEC to ensure that data centers pay their own way when it comes to grid, upgrade to the grid, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. That makes it really clear that local government, meaning you all, to have the leverage, to have the backing, and the responsibility to work with energy regulators to protect your citizens. Now's the time to be doing that. You're not powerless. You have the responsibility to use this leverage you have been given wisely. Local governments all over the country, including Texas, which is not a bastion of liberal theology that put a hold on these centers. I'll be done in just a second. And so I think we're seeing all over the country people putting a hold on it. Doesn't mean that we shouldn't progress. It doesn't mean that we won't progress, because personally, I think we're past that point. What I think we need to do is we rely on you all to look at how is this going to affect the grid. If there's a problem in the future, if they exceed the usage, they're very successful. They're using more. How is that gonna affect the grid? How is that gonna affect rates that we pay for electricity? That's the one thing that I'm just not seeing that you all have fallen through on, and I hope that you can as you move forward.

All right, thank you, Mr. Waldman. If you have anything else, just make sure you get it to Mr. Byer. Yeah, that's fine.

I'll send it in to all of you through the thing. Okay, thanks, sir.

Next person we have to speak is Mr. Andy Kegley.

Good evening, Andy Kegley. Following up on some of what Bob said and something on your agenda here later tonight, I'd like to ask again about the transfer of land in Progress Park mentioned in the minutes of the June 30th meeting. Just come out and tell us, please, if it's related to Solis Arcs for construction or for partitioning the Blue Star lot or something to do with VDOT's new roads, we'd like to know. because every meeting that passes without any disclosure of what you're doing with the public's assets via secret transactions does nothing to restore our trust and further undermines your credibility. I do appreciate the Chair's clarification about the NDA as expressed in the last meeting. It's worth noting, observing, too, that anything to do with Lot 35, Project Gradient, the Solis-Arx project, should not be considered covered by any prior non-disclosure agreement as either of the two parties to the NDA from sometime early 2025 are no longer connected to the project. The IDA director is gone and the original developer of Solus Arcs sold the fluid stack. So please, no more hiding behind that faded fig leaf. the same closed door discussion on the very same subject acquisition disposition of real property East with Fort Chiswell is on the calendar on the agenda here late tonight for closed session and just as a reminder we're doing an AG district meeting Thursday at seven at Glenwood Church and we've got some interested landowners in that part of the county interested in hearing more about it thank you all right thank you Mr Kegel next person we have to speak is Miss Stacey Beamer

uh i wanted to first um i went back and watched the meeting and i heard uh miss crockett ask a question about electricity and listening to mr walton talk um when the big city slicker woman came in here to sell you guys on fluid stack i do recall if i'm correct that she said that that company would pay for all electricity. I may be wrong, but that might be something we need to ask them about. Uh, back in the day when with bill was considered a very safe place to live. I'm sure some of y'all me, we played a game called kick the can. Remember that? So I want to thank Mr Cook for his comments. I was at the beach last week, but I did go back and watch the meeting. Um, about to stop kicking the can on this zoning. Um, when I talked to about three or four of you all at the four chisel meeting March 30th, and I asked you, please, please don't stress this out. Don't stretch it out. Let's get it done. Because the longer you stretch it out, the more companies you're going to have in here, like the one on exit 86, buying up farmland. So I want to thank Mr. Cook. And as he says, let's stop kicking the can and get rolling. And if your constituents don't want it, it might be they don't understand. When we first started this, a lot of citizens had no idea we were getting a data center. They didn't know what it was. So it may be they're looking at the old way of zoning from years ago. So that's your job. to explain to the people that voted for you what this new zoning is about. And Mr. Cook had a very, very good point when he said, just pass it. They can come in if they have a complaint. They can meet with us. We can rezone it. Because you're never going to make anybody happy, and you're never going to get to a good medium with this. So, thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Beamer. Next person we have to speak is Miss Miranda Edwards.

Hi, Miranda Edwards.

I have handouts I'd like to be passed out.

So on behalf of Preserve With, we started a zoning survey to see what the interest would be in implementing zoning in With County. We wanted to be unbiased, so we left the option for yes, no, or undecided. Everyone had to put an address and their name to verify that they lived in With County. They also had the opportunity to leave a comment, so several comments were left on our zoning survey. This has been emailed to each of you. I just sent it earlier today. So I recommend taking some time to look at those comments that were sent to you via email. Not all of them are on this printed handout, but it's just a couple. So I just want to share that we received 275 responses so far from the dates 7-29 to 8-10. 246 of those were yes, 22 were no, and then seven were undecided. Just curious, is this a helpful number to help you make your decision regarding zoning? Like how many have reached out to you from your constituents? And then just to further break it down by district, District 1, the Blackwood District, there was 14 yes, one no. West Wytheville District 2, 43 yes, 2 no. District 3 East Wytheville, 46 yes, 1 no, 2 undecided. district four is for chisel 61 yes six no two undecided district five is lead mines 62 yes eight no three undecided last is district six speed wool 21 yes and three no i do want to call out if you look at that email that i did send you you'll notice some of the ones that voted no or put no in the survey they left a comment for no data center so i worried that maybe sometimes there was like some confusion if this is a survey for no data center so highly encouraged to look through those comments verify the responses that you received just some comments that were left by the individuals in our county is that this is an issue that affects our health our financial budget our environment resources and who we are in this county Another is moved here from Northern Virginia to get away from overpopulation and all the data centers would hate to see this beautiful area destroyed. Another is I moved here to get away from the shortsighted destruction of land and siphoning of resources going on in Florida. Once it's gone, you can't get it back. Limited zoning will at least create transparency and cost slash benefit discussion beforehand. encourage everyone to look at the e-mail and the handout of the zoning survey.

Thank you, Ms. Edwards. Next person we have to speak is Ms. Dena Allen.

Hello, I'm Dena Allen. I'm from the Barron Springs area. To follow up on her with the survey, the lead mines, Some of the comments is we need zoning to keep data centers from destroying our beautiful county. Stand up board of supervisors. Farmland and natural resources are too important to destroy for technology. No data centers, whatever we need to do with county and Southwest Virginia doesn't need or want them. Zoning is intelligent decision making. Please pass zoning regulations. Our community needs protection. I'd rather see a farm. in outstanding conditions with a bunch of cattle on it than a day sooner any day. Following up on that, I had asked the last meeting about a letter of intent and gave it to you. I never heard anything for two weeks. Nobody's called me. I'm wondering if this is the land that is going for the property y'all are having a closed meeting for today. But I would like an answer on it. I don't know why We've got y'all voted on it. She said may and then everybody else. Yay. But nobody seems to call. That's why we don't trust. It's, you know, it's like we're being left in the in the dark. It's like y'all don't want to do anything like y'all got another closed meeting tonight. So please let us know if this is, you know, the one that job already done the letter intent is the same one that Jesse was talking about. Or if it's another piece of land. I mean, We don't know. Y'all are not letting us know anything. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Allen. The next person we have to speak is Ms. Donna Nichter.

Hi, Donna Nichter. I'm going to follow up on Brenda and what she was talking about with the survey. uh my notes are kind of all over the place so bear with me um basically we put together the survey so that we could get an unbiased representation of what folks in with county wanted we put it on you know all over social media and various platforms we went to the whitfield farmers market barren spring gobble stop to our neighborhoods um you know we're trying to go different places so that we can get an unless view um there were several comments that said no data centers so there's some confusion on the survey you know we the question that was asked was do you do you support do you support zoning and some folks responded I don't want data centers no data centers so so that was that I don't know if that translates to yes, we want zoning then, or because they just said no data centers. Yeah, so in Fort Chiswell, the district that I'm from, we had 90 yes, 90% yes, 7.4 no, and 26 undecided. which translate to 61 yes, six no, and two undecided. Some of the comments that they made, Where I own and operate commercial business on the new river and with county, we need to conserve the new river and the surrounding land around that. If they build the two data centers, progress park and with Pulaski county line, I'll be stuck halfway in between with less than nine miles from each. That was not my comment, but me too. I'll be stuck in the middle of them. Um, no one likes zoning, but at least if zone, the public has some control over the development, which can help prevent data centers or solar farms. Zoning may be lesser of two evils, but if it keeps data centers out of the county, then I support it 100%. I don't support data centers in with county. I think we need zoning. So data centers cannot be built on private farm land. Zoning makes sense for with county because it would clearly define residential lines and commercial properties. Um, I mean, we're trying to do this to be helpful, to give everybody an idea of what folks want. I'm really curious how many people have contacted you, like is it five, is it 50, is it 200? I want to reach more people, so if you have any ideas on how we can do that, that would be great. And as far as the AEP and providing the electricity to fluid stack. My understanding was that if they could not provide all of it, they would provide their own. So does that mean generators?

And how does it affect the environment and everything? Thank you, Ms. Nisner.

Thanks.

Next person we have to speak is Ms. Amanda Baines.

Oh, I stood before you most recently, approximately two months ago, and asked you to invite the Attorney General in to investigate my claims into the Wythe County Sheriff's Department and their failure to investigate. I've had no response as of yet. Two months ago, I stood before you as a citizen of the community asking for your help. Tonight, I stand before you as a mother, as a parent. dressed like a mother who has ran around to three different counties today dropping off things. My seven-year battle in 19 pages to various news outlets and radio stations. I didn't realize the WIFO Enterprise was no longer stationed here, so I have actually an extra one if anybody would like to bring it. May I give it to you? I crossed out Southwestern because your house has been wanted for a month. Recently, I was just arrested on a felony warrant for posting Kelly Suss's picture along with the song Dead Pedophiles attached to it. Heard what you did to that kid in the stairwell. Now you want to walk free, call it fair hell. I remember little shoes by the trash can, fingerprint fear in a broken down trash van. You pray, I pray, that's a bad mix. You touch, I judge with a brick. No therapy available when you cross that line, just a shallow ditch, just a cardboard sign. Dead pedophiles don't reoffend. That's a one-way road, a dead end. You can't hurt kids if you're under cement. The halo you fake, I tear, I bend. Is there one person here tonight in this room that does not agree with those words? Does Kimberly Ayers and Kelly Sluss not agree with that after seeing the horrible things they have as a cps workers but never did i say i was going to kill anyone i just agreed so tell me how or why this board would agree with them and set in silence to protect them silence is compliance With that being said, I ask this board today, what's worse, perpetrating the crime of sexual abuse of a child or standing back in the shadows to allow it? I know you're not allowed to respond. I have reached out and I have pled and begged to every single one of you, not as a citizen, but as a parent, as a mother, to investigate my claims. You won't even look. The evidence is in that envelope. Have a look. Look. Don't glance. Read. And I hope to hear from someone soon. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Baines. That's all we have signed up for citizens' time, so I'll close citizens' time. Next item on the agenda is approval of payment of invoices. All board members received a packet of invoices. Is there any invoice that any member has questions about or would like to pull out? Hearing none, I'll entertain a motion to approve the invoices as presented. So moved. Second. Got a motion from Mr. Burnett and a second from Mr. Morgan. Any questions or concerns? Do a roll call vote, Mr. Burnett. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye.

So approved. Next item on the agenda is approval Approval of the minutes from a previous meeting, July 28, 2026. Again, all members have received a copy of it. Is there any additions or subtractions to the minutes that's presented? I hear none. I have a motion by Mr. Burnett. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Mr. Martin. All in favor of 65, say aye. Aye. Anybody opposed, same sign. So approved. Next item on the agenda is old business. Mr. Barton, do you have anything for old business?

Do not, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Hankins?

I don't.

All right, moving on to new business. We have Mount Rogers Community Service Update with Ms. Sandy Bryan.

I'll try to be quick, because I'd like you to meet some of our other leadership. We'll be as brief as possible. But I did, I'm sorry. I did give you a couple pieces of paper I wanted you to see. The first one is the impact snapshot. In year 25 through 26, fiscal year 25, 26, we saw 2,072 county residents. That's 7.3% of your population. We're seeing an increase in children. And you can see that down at the bottom of the page. Thank you for your allocation. That will go to help pay for a new nurse practitioner for the increased need we have to serve children in this area. And the next page, just to let you know, we've gotten quite busy. Again, July 25, we saw 299 children that month. This year we saw three, last month we saw 314. Last July, 373 18 to 40 year olds and now 389. So we are seeing an increase in those young adults and young children. And again, that allocation will go to that nurse practitioner nurse to help serve the increased needs in this county to serve young adults and children. So I appreciate it very, very much. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Brown.

good evening my name is anthony craver i'm the program manager of veteran and wellness services so i'll try to make this quick so they get a chance to speak um i reside in smith county but i you know of course work up here in with you'll have a lot of awesome resources here and with well we'll say that right with the cboc um dvs office here locally one thing that um there's kind of a gap is that peer support right so I'm an eight year Air Force veteran, two combat deployments. I am 100% disabled. So a lot of the work I do is out of my heart, right? Fishing for bets is one of those. So I get any veteran that wants to attend right together we fish i give them fishing equipment we hang out some other things i do is i'll work closely with southwest virginia together with veterans we do a lot of events so if anyone is interested know somebody has anybody in their family that's a veteran or is a veteran is interested in participating in groups like these then i would love to take them out and meet those individuals all right thank you all thank you sir and thank you for your service

I'm Samantha Crockett. I'm the senior director of wellness and community engagement. And along with some of the things that, you know, Anthony was talking about with our, with our veteran services, I wanted to touch base a little bit about our, uh, pure wellness centers. So this is something that's fairly new in our service area. Um, right now we do have one here in Whitville. It's at, um, um, the bottom of our crisis care center. which is in the old health department at the top of the hill where our administrative office is. That is available by the bus route, so we're getting a lot of people there. One of the main things that we're trying to do with our peer wellness centers is have a space that is open that anyone can come to. A space that you do not have to receive any other Mount Rogers service, that someone can come in, that they can get that initial connection. right they can they can walk through the door even if they're not ready for services yet for whatever reason maybe it's because of internal stigma within themselves or maybe they're already receiving services from us or someone else and they would like another place to come for three hours three days a week to you know just have a supportive environment while they're there Sometimes people come in, they want to take a shower, they want to wash their clothes, they have an opportunity to get some food. But the biggest thing that we're really trying to do is we have a peer specialist and a wellness specialist. And so that wellness specialist is really working with them to get those basic wellness needs met. but also make sure that they have access to different supports throughout the community. And that peer specialist is there to share their story, because storytelling saves lives. And so making those connections, people are then feeling more confident and more comfortable being able to get into services. And so we are seeing that over the course of three to six weeks of somebody coming in, they're ready to actually transfer into their treatment services. So we're able to get more people in there and more comfortable. So we're trying to expand those hours, and I would invite any of you to come and to visit any of those. We would love to share more wellness and treatment services. Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am.

Hello, my name is Mark Warren. I'm the senior director of community services Rogers and I was going to talk to you a little bit about permanent housing Which is a program that we have in Mount Rogers With County information we have land 12 landlords that support this program For our SMI or serious mental illness PSH apartments filled we have 39 Our PPW, which is our Parenting Pregnant Women Permanent Supportive Housing Apartments, we have seven built with that. The full program, which would be all of the counties, total slots, we have auxiliary grant support housing, and that is 45, so we're at capacity with that. PSH as a whole, there's 140 slots available. We have 60 of those filled, and PPW is 15, and we have 12 of those filled. And so out of the state hospital discharges, we have 43 folks placed in permanent support housing. Total landlords throughout all the counties that are working with our program are 27, and then we have 32 PH staff that serve in that catchment area. Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

I'm Kathy Cress on the senior director of operations at Mount Rogers specifically over our buildings and grounds. I just wanted to piggyback on Mark's presentation about the permit of supportive housing as you know housing in this area is limited and when we're trying to find landlords also in the area it's a little difficult so we decided to do something a little different and we decided to become a landlord ourselves and so as you all know we purchased the old trail motel in Graham's Forge and where we call now our Peaks View Apartments. And just wanted to let you all know that it is now a very successful program where we're able to integrate community members along with our permanent supportive housing members in a supportive environment. We're up there whenever we need to be. Things are very quiet. And we're happy to report that. And I think that the the way that we're able to successfully integrate community members as well as our individuals is really a shining star for Mount Rogers.

So thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chris.

We showed up in math tonight.

I'm Kim Williams, Senior Director of Crisis Services. Wanted to talk to you a little bit about the services that we provide specifically for Wythe County or cover the Wythe County area. So we have a mobile crisis team that we have had for quite some time, probably about six years. We were one of the first CSBs to have a mobile crisis team. And when we first started that team, it targeted youth specifically. And so that program has been very successful. About three years ago, or two and a half years ago, we expanded to covering adults and youth. We now partner through the regional hub and we are dispatched now by 988. Folks can access our crisis services by calling us directly and we dispatch right to where they are or they can call the 988 number that is now the 911 equivalent for mental health crises. and we are dispatched we we are dispatched um up to two hours outside of our catchment area but we continue obviously to cover with county as well just in the past fiscal year we served i know sandy gave our numbers earlier for youth but youth specifically we had over 200 around 270 assessments for youth what going out into the community seeing them at our local emergency department you know responding to their homes responding to schools just basically wherever that child is we try to go to them and with our mobile crisis team another thing that we do is we try to coordinate with our local law enforcement agencies So Mary and PD, or excuse me, with Phil PD and then the sheriff's office. If we get dispatched to a call and we're unsure about that situation, they've assured us that we can call them and they will respond with us. And we have assured them that same situation. guarantee that if they need us, if they get out and someone's in a mental health crisis and they would like backup, we're happy to do that. Our goal essentially is to assist the state with the bed crisis that I'm sure you all have heard about in terms of mental health placements and keep people in our community. And our mobile crisis team has been a pretty successful part of that continuum of services that we provide to make that happen.

So, excuse me. If you go out and you have a child that needs to be admitted, how far do you gotta take them now to find them a bed?

So we do not get to determine where that child is placed. What we do is we follow, we have like a standard evaluation that we have to complete. We have a platform provided to us through the Department of Behavioral Health. We upload that information and that child, that information is sent out to all of the children and youth facilities in the state of Virginia at one time. and then the placement is determined by who reviews that case the fastest and who accepts it the fastest so whoever has a bed available whoever can accept that child or youth with the level of acuity that they are presenting with if they are more acute if there is aggression and those kinds of things those those kids are harder to place privately and so that's when we see that they are then picked up by the state hospital as a bed of last resort because private facilities won't take them we do have a youth crisis stabilization unit in Graham's Forge that is now under my umbrella and we are currently looking at how we can increase our acute manage the management of acuity so that we can take kids you know and keep them one from having to wait forever for beds because that's not therapeutic and then how we can keep them in our own community and keep them with the resources that they need for a more effective recovery, keeping them closer to family, keeping them closer to the resources in the community that you all provide to more effectively support them rather than sending them to the other end of the state for that. So we're trying to problem solve on our end to try to help with some of that as well.

I know when I worked for the school system, we'd have kids, and they'd have to go all the way to Stanton or somewhere else, and their family's down here, and they're half a state away.

We pass each other. I mean, our law enforcement pass each other sometimes. So I will say that I'm a member of the Emergency Services Council for the state, and we constantly have those advocacy conversations about, can we look at changing that process so that we aren't doing that kind of thing? So I appreciate the question.

Thank you, ma'am.

And we just thank you. Appreciate the partnership. And please let us know how we can continue to improve the questions.

I just I can't believe you. You're going to get in and out of here without Richie Pike talking.

Oh, I was impressed.

I was going to applaud you. You have done something that people have been trying to do for a long time.

I forgot Richie. Richie, I'm ready.

I'm ready, Mr. Pike.

Spoke up on my behalf. I'm ready, Mr. Pike. He's ready.

I am Richie Pike. I was the chief manufacturer and officer. for our agency, but I'm not sure today.

Maybe Ms. Brown forgot to tell you something on the way here.

She did.

But I do appreciate the opportunity to speak. And as hopefully most of you know, we support folks with jobs in various ways, supported employment in our community, which we partner with community businesses, and commercial partnerships. that we bring that work into our three facilities and do that work. The other piece is we partner with DLA Defense Logistics in Philadelphia and Source of America to bring government contracts in. Tonight I just briefly want to talk about those government contracts. We've always done a little bit of hand cutting. But we've always had to subcontract out our government contract cutting because it needs to be precise and it needs to be most effective in material usages. So I'm happy to say in the last few years, Source America has added grants that they offer to nonprofits all over the country. You have to lobby for those and you have to apply for those. Well, we applied last year, and believe it or not, I told Sandy, I'm so old, we'll probably get it. And I didn't want to do another huge project, but we got it. And in the last seven to nine months, we have added an AccuMark, AccuScan CAD system. We've added a new Lectra i6 automatic cutter. and we've added two 52-foot air flotation tables, and we've also added two Gerber spreaders. And it's going to make a difference in our cost over time. And right now, we currently have three individuals that we serve working in that department. Two of them are spreading, and one of them is bundling. We did, by the grace of the good Lord, find a lectra. cat operator within our procurement area that came on board and we've got a gentleman who used to hand cut for us is now running that automatic cutter so i offer each of you to come and see state-of-the-art equipment and it's in our withfield facility and our local mike dos

gentleman which is from Ivanhoe is our plant manager and he's running that facility and he's doing a great job thank you thank you Richie and I'll just echo if you haven't been out to the IDC for anybody in the room and for all the board members if you haven't been out there you need to go out and look at that workflow and that process that they have set up it's It's real good. So it's better than good. I mean, it's an awesome site to be at. So I know you got Richie and Mr. Dallas out there. So they do a good job with it. Ms. Bryant, thank you for coming. Anybody have anything for Ms. Bryant and her team? Richie, you've done well. Thank you, sir, for letting me speak. so just in case the people in the room doesn't know richie and i we go way back uh richie actually broke my ankle in freeze one one time playing basketball no we do appreciate y'all coming out so thank you you're more welcome to stay for the remainder but if you need to leave

Thank you.

Next item on the agenda is the FY26 Health Department carryover request. We have Ms. Megan Hellmuth, I think.

Dr. Hellmuth, come on up.

All right. Thank you, guys. I appreciate you having me. So we had some carryover or some unspent funds from FY26, mainly related to salary turnover and the federal shutdown that took place at the end of 25. We had to pause some discretionary spending and things like that. we looked at the needs that we may have that we haven't been able to fill and one of those is an all-wheel drive vehicle mainly for our environmental health staff but in order to ensure that we utilize all the resources it would be open to other staff if environmental health wasn't utilizing that and that's because our environmental health staff do a lot of on-site surveying and they test the soils for septic and wells and do some bear applications, it's called, where they're actually digging the drain fields and things like that and laying those out for folks. And in Wythe County, we do a lot of those. And our Wythe County staff also cover the Bland County area for some of their onsite as well. so our request is to be able to use the unspent funds from FY 26 to purchase a vehicle right now we have a Nissan Sentra in the with County Health Department and that is not really suitable so our environmental health staff are using their own trucks and their own vehicles to perform their duties and we are reimbursing the mileage but that is up to $10,000 a year sometimes and mileage went up again on july 1st to 76 cents a mile and so um it is an ongoing cost that we have to reimburse staff for that and if we had a vehicle we'd be able to reduce that operating costs um the unknown operating costs i would say of travel because we don't know applications that come in and how many times our staff are having to go out and stuff like that so that's our request

Mr. Chairman, y'all know I like saving money as much as anybody else in the process. However, the Health Department budget this year was $34,000 less than what it was the previous year in the process of what you funded. I have no objections to recommendation of this carryover. I do worry about Tuck Holliday driving it, but that's a separate matter.

All right, I'll entertain a motion to approve the carryover as presented. So moved. Got a motion by Mr. Morgan. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Mr. Morgan. Is there any questions or concerns? Any questions for Mr. Hillman? All right, here now, we'll do a roll call vote. Mr. Morgan? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. So approved. Thank you, all. Thank you, ma'am. Mr. Barrett? Is there any other new business?

No, sir.

Mr. Hankins?

Yes, sir.

All right. Moving on to board reports, building the grounds committee.

Yes, sir. Building grounds committee met on August 5th. August 4th, I'm sorry. 2026 building grounds committee made the following recommendation. Dog shelter. Engage in an architectural firm with whom the county has an engineering services term contract to draw up plans for the animal shelter.

All right, coming from committee, it doesn't need a second. Any questions or concerns with this request as presented? All right, here now with a roll call vote. Mr. Burnett? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. So approved. Anything else for the buildings and grounds? That's it for the buildings and grounds. We're just going to call this Jesse's hour. So you've got the hot mic. So water committee? Aye.

Water Committee met on August 4th, 2026. Recommend the following actions. Number one, four chisel sewer wave connection extension for 90 days.

All right, again, come from the committee. It doesn't need a second. If there's any questions or concerns with this request, it's presented. Hearing none, we'll do a roll call vote. Mr. Morgan?

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye. So approved. The second item is the Barrett Mill Road sewer wave to connection extension to wave connection fee for 90 days. All right.

Again, it comes from the committee. It doesn't need a second. Is there any questions or concerns with this request to present? All right. I hear no. We'll do a roll call vote. Mr. Byrne? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. So approved.

Anything else Mr. Vernon? That's it from the water.

Moving on to Board of Supervisors time since you've got the hot mic Mr. Vernon.

I just have a few items. Ms. Allison would you be able to get me an email on what you requested please and I will make sure you get an answer. Thank you. I wanted to thought I was very important. I ended up missing the county picnic. I've heard it was really good and I expressed my, me not being able to attend. But anyway, I've heard it was really nice and I appreciate everybody that attended. I have three items for VDOT. One is the grading on Dry Pond Road. One is on Castleton Road, half a mile before you get to Route 100, there is some very bad pothole pavement. And then from Route 100 from the fire department to Gardner Road, they would like to do a speed study to see if they could lower it to 45 miles per hour. And that's all I have for redon. And Allison did a fantastic job on the web page about the dealing rule. I look forward to what she puts out in the future about additional information regarding the county and county and how the county works. And that's all I have. DAVID BURRAGE.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Burnett. Ms. Crockett?

I just want to say thank you to Ms. Edwards for your work on the survey and for everyone who came to talk tonight. Appreciate the time that you all put into this. If anybody is not aware, today was the first day of school. So I'm going to use this moment as a plug for something that is important to me. So my kids both started school today. They're both very, very excited about it. It's kind of cute. I hope it continues for the rest of the year. I think we'll just go downhill from here. School infrastructure is very important to me. Both of my kids go to Spiller, and both of them got the honor of sitting next to the air conditioning machines. So I personally support the 1% sales tax. It's going to be on the ballot. encourage everybody to go out and vote for it you know school infrastructure is important to me and I feel like financially that is one way of getting something that is important to me and also makes sense to me financially but I encourage everyone to do what makes sense for you and what is important to you thank you

Well, I went out over Lost Gap last week, I think it was last week, and there was a ditch across the road, and it was probably about four inches deep, and I hit it and thought my chest was going to fall apart. Then I came back over there this weekend and they filled it in. So thank you to VDOT for fixing that ditch across the road. Other than that, I have nothing.

Mr. Martin?

Just right out the gate, I want to apologize for missing last week's, the last board meeting that we had. And I want to thank the staff for all the efforts they put in to putting the picnic on for us last week.

I want to thank the staff for about the picnic. They did a fine job with that. The other thing I want to give kudos to VDOT on the roads that I've requested to get fixed and they've done it in a timely manner. So I appreciate that. That's all I have. All right.

Thank you. So I've got several things. One, I want to apologize for not being able to make the picnic. I'm in the same category as Mr. Burnett. I was tied up at work. So I do want to thank the staff for everything that they've done and everything that they do for the county throughout the years. And I know that they had an enjoyable time for that, so I do thank everyone that participated in that. The other pieces on the school, to echo what Ms. Crockett said, school did start today, so I would just ask that everybody take extra time and extra precautions as you're out going to work in the mornings with the school buses out. We got children out there getting on school buses, and they're getting on the buses real early in the morning, so just be aware of that as you travel. throughout the county because we've had a period of time that we was able to speed through the county getting to work but now these these yellow buses is out there and they got precious cargo on it so please please take your time on that one uh so that's that so um mr hankins i know we had talked about the rec department and some of the situations that's going there i'm I look forward to your follow-ups on that one to get that reconciled and taken care of. Mr. Byer, I know we briefly discussed the cigarette tax. That was a question that came up in our meeting last night. So if you can kind of give us an update on where we're at on that, or are you going to take that?

Yeah. I do sit on that board. And I pulled up the report after you commented on it. The last year, the fiscal year 25-26 report with county's total taxes were $303,000 from the cigarette tax. You all can't see the that I'm looking at, but overall collections for the Mount Rogers Cigarette Tax Board has continued to decrease since its implementation. This year is currently holding just a little bit below last year's numbers in the process. There was some discussion about some of the recent law changes on vapes may be creating some of the rebound of those numbers in the process. I want to say we were up in the $375,000 to $400,000 range originally, and it's continued to drop since then, but I will share this report with you all.

All right. Thank you, sir. And that goes to the general fund, right? It's not earmarked?

Well, it goes into the general fund. We have always applied it along with the gambling, the regional commission money into the emergency services department, but it does just go into the general fund. All right.

Thank you, sir. I see Mr. Morgan and myself, we met with the Farm Bureau last night to specifically talk about zoning. I know zoning's been a big topic tonight. So we did meet with the Farm Bureau last night and we talked a little bit about zoning and a whole lot about other things. in the county, a lot of it was around the 1% sales tax. They weren't fully understanding that. They thought we had raised it, but actually we had voted on the resolutions for it to be put on the ballot. So we explained that. We talked about the commission tax revenue off of the casino. We talked about the cigarette tax. Mr. Morgan, if I'm missing anything. We talked about the schools and the shapes of the schools. We did talk about some of the funding from the data centers. The data centers wasn't a very big topic like we thought it would be. When we finally got back to the zoning, it was kind of a A mixed bag really is none of them was really far. But then some of them knew that we have to do something. So we went to the Farm Bureau to get the ag industry involved in it because they're going to be the biggest impact. with the zoning so we did have those meetings i'm sure we're going to have another follow-up meeting with those folks because we got some information that we owe them some of the questions that they had but overall it was a good meeting i thought we they told us we would be in and out pretty quick and it was a good time we made sure all the questions was answered to the best of our ability and the satisfaction of that group so um it was a good meeting from that part um so the next thing i have is the fluid stack i know mr bieber i think you asked the question and or you made the comment you are correct the lady that was here from floyd stack did make the comment that they would be responsible for the electrical upgrades or anything that they needed so she did say that so just clarifying that that that you were correct and what you heard on that and then the last thing i got i know um we kind of mentioned it early mr deborg mentioned it but um former treasurer sam crockett passed away so we do want to keep his family and their thoughts and prayers sam was a good guy he done a lot for the county and served the county for many many years I actually looked up to Sam a lot. I would aggravate Sam a lot when I'd go in to pay my taxes and Would always joke with him, if your book says my property or my vehicles are worth what you're saying it is, just write me a cashier's check. And he'd always laugh at me. But he's going to be missed. I know I haven't had too much interaction with him over the last six or eight months. But before then, I would see him pretty often. But yeah, just keep that family in your thoughts and prayers. And then at the end of the meeting, we'll probably do something and honor him as we dismiss out of the meeting. With that, we'll move on to the next item on the agenda is the closed meeting under the Code of Virginia 2.237.11.83, Acquisition and Disposition of Real Property, East Withwell and the Fort Chisell Districts.

Mr. Chairman, before you entertain that, may I make just one comment while we still have a lot of the audience here that sometimes leaves in the process? A couple times it's been suggested about board members trying to take tours of some data center sites. We've actually been working on some tours over the last couple months that have not come to fruition. Members of the board will be going tomorrow, four members of the board will be going tomorrow, will be two in one car and two in another car to visit the Henrico Data Center site. Just wanted to pass along that information to those that are here.

Thank you, sir. All right. Thank you, Mr. Byron. I'll entertain a motion to go in a closed meeting as presented. Got a motion by Mr. Morgan. I'll have a second. Second by Mr. Martin. All right. We'll do a roll call vote. Mr. Morgan? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. So moved. We've got a motion from Mr. Cook and a second from Mr. Martin. Any questions or concerns? Hearing none, roll call vote, Mr. Morgan. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. All right, we're now in open session. Mr. Morgan, are you ready to start the question?

Whereas the Wythe County Board of Supervisors has convened a closed meeting on this date pursuant to an affirmative recorded vote and in accordance with the provisions of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, and whereas section 2.2-3712 of the Code of Virginia requires a certification by the Wythe County Board of Supervisors that such a meeting was conducted in conformity with Virginia law, Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Whipp County Board of Supervisors hereby certifies that to the best of each member's knowledge, one, only public business matters will be exempted from open meeting requirements by Virginia law or discussed in the closed meeting to which this certification resolution applies. And two, only such public business matters as were identified in the motion convening the close meeting were heard, discussed, or considered by the Wythe County Board of Supervisors.

All right, I got a motion by Mr. Morgan. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Mr. Martin. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Anybody opposed? All right. Is there any more business to come before the board?

Yes, sir. I'd like to make a motion. A motion to authorize the county administrator to execute land lease agreement with option to purchase lot 30 and lot 32 of Farber's Park to Archipelago DCCO LLC. Conditioned on archipelago accepting recommended edits. All right, I got a motion. Mr. Morgan will have a second.

Second.

I got a second from Mr. Cook. Any questions or concerns with this request? All right, we'll do a roll call vote.

Mr. Brown?

No.

No.

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. approved. Any other new business come before the board?

I've mentioned to you, Mr. Chairman, before the meeting, I'll mention for the edification of the other board members, the Regional Improvement Commission will meet next Thursday in Abingdon. This is the happy meeting where we get to do the annual allocation of the casino funds. This year, we expect the allocation to be $1.85 million per locality. So that's Between that and the $800,000 billed for ambulance services and the roughly $400,000 for cigarette taxes, we still don't cover the $3 million it cost us to cover emergency services. But we're glad to have that as a source of revenue.

All right. Thank you, sir. You'll keep us posted on that. We'll take all we can get, all right? Anything else, Mr. Higgins? No, sir. All right. Mr. Farmer? Yes, sir. Ms. Collins? Yes, sir. Any other board member? Hear none. I will honor Mr. Sam Crockett, former treasurer with county as we adjourn tonight. So in honor of Mr. Crockett, we will be adjourned.