I You know if Does There's no benefit in the building two houses. Increasing the requirements for storming the region. The city is going to be in there. It's almost like a bigger layer of the new. I mean, I'm. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm going to call the Saturday September 14th Public Hearing to order. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Mayor Wilson. Nice to meet Jackson. Here. Councilmember Gary. Here. Councilmember Bagley. Councilwoman. Excuse me. Councilman Chapman. Councilwoman Gaskins. Here. Councilmember Pikeaskins. Okay. We have a quorum. I imagine Councilman Gaskins is on his way. Councilman McGuirey is participating virtually. We do have a resolution allowing electronic participation. Is there a motion to approve the motion by Vice Mayor Jackson to approve the resolution authorizing electronic participation by Councilman Gierri, seconded by Councilman Gaskins. Any further discussion on the resolution? Hearing none, it is a roll call, Madam Clerk. Please call the roll. Nice to meet you, Jackson. Hi. Councilman Gaskins. Hi. Mayor Wilson. Hi. Councilman Gierri. Hi. Okay, the resolution is adopted unanimously. Good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us. What we are going to do, just a reminder from a process perspective, we have the public discussion period first. We have more than the 15 people signed up that we will handle at the beginning of the agenda. So I'll go through the first 15 speakers, allow them to speak as part of the public discussion period. Then we will go through our docket. We have a number of items on the docket today. And at the conclusion, any of the additional speakers on the public discussion period that wish to speak, we can handle those folks at that point as well. Just to give you a sense, I think we have about 25 who are signed up for the public discussion period. So we'll get through the first 15 before we start and then we'll do the agenda and then we have others at the end. So let's get to it. First, we're gonna start the public discussion by the way, use both podiums please. We have Ben Domenic followed by Elizabeth McGill followed by Janice Grinna-Dier. So Mr. Domenic is online. All right. Mr. Domenic can you hear us? I'm sorry. You need to unmute. Just needs to speak. We cannot hear. You cannot hear me. Sorry. Thank you so much. I appreciate the council's consideration today. I have been a resident of Alexandria for a within a decade. I'm raised as a family here and my wife and I have two young daughters and I wanted to just bring to your attention. An issue regarding a crosswalk on Russell Road that's of interest to the Emmanuel Episcopal preschool in ensuring the safety of the preschoolers who cross the street every weekday. Emmanuel Episcopal is located at 1608 Russell Road. It's at the intersection of Monroe, Russell, and High Street. And every weekday, there are more than 70 students under the age of six, the majority of whom crossed that street in that area as parking at the school is very limited. I have sent a Google Maps image, which I believe was sent to all of you. I'll email it as well to any of you. And as you can see, there is no crosswalk across the street on the front corner where most of these students cross. And the fact that there is also no school crossing sign when approaching from the south means that drivers who are coming up Russell don't know that they're entering a school crossing zone. And drivers who are coming down the hill because the intersection is at an angle are often unaware of the positioning of the street light where they should stop. Because of this, I've observed, and other parents have observed on a number of occasions, incidents where drivers are supposed to stop, but they roll into the intersection. And, you know, they'll stop suddenly, once they realize that they've entered it. The school administrator, when I discussed this with her, confirmed to me that there were requests that had been submitted previously via the portal regarding this issue that hadn't resulted in any changes. And so I just wanted to bring this to the attention of the council. My daughter loves this school as to her classmates and the administrator told me yourself that this is their number one safety concern regarding the school. They wish that they had a parking lot, but they don't. We very much want to ensure their safety on an increasingly busy street. And I just wanted to bring this to all to your attention and hope that it's something that you can consider going forward as it would really, I think, elate the concerns of a lot of the parents about the safety of crossing that street. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Dominguez, for bringing this to our attention. I have not seen this request, but we will look into it. You said you sent us an email that included this request. Is that you sent it to the clerk? Okay, okay, we have it. We have it from the clerk. So we will get your contact information and follow up with you and make sure we get your response. Thank you, thank you for your response. Thank you. Thank you for testimony. Next speaker is Elizabeth McGill, followed by Janice Grinady, or followed by Colleen Moore, followed by Trayvon Jordan, Fern Fiez, Seth Markowitz. Do we have Ms. Good morning. Hello. Can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you. Great. Thank you so much. Good morning, council members, and thank you for the opportunity to speak about the proposed changes to the Duke Street and West Taylor Run Parkway intersection. My name is Elizabeth McGill and I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. I'm going to go to the city. during our recent meetings. The first and biggest concern that the community has is that of safety. The creation of a slip lane will introduce heavier and faster traffic into the neighborhood on streets that are not designed for such speeds or volume. The new bike and pedestrian lanes approved by parking and traffic will put bicyclists and pedestrians at risk of speeding traffic pouring directly off of Duke Street at a steep grade with neither entry light nor stops it into the neighborhood. These risks directly undermine the goals of this project as outlined by the city to improve citizen quality of life, increase safety at the intersection and to reduce cut through traffic on the neighborhood streets. Additionally, many of you have seen the videos of neighborhood flooding with neighbors at the Duke Street end of Taylor Run Parkway at highest risk. Despite repeated requests, city staff have been unable to show how the proposed slip lane would not direct even more water towards those homes. Increased flooding rates directly undermines the stated goal of the city to improve citizen quality of life and would make these homes uninhabitable. Many citizens, including myself, are also extremely concerned about the undue burden that these changes would place on one of the last financially accessible neighborhoods in this part of Alexandria. The proposed changes would push the burden of excess traffic, cut through traffic, flooding, and unnecessary stress onto one of the last remaining areas with financially acceptable workforce and family housing. Finally, while TRCA acknowledges that Duke Street is a high traffic volume thoroughfare, we would like to draw a distinction between Duke Street and our service road. There have been no pedestrian or bike and vehicular accidents on the service road since 2011, which is as far back as the city's Vision Zero crash dashboard goes. The RCA recommends that the city use funds allocated for this intersections redesign to instead address the high crashed west found on ramp to telegraph road where pedestrian was seriously injured only yesterday morning. It is for these reasons as well as many more that you may hear this morning. The T. RCA city can It is for these reasons, as well as many more that you may hear this morning, the TRCA City Council to reject the proposal, which adds a slip lane and changes this road to one way. I do want to take a moment to thank City staff and City Council for the changes to the intersection that have already been made as part of the Duke Street traffic mitigation pilots, particularly in closing off access to the Telegraph Road ramp across the street from this intersection. Residents and city staff alike can tell you that both regular and cut-through traffic have been reduced and that quality of life has improved immeasurably as a result of these changes. TRCA asks that this hard work not be undone by implementing the proposal from parking and traffic. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Ms. McGill. We appreciate the death made. No, we don't. No, no, no, please, we don't do that. That's not, that's not okay. Thank you. All right. Next speaker is Janice Grenadier, followed by Colleen Moore, followed by Trayvon Jordan, Fernfayez, Seth Markowitz, Jane Nunn. Thank you very much. Welcome back from summer break. Pursury in Virginia is any person to whom oath of office is lawfully administered or any occasion will fully swear as falsely on such oath and that person is 18 years of age or older or any person in any written declaration, certification, verification or settlement, our statement under penalty of perjury pursuant to 8.01, 4.2, willfully subscribe as true, any material matter, which he does not believe is true. He's guilty of perjury, which is a class five felony. Our homes where we have mortgages, a lot of them are put into a Ponzi scam. Mine was no different. And Troutman Pepper, a law firm, and Brock and Scott, a law firm, illegally foreclosed on my home in 2018, I am still in the home. They stated in their documents that Wells Fargo Bank owned the home. Wells Fargo Bank in 2019 filed here in the city of Alexandria that they had no loan in my name on my property under my social security number. They then further in August, oh wait, no I'm sorry, that was November 28th of 2018. August 7th, they filed in this, they did a notarized letter for the city of Alexandria Judges and for the law-formed pepper who claims to represent them who makes over a billion dollars a year that they have no loan in my name. They did not foreclose on my home and they had nothing to do with it. Troutman Pepper then filed in 2022 under the guise of Wells Fargo Bank to try to have me removed from the house. It is clear and Wells Fargo Bank has stated several times. They have no loan in my name on my property, but Trautman Pepperhamton Sanders or Trautman Pepper, whatever they're going by, is in collusion with the judges. They're in collusion with the city, with the clerk's office here in the city and with the police in the city. The police have stated, even though this is a chaos five felony, that they're not gonna do anything about it, because these are lawyers. These people are above the law in the city of Alexandria. Our judges are above the law from taking in the evidence that is clear, concise, and gives me standing to fight this. Majority of people don't have that opportunity because they aren't given the time to actually research what documents are filed on their property. Everybody in the city of Alexandria needs to understand what type of a Ponzi scheme is going on with our banks. Thank you, Ms. Grenadier. Next speaker is Colleen Moore, followed by Trevon Jordan, followed by Fern Fes. We have Ms. Hey everyone, can you hear me? Yep, we can hear you. Hi everyone, my name is Colleen. I am a resident of Alexandria. I am here to call for the city of Alexandria to divest from the Virginia Treasuries Local Government Investment Pool and to include disbanding the Virginia Israel Advisory Board in their legislative package. They send to the state senate in January. I traveled with a faith delegation earlier this year to Jerusalem and the West Bank, traveling with the United Methodists and Presbyterian leaders. We visited Sillwan, a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem, where the residents are under constant threat of their home being demolished. We also visited Chikjera, another Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem that has been in a legal battle for years to stay on their land, despite having documents of ownership for decades. We visited the Church of the Good Shepherd and Neblus in the north of the West Bank that had just been raided by the Israeli Defense Forces the week before, breaking down doors and raiding the sanctuary just a few hours before they held their Sunday service. And as we made our way down to Hebron in the south of the West Bank, you can see Caterpillar bulldozers alongside the highway. Caterpillar is one of the companies that the Virginia Treasuries Local Government Investment Pool is invested in, with 82.9% of the $419.6 million invested in its reserves, the LGIP. Caterpillar's bulldozers and other heavy machinery are being used to demolish Palestinian homes and infrastructure in the West Bank and Gaza, which constitute a violation of international law. In all of these cases of home demolition and IDF violence that I mentioned witnessing in Palestine, companies like Caterpillar, Toyota, Lockheed Martin, and so many more are responsible. The investment policy states that investments should be made with care, skill, prudence, and diligence, investing in companies that actively and outragely violate international law is anything but. Our city is investing taxpayer dollars and companies that repeatedly collaborate in and profit from the violation of human rights. It is a local issue and must be prioritized as such. I ask you to reflect on the values that you may have, like equity, justice, and accountability, and the policies you may care about, like education, affordable housing. But you preferred taxpayer dollars to go toward helping the people of Alexandria instead of investing in companies that are profiting off the basic human rights of Palestinians. I urge you to consider your values if you come from a faith tradition or even if you don't. For me, the reason I traveled to pay witness and the reason I'm here today is because of my values and my Christian faith to hear from our Palestinian Christian siblings. I urge you to reflect on what it means to be faithful, what true justice means, and what my own city is helping to commit these human rights violations run counter to my values. So I urge you to reflect on your values and make the morally correct decision to divest. Thank you so much. Thank you, Ms. Moore. Next speaker is Trayvon Jordan, followed by Fern Fayez, followed by Seth Markowitz, followed by Jean Nun, Andrew Kwan, and Amanda Eisenhower. Hello, good morning. Good morning. I want to start with a quote from Frederick Douglass at a set in his 1857 address on West Indian emancipation. There is no progress without struggle. Power can seize nothing without demand. It never did, and it never will. My name is Trayvon Jordan. I am a new resident to Alexandria, and I hope to and it never will. My name is Trayvon Jordan. I am a new resident to Alexandria, and I hope to make it my home. I am now a lawyer in Washington, DC, but I hope to be barred in this state next year to help those in my new community. Before that, I spent about a decade in the Marine Corps, and I left as a captain. I'm here today to support my peers and my colleagues and investment from companies that profit from Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank. You have heard and we hear more about the horrendous acts and polls upon the Palestinian people by the Israeli government. You have seen the news, the videos, the pictures, and the students protesting and universities around the world. It is now to discuss what we do to act. There is clear evidence of human rights abuses and the investment in those abusers further the abuses. No one is safe in Palestine, not the innocence, not the UN, and not even American citizens. History looks respectfully upon the people who put their energy, time, life and limb into movements, like the movements of the 60s, anti-vietnam movement, apartheid South Africa, Iraq, Afghanistan, Darfur, and so on. This fight is no different. I come here to say that there's a precedent for this. This is not some impossible unheard of task. This is not out of touch, a bunch of individuals who are asking for too much. There is a blueprint for this that has worked in the very recent past. Specifically, in response to anti-apartheid protest, municipal divestment from apartheid South Africa made, excuse me, from apartheid South Africa made a considerable impact on the end of that system. Because we as Americans have considerable influence, those legislators use their political capital to do what was right when faced with the realities of that brutal system. They use their powers and support of the self-proclaimed principles of freedom, safety, and self-determination. The investment happened in Berkeley in 79, Gary Indiana in 83, Wilmington, Delaware in 82. In 1989, 26 states, 22 counties, and about 100 municipalities had taken action in economic divestment. It is no coincidence that the part-todd came to an end shortly after that. In closing, I have one question to leave you with. How will history remember you? And how the actions you took or didn't take with your power? This is a movement and there is a moral imperative to act. Nobody is free until everybody's free. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Jordan. Next speaker is Fern Feaz, followed by Seth Markowitz, followed by Jane Nunn. Hello Hi, I'm here to ask city council to devest Alexandria from companies that support the genocide in apartheid in Palestine and also dismantle Viab I'm a Muslim and I've faced Islamophobia since I was a child after in the wake of 9-11. Now as we watch this continuous live stream of a genocide brutally murdering innocent women, men, children, and with our elected officials remaining silent, it tells people like me and me and people like me that our deaths are justifiable, which makes us feel unsafe here at home. So I just wanna, yeah, point that out. I also wanna tell you something that happened to me right here in our city. Some months ago, I was trying to cross the street, down on Duke Street, and after having hit the button, waiting for the signal to cross, I was hit by a car while crossing the crosswalk. And I've been, I've suffered many injuries and I'm still recovering to this day. So having been the victim of this vehicular trauma, I have been disgusted to learn that the city of Alexandria using funds from our taxes that we pay is furnishing the Israeli army with vehicles which are being used to crush innocent people in Palestine right now. The local government investment pool, for instance, invests in caterpillar, which has supplied the Israeli military for decades with heavy machinery used to ethnically cleanse Palestinians. Israeli tanks, bulldozers have been repeatedly documented running over, crushing, and murdering innocent displaced people. On December 16, 2023, for instance, bulldozers provided by the U.S. crushed innocent civilians sleeping inside their tents in a hospital courtyard. Many of you may know about the 21 years ago, Rachel Cory, a young American activist who went to Gaza to protest the same displacement of Palestinians. Cory bravely stood in the path of an Israeli bulldozer, again, provided by us. She expected it to stop because other bulldozers had stopped for international protesters, but it kept going. And the 23-year-old college student from Olympia, Washington, was crushed to death by a bulldozer we provided. So previously, my friends and I had only asked you a simple symbolic message, which was call for a ceasefire, to call for an end to the genocide. And your own human rights commission recommended that you passed this resolution. In a way, I suppose I could thank you for not even being willing to do the bare minimum of passing a ceasefire resolution. Now we get to ask you and demand you do something more meaningful. Alexander is invested in the Israeli part-tied and genocide of Palestinians. We demand that the City Council ensure that our taxpayer dollars are not invested in companies that repeatedly collaborate and profit from the violation of basic human rights. Someone who has suffered a great deal from our city's own feeling infrastructure. Yeah, ask you to. Thank you, Mr. Fez. Next speaker is Seth Markowitz, followed by Jane Nunn, followed by Andrew Kwan. Amanda Eisenhower, Glenn Pine, sorry Meredith Conjron, Laurie Cooper, Josh Wimpy, Catherine Shulman, who's the 15th speaker. Do we have Mr. Markowitz? Just need to unmute. Any more minutes? I'm on mute. Can you hear me? Yep, we can hear you now. All right. Great. Thank you for the opportunity to speak this morning. I want to use my time to follow up with Farhan's free thing and express my continued disappointment and the council's failure to consider and pass a Gaza ceasefire resolution. I mean, I guess I should be used to American in action in the face of genocide. My grandmother was born in Preslau, Germany in the 1930s. For the simple crime of being Jewish, my family had their entire lives stripped away. But they were lucky. Even after having their businesses and bank account seized by the Gestapo, they still had enough means to purchase tickets on the St. Louis, a ship of over 900 Jewish refugees seeking refuge in the St. Louis, a ship of over 900 Jewish refugees seeking refuge in the Americas. But when they got to the US after a long journey, seeking just basic safety, they returned away. Force back to Europe, over one third of those desperate passengers would subsequently perish under the Nazis. And while I am extremely fortunate to speak to you today, because my family managed to escape to safety and Britain, the same cannot be said for those trapped in Gaza right now. For the simple crime of being born in the strip, in its civilians, most of them children continue to face mass starvation, polio outbreaks, and having American-made bombs, finance with our tax dollars dropped on their tents in humanitarian zones. The continued silence of the council on this speaks volumes. So I beg that you not repeat the inaction and apathy of Americans, my family first experienced in 1939. As an Alexandrian, I ask you to be the leaders in human and civil rights are city claims to be and pass a ceasefire resolution to call on our leaders across the river and DC to take real action to end this genocide. And if you still not take this basic humanitarian step, we do ask and others have spoken today that the council exam is financial investments and work towards divesting from the Israeli government. If you feel that ceasefire resolution is, as we said, symbolic and not going to actually make a difference, let's turn to the one thing that actually does, money. Economic divestments play a large role in ending the apartheid in South Africa, and these were often started at the local level. Every dollar removed shifts this balance. So be the city we claim to be. And call for a review of our investments with the goal of divesting until real action is taken to end the slaughter in Gaza. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Markowitz. Next speaker is Jane Nunn, followed by Andrew Kwan, followed by Amanda Eisenhower. Good morning, everyone. I recognize that our group has been spending the last, the past 11 months, begging and pleading for the council to call for a ceasefire, to call for the end to violence, and even just to acknowledge the violence that is being done to the Palestinian people. I could stand up here and explain the ways that Palestinian prisoners are being raped by Israeli prison guards. I could also talk about the fact that children are not only being maimed by US-funded weapons, but are also being exposed to polio, which is a disease that has been eradicated in various countries. I could also talk about the fact that as each day passes, we continue to not comply with the layhe laws. However, I recognize that none of this information necessarily matters. As we enter the year mark on the ongoing genocide in Palestine, I want to spend my time here today to talk about how our own taxpayer dollars are being used to fund Israel's ongoing violence. How is this being done? You might ask, well, let's talk about it. Introduce the Israeli, the Virginia Israeli Advisory Board or Viab. Viab is an Israeli business promotion entity in the United States that has been deeply invented in the Virginia State government since 1996 and is funded by state taxpayers. Another question you might be asking yourself, why does this matter to me? I'm just a city council member who has no ties to anything that is being done at the state house. Well you might be interested to know that over the last two decades Viab has funded millions of dollars towards Israeli businesses and away from Virginia companies. As you all know inflation has hit small businesses in the area all over in the area and over the past few weeks I have ventured out to a few small businesses here to chat with them about Viab, and their answers are always the same. Oh, wow, I had no idea, or that's not fair. Viab is also unlike any other community-specific state advisory board, because it directly is funded by taxpayers. Yet no other advisory board representing specific communities in Virginia received these taxpayer funded advantages. This includes the Virginia African-American advisory board, the Virginia Asian advisory board, the Virginia Latino advisory board, the Virginia council on women, as well as the Virginia LGBTQ plus advisory board. Viab also diverts millions of dollars each year in state, federal, and private grants towards Israeli corporations. It collaborates with state-funded entities like colleges and universities and projects designed to benefit Israel instead of Virginia's students, residents, or businesses. No other country receives Virginia taxpayer funding for business promotion and via pressures state lawmakers and local business communities to develop a long-term, stake in Israel despite Israel's systematic apartheid, human rights violations, and occupied Palestine and the ongoing genocide in Gaza. As a proud resident of Alexandria, I do not want my taxpayer dollars funding of apartheid and genocide in Palestine. I know that none of you might care about the atrocities being committed in Palestine, but I do know you care about small businesses having success in Virginia. I'm not sure if you're going to have a meeting with the committee. I'm not sure if you're going to have a meeting with the committee and I'm not sure if you're going to have a meeting with the committee and I'm not sure if you're going to have a meeting with the committee and I'm not sure if you're going to have a meeting with the committee and I'm not sure if you're going to have a meeting with the committee I'm here to speak to the city council. I had a whole speech repair. I think my friends have already said everything needs to be said. Regarding the city council looking into its investment funds and divesting from any businesses that support Israel. And also to advocate for the disbanding of Viab in your toy and the city council. I think my friends have already said everything needs to be said. Regarding the city council looking looking into its investment funds and divesting from any businesses that support Israel and also to advocate for the disbanding of Viab in your 2025 legislative package to the state senate. I can go on about how the cities invested in Airbnb, for example, Lockheed Martin and the crimes that they've committed, how they've supported crimes against the Palestinians by funding Israel. But I think the better use of my time because that's already been covered here, is to just talk about my own personal experience. So members, I'm a mental health counselor, that's my day job. I work primarily with children and families. And I'm particular work with the children and families in Alexandria who have been art, who have come here in large part because they're fleeing violence from other countries, particularly from Central America. It's heartbreaking to hear the stories of how they've had to deal with war conflict, gang violence, right? And how that has continued to shape them and to see small children be unable to do something as simple as be a child because of what they've gone through to me is so heartbreaking and to the credit of Alexandria I know that you have all done great job in terms of being expand mental health access for a lot of folks so kudos to you for that. But I cannot support the fact that while we do that, we are also investing in business companies that profit off of work runs in Israel and in Palestine. I can't do that. And so I'm here to add to my voice to what Aaron also said that we need to take a look at the investments that were actually invested in and take actions to no longer support these immoral acts. So with that said, as my friend Trace said, there's already precedent for this. When it came to South Africa in 1985, the City Council was more, was very supportive, and actually took steps to divest, which in fact helped, I believe, lead to the end of apartheid in South Africa. So I'm calling today for a city council to please consider divesting from any businesses that do support Israel and to incur advocate for the disbanding of buy-up. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. Kwan, for your testimony. Next speaker is Amanda Eisenhower, followed by Glenn Pine, followed by Meredith Conjron, Lori Cooper, Josh Wimpy, Katherine Schoenman. Hello. Good Morning. Hi. So when this spring is your constituent's advocated for a ceasefire resolution, we were constantly met with the narrative that Israel's ongoing genocide against Palestinians was not a local issue, but matter of foreign policy. So if that's our city council's position on a largely symbolic resolution, right? I wonder if your position might be different when it comes to the city's financial involvement in genocide. Alexandria is invested in genocide in apartheid in at least three ways. And we've talked about a lot of them. I want to focus on the most direct way that we are invested here. So Alexandria manages, and if it does share capacity, its own supplemental pension funds, including the supplemental retirement plan, the OPEB trust composite plan, and the defined benefit plan. These are worth over $790 million combined. Through the various investment vehicles included in these funds, the city invests its employees payroll contributions into public equities from companies that profit off of genocide and occupation. Among our top 10 investments is Lockheed Martin, the world's largest weapons manufacturer. Lockheed Martin sells millions of dollars of fighter jets and ammunition to the IDF for use against civilians in Gaza and the West Bank. These include hellfire missiles, notable for their use of blades to slice through flesh, including at the August 10th massacre of over 100 people during morning prayer at the Al-Tabian School. Children's remains are so thoroughly dismembered that the death toll had to be approximated by weighing plastic bags of unrecognizable human flesh. The city also voluntarily invests over $345 million of our cash reserves into the local government investment pool, where reserves are pooled with those immunosuppilities across the state. The LJP is investing in companies like Caterpillar, which as my fellow residents said, have applied the IDF for decades with notorious D9 bulldozer used to raise homes, schools, and infrastructure in order to displace Palestinians and violently enforce the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. And finally, the city invests over $144 million into the Virginia retirement system. VRS invests in a slew of weapons manufacturers, including Northrop Gummim, Palantir, Raytheon, Gerald Dynamics, and Boeing. VRS also invest directly into Israeli bonds and financial institutions, further entangling our state and local tax dollars with genocidal apartheid Israel. The city could take meaningful action to divest itself from genocide into apartheid, at the very least, through the funds that we directly control. The city could also use its legislative package to urge our state legislators to dismantle the Virginia Israel Advisory Board yet another way that Virginia tax dollars are diverted to support Israeli weapons manufacturers. If the city council's mandate extends only to local issues, then our city councilors could do everything within their power to ensure that the local dollars entrusted to their care are invested responsibly rather than than in apartheid and genocide. And I sincerely hope that you all have the moral courage to do so. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you, Ms. Eisenhower. Next speaker is Glenn Pine, followed by Meredith Condron Laurie Cooper. Hello. Good morning. I'm a Jewish Alexandria resident, and it's with profound horror that I've witnessed my government enabling and effectively conducting a genocide since last October. Biden and Harris, literally the most powerful people on earth, could stop the genocide immediately by even threatening to end the steady supply of American made bombs and bulldozers, which Israel has used to flatten Gaza and turn thousands of children into bags of bone-up flesh. But instead, they've started making empty, manipulative calls for a quote ceasefire, as though they were helpless bystanders. Here at the local level, it's the same famed helplessness. In hours of testimony here in these very chambers, local residents have presented in painstaking in the last few days of the pandemic. We have a very significant and significant and significant and significant and significant Selective representatives have instead pretended that you're helpless. I guess it's just too controversial to oppose a world-historic genocide when you have your political careers to worry about. Well now we're informing you that Alexandria controls investment vehicles that are directly funding the genocide. Will you pretend that these don't exist or that you're helpless even though you're the most powerful political body in the city. Councilman Chapman you met with us on March 7th and you said that you supported a cease fire and then you did absolutely nothing and now you've written emails saying that you opposed a vestment. So that is not support. Councilman Aguere on Zoom you said behind closed doors that you would vote for a cease fire resolution, but that you wouldn't put one forward yourself. Or even speak of it in public. What cowardice. And at least Councilman McPike has been transparent about his sheer contempt for our movement for Palestinian liberation. Presumptive mayor-elect Gaskins, you have also done zero to oppose the genocide saying only that Jews and Palestinians should both feel like they belong here. But that framing is very offensive. Zionists in the US are overwhelmingly Christians. Do you know that Jews are very divided on the issue? And that there's a flourishing anti-Zionist Jewish organization right here in the DMV? I'm Jewish. I'm not a Zionist, and I want divestment now. So do I belong here? As her Palestinian-Americans, I mean, do you think they feel a sense of belonging when you and the council won't lift a finger to oppose the wanton slaughter of their people? So this is not about religion, it's about power, and it's about land, it's about standing up to a moral atrocity. It's funded by our country and by our city. The city that you officially represent. Order a review of Alexandria's funding of Israel and cut the funds. Dive-est. Thank you, Mr. Pine. Next speaker is Meredith Conjurent, followed by Lori Cooper, followed by Josh Wimpy, followed by Catherine Schoeman. Good morning. Good morning. My name is Meredith Conjuren. I am an Alexandria City resident as well as Virginia State and Alexandria City employee. I pay taxes in the city of Alexandria. I have a Virginia retirement systems account where my retirement contributions are being invested in companies that directly profit from the ongoing genocide in Gaza. You have been unwilling to introduce and support a ceasefire resolution. You've ignored the human rights committee's recommendation that you do so. And you've justified that choice over and over again by arguing that a ceasefire resolution is beyond the scope of local politics. And if that is your position, how do you then in turn justify the investment of city money in Israeli financial institutions. Why is the Virginia Israel Advisory Board funded in part by Alexandria tax dollars? Why does that board even exist in the first place? If your position continues to be that the genocide of Palestinians is not a local issue, then divestment of all funds in Israeli businesses and institutions should be obvious. Would it not be your position that that money is better spent investing in Virginia businesses? Could that money not be used to better the lives of the citizens of Alexandria? I want my tax dollars to be used to benefit my community and the people in it. The homeless shelters in our city do not have enough beds for everyone that needs one. The wait list for free mental health care in Alexandria is months long. There are substantial vacancies at ACPS and the community services board. Food insecurity is rising in Alexandria. The people of Alexandria have a right to decide how their city's money is spent. You have a professional, moral, and ethical obligation to consider the wants of all of your constituents. Even those you might not agree with. And to pretend otherwise means that you do not believe in local government. Please take action to examine the city's financial investments and cut ties with institutions and corporations profiting off of unthinkable destruction and genocide. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Conjun. Next speaker is Lori Cooper, followed by Josh Winpey, followed by Katherine Schoeman. Michelle Min is the 15th speaker, so we will, we have a number of other speakers as well after her, so we will pick those up at the end of the agenda. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Council members, I'm Lori Cooper. I've been here since age two and lived on Point Road for 37 years. I served as director of the rape victim companion program which is now Sarah and I'm chair of the public and this chair of the Public Health Commission. I do care about the quality of life for all Alexandria residents. Council was soon to vote on the traffic board's recommendation that the service road between Hilton and Cambridge be changed from two-way with shared bike lanes to one-way westbound with independent bike lanes. Longview Hill Citizens Association has put a great deal of consideration into this because it affects us for a long time to come, for some of us possibly to the last years of our lives. We urge deferral for planning and for more data. Let me start with life and health. If changed, first responders may lose precious time coming from the west to west tailer run to access long view drive the only access point to this neighborhood. Miss Orr has told us that the deac street in motion changes will, once they're in place, the possible lost time will be made up. That would be great if that is true. But none of us know yet if that is true. And we're asking that this decision be deferred until those changes on de Street are completed. And the data show that this timing is possible to achieve, even in the high traffic volumes that exist and are expected to increase over time. For our residents, some of whom have serious medical conditions, these precious minutes can be a matter of saving a life. Let me tell you a little bit about our neighborhood. We're not just a small group of single home and townhouse residents, townhouse owners. Our neighborhood also has three apartment complexes featuring over 300 units, home to several hundred residents of Alexandria. We also have the medical plaza with 30 small businesses and the new clinic for pediatric associates, which projects seeing 160 patients daily Monday through Friday and coming soon the addition of 19 town homes on land that for over 100 years served one home and one or two cars with each of those. It's complex, no? We need more careful planning and it must be deferred until that happens. We've been fortunate to have met with five council members about this. Perhaps the mayor and the vice mayor can find time to meet with us before September 21st. Fourth, we discussed appreciation for the changes that have worked to reduce cut through traffic in our neighborhood and our acceptance of compromised access to telegraph road. Please don't undo this. The unsafe intersection of Cambridge Road and Duke Street, which grows unsafe for by the day as impatient drivers are inventing their own traffic regulations through long waits. Council needs to know what Bishop Eirton can contribute to making the community safe. Please work with them so that this can be changed. The existing safety of the neighborhood bike lanes experienced by commuting cyclists in our neighborhood who commute sometimes more than 200 days a year. What we need are wider sidewalks for the pedestrians who frequent the service road to get groceries, go to bus stops or direct to work and recreate. Thank you miss. Thank you miss Cooper. We need elimination of the school road which proposed reports to time as expired. Thank you. We urged a for all. Thank you. Next speaker is Joshua B. Followed by Katherine Schoenman. Does someone work as well? That one works. Absolutely. Great. Thank you all for being here on this really beautiful day. Outside, and I'd like to begin by seconding the comments made by Laurie Cooper and also earlier by the Taylor Run Civic Association. I am Joshua Wimpy. I am a long time resident of Alexandria. and also earlier by the Taylor Run Civic Association. I am Joshua Wimpy. I am a longtime resident of Alexandria. I've lived for 13 years off of Longview Drive in the Longview Civic Association neighborhood. And I've had the pleasure of meeting with many of the council members here today. And I really appreciate that you all have come to see the site, to talk to the neighbors and to see exactly what is going on. I very much appreciate that. So a couple of things. I won't repeat what's already been said about the neighborhood, how it functions and so forth, but I want to talk about the specifics of the plan. Currently the intersection at Cambridge and Duke Street where Bishop Hyrton exists is deeply broken. This is a failed intersection and I'm very excited that the intersection is going to be redeveloped. However, the proposals that have come out of the engineering team are simply inadequate to this task. For a number of reasons. First, the Cambridge Road intersection that they've proposed is extremely complicated. They're end up being three different pathways between Cambridge and Duke Street at the intersection there, bringing high-speed traffic on a slip lane into the service road. It's extremely dangerous. It also is given priority over neighborhood traffic. They'll be entering the slip lane without a stop sign, without a yield sign, without any lights signaling right of way. If this becomes a one-way street, this slip lane given priority effectively locks the neighborhood into their street for, say, 30 to 40 minutes every morning when Bishop Byerton is filling. Another 30 to 40 minutes every afternoon when Bishop Byerton empties. And whenever Bishop Byerton holds events, whether these are PTA events, whether they're football games, any event Bishop Byerton locks us into our neighborhood because it becomes the only route of Egress. Ostensibly, one way proposal is to facilitate changes to the Cambridge intersection. And we strongly urge the council to send these proposals back to the drawing board, that these go back to the engineering teams, ask them to think about having a much variable dozer figure out how to improve this intersection the current proposals are unsatisfactory. The second premise is that this section of service road is seen as an opportunity to add a protected dedicated cycling lane with a removing one lane of traffic, painting a green, becoming a dedicated cycle track. I'm a cyclist, I commute to work every day. I also ride my daughter to Douglas MacArthur Elementary School every morning, and so I traverse this segment of road approximately 800 times a year on a bicycle. And I can tell you this segment of road is already one of the safest segments of road on both of my commutes, including Taylor Run, which has dedicated bike lanes. This segment of road is safer because the traffic is slower, there's less traffic, and there's a concrete wall that separates us from Duke Street proper. So there's no need to add a dedicated bike lane here in order to generate a safe place for cyclists to ride. And if that's the only reason that we're doing it, I don't think that it's a good reason. So in conclusion, I'd like to say that I very much look forward to Duke Street Emotion and the broader goals of Duke Street Emotion, the development, the improvement of the Duke Street right of way in general. However, the devil is in the details and this particular segment is really devilish. It needs to be sent back to the drawing board. There needs to be a lot more work with Bishop Ierton to come up with a plan that works, a simplified intersection, simplified ingress and egress to Bishop Byerton and retaining two-way traffic on the service road or something even more imaginative that I'm sure the engineering staff is capable of. So I urge you to vote no on slip lanes which are dangerous. I urge you to vote no on this proposal for one way service road to facilitate a bad intersection at Cambridge. And I hope that we can fix this. I appreciate your time. Thank you, Mr. Wuppie. Next speaker is Katherine Schoenman, who is the final speaker on this phase, and then we will come back with more at the end. Michelle Mn. Good morning. You're all still complicit in a Holocaust. It's been a year and you're still utterly complicit in a Holocaust. You're still, you haven't done a single thing to try to divest our money. Our money, my money is a city employee and a city resident from going into these companies and killing, let's see, about 386,000 people is the latest count. You don't care, man, you don't give a shit. Ooh, hey, watch the fun. Yeah, you don't want to end you. Behave better and I'll behave better. Yeah, thank you. You're still doing it. What you're doing now is exactly what you would have done in the Holocaust. You would have turned me in for a couple bucks. You children are going to study you. They're going to ask what you did, and you're either going to lie to them, or they're going to be disgusted with you. Why is our money going into Virginia, it is a real advisory board? When our money isn't even going into the LGBT board, advisory board, the Latino businesses advisory board, none of it. You guys prop up the myth that we're owned by some ridiculous Jewish cabal because we're giving so much support to Israel, because you're also afraid of defying it in any way, defying the status quo that purports that makes Israel this untouchable entity. It's disgusting, you need to divest. You know what you have to do. You're pretending you're powerless, but you're not. You can do it with a legislative package. You can ask for Richmond to get rid of it. You can look at the investments the city has. Maybe you will, maybe you won't. I really hope you do. And your children, future generations, and the next 100,000 people to be exterminated. Hope you do. Have a good afternoon. I'm gonna get some food. Thank you, Michelle. All right. Okay, we are gonna go now, Madam Clerk. Action items playing, commission, consent calendar number four. All right, is there a motion to approve the consent calendar item number four? Close to public hearing and approve the consent calendar. There's been a motion by Vice Mayor Jackson, seconded by Councilman Gaskins. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor, There's been a motion by Vice Mayor Jackson, seconded by Councilwoman Gaskins. Any further discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor, please be knowing, saying aye. Aye. All those in favor, please be knowing, saying aye. Aye. All those in favor, please be knowing, saying aye. Aye. All those in favor, please be knowing, saying aye. Aye. All those in favor, please be knowing, saying aye. Aye. All right, we have the rule call consent calendar is our motion to close the public hearing and approve the rule call consent calendar motion by Councilman McPike seconded by councilman Chapman She ran off she missed that vote all right motion the second Any further discussion is a roll call madam clerk. Please call the roll councilman McPike Councilman Chapman, Mayor Wilson, Vice Mayor Jackson, Councilmember Geary, Councilmember Bagley, Councilwoman Gaskins. All right, hold on, Councilmember Geary, did you vote aye? Yeah, aye, you, but aye. We didn't hear you, okay. And then, so that's, Councilmember Gaskins is out, so that's 6-0 on the roll call consent calendar. Madam Clerk. Public hearing and consideration of a lease agreement between the city and Jeffrio Yates TR for the use of public right away adjacent to 1050 North Fayette Street. Okay, and I believe Mr. Blair has just signed up for, if we have any questions, are there any questions? If not, is there a motion to close the public hearing and approve the lease agreement? Motion by Vice Mayor Jackson, seconded by Councilman McPike. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor, please ignore. He's saying aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. Hearing none, all those in favor, please ignore me. I say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. The ayes have it. The police agreement is approved. That would be 6-0. Madam clerk, number seven. 6-35, up one place public hearing and consideration of an appeal of the June 4, 2024. Planning commission decision to approve the subdivision request with variations to re-subdivide it in existing lot into two lot zone R5 residential. Okay, so from a process perspective what I'm going to do here is we are going to have a staff presentation. We're going to let the staff present and answer any questions of the council. At that point, I'm going to ask the representative of the Planning Commission to give us some insights and the Planning Commission's deliberations on this matter. And if there are any questions of the Planning Commission, we can then deal with that. And then we will go to public testimonies. So I'd ask that our staff make their presentation. And then as we do the testimony, we're, everyone's going to have three minutes as we normally would do except there will be a representative both for the appellant and the applicant who will have as much time as they need to consume, although I ask of course as always that everyone be judicious about the time that they use. So, hello. All right. Good morning. This is Sam Shelby, planning and zoning, and I'm here to go over the appeal of the subdivision approval, the planning commission's approval of the subdivision for 635 up in place. This is about an acre-sized property piece of land up by the Masonic Temple. It's 0.95 acres of use act, and it's an existing lot with substantial or substandard frontage at the end of a spur that comes off of up in place. It's a little spur like for a better term is dead ends at the subject property. And the existing property has 22 feet of frontage about on that dead end there and on along an angle. The applicant requested a subdivision to subdivide the property east-west roughly Along its length so the side lot lines would would intersect with the front lot line and the two lots would share The existing insufficient frontage on up in place. So each lot would share the 22 feet of frontage and because the zone requires more frontage than that the zone requires 40 feet of frontage. And because the zone requires more frontage than that, the zone requires 40 feet of frontage per lot, the subdivision includes variations to get permission to have lots that don't have the required width or frontage. In general, subdivision reviews are a little bit different than special use permits. There's a little bit less discretion. There's more rigid standards of how what we look at for to recommend approval and for planning commission and now council to deny or approve it. They're limited to access. So that's why the front-end requirement exists is to ensure that there's vehicular access, there's ways to get utilities to the site, and there's also a way for firefighting apparatus or you know, and other emergency vehicles to get to the site. One of the other things, one of the other considerations on review is the lock configuration, and that is shape, size, and orientation. And as part of that, the Planning Commissioner Council or whatever the reviewing body is, is supposed to look at how it is compatible with in terms of the existing neighborhood. The idea being that if you create a lot that is similar to the neighborhood and is in generally conformance with the zone, that you're allowing for a site that's suitable for the residential uses that are permitted in that area. And therefore, if you're doing something that's permitted in the zone, then you're also in conformance with a small area planned for the area. As I said, because the lot does not have the lots do not provide the required furniture with, the applicant has requested variations from these regulations. And this is a multi-part review or multi-part review that you, there's multiple facets you have to look at. So the first is whether or not stripped application will result in a substantial injustice. And staff found that it would, not stripped application result in the substantial injustice. And staff found that it would, because stripped application means that the lot cannot be subdivided. That if the applicant were required to provide complying with in front edge, it's not possible. So they'd have to keep the lot unsubdivided. And the way the zoning ordinance tells us to review substantial injustice is if the subdivision can be approved with these variations, then we have to find that it's reasonable to deviate from the front-end gen width requirements. So basically, the subdivision could be approved with the, as long as the general gist, the purpose of frontage and width are upheld. And SAF found that to be the case, the lot width and frontage, the frontage has existed on this site for 75 or 80 years with an existing single unit home on it. And the purpose of the frontage requirement, as it went over before, and the presentation is to ensure that you can get a car to the site or you can get utilities to the site. And that has served, that purpose has been served for as long as that house has been there. The amount of frontage that's required is generally so there's a sameness in sort of lot sizes and widths and that kind of thing, but because this is an existing condition, that's a difficult standard to apply because this is existed for so long without, you know, it's hard to demonstrate that there's been something incompatible or something that has caused incompatibility with the surrounding lots with one house. And the staff feels the same way about the two houses that it would not make it more incompatible. That any development on the site is going to be interesting because of how it's configured. And one to two, you know, constructing two dwellings versus one is just not going to disrupt or be completely out of character with the neighborhood. The lot with requirement is in place to ensure that there's room to put a house with complying side yards beside it. The lot width requirement is dictated in the ordinance to be measured at a certain distance from the front lot line. And in this case, the houses are going to be set further back than that minimum distance that the zoning ordinance tells us where to measure the width. So it's would uphold where to measure the width. So it's, it would uphold the purpose of the width requirement, which is to make sure that the house, the lot is wide enough to accommodate a house and recomplying side yards. The R5 zone permits single unit dwellings, and that's what the applicant is providing, or proposing so that would be, the proposal would be consistent with the RFI zone use provisions. You also have to find that the proposal would be consistent with existing development. And as we've said, this is a, it's already unique lot. The addition of a second unit does not disrupt the development pattern and the neighborhood. And then the final point is that the zoning ordinance establishes five different special circumstances that can exist on a property. And these are existing conditions not proposed that have to exist in order for a subdivision to be approved. And the zoning ordinance says you only have to find one, one of them. Staff felt that there were two. One was the extremely rugged topography, topography, circumstance, and the existing insufficient frontage on a substandard street. We're unfortunate that the zoning ordinance doesn't exactly define what it means by extremely rugged topography, but it, I don't wanna say it doesn't matter, but again, the zoning ordinance only requires one of don't want to say it doesn't matter, but again, zoning ordinance only requires one of these special circumstances to be found. And the other one is that there's an existing lot on a street that's substandard and width. And that's exactly what's happening here. It's an existing lot on a street, up in place here, this burrow is only 32 feet wide. It's supposed to be much wider than that. That's a substandard street. The existing frontage is 22 feet, that's less than the 40 required by the zone. So that special circumstance exists. The appellants are claiming that the site doesn't have a topography and as I mentioned, staff still feels that that case, that to be the case, but it's not defined. And again, this special circumstance does not have to exist, or you do not have to find that it exists to review the variation, the insufficient frontage criterion as the one that we feels a factual, it's a fact of the case that it's an existing lot with an insufficient frontage on a substandard street. The appellants also feel, I don't want to summarize their arguments, I'm just gonna get, you know, fully summarize their arguments, the public health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health care and the health and the health care and the health and the health care and the health and the health care and the health and the health care and the health because there's an existing private driveway on the site that has a curb. And I think what they were saying is that they'd like for that to be considered frontage. There's just no mechanism in the zoning order for us to consider that private driveway as street frontage. The appellants also found that the substantial injustice, criteria are not clear and that the planning commission and discussed other matters at the hearing. But the ultimately, this is just for reference because this is a denovo hearing, but they recommended approval 6-1. The commissioner who voted against found that the substantial injustice wasn't met and he also had the sort of same question that the appellans did about regulatory topography. So with that, that's a lot of information. I'm gonna stop talking and let you guys ask questions. Thanks. Okay. Questions from Mr. Shelby? Council member Bagley and then Councilman Chapman. I think Councilman Fike. Okay. Thank you for the presentation. And I guess just to clarify a process question, if we have questions for staff after the public has spoke, I assume we can look back. Yes. Okay. back. Yes. Okay. So, never. Right now. So thank you, Mr. Shelby, for the review and for your work on this project. I wanted to go back to the lot with discussion. The recognizing that we are not here today to talk about the ultimate building design, you know, the actual building permitting process, but I do I am interested in When the lot with okay requirement is measured at the front of what is essentially the the frontage part of this parcel is that correct? It close to the front 20 feet from the front line. Yeah. Okay. And the purpose of the lot with requirement in our code is to serve side yard distancing from other properties. Yes. Okay. When will recognizing that's not today, but when and will in the ultimate building permitting process will there be a check on? Are is the side yard requirement that is the intention of having a lot with requirement being served by the application, by the actual building proposal? So if the subdivision is approved, if they would move on to the grading plan process, and those are handled by transportation environmental services, but they're routed to planning and zoning for review, and that's when we would get the actual sighting of where the house would be, and that's when we could say, you know, this is the side yard you're providing, this is the maximum height that building can be from that lot line. So that's the first sort of take, the first step of chance we have to review. And the second chance would be for the building permit when the applicant submits the actual elevations of the house. And so we would measure the height of the house and make sure it complies with a one to three height to set back ratio and make sure that the side yard is hurting compliance. And so that math, to some extent, is dictated by where they intend to place the resulting building on the parcel. Right. OK. And so ultimately, if we were to grant a variation today and allow a subdivision, knowing that at the point our process measures with, the width is insufficient, we're not ultimately waving the requirement that the home that results will have sufficient side lot and set back requirements. Right, if there's no way to bring to for us to approve a case that the house, if it doesn't have compliance high yards, they'd have to go to the board. Is zoning appeals and they could never, they wouldn't meet the criteria for approval. Okay so I appreciate that you just said the inverse of what I said which is if they proposed a home to be built in this portion that fails the the lot with requirement the building permit would not be granted because they wouldn't be meeting the side lot requirement that the lot with requirement creates. Exactly. Okay, thank you. That's my question. Thank you, Council. Okay, thank you, Councilman Bagley. Councilman McPike. Not right now. Okay. Other questions at this point. All right. So we're going to go now to Commissioner Lyle who's representing the Planning Commission. And she's going to give us an insight in the Planning Commission's deliberations here. Good morning, Mindy Lyle for Planning Commission. We discussed a lot of different aspects of this case. And one of the things that Commissioner Brown said was that the subdivision ordinance needed to be clarified and we need to do some updates so that it would better define substantial injustice and rugged topography because there actually are no definitions. But he also explained and he's sort of our gold standard on legal terms that subdivision reviews are limited to lot shape, size and orientation, and we can't base them on conceptual or hypothetical development. We found, six of us found that this demonstrated a substantial injustice basically based on rugged topography because of the wetlands and the actual terrain towards the back of the lot and that the insufficient frontage on the substandard street really contributed to the inability to have exact lots that looked like every other lot in that subdivision. That if you were not going to consider the insufficient frontage, then this lot could never be subdivided. So that that constituted our decision. Are there any questions for Commissioner Laugh? Councilman Peik. In your time on the Planning Commission, have there been similar subdivisions like with these sorts of features that have come before you all? We've had one, I'm going to say four years ago maybe, that were substandard lots that we have approved. And there are examples throughout the city where you have substandard lots. Alexandria is not a city of sameness, where it's all planned communities. And some of the older subdivisions in particular have developed where you might have a lot that now can be subdivided, that wasn't, and you have a lot of different configurations. Dartmouth is one that comes to mind. You also, we had one, I think about four years ago, that was very rugged terrain that developed, and that subdivided into three lots and there was insufficient frontage for that. So thank you. Okay. Councilman Chapman. Question that popped into my mind in terms of your service has there been and there probably has other applications where the defining of Words and definitions kind of really hinges on Decision of the planning commission that went about four years ago Most of the time when we get subdivisions, it's fairly straightforward. We had one that one lot was being divided into two, and that was recent. We had two subdivisions on the same docket, but most of the time it's fairly straightforward. Councilman Gaskins. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and Thank you. Councilman Gaskins. Thank you, Mr. Mayor and thank you, Commissioner Lyle. Can you talk a little bit about how the planning commission specifically looked at the shape of these lives? I think we know, given the uniqueness of the site, it's going to be irregular and it's going to be different than the rectangular shape lots that we see in the other, I guess, comparable original subdivision. So how are you guys reconciling the fact that by the nature of the site, it will be a different kind of funky or regular shape? We have those in the rest of the city. And you really can't... you take the square footage of the lot into consideration. And in some cases, there was one case, I guess, about six years ago, that was an irregular shape lot on mansion. I think it was mentioned that they had to work hard to get the home to fit when it came into permitting, but it was in a regular lot. And like I said a lot of times, we just don't have these come in that often, but there are examples all through the city. And that was one of the reason for Mr. Brown suggesting that we start to look at the subdivision ordinance going forward and put a little clearer definition to some of these terms. Thank you. Hey, other questions for Ms. Laugh. All right. I do want to come back on that suggestion that you made. I want to, we'll probably talk about it later, but I do think that's an important conversation here. All right. We're going to now go to, I believe it's Eve Anderson, who's going to be representing the appellant. And so we're going to allow her to state the appeal and then we'll go into the testimony in order. Sanders. Good morning. Good morning. I don't know if I've ever been so nervous in my life. No, no, don't worry. We are very nice. We don't bite. Often. We are very nice. We don't buy often. Good morning. My name is Eve Anderson. I live on up in place. Am I property of that's the one in discussion today? And I'm also very short. Thank you for spending time with us these past months and even for some years regarding this matter. This is a complex issue with a lot of intricate details. And I want to thank you for your patients with the lengthy document I submitted. I will try to be brief and highlight our concerns. The first one is the alley regarding the alley to the south of the property. There are unresolved legal issues. It's concerning to us that the Planning Commission voted on this subdivision application while these legal questions remain and the rightful property owners may not have received proper notice. Topography. We've heard a lot about it already. Topography is what lies within the lot lines and is a development concern and not a legal planning of lines issue. Any reference to the topography of the lot surrounding this property also has no relevance in this decision today. These lots are not under review. Director Moritz and we've heard also tell us that the ordinance does not define the term rugged topography. We submitted the applicant's own commissioned report regarding the topography of the property and it was classified as gentle to moderate. This report is the only scientific evidence presented and it shows that extremely rugged topography does not exist. This condition does not met. The wetlands. When Mill Hill was aware of the wetland designation, when he entered into a new contractual agreement with the land owner in 2024. The city has long been aware the property lies within the Taylor Run during each base. Substantial injustice. For this subdivision, the city interprets substantial injustice to mean that the strict application of the zoning ordinance would preclude any resubdivision of the subject property. Director Moritz told us that if not for the insufficient frontage in the isolated wetland, the property could feasibly be redevided into three or more lots. The applicant is here requesting a subdivision only. We can only consider today what is under review. Only two lots are proposed today. We are discussing these two lots and whether the property can be developed if the subdivision is not granted. Both the city and the applicant have stated they can develop this property whether or not the subdivision is approved. Which answers the question. Therefore, substantial injustice is not met. This is not only about the substantial issue prong. It is also about the use and character of the lots as the ordinance states, even before we begin to look at the special circumstances. So if we talk about the character of the neighborhood, while we recognize the quirks of the property, we also have to look at its historical assimilation into the neighborhood, and in its current state, it works. It fits, it functions, and it is enjoying. To find commonality, staff could only say that all the lots are significantly deeper than they are wide. Generally, generally, old city, many lots are deeper than they are wide based on lot requirements. It seems to overlook the details that to achieve the proposed, extremely reduced frontage, the lots will no longer be trapezoids, but will be pennant or flag-shaped, unique only to themselves and either in character with the original lot or the surrounding lots. Many neighborhood lots more closely mirror rectangles, but the analysis seems to consider a trapezoid rectangle and flag as essentially the same shape. To attempt to find similar lots in character, staff pointed us to homes on the Monk Place among your drive. Including these properties, in the analysis is a continued attempt to draw similarities where they simply do not exist and to support the non-conforming and wholly uncharacteristic plan. These lots are far outside the original subdivision, are zoned R8, not R5, they're on a wider street, and have frontages that far exceed even the minimum requirement for R8. The character of the resulting lots is simply not consistent with the existing development and lots in the immediate area. I'm gonna move on to frontage and width. Today's frontage, as it exists, and the existing development and lots in the immediate area. I'm gonna move on to frontage and width. Today's frontage, as it exists, is grandfathered in. Win Mill Hill requests to create two lots with a massive reduction in the ordinance requirement, four frontage, and cites the street width as a special circumstance. Street width has no correlation to and does not affect the frontage of this lot. The staff report set up in place always dead ended at the subject property and no other streets were ever platted alongside the subject property, increasing its frontage. A street cannot increase frontage. Streets do not dictate lot frontage. The lot parameters are what talk about frontage, streets do not dictate lot frontage, the lot parameters are what talk about frontage. The city also acknowledges that the roadway narrows along up in place and thus only one lot can be served. The special circumstance is not met and others will speak to that this morning. The submission plant is incorrect. The zoning ordinance for a subdivision states, the purpose of these regulations is to provide for the orderly division of land for development or transfer of ownership and an accurate system of recording land division and ownership. I ask the city to thoroughly examine the plat as approved by the Planning Commission. There are discrepancies and incorrect measures on that plat that conflict with the plat's of the surrounding properties, their legal deeds and the legal deed for 635 up in place. The city cannot approve a subdivision whose true meets and bounds are not reflected on the plant. In doing so, the city may be approving changing the legal borders of that property and at least 11 properties on South View Terrace and up in place. And that concerns me that we may end up in some sort of litigation about the lots we already own. I can provide you documents and details if you wish. While we are sympathetic to the contract purchaser, we do feel if the conditions of the land are not to his liking or the ordinance are not something that he feels he can comply with, he does not need to buy the land. We've all said there are other opportunities for this property in its current state. This is not the only proposal for this land. As acknowledged by both the city and Wynn Millhill, there are options. We ask you to deny the subdivision request. We feel that applicant has not met the burden for all the special variations and circumstances. Thank you for your consideration. Thank you, Miss Anderson. Questions from Miss Anderson? Vice Mayor Jackson. Thank you. Thank you, your consideration. Thank you, Ms. Anderson. Questions from Ms. Anderson? Vice Mayor Jackson. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Anderson. This is directed to staff concerning something she has brought up. Can you please elaborate on any discrepancies you are aware of concerning the borders of that property? The lot lines that bound the subject property, the North Southeast West lot lines are not changing with the subdivision request. So whatever the land record show, or what would be what the final plat would show. So, you know, the only new lot line that's proposed is the one that divides the subject property in half. Okay. So, Miss Anderson, can you speak to what they just said? I can. I have the legal deed for $6.35 on the price. And on that north border that is not changing today, the submitted plat says $275. I mean, I'm not starting to get through papers. $275. The legal deed says that line is 315. It is also not a straight line. So that's a difference of 40 linear feet. The coordinates, the coordinates also, are not aligned. The north border, I believe, I can't see that from here. Says it's an 83, whatever. The flats above say 89. That is also the case on the flats on the south border line that are not changing. The width, the, the, the, the. Can you help me with the engineering? What did I call those lines? The parallel, yeah. The parallel, the degrees. The degrees differ. So that means if we're walking side by side and one of us is going 83 and one of us is going 89, we're off. We're off. And if one of us is only going 275 feet and it's 315 we're still off. We're off on the side border by at least six feet. So these borders while they, while what we're showing may not be changing. We have at least 11 properties whose borders might be changing because those lines are not right. It is not. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I believe Mr. Governor, I'm just going to help. Okay. Other questions for Miss Anderson? Councilmember Begley. Miss Anderson, the discrepancies that you've learned about in the process of your work here, they exist regardless of this request to draw a line in the interior of the property. Is that a fair statement? Like the concerns you have today about questions over the outer lot lines exist regardless of the interior line being added or not. That interior line where it meets, where it comes down at the point of up in place may also not be correct based on the angle and the border of that line that border 623. Okay, so to drill down a bit then. Okay, I'll try. what you've just said is the only element of a dispute over the boundaries that's actually impacted by the decision before us today would be the extent to which there's a dispute related to the point at which the subdivision line hits the outer boundary. I can't say that 100% because these are not straight lines. And so I hear what you're asking me is that the only point of dispute. However, if it is also off, it throws off the trajectory of the whole design for lack of a better work. And so the angles could be incorrect in the corners. And so that is what I'm trying to get out. This plan is not legally correct, is the best that I can say to you? Yeah, and I hear you. And I guess what I'm, I have a follow up question I'm gonna have for like the city attorney in a second, but what I'm hearing is, even if I accept the premise of what you're telling us today, that there are legitimate questions, legal questions about the boundaries of the 11 exterior lots, that question exists today, regardless of, you could bring a suit today to clarify your boundary lines against the current owner of the land. If I accept what you're laying out,, there's an argument that of the 11 property owners, a certain number of them have whatever legal process is necessary to clarify lot lines between themselves and the current property owner. I guess. So, but go ahead. Yeah. And so my question to the city attorney on this point, because I do want to like know if this is a today issue or not, is questions about the underlying boundaries, meets and bounds measures of the lot at issue, and element of our subdivision analysis. No, that's not today. What I'm hearing described has to do with the land boundaries, and this is a new issue that's been raised for at least my ears today. But this would be a private legal issue. What she's raising today as it pertains to the measurements of what she's describing of the outer boundaries and the other lots surrounding. It's not an issue for today. Okay. And then I just want to continue on this panel for one month while I'm just up. Is so for staff, then, I have a question. To the extent, you know, appreciating that, like, technically, this isn't part of the analysis. But if we accept the appellance presentation and the factual, you know, position she's taking that arguably, and I'm just gonna pick a number, but arguably, you know, 20, a certain number of feet, let's say 10 feet are off at the North boundary, and 10 feet are off at the South boundary. So the square footage owned by the app, by the 635 Upland is less. Would that given the size of the proposed subsid visions, impact, I think each of them is 18,000, 19,000 square feet roughly? How much could they each lose before they fail to satisfy the amount of square footage they need to be here today to ask for these two lots. And Carlmore is playing director. Sam will tell me if I'm not correct, but I've been following this closely too. And the proposed lots are not so close to the minimum lot size or minimum widths that we would expect for the RFIB zone such that such adjustment would put it in danger of becoming a lot that's out of, out of, out of, in violation of the zones parameters. Just so the app, the app, the balance, sorry, I started to give track of who's here today. But, you know, I mean, I wanted to drill down on this because there are other elements of the appeal that I think are more central to the case. It just in, in front of me, of myself. And so I just wanted to drill down on, is that actually a route that we can analyze today? And but for the thought exercise, you know, where does it land? So that's where I'm following up on. May I speak? Where we see it is that this shape, these corners, these lines are not as being presented today and that it is not a straight line. And so, well, I hear the comment about the square area, the square footage. We are saying to you, we have concerns that we are approving something that is not correct. That is what I'm bringing to your attention. It spirals out of control for a lot of us. We are approving, that's what I just want to try to verbalize, because I'm just a private citizen. Those borders are not correct what you are being asked to look at because we are only looking at lot lines. Can I lean on the city attorney one more time? So can you just describe the process for assuming that this were approved as submitted. What happens next before this is finalized as it relates to the subdivision? What is the actual legal process that mechanically happens once that's done? I'm going to ask Deputy City Attorney Christina Brown who's been working on this case to address that. Thank you. So today's approval is a preliminary plat. There will be an opportunity and there will be, there is a legal requirement that a final plat be submitted and reviewed. So staff will be reviewing that to ensure compliance with the preliminary plat and decisions that are made to address the issues that come up. So before going to record, there will be a final plat that's reviewed by staff, and that's ultimately what's recorded in land record. So is that surveyed? Is there? Is there a- There's a survey or certificate that's added to the subdivision plat at that time. Okay. Okay. All right, thank you. Other questions from Ms. Anderson? Councilman Paique. So the city staff and their presentation when they described the frontage issue, they're saying that up in place, you know, the street comes to a point where it dead ends. The street a little bit of the land of the south and that that dead ending is the frontage that is insufficient and thus qualifying for one of the variation requirements. You're saying that you do not believe there's insufficient frontage here, so what would you define as the frontage? I think we said the frontage is grandfather today. Yeah, grandfather today. It is. Okay, here we are. We're not going to do this as a large conversation. Miss Anderson, if you think you answered the question, Mr. McPuff, you have a- No, I'd ask the staff, so how would you describe the Frontage situation that we have here? Why you'd say it qualifies as being insufficient? It seems like this is the answer, so let me start here. It's 22 feet and it needs to be 40 feet. The zoning ordinance requires required is 40. And the street front edge is the length of a lot line along of street. So that's the measurement. So you're saying it's in material that it's insufficient, as it would be your position. It is, I don't know, for Ms. Anderson, I'm sorry. Because. So what we have read in the report and what we understand it to be, it is grandfathered and has functioned as is in its 22 feet as with no negative consequences on its surroundings. That's on page of the report. We can't, it is what it is, 1908 to 1933. Okay. Yeah, answer your question, Sarah. Yeah, I think so I'm just, I was trying to think, you know, I guess I'm going to get into is if insufficient frontage is one of the variations that we're going to, and I don't understand what your argument is that this probably doesn't qualify for considering of that variance under the insufficient frontage. If I understand correctly, today it is what it is. Once if granted, and then it goes down to 11 feet, it is far off the 40 feet. We're having 11.03 frontage per lot, which will then be considered standard. This lot will come into compliance with the variations of width and frontage as requested as it has been explained to me and was stated at the planning commission meeting. What we are saying today is that reduction to 11 feet, 11.03 per lot Is so far off today's standards that that is the concern Thank you. Okay any other questions from Sanders All right, thank you miss Anderson next speaker is Elizabeth McGill follow is representing the Taylor Run Civic followed by Susie Miranda Bill Kalish, E and Margaret Argusd. Hello again. Hello. Can you hear me? Oh great, okay. So yeah, thank you again. My name is Elizabeth McGill, and I am here today on behalf of the Taylor Run Citizens Association. The TRCA supports the appellance position in opposing this subdivision. We believe that the applicants request to create two oddly shaped pennant lots with a mere 11 feet of frontage. Each changes the long established character of the George Washington Park neighborhood. George Washington Park was orderly and thoughtfully platted in July of 1908. The western border of the neighborhood boundaries were along the old former corporation line at the end of upland place, the last year of the year. The western border of the neighborhood boundaries were along the old former corporation line at the end of up one place, shown as Mason place on that platform. On October 1, 1908, William Smith and William Finkle acquired the land border in George Washington Park and enjoyed it as a farm. R.H. Finks purchased it on March 8, 1921. On September 22, 1933, 12 years later, and 25 years after the establishment of George Washington Park, R.H. Franks divided his land along that western border abouting George Washington Park and the old former Corporation Line, establishing what is now 635 up in place. In 1941, the owners of the original subdivision, 635 up in place and the surrounding property would later become the Glenmore neighborhood granted that would later become the Glenmore neighborhood granted the city a sewer and sanitary easement across their properties. And over time, he continued to subdivide his property along south Uterres. Mr. Frank's dedicated portions of his land along south Uterres and Monk your tribe for public right, right of gutters. However, the on not enter similar aggr property. Property has ne I started with a brief h up in place as a propr established in the neb and has remained in its over 91 years, watching, like Carl in the movie Up as development has sprung up all around it. Creating two new irregularly shaped lots with a drastic 75 person reduction in frontage will be fully unique and atypical for the neighborhood. TRTA was unable to identify lots with the combination of substandard frontage and width and orientation, as well as the perpendicular lines at the end of a road in our neighborhood. The creation of these two lots with barely 11 feet of frontage each also reduces access to emergency and fire services, increases congestion and traffic with low visibility and limited space to maneuver, likely requiring vehicles to back out up hill to exit. This creates unsafe conditions near public park enjoyed by the community. As such, the proposal drastically changes the neighborhood by cramming a second lot between the 600 block and the 700 block of up in place and in danger is the existing 120 year old tree canopy and vegetation. TRCA stands with the 86 neighbors, nearly 100% of the landowners within the 300-foot offset who signed the appeal petition. We ask each preserve the character of the neighborhood and deny this subdivision request. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. McGill. Next speaker is Susan Miranda, followed by Bill Kalish, followed by Marsha Argus, followed by Derek Argus, followed by Colleen Broderick. Lou. I'm Susan Miranda. I have lived in the neighborhood for about over 20 years. And I don't really have anything else to add to this conversation. I would like to support Ev Anderson in our previous speaker representing the Taylor Ronson Association. I actually don't but this property. I literally live right across the street from a house that or houses that have but the property. I agree wholeheartedly that the property should not necessarily be subdivided. That green space back there is utilized by not only wildlife, but our community as green space. And I don't want to take up your time because they've said it better than I would. So thank you. Thank you, Ms. Miranda. Next speaker is Bill Kalish, followed by Marsha Argus. It's okay, Kalish. Um. I have some maps that I marked up by the park and hand it up. This is a 60 of the latest version of the staff report. If you recall that up, if that's possible. But you can see it on the map. I have marked it up. We don't have it. We have it. I've marked it up to show the actual street widths. Mr. Shelby here said that basically existing lot with a sub-standard street under 11, 17, 13, A3 is the staff's main basis for granting this application. The application has a fatal flaw because the street is only 15 feet 8 inches at the subject property and under that part of the ordinance it may only serve one lot as a matter of law. So look at the map. The reason why they're claiming the extra feet is because they're claiming that 11 foot alley. If you look where it says up in place, it says 32 feet. That's includes that alley. They've conceded the alley. They don't claim to own the alley. They can't build on the alley so the alley can't be part of that measurement. So the street is 15A and think about it. If the street was 32 feet wide, they'd be claiming at least that much in frontage because they've got the frontage at a diagonal. And so they're conceding it tacitly in their thing. So they don't have the alley. They don't have a 32 foot street. And under 11, 1713A3, a street that is less than 30 feet may only serve one lot as a matter of law. And I'm pretty confident that a Coral Back is up on that. It's straight. The Higgs decision tells us that we're supposed to use the plain language to interpret these ordinances. And the plain language to interpret these ordinances. And the plain language is how wide is the street. If it's not wide enough, it can't serve more than one lot. And that's a matter of law. Also, the staff says it's consistent with property. Eve pointed out, Lamond and Monkure properties. The staff says, if not for the wetlands, we could build a cul de sac on the subject property. There is a wetland, they can't build a cul de sac. You can't compare those two properties. Sam Shelby gave me a list of other ones. I gave them my letter to y'all. I went around to every one of them. None of them have anything to do with this. They're not comparable. They're one house, not two houses. They're up above another place or on level. This is going to be down in the hole behind all of our houses. It's inconsistent in that all the houses are in neighborhood. If I look out my back door, I see someone else's back door. I'm going to see someone else's front door now. That's inconsistent. The playing language of the law says it has to be not inconsistent, but it is inconsistent. Also, as a matter of law, I think the court would back us up on that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Calish. Councilmember Baglan. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Calish. Councillor McLaren. Ms. Brown, could you speak to this question about the legality of the street? I just, I don't remember this being in the staff report. I'm sorry if I've missed it. But is there, you know, is there any way to address sort of this idea that a 15.8 street can somehow only about one lot, or because what this raises for me is a larger question, is the speaker sort of implying that it's insufficient for the already preexisting houses on this street? And I mean, it's on the other day. And so it's on the other day. We don't go back and forth. I'm sorry. Just Brown. I'd actually like staff, because they're the ones who calculated the street front if they could handle that. That's fair. Yeah. Right, so the improved pavement there is, I have measured it, we can go with what Mr. Kailer said it is, 15.8. The right of way is 32 feet wide there. This slide actually that's up on the screen now, I can zoom in a little bit more, shows exactly the configuration here. The right of way here is 32 feet wide. The subject property where the highlighted line in has 22 feet of front edge, and then there's another 11 feet of front edge, or not front edge, sorry, 11 feet that's made up by the alley, that totals the 32 feet of the right away here. In the variation standards in the subdivision ordinance, it says you can only have one lot. The existing condition, you can have a street that's less than 30 feet wide if it's only one lot, but it's 32 feet wide, so it's. It's 158 It's not Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Calis, I'm sorry. We don't we don't we don't have it back and forth like that. That's not the way this works. All right Miss councilmember Bagley, did you have a follow-up there? I guess I'm at a loss because I'm a genuinely I'm trying to reconcile the my experience driving on the street, the numbers that you're saying, and then what Mr. Kayla's just saying, and I'm sorry Mr. Kayla, I'm not inviting you to, just y'all 15.8 at me again. Can somebody, can Sam, can you take another crack at differentiating what he's saying 15.8, and what you are saying is a 32 foot wide street? is the current. So, I'm not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not sure if you're not The platted width of the right away here is 32 feet. It's not all paved and it doesn't all have sidewalk, but it's 32 feet wide. Okay, so for purposes of interpreting the zoning ordinance and the relevant, it's not about how much paved asphalt there is. It's about how much available right away there is. Exactly. Okay, so we might have paved to Mr. Calishe's point, 15.8 worth of pass vault. But it's about the potential that there is 32 feet of right away established at that point of 22 feet plus 11 feet. Correct. Okay. What about the alley? Okay, all right. Mr. Calish, other council member gaskets? That was actually my question. Can you talk a little bit about how the alley factors into that calculation? The alley has is not involved in the right of the right away ends at the subject property is shown on this I Can zoom in a little bit more here, but the right the alley the right away ends at the subject properties front lot line and And part of the alley continues further westward of that point, but it doesn't affect the width of the right of way. Even with, I guess when I'm trying to stand and maybe I don't have a good visual of it. But when you're on the street itself, it felt like if I'm looking right at the dead end, that there's almost like a bump out from the, like, left, left side. Does that impact the 32-feet at all? And it's hard to describe without, like, a picture of the actual street in front of us, but I guess what I'm trying to say is it doesn't feel like the street goes straight down like this. It went a little like- The street narrows. Right. the street down like this, it went a little like. The street narrows. The right. I'm saying street. So in the state 32 all the way down, I guess it's a- Does say the width of the asphalt, the actual pavement does not stay 32 feet. It tapers down to 15.8. So the bump out you're describing as it tapers in, the actual pavement narrows, but the right of way is still 32 feet along that entire length of the spur of up in place. Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you, Mr. Cadish. We don't go back and forth. All right. All right. Thank you. Next. Next. Okay. Okay. Okay. Mr. Cadish. Can't do that. Next speaker is Marsha Argus Argus and Derek Argus then Colleen Broderick Thomas Knight Christine Bina Cure Hello, sorry about that Morning, my name is Marsha Argus. My husband Derek Argus actually won't be able to make it So I'll be speaking on behalf of both of us. We own property adjacent to 635 up in place, the parcel that is directly north of the existing structure on the 635 lot. We're appellants on the appeal of the Planning Commission's approval of the subdivision application. I agree, well, first of all all let me just say I appreciate the time that many of you spent visiting the neighborhood and talking with us. We have, Derek and I have many concerns about the subdivision request. Most of them are outlined already in Eves comments, other comments and the detailed paper you received earlier this week from EVE. So my comments will be brief. In referring to the subdivision approvals, zoning ordinance, section 11, 1713, states that variations, as you all well know, may be authorized when the commission finds that there are three factors that are met. Not just one of those factors, but all three, the substantial injustice, the use and character, and also special circumstances. I just wanna make a simple point about the substantial injustice. According to code that occurs when strict application of the ordinance would create an unreasonable burden on the development, use and enjoyment of the property. This point has been brought up before. I think we need to really think about it. There are multiple options for development of 635, some of which would not require a subdivision. That's a simple point, but again, very critical. The applicant cannot argue unreasonable burden here. Negating any legitimate claim of substantial injustice. So that is my simple comment. I hope it hits home. My husband and I urge you to reject the subdivision application. And we do appreciate your very thoughtful consideration. This is a really important matter to us. Thank you, Ms. Argus. Next speaker is Colleen Brotorick, followed by Thomas Knight. I'm referring to a map that you should have in your packet, does everybody have it? Yeah, we have our packet. It's all digital. Okay, and also I'm referring to Bill's little map here, too, because on that property, I'm calling Veronica the next to the property. I met most of you, and I appreciate your time meeting with the neighbors. But on the map, the road goes from 25 to 15 pointed. No point is it 32, absolutely no point. But what I want to say is you've seen from our petition that we have overwhelming support. And when we talk about whatever happens here is going to be irregular lots. It does not have to be irregular lots. One thing I want to point out is that in our neighborhood, the lots go from north to south. This subdivision is going from east to west. If it would go if they would subdivide that and have the wetlands on one side and the property on one side, we would have what we have now. We would have a perfect lot for one home. It is suited for one home. So it doesn't have to be irregular. We can make it irregular, but we don't, it shouldn't be irregular. The applicant is asking for a 75% reduction in front, which is required by code, this is a huge request. We're going from 40 feet to 11 feet per lot. And when we do that, we're ending up doing is making two non-conforming lots. I think we've referenced this a couple times of what the next steps are, but the decision you make today will have so many unintended consequences as we go forward. And so that's why it's hard to put a lot of these things in what comes after this review today. The engineering reports, that's down the road. But once you say we're going to subdivide it in this non-conforming way, we set ourselves up for many obstacles in the future. We talked about rugged topography. I think what we said is it's not defined correctly in the future. We talked about rugged topography. I think what we said is it's not defined correctly. In the reports, we say it goes from varied to rugged. And then Eve mentioned the TNT Environmental Report about 31st, 22. That went to RC fields, which said the terrain of the project site consists of gentle to moderate slipping topography. Therefore, extremely rugged topography cannot be used as a special circumstance. So I think when we look at the carriage or the neighborhood, and if you just would look at my map one more time, I think it's a great job of just showing that north to south is what we have. This goes east to west. It's totally non-conforming. It doesn't make sense. It doesn't have to be that way. I just want to say that Windhill Hill, he's proven, he's reputable, he's tasteful. He can develop a property in a way that would conform to our neighborhood. He would be welcome to do so. But what he is asking for is dramatic changes in code on frontage and on the subdivision east of west. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Of course, I'm asking you to deny the request. Thank you for your time. Thank you. And of course I'm asking you to deny the request. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Broderick. Next speaker is Thomas Knight, followed by Christine Bynaker. I don't know if I got that right. David Bynaker, Margaret Zavarelli, John Zavarelli, Keith M.A., Mark Ruger, and then Kathy Buscar, turning for the album. Good morning. Good morning. I got a beat myself up by War of Hearing AIDS. And I get a lot of echoes since the problem. That comes with age. My name is Thomas Gregory Knight, and I'm the lucky man. That's my wife, I think you just spoke. I live at 6.2, you open. I call it Ground Zero because I live next door to the property. We are discussing this morning. We also share our property with all the wild animals that have claimed that lot for years and years. I don't know if you care about that, but I just put that out there. I see. I've ripped my wife, Colleen, for 32 years. Also, I've been a resident of Alexander for 52 years. I think I'm the senior person on the block in the neighborhood. Now for first things first, I want to thank all of you who did your job by coming out to see the property. We were discussing this morning. I appreciate it. Now in the matter of hand, the process that will be carried out in this chamber today will reflect a great day to see and feel our democracy in action to opposing facing off with diabolical differences, trying to resolve an issue which will have developmental impact on the future of neighborhood. Our democracy is being showcased, and this is a very good thing in my view. Now for a quick review. Over two years ago, the Mill Hill presented a plan to the neighborhood that included a call to act with four luxury homes. This proposal was presented in a manner that was very offensive. I thought our first in-person meeting was going to create a civil war. I thought those of you that were present know what I'm talking about. It broke out in the street almost. We were told our neighborhood was going to be improved and we should be grateful. It was it was display of excessive exuberance on the part of the applicant. You can see this whole conversation got off to the wrong foot. In the end, the applicant's request was withdrawn, and he did not purchase the property. The property went back on the market. Now, fast forward today. In 224 or 2024, Wimville Hill came back with a new plan. In my view, many of the previous problems still exist, wetlands, frontage, access, and safety to name a few. By now, the African is asking for a subdivision with extreme variance as being requested. However, it appears that the ordinance have leveraged for subjective interpretation and there seems to be many loose ends. When Mill Hill is approved proven and reputable building, and if he would use the correct lot for the one home for which it is suited, he would be more than welcome to build it in the neighborhood. Is that it? That's it. Can I say something else? You can do one sentence. One sentence? Okay. I'm wondering, is a neighborhood facing an opponent when no hill that no one has ever defeated in a contest and is rigged against us all? All right. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Knight. All right. Next speaker is Christine Bynaker, followed by David Bynaker, Margaret Zavarelli, John Zavarelli. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the Christine Bynaker, follow by David Bynaker, Margaret Zavarelli, John Zavarelli. Hello. My name is Christine Bynhacker. As of last month, my husband and I have lived at 715 up in place for 25 years. The property at 635 directly abuts ours. I'd like to focus my comments on looking at the proposed subdivision in terms of fairness and consistency, as well as asking out loud, how does the proposed subdivision fit in with the city's zoning ordinances and the character of the neighborhood. It really doesn't fit, which is why they applied for multiple variations to the city ordinance. Prior to this proposed development, the last time I had to interact with the Department of Planning and Zoning was in 2011 when I wanted to build an addition to my then 1000s square foot home. My husband and I hired a contractor, and we worked with Planning and Zoning for months to develop a set of plans that would meet city code, all the code. For us, the questions were mostly about square footage, Florida area ratio, and setback requirements. In the case of 635, the questions relate to the subdivision and they're about frontage, safety and access among the other issues that you've heard heard about already from my neighbors. You'll have to ask yourself, is it allowable to have a subdivision with only 11 square feet of linear feet of frontage per property on a super narrow lot that isn't aligned with any of the other homes on up in place. Please also ask yourself, would it be fair and consistent to allow these new lots as drawn? The plans show an orientation that seems weird and wackadoodle to me. The lot shape, the size, the orientation, all of that. These proposed new lots aren't compatible with the existing neighborhood character, aren't safe for those two proposed properties or their neighbors, and they have any number of other negative downstream consequences for the abutting neighbors and those neighbors that are both uphill and downhill from this property. I want you all to hold this owner, this contract purchaser, this potential developer to the same standards that I was held to, that everyone else is held to. I want fairness and consistency. When I renovated, I had to stay within the character in the character of the neighborhood and comply with all the ordinances. In this case, there is no substantial injustice. Their own reports say the terrain is only moderately rugged and the width of the street where it meets up in places too narrow to allow a subdivision. It doesn't have the 30 feet required or the 32 feet or the 50. That is the point for debate and I ask you to please reject the idea that lots don't have to come into compliance with city code when everyone else is required to meet it. Thanks. Fairness and consistency. Thank you. Miss Binehacker. Next speaker is David Binehacker, followed by Margaret Zavarelli, followed by John Zavarelli. In just an administrative update, we're going to finish this item and then we will take a brief lunch break before the vacation item. So just for those who are here for the next item, we're gonna finish this one and then take a brief lunch break. Good morning everyone. My name is David Bynhacker. I guess if Tom was a lucky man, I'm also the lucky man. I'm the husband of Christine who just spoke. I live at 15 up in place. We've been there since 1999. A number of reasons that we believe that I believe that this Subdivision should be rejected. I do want to speak to just one in the interest of time. Not having to reiterate all the other good points that my Neighbors have brought up. And this again has to do with the width. And I think the image is a great one that's on the screen. We're talking about it between street width and right of way. So clearly, I mean there's the discussion of the street at the top of the breakout is, it could be 32 feet wide, but then it narrows the street narrows whether it's paved or not. It narrows, it is visual. You could see the lines and where it's hitting the blue is narrower than the 32 feet. If the requirement in order to have a subdivision is that there is 32 feet, there is clearly not 32 feet as the street abuts 635 up in place as such. Clearly, this should not be allowed for a subdivision. I urge, I hope all this is not a way to do this. I hope that this is not a way to do this. So, I hope that this is not a way to do this. Clearly, this should not be allowed for a subdivision. I urge. I hope all of you see that clearly and reject this request. Thank you. Councillor Mabagli. Just a question for staff. of street or is it 32 feet of right of way? It's the terms are a little bit interchangeable. We were talking about right of way. We're not good at streets. Street and right of way are interchangeable. We're talking about pavement. Again, I think 15.8 feet is how wide the pavement is. The right of way is 32 feet wide there. The right of way is left street is 32 feet wide there. So ultimately, to use an example, the right of way is 32 feet wide there. The right of way slash street is 32 feet wide there. So ultimately, to use an example, because that's the way my mind works, if there were a street, and let's say that existed, that was 40 feet of paved street, but it turned out the city actually only owned 36 feet of right of way, it would be the right of way that would dictate any conversation about what's possible off of that street. It would not be, you know, what was paid before that term. It would be how much of it is owned by the city, 36 feet, 32 feet, or has right away by the city. Right. the zoning order is not street all rights away or streets and all streets are right away. It doesn't say it has to be improved to be considered a streets or right of way. So in this case, the right of way with is the determining factor. And I think we've, as we've learned when we've been doing our ting deployment around the city that right away in many cases extends into what people assume are private property and in their yard, we've had that challenge all across the city. So, all right, next speaker is Margaret Zavarelli, followed by John Zavarelli. Hello, good morning. Good morning. Thank you. My. Good morning. Good morning. Thank you. My name again is Margaret Savarelli. I'm a homeowner on Upland Place. Thank you very much for considering the viewpoints of the neighbors surrounding this neighbor surrounding this property. Your decision today will affect our quality of life and the values of our property in both the short and long term. I just wanted to focus on one small issue. And when I learned of what was happening, it alarmed me because as a my husband was active duty military and we were in a similar situation at previous property where there were some harmful effects to the neighbors of what was going on. I'd like to point out, I don't think we can overlook the impact of dividing this lot and adding in the potential of an additional structure on an already stressed drainage area. 635 Upland and its current state has the infrastructure to support one home or the redevelopment of the existing home. I believe dividing the property into two lots with two potential structures is ill-advised and will not negatively impact the surrounding properties. Grading and re-grading will impact the adjacent properties, including water runoff, stability of yards, damaged defenses, tree roots, use an enjoyment of the yards, the structural integrity of the surrounding properties and the potential for negative and negative consequences to their structures must be considered. The ground disturbance caused by the extensive construction to clear, excavate and prepare for construction, as well as actual construction can create vibration which is concerning given the age of the surrounding homes. The applicant is requesting the creation of lot 506 and they positioning it over directly over known existing stormwater inlet which is the runoff point for 14 areas, pardon me, 14 acres of drainage, which includes wetlands. I'd like to ask you to consider what are the consequences and plans for the grading plans, utility plans, stormwater management plans to support two lots. Should current neighbors be asked to potentially stuff or drainage and yard stability. If there is a drainage problem, how will equipment be able to access this area to fix any issues if the lot has two large structures built near the access point? I'm asking you to please oppose this. The potential developer was aware of all the issues on this property. They are asking the council to bend the rules for them and bend them big. They have perfectly acceptable options to develop this property as a single lot. There is not substantial injustice to the developer. However, there are long-term, deleterious effects to the citizens who already live here. Please oppose this application. This is disruptive to the current neighbors. Thank you very much. Thank you, Miss Everellie. Next speaker is John Zeverelli, followed by Keith M. Lay, Mark Bruger, and then Cathy Puscar, are they turning for the applicants? This was Everellie. Good morning. My name is John Zeverelli. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I have seen used and it is problematic in an already congested access challenged area. It blocked the entire area for the right reason when the fire truck went there. Let me go to what I'm really getting at here. I have been at homeowner in the city of Alexandria for 23 years. It's because I didn't have to stay here, right? We all have free will because I liked the way the city was designed. I liked the zoning. I liked the ordinances. I liked the way they were enforced. And I felt like it was a mechanism so that there was consistency. It was applied fairly and reasonably. And so I feel like these attributes are important because it does help maintain the city of Alexandria the way that I chose and clearly other folks. And I'm one of 86 people that oppose this subdivision in the area. And we don't support it for a few reasons. And I think it's contrary, sub-dividing this is contrary to the ordinance, these variances, and ultimately I don't believe are past the reasonable person test. These variances that are being applied are significant. They're not little ones. They're not little ones. And it feels like they're being applied on top of already granted variances, which happen to be grandfather. So they're like variances on top of variances. And I don't know that that gets considered, but it is causing this very confused situation where how lot width and all this narrowness, if you just drive there, it is really challenging. Access. Again, I live at the top of the spur where it intersects the loop on up and place. The street is already congested. If we expect additional services, is that normal to run another fire hydrant down there? Maybe, maybe not. I don't know if that's the expectation to approve this subdivision. Does that mandate that we now have to install another fire hydrant? I'm not sure. I'm not sure if that's reasonable. We expect cars that are parked on houses that don't have any provisions because when they were built, they have garages or driveways to be displaced up onto the upland place loop. That will completely conjust that area. It is very narrow. You can't have parking on both sides. It will restrict emergency services, utilities, and everybody else that uses that street to include the bus stop, which is only one block away. So in conclusion, I do not feel that this variance is reasonable and I don't believe it is fair and consistent with what everybody else has to do for the purposes of an up. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Avello. The next speaker is Keith M. Leigh, followed by Mark Fruger, followed by Kathy Puscar, the attorney for the applicant. Hello, good morning. Hi, good morning. Thank you, council. This is exciting for me. I've never done this. Welcome. Welcome. I went to T.C. Graduated ADA, and I pretty much stayed around, because this is such a beautiful city and this is part of it. Keep it beautiful. So my I wrote this speech and and I was already and everybody already said everything so I'm going to say something different. I'm going to wing it and I had bothered to memorize this but well what's the point. So basically the street all oh, it dead ends. Oh, sorry, I live, I have the joy living in the original Frings Farmhouse, 700 South Uteris. So I have a whole border along with this 635 up in place. So it's a lovely house, it's got that big lot. And if this goes forward, think about what happens to 700 South Butares. That's a double wide, right? Like, you could do a lot of stuff with that, too. It's the precedent, right? But first, I'm going to say, talk about what was passed to me, which is that the street always dead ended at 22 feet at the property. That property line is also angled. So mathematically, if you look at that, that's 22 feet. How do you get 32 feet? I just don't see that. So that's, I don't see 32 feet there. But I'm going to summarize basically, what is the precedent you're setting here? You're gonna get a lot of this, right? If you approve a variance for 11 foot, frontage, just look at that map. Could not, as someone else, who's touching the same property, also asked for advance? I mean, all town you have these frontages and it's beautiful and it's row houses. What's gonna happen to this neighborhood? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Muley. Next speaker is Mark Bruger. I think it's still morning time, so good morning, Mr. Mayor. Good morning, the council. Good morning. I want to begin by echoing a few comments that you've heard here today. First and foremost, the concerns of my neighbors are thanks to you, Mr. Mayor, members of the Council, for actually taking the time to come out and visit, and your careful consideration of this matter, and also my compliments to Wynn Millhill. You're not going to find a single person in this room and in this community that thinks that they do not do beautiful quality work, and I would welcome them to the point that they would have one residence in our neighborhood. And while I understand their perspective of substantial injustice as it comes to not being able to properly use and enjoy the development that they want, I want to focus for a second on the substantial injustice that would occur to people already in the neighborhood that own the house there. And specifically for my family, we are on that spur that we're talking about. That substandard street that is not wide enough right now. We are currently grandfathered into the fire code, which means that my two vehicles for my family can park on that side street as can my neighbors. And there's no other requirement necessary to bring emergency services down. But in our discussions with the Fire Marshall, if they were to build two properties, there's a subdivide the property issue and build two properties there, that would require, the grandfather clause would go out. And they would actually prohibit parking along that spur. And what John had mentioned before, what that would actually result in is that my two cars, my neighbors two cars, both families of which have young children will now be forced onto that congested main strip of Opland Place which has cars zipping through it in high traffic areas at fast speeds with my two young children. That is going to have a direct effect on all of the neighbors around that surrounding property. But more so than that, I want you to think about when I bought my house five years ago, we had that very quiet, very safe spur down the street. And when I bought it, it was my understanding as it has been for the last 75 years of my house that I could park in front of that. If I cannot park in front of my house, how does that not affect the enjoyment and the use of the property that I already have? And how does that not affect the valuation of my property, the property of my neighbors, and the property of everybody else in the community, if they want to sell sometime in the future. There are a lot of unresolved questions here today that have all been raised. There is the alley. There is the wetlands. There is other aspects of it, but parking is one of them. Parking is a serious deal in Alexandria, and we have not come to a proper determination on that. So, I know I don't want to repeat anything that everyone else has already said, but I just wanted to add that to your consideration as well, because if you do approve that subdivision, substantial injustice could occur for other people in the neighborhood already. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you, Mr. Brueger. Next speaker is Kathy Puscar, the attorney for the applicant. She's the final speaker on this item. No, no, no. Officer tackle her. Good morning. I figured the Kathy would be the first one. On the Vile. Good morning. For the record, my name is Kathy Puscar with Walsh Kluci. I am a T.C. Gride as well. 1985 and I stuck around because this is a great city. to be here today on behalf of Wynn Mill Hill to represent Mr. Dameron in his request for a subdivision with variation. There's a lot that's been said here today that I want to get to. I'll try and get it as part of my presentation, but I might circle back at the end. If we could pull up the presentation, I gave you all hard copies but shared it with the staff so the community could see it as well. The first page speaks to the variation and what's before you. It's the variation of a subdivision which is permitted by the ordinance as also stated in the city charter. And that is to allow for variations of the subdivision ordinance when you find that a strict adherence to the provisions would result to it in a substantial injustice. That the use and character of the resulting lots of parcels would not be inconsistent with the use provisions of the zone in which the property is situated and with the existing development in the immediate area. And one or more of the following circumstances exist. Extremely rugged topography. Both staff, the Planning Commission and us submit that it is extremely rugged topography by the very nature of Planning Commission and us submit that it is extremely rugged topography by the very nature of this lot where as everyone kept saying, it's far below South Uteris. That's what they testified. Far below South Uteris. There's also a gully that runs through this property that was created because of that situation. And the city actually went on to the property and installed improvements to help with the storm water. and there's a forested area So we do meet number one, but if we don't meet number one we meet number three Insefficient frontage on an existing street where the interior of the track can be served only by a street Substandard and width when not serving more than five lots now A lot of questions about it's 15.8, it's 22. What about the alley? What about this? I think people are conflating frontage with street width. We are not claiming that we own the alley. Our property, go to the next page, a but the street. And so if you look at the street width, our frontage is at that corner, the yellow. The street width is 32 feet. And I'm gonna pass this up because there's also been a lot of statements that have never been made before about how our subdivision survey is inaccurate. I'm gonna hand up, I only have one with me. You guys can pass it down the dius. It has a surveyor certificate on it by our civil engineers. This was reviewed by the city as part of the preliminary plat submission. It will be reviewed again when we file our final plat. But let me make sure you all understand that the definition of a street pursuant to the city's zoning were in its section 2-196. The definition of a street is a public right of way dedicated or otherwise acquired for general public access to private properties and other streets, including but not limited to use for utilities, walks, and vehicular traffic. So the width of the pavement has nothing to do with the substandard width of Upland Place, which is substandard. So I'm going to pass this up. You can look at our surveyor's seal. You can also look at on page two where he says, up in place, formerly known as Mason Place, 32 feet of right away. So hopefully that'll put those issues to bed. Once again, staff has reviewed that and they agree with us. These variations of the subdivision ordinance are limited to five if we could go back to the previous slide, are limited to five special circumstances. Not everyone can just walk in and ask for a variation of a subdivision. You have to meet one or more. And there's been argument as to whether this is rugged topography or not. We think it is, they think it isn't, doesn't matter. We clearly meet number three, insufficient frontage on an existing street where the interior of track can only be served by the street substandard and width when not serving more than five lots. And there's also been a lot of conversation about this definition of substantial injustice and staff in the Planning Commission tried years ago to kind of, cause it's a hard one, right? It's a balancing one, right? It's a balancing act, but I'll read to you from the staff report in 2010 when this definition was added. It says the city has long had a mechanism for allowing flexibility in the subdivision approval given the variation provisions adopted as part of the subdivision regulations in 1940. The standard requires a balancing between the harm to the applicant in terms of limitation on the use and development of the property on the one hand and the benefit to the community of zoning compliance on the other. In the variation context, the result of the three considerations is tannemount to balancing of planning standards with zoning. If the zoning rules are not met, but planning considerations are, staff will typically recommend in favor of the variation. And so that was how they described it back in 2010. They cited a number of variation cases, none of which are exactly on point, but they were cases of special, unusual circumstances like this one, where you could not subdivide by right, but you could go through this process for a variation because you meet a very specific criteria through which that variation is allowed. Next slide. The lot, as it's, I hear a lot about, oh, consistency with the neighborhood and two lots is not going to be consistent with the neighborhood. Look at this lot. It's 41,573 square feet. It is more inconsistent and an existing configuration than the proposed configuration. And I think the community has shown their hand a little bit when they talk about what we just want on. We just want one. You heard someone else say, this green space is utilized by our community. You heard others say, this went off the market and then went back on the market. The neighbors could have purchased this property at any time over a number of years. They knew it was on the market. They didn't offer to purchase it until Mr. Dameron had it under contract. And once he had entered a contract, it was, well, can we buy it? We'll buy it. They had the opportunity to buy it, they didn't. And they can't interfere with the rights to apply for a subdivision and ask for a variation that the ordinance is set up to allow. And there's this discussion about substantial injustice means if you can build anything, there's not a substantial injustice. You can build one house, therefore there's no substantial injustice. The very fact that we're talking about a subdivision means that that cannot be the judgment. If I could build anything, means there's not a substantial injustice, then you would never approve a subdivision under this provision of the ordinance because it necessarily envisions two lots. So a substantial injustice, the unreasonable burden, has to be more than is there just something you can build anywhere on the lot? It's not. It's looking at the purpose of the zoning regulations for the frontage requirements. It's looking at the width requirements and it's looking at the purpose of the zoning regulations for the frontage requirements, it's looking at the width requirements and it's looking at the line and the characteristics of this lot. So go to the next slide please, where we have the subdivision. Here you see the subdivision and you see the line that everyone is referencing where we have to change the subdivision line to meet the right of way, to have access to the property. If you envision the line on the right as a street, if that were a street, the frontage is over, the property line is over 127 feet. If that were a street, I could take my line that I'm showing there in the middle of those lots and I would take it straight out and I would meet the subdivision requirements just like my neighbors. Unfortunately, that's not the circumstance we find ourselves in because we're on a substandard correct that there's something wrong with the survey, which there isn't, we only require 40 feet of frontage for a lot, and we have over 60 feet of frontage for each of these lots if you could imagine a street being at the front of this lot. Next. Now we have to look at the lots in the context where we find them with the subdivision. They've made a lot of noise about the fact that these these lots are oriented different than the other lots in the Frank subdivision. I ask you to look at the bottom cleaver of this exhibit below and next to my blue outline. What do you see? Houses that are oriented east-west and houses that are oriented north south. That is the configuration of a typical block where lots face different directions by the necessity of the block. If you look at the lots we're creating, they're 22,035 square feet and 19,538 square feet. The house, they are allow a point 4, 5 FAR. They are similar in size at the other lots in the Frank subdivision. They are similar in width and depth as to the other lots in the Frank subdivision except for the point at which we have to turn the line in order to provide access to the lot. And once again, these lots being created by the subdivision are more consistent with the community than the lot as it sits today at 41,000 square feet. Let's go to the next page. I'm glad someone brought up subdivisions because what you're saying to me is there are two other lots in the Frank subdivision that could subdivide. And the neighbor's main argument has always been that they don't want two houses they want one. We don't want two we want one. We love Mike Dameron if he did one, we'd love him. What would happen if these neighbors came in to subdivide their property under the subdivision ordinance, which they are able to meet because they don't have the unusual circumstance of not having enough frontage the way the original lot was created. Would the neighbors be saying no, we don't want two houses, we want one? The answer to that question should be no, because there's such things as property rights. And in the same vein that you would allow those lots that meet the requirements to subdivide, you should allow this lot which needs a variation because of the location of the existing street should be yes. And I will also remind you that I think Ms. Bagley asked about it at the very beginning of the hearing. We still have to meet the setback requirements. So if we have an adequate width, if we have an adequate front that does not impact the size of the house we could build. Ms. Bianca referenced an addition to her home that we have to meet the same setbacks that they met. We will have to meet the same height, the same FAR that they had to meet. But if this isn't enough for you, let's go to the next slide. Where we've identified the same standards. We will have to meet the same setbacks that they met. We will have to meet the same height, the same FAR that they had to meet. But if this isn't enough for you, let's go to the next slide, where we've identified additional sub-divideable lots in the neighborhood. Those are property rights that people have when they buy property that has zoning that permits the subdivision. And once again, yes, we're asking for a variation. But if you can't ever meet the requirement of the variation if one house is enough, then that provision would not exist in the zoning ordinance. So there are other lots in this neighborhood that are also subdividable. And arguably, this owner should be treated the same. So I know we're not talking about houses here today, but there certainly has been a lot of concentration and focus on it. So I'm going to focus on it for a minute as well. As the neighbors mentioned, Mr. Dameron is a very good builder who lives locally in the city, raising his family here and does a really quality job. Let's look at the next page. These are similar examples to what he's like would like to build here. These are in Rosemont. He also has a number of homes in Del Rey, Northridge, and now, hopefully, this neighborhood. Next. We're not supposed to be talking about the houses, but I'm gonna because everyone has made such a big deal about it. This is how he proposes to locate these houses on this lot. Let me be clear, Mr. Dameron wants to build two homes. That's what he wants to build. He's willing to state that on the record today. And in fact, these are the footprints of the homes he wants to build. One house on lap 505 is 2892 square feet. One house on the other lot is 3336 square feet. There are other houses in the neighborhood that are similarly sized to the house that they are proposing to build. In fact, the broader ex-very right next door are 2698 square feet. So it's less than 200 square feet difference between them and what Mike is proposing to build. And their FAR does not include their garage because they built their house prior to the current regulations which would include the attached garage in the calculation of the floor area. I could cite you a number of other houses in the area that are similarly sized. But the interesting thing is when you start looking at FAR, everybody that's in an R5 zone has the right to build a .45 FAR. The two lots that I just mentioned in the houses that Mr. Damell wants to put on them are a .13 FAR and a .17 FAR. Ms. McGill's house is a .27 FAR based on the real estate assessment records. Miss Anderson has a .36 FAR. Mr. Calish, .25, the Argus 0.17, which is the same as what we have, the Brodericks 0.45, the Broger's 0.33. So if there is a discussion about the size and scale and fairness of what we're trying to build, we are actually building less relative to the size of the lot than many of our neighbors. And I would point out that when I'm speaking about the Anderson's and the Binaikers and anyone who lives on the upland place who went to court to buy that 11 foot alley, my information is based on the real estate assessment records. And as far as I can tell, looking at that map and the tax map, the city has not yet included the 62 by 11 square foot addition of that alley that they earned the rights to last summer, which equates to 682 square feet of land and 306 square feet of development. So I would suggest that the city take a look at that before the next real estate assessment comes out. That addition of that land to their property allows them to build even more than what I found in the real estate assessments today. So they're getting the benefit of consolidating land to make bigger houses and yet they're denying us the ability to build two houses by subdividing the lot. So hopefully that'll get remedied in the real estate assessment. The side yard is the side yard regardless of whether we have one house or two. That upland place frontage is our front yard. So the side yard is the side yard no matter what. It is a one to three ratio with a minimum of seven feet. We're allowed 30 feet in height and a .45 FAR. I've been asked by some to show kind of the relationship of this house that we're proposing on lot 506 to the neighbors. And so we did that. Once again, even though we're not required to, so if we go the next slide. As you can see, this is the relationship of this house to the closest house along Upland Place. It's 34 feet from the house to this house. And then from the one story porch to the rear to Miss Anderson's house is 31.2 feet. That relationship is actually greater than the relationship of many, many houses you see in Alexandria where you have corner lots inside yard spacing rear yards. But let's look right in the neighborhood. How about across the street from South Uterres and across the street from up in place? Let's go to the next slide. And if you look at this slide, you'll see on the opposite corner, side yard facing a rear yard, a side yard facing a rear yard. Oh, another side yard facing a rear yard. And that happens over and over and over. And if you look at the relationship of those houses and the proximity of them to each other, you will see that they are closer than ours is proposed to be. They meet the requirements I assume when they were built, but the conversation about how close these are gonna be and side yards and rear yards, it's just a bunch of noise. But I'll show you pictures just to be sure. Next. So you can see here you have a house that sits higher than another house. Rear yard to side yard. You have another house that's a two story house next to a one story house side yard to rear yard. And it goes on and I could find you many more throughout the city. There are also many instances of the city of properties that have shared access. Now there's also been a lot of comments by the community. I think Ms. Anderson said there are options. Ms. Brotterk said there are options. I think maybe the Zeverelli said there are options and you're right there are options. Mike does not want to take advantage of the options. He wants to build two houses with, yes, a variation of the subdivision ordinance, which you are authorized to make in which the Planning Commission supported and staff supported. But I'm gonna show you the difference between what Mr. Dameron wants to build and what the option is. So next, here are the two houses that Mr. Dameron would like to build. There were comments about stormwater actually building two houses. We have stricter requirements under the city ordinance than if we built one. We are required to maintain the wetland and the buffer to the wetland. But this is what two houses would look like. As you all know, you recently passed zoning for housing, which would allow us to build four units on that property. And so let's go to the next slide. This is four units on that property. We can do this by right. We will keep the footprint. We have to keep at least 50% of the footprint of the existing house. And we can do an addition to create four units under zoning for housing. This is not what Mr. Dameron wants to build, but he's being backed into a corner by neighbors who want to be able to take full advantage of their property rights, but don't want him to have that same ability to do so. There was a comment about the fire hydrant and the fire we actually are providing another fire hydrant With this proposal this this subdivision has been reviewed and we can go to the next page This subdivision has been reviewed by the fire marshal and There is adequate fire access. They have asked us to add a fire hydrant at the end of the street, which will be part of the approval of the homes that go on the lot. Property values. I've never seen a property value go down by new construction in this city. We have construction in Del Rey. We have construction all over this city. New houses on new lots, additions to buildings like the Bineck or Zome. That is what we all look for when we buy our properties. And we look at our property rights, our zoning rights, they allow us to build. And the city wants us to build. Zoning for housing speaks to wanting us to be able to build. What we are requesting here is not as wildly different as the neighbors would like to have you believe. If you look once again at the houses at the other end on the left, they face the same direction we're facing. Because when you have a block, if that were a street on the frontage of us, nobody would be questioning it. Yes, we have an unusual circumstance. Yes, we have a 41,583 square foot lot that sits uniquely unlike the neighbors in the size of it. And by actually subdividing it, we are making it more similar to the neighbors. And as I submit to you, as our neighbors around us and in our subdivision are allowed to develop at a .45 FAR, are allowed to subdivide their lots. The same relief should be afforded to us in this particular situation. The lot has been this way. It was not, we are not creating the issue, the issue existed already. The homes that Mr. Dameron are proposing to build fit within the neighborhood in size, scale, height. And we would request your support of the staff and of the Planning Commission, invoting to support the variation to allow two homes. Thank you. Okay, questions from Ms. Pusscar, Ms. Councilman Ragley, then Vice Mayor Jackson. Thank you. Thank you for the presentation and the slides as well. Did I hear you correctly that there will be a fire hydrant added if the subdivision is allowed? Correct, that is what Ray Overcott, who is the, I don't know what his official title is, There will be a fire hydrant added if the subdivision is allowed. Correct. That is what Ray overcott, who is the, I don't know what his official title is, but he is the person who tells us what we need to do for fire access. If the subdivision isn't allowed, will there be a fire hydrant needed? No. Even if the, uh, that, oh, I don't know. We might have to add it anyway, because if my cast to result to doing the fourplex, I would imagine that Ray might want it anyway. Okay. And recognizing it's not essential for part of the analysis today, but I did want to clear sort of factual record on that. Yeah, and if I can, we're going to go through a lot of questions here. I want to try to discipline us on the things that are valid to be part of this consideration and are not. And I think you correctly noted that that was, that was not something. So, okay, keep going. Yeah. Okay, can we, well then I'm gonna, I was gonna, I won't ask this question then. I didn't mean to, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you're right. We differentiate as we go to the conversation. We'll flip back quickly to the 5.05 and 5.06 houses are shown. And he's at it. Okay. So, um, Wal-Mispuscar is here, but I'm actually going to ask this question to staff. And then if Ms. Puscar has a comment, she can, um, if, um, if the subdivision isn't granted, could the house envisioned as 506, the one closer to Upland and Southview be built at that scale and in that location? They, oh. Yes. Do we agree? I would say as long as we keep 50% of the footprint of the existing house, we could build a house that encompasses that same footprint. If that makes sense. The house could be bigger than it is today. Could have the same profile to the neighbors, but it would be bigger because it would be connected to the existing house. I know. So no fair. OK. OK. Just to go back to the beginning then, the one point that is sort of relevant that I think gets at the frontage question and I want to be sure that I heard you clearly. There have been questions raised today about the alley and it's your position today and you're conceding that there's no ownership interest in the alley being claimed as relevant to this application. Correct. My client is not claiming any ownership of the alley. I just know that the right of way is 32 feet. But that's at the intersection of the right of way with this property, which the alley is beyond. So. Okay. I just wanted to be sure that that wasn't a point of disagreement, I guess, amongst the parties and staff, that the ownership of the alley isn't relevant to the application being made for this subdivision. Sam's nodding. That's right. Yep. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor McBagley. Vice-President Jackson. Thank you. I may have missed it, but if you all could remind me, did your client actually meet with the Taylor Run Civic Association and the residents? Yes, we met multiple times on site. Thank you very much. Other question of Ms. Pascar before we close the testimony. Emotion by Councilman McPike to close the public hearings. Second, second by Councilman Chapman. Any further discussion on closing the public hearing? Hearing none. All is in favor. Please invite us to say an aye. Aye. All opposed? Say nay. The aye's have it. The public hearing is closed. That's the moment of play. All right. I figured you were wanting to move the conversation forward. All right. Other questions now for our staff. Councilman Chapman. So for staff, a couple of things. Let me start in. Under Section 217-13 for the variations. As we get into kind of discussing the reasons why we can give variations, how does staff see those three different things playing together. Do they, do you have to have only one of them? Do you have to have two? And then you're able to get to the third. How do you guys see that working? So council has to find that a substantial injustice exists that has to happen no matter what. That's always every time. The then lists, it has the subdivision would be in character with the use, it would the subdivision would be in character with the use, it would allow uses that would be consistent with the zones used permission. So you could have a house that would comply with the requirements. That's another always thing. The third always thing is that the lots would be, the development would be in character with a neighborhood or consistent with the neighborhood. And that's another always thing. The fourth thing is one of the special circumstances that we've talked about a couple times. Rugged to Prography being one of them. There's a couple others. The insufficient frontage one. The council only needs to find that one of those exists. And that's it. That's basically it. And so I know, and I know this happened, I guess, at Planning Commission with the commissioners, the conversation about substantial injustice. What that means to staff, what that means of planning commission, I guess, assuming up here, what that means to council, to be able to unlock the other items to go ahead and move forward with the variation. And so if there is disagreement, not understanding, or a difference of opinion around what substantial injustices you cannot unlock the arrest of that to grant the variation. Is that correct? I'm going to pull this up real quick and I'm here, Carl. It's starting. Yeah, I'm happy to jump in. I think if a majority of council members find that a substantial injustice does not exist, then the result I think would be that you would vote to not support this subdivision. Thank you. I'll hold off questions for now. Any other questions, Councilman Gaskins? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I think my questions kind of align with where Council Member Chapman was going. I hear correctly at the end of the day, substantial injustice is the one thing that has to always exist, right? Right. That's the one we have to be clear on. And I know there's been some back and forth as to whether or not it's not, it's to find clearly or, for example, big US, but in the staff report, there is a definition that is written around the unreasonable burden, the use and enjoyment of the property. That's the definition. Right, yeah, it's also on the screen now, too. Yep. It's not cool. Okay, so to me, it seems like that's not a question of whether or not that's the fine, that's really clear. I just want to make sure I'm tracking that at the end of the day, the only place we're having discussion on is how we define a burden, how we define a use, and how we define an enjoyment. Correct? That sounds right to me. Yep. And then back to the definition. There's more to the definition. That's correct. No. Sorry. There's more to them. Well, that's what I'm trying to. I want to make sure, because the vote to me, if I understand this correctly, if we don't have this clear, we don't get to, did number one exist, number two existed? I think, yeah, highlighted on the screen is the second part, which does say that you're balancing the objectives of the subdivision requirements with what we're characterizing as the planning principles, but also described as the use and enjoyment of the property. And another way of thinking of it is the requirement to have, for example, a standard lot frontage. So important that it overwhelms the benefits of developing these, this parcel as two lots. I guess as part of that then help me understand because it did also come up in the Planning Commission discussion. This piece about options and options of what you can cannot have in the property. I guess what I'm looking for and I don't know if staff can give this guidance. Maybe this is the policy decision between the council but how do we factor in options as to whether or not that plays into defining this balancing act and I mean even from the initial thing that Ms. Puscar read she talked about flexibility to me flexibility is you have the options to do different things I'm trying to make sure I understand the intent of this definition but also the things I can weigh in considering it. Councillor Wilhelm and Gaskin, Christina Zeckner Brown from the City Attorney's Office. So the variation standard is billed on the premise that you're considering the subdivision request. And so what you're balancing is the purpose of the lot frontage and lot width requirements against the burden on the person who's asking for a subdivision. So you're weighing those two things against each other as far as what you're deciding if a substantial injustice exists. If one is greater than the other, if the purpose of the land use provisions is greater than the burden on the landowner than you would say a substantial injustice does not exist. Okay. And so even in that case though, because I'm, it's tricky because I know we're not supposed to factor in other things but they've been raised multiple times in this conversation with the other potential options or so forth that exist on the property. There's still a frontage requirement. There's still a whiff requirement. There are still these things that have to be met and would still come up regardless of what are the things that they're trying to pursue. That's correct, but there wouldn't be a subdivision, so you wouldn't be weighing the factors of subdivision criteria which you are doing here because the request is to divide it into two lots. Okay, I might have a follow-up question, but I think you can get at, I mean, we have a funky lot. It just is what it is. There are all these different pieces. Even in the staff report, it talks about, I'm sorry. I was saying, even in the staff report, there are a number of lines where it says here's what you would be able to do but for the conditions on this lot. And so I'm trying to reconcile the definition that we do have to work with as well as those other but for conditions that exist on the property. I might have another question but I'm- Councillor M. Baglan. Can I realize this is a quite on the fly question for staff and maybe legal counsel but when did this variation language 11 17 13 get Incorporated into our code into our zoning process? Do we know that? From staff what they have researched we think around the 1960s, but from what Ms. Puscar said, there was a staff report that she was reading from the subdivision standards came in in 1940. So somewhere in 1940s to 1960s, but there was the clarification and the 2010s. Okay, and what's driving that question and is also contributing to my analysis for everybody listening and why I'm asking that is several of the speakers said things like I chose this city because of the way it was laid out, because of the neighborhood, because of the zoning ordinances. And I'm not trying to be overly cute. This has been a part of our zoning plan for arguably somewhere between the 40s and the 60s, but this variation element, what I was trying to learn by the question is, is this a new option that we've recently added or changed or revised? And what I'm hearing is that the foresight with regard to variations has existed in our code for 40, 50 years is what I'm hearing. And I appreciate that. And then I really liked the way that my colleague here turned this process into like a one chronological process almost. You know, you can't do one without the other. And so acknowledging that, I then do just want to quickly, if substantial injustice is satisfied, just if we accept that, like the council agrees on that, you know, that premise is satisfied, that strict adherence would result in substantial injustice, then we move through use and character and does it satisfy one of the five potential criteria. And then with regard to the criteria, we only need to find one of them met. So if we set aside rugged topography entirely, recognizing there's points of view on that, we can satisfy another. Okay. And the middle ground, use and character of the resulting lots or partials would not be inconsistent. That analysis, and I'm trying to stay within the legal lane, that analysis is where Mr. Shelby has talked to us about lot size, lot orientation, lot shape. Those are the three elements that sort of speak to use and character of the resulting lots. Is that a fair statement? Yes, and I think did you say orientation? Thank you. I meant to. Okay. All right. Well, thank you. I just wanted to be sure I understood how we meet each element and it would it in one order. Other questions of staff. So can I ask a question to Ms. Brown again? So I just want to, I want to, I knew Councillor Mourbagli was trying to move us along that decision tree and I want to move us back all in that decision tree in a few more seconds. And talk a little bit about that balancing act again. So in section B, subject to B, as you use in this section, substantial injustice is strict adherence. Strict application of the ordinance would connect an unreasonable burden on the development, use of enjoyment, et cetera, et cetera. So talking about that balancing act in this case between the street frontage, which they're requesting variation on and, it basically whether that presents a substantial justice does the fact that the Existing lot already does not meet that is that alone enough to to get you there In that balancing act or I mean obviously this is a subjective decision on the part of the council as we balance that but if the existing lot does not have the requisite street funnage so already doesn't get there so clearly today that is unimportant, if you will, that it doesn't meet the street front edge. Does that alone allow you to say, well, okay, it's clearly not that important. So there's not a substantial injustice there. That can be factored in. The fact that it is already insufficient under zoning purposes, you know, it is, you would be looking at the purpose of the lot frontage, which is access. And so if you're saying you would be saying, it's existed for one, I don't believe that its existence for two insufficient, as insufficient frontage would be, would be any more detrimental. Does that make sense? I think that makes sense. Yeah, no, I'm just trying to make sure I understand how y'all are suggesting that we approach that balancing act. Other questions for our staff? Councilman Chapman. Under the definition of the substantial and desks, as we talk about our own reasonable burden, there's definitely going to be burdens on different properties depending on the entire size and all of those things but The staff have a definition of what's unreasonable Well, I think you know that this is being Part of the reason why it's in the ordinance for under a variation or under an exemption is that it is up to some judgment. However, I think where I always go back to is whether or not the criteria that this proposed subdivision is not meeting is so important that it outweighs what otherwise might be a two lots that we would say fine. That's what goes through my Any other questions or a motion? Or will I just sit here? That's an option too. That's going to get you any questions? No. All right. I'm going to go ahead and put a motion on the floor in the interest of spurring a conversation. And we'll see where it goes and where it takes us. Before I do that, I do want to, since I'm the one stepping up to do it, I want to take a moment to, I do want to thank all of the neighbors who met with me and my colleagues who spoke to, who sent emails in and who spoke today. I want to make special note that at no point did anyone imply anyone's motives here were being guided by anything other than our best efforts to understand the law and the zoning code. And I genuinely appreciate that for what it's worth. Not having any clue how this is going to play out today. I do just want to express that while the conversations and the meetings and some of the testimony today has been passionate and clearly emotional, it has been respectful. And I really think, Mr. Knight, I think made the comment about like democracy and action. And I appreciate that because you all did a really, you know, you made Alexandria look good, I think today, in this dialogue and in this interaction. So just wanted to lay that out there. Okay. So having read all these reports and met with all of you and listened to the testimony today, I'm going to walk through briefly where my analysis, as we've all laid it out, so that my colleagues understand, I guess, the basis for my motion. The strict adherence to the lot and with zoning ordinance to this parcel, to me, weighing the reasons for those provisions and those specific numbers and whether or not they are served presently against the use and enjoyment of particular parcel, given its size, location, options, neighborhood. I find it would create an injustice to the applicant to not be able to pursue a subdivision under the available variation, given the excessive size placement and neighborhood quality that exists here. So that moves me to part two, which is whether the use and character of the resulting lots would not be inconsistent with the use provisions of the zone and within the property is situated. For me, the resulting subdivided lots, understanding there's a different opinion here, but actually are look a lot more like their neighbors than do the current really large, you know, three times as large, lot, it's long and deep, similar to other lots, and it is proposed to be used in exactly the same manner essentially as the lots around it. It's being proposed to be used for single-family zoning application, which is similar with the use provisions of the zone in which the property is situated. And that gets me to the third part, which is a special criteria exists. And I believe setting aside for me whether or not one is satisfied, three is satisfied. And so recognizing as a balancing test here, each of us will make that balance separately. I move that we, and I don't have to reference planning because this is de novo. So I move that the subdivision application variation is granted. Is that language approved? Okay. There's a motion by Councilmember Bagley. Is there a second? I'll second the motion. Seconded by Councilman McPike. Further discussion on the motion. Councilwoman Gaskins, your name is Councilman Chapman. Thank you Mr. Mayor. Thank you to my colleagues for outlining your thinking on this issue and how you came to your conclusion. I think my read draws me to a different conclusion, which is fine, and I think this is part of maybe what Commissioner Brown was getting at, where there's more work to be done to really define what this looks like because the reality is is our city changes. This is not the last time we're probably going to see a case like this. I think what I am holding with holding is the question that Miss Brown presented to us, which is, you know, is the criteria so important to us. And I think when I look at in the RFI zone, you have the 40-foot frontage requirement. You have a lot that's already less than that at 22. And then you're further subdividing it to 11. That's playing out in my mind. You also have the condition where the width is also deficient, which because of what we have, because of the existing site conditions, the wetland, the buffer and all these things, you're going to get a irregular lie. I think that's the official words that were laid here that I think raises questions for me about how we orderly divide up property and our city. That criteria feels really important to me. And so when I make that balancing out of it or when I make that weighing, it feels that it is important enough to apply, that I do not think it creates an unreasonable burden on The developer here. So I will be voting a different way But I also wanted to make my thinking transparent to you to my colleagues and everyone else as well Thank you councilman gaskin councilman chattin. Yeah, I apologize to my colleague for not bringing this question earlier I was just trying to find it. In 1117, 10 in talking about the subdivision requirements. It talks about substantially the same character. And one of the things that is restrictions. Do we have additional lots in this area with a similar restriction on kind of some of the use? Are there portions of the neighborhood that I might not be aware of that have a restriction because they can't develop on all of their property? Or all of their property within the regular policies that we already have? You know, you talk about the wetland, or you talk about the wetlands, OK? I'm not familiar with other wetlands that impact lots in the city of New York. Do we have them? Because to me, if that's not the case, that's one of the other things that sets this particular property apart from others in the neighborhood. So we don't have surveys of the other properties. But there is the buffer that surrounds the wetland is 50 feet and some of that goes go on to the properties on Upland place, but that is not part of the original subdivision So it's not it's outside the you can consider it because the ordinance allows you to but it it wants you to focus on the original subdivision I think also restrictions here means things that were either private agreements or things that the approving body put on the subdivision when it was originally subdivided. And a lot of times that looks like some ugly things like deed restrictions of who can live there, but it's also things like building restriction lines that are not city and forest, but that are agreed to privately and recorded with the deed. Thank you. Councillor Mournberger. I see my colleague wants to speak. I just, yeah, I guess since we're sort of in sort of an open dialogue now on the pending motion, one thing I didn't say in sort of initially making the motion is, I also found it compelling today, and I'm responding a little bit to my colleagues current analysis. One of the things that spoke to me was, was several of the people acknowledged, there's been no negative consequences of the frontage to date as it's currently laid out. And I wrote that sort of in quotes. There were several people who sort of commented on, it's working well as it is. And so again, recognizing the balancing, but that informed my visits to the property, as well as listening to the testimony, was that the way this was created in 33 and has sort of existed for the 75, 80 years that we've talked about it. And then we crafted our frontage rules with a certain number that some level was arbitrary but was informed by best practices, has not proven over the 75 years of the parcel or many of you who spoke to your decades, living in the neighborhood, nobody came up and gave us an example where a dangerous thing had happened, you know, because of this substandard frontage, where a dangerous circumstance had existed, or I was living here when, you know, because of the width of the street X happened. And I'm not faulting anybody, but I was listening for that kind of impact that the the lessened frontage has having at present and What I heard on the other hand was more confirmation that you know, it's currently you know working well that parcel currently works well And so ultimately when I thought about the purpose of our fronting requirement and was it being served, I did feel like some of the testimony gave me some comfort that the purpose was being upheld even through this insufficient frontage that currently exists. And so not to, I'm not trying to belabor the point, but that was a piece that I, you know, that informed, I guess, my balancing of factors. And it's in, the reference to up and sort of that development has sprung up all around it. That really, I want to be conscious not to penalize the last builder. If, again, when we're talking about balancing of interests, I'm conscious that, you know, I don't, in my balancing of the zoning code versus the use and enjoyment that the person who goes last is held to a slightly different standard because they went last. Then they might have been if they'd gone first. If they had, let's say gone in, if they'd done this in 1950 or 1960 or 1970 before some of the other homes around it had come up. So my balancing and to make clear to the mayor's point earlier, and that I'm not sort of trying to think about the particular house and shape and color and size, is coming back to these development rights, these property rights, and the order in which everybody gained them, and the laws that existed when they gained them. So I may not, you know, I'm not, you know, I may even convince anybody on this, but this is the testimony I'm not, you know, I may not even convince anybody on this, but this is the testimony I'm hearing and the chronological facts that I am trying to inform 1713B. Other Councilman Pike. No, thank you. This is a, I'm, I Seconded my colleagues' motion here. This was a case that I struggled with a lot over the last several months. I've met with the neighbors many times. I've been to the site and I do share, some of the, when he comes to the building in placement, some of the questions I actually was, I think the member of council asked you to show me how is this going to relate? But I also recognize that's not what we're discussing here. What we're discussing here is is the lot. We're discussing the subdivision and when I look at the criteria that I legally have to base that decision on. I find that my thinking follows very much a similar path to council member baglies. I recognize that we do have lots in this area that face different directions. We have some that go east west, some that go north south. We see that commonly. We have lots that are R5 lots, and we are taking this, if this passes, taking this to being closer to an R5 lot, just sort of in its general scope and scale. And the frontage is obviously the insufficient frontage is the question that a lot of us came back to. And I know that we do have places in the city where what you have here is 11 feet of frontage, 22 feet of frontage that'll be split 11 feet on a private drive that'll go to multiple homes. We've done that in other parts of the city before where you have very small, technically, very small frontages that in other parts of the city before, where you have very small, technically very small frontages that in a line together form the access point to collection of homes, and we know that that does work. So that all informs my question of, am I thinking on the real question, which is the substantial injustice? And whether the fact that you could build anything, you could actually build something that would be much more impactful on the neighborhood in terms of the number of cars that would likely be there and the size of a building, the size of a permeable surface, without the subdivision. But simply the fact that you can build does not mean that you're avoiding the injustice, not allowing this subdivision, which otherwise does create two houses that I think that could be in more reasonable scale with the neighborhood to lots that, while perpendicular, do form a more reasonable shape. So I do think that there's an injustice there that we would be creating if we did not grant this subdivision. So I feel by the standards that we are required to use to consider this subdivision request compelled to support the motion that my colleague has made and I will be voting in accordance with that. Other thoughts? Councilman Gasquins, will you try anything? No, Vice Mayor Jackson, go for it. Thank you. This was no softball decision, obviously. We've been discussing this now for about two two and a half hours here alone. I too am going to go in another direction in terms of how I'll vote for this. I believe, and we've discussed some things that we cannot base our opinions on. However, it is also hard to put those things aside. When you have, you know, again, the civic association here making very good points, other neighbors making very good points, bringing out some other, you know, whether it's a discrepancy or not, we don't know. We won't know until building code and permitting is done. But I also have great concerns about where does this stop? If we start with a precedence for giving this particular subdivision air when it doesn't really need to be divided, that causes me concern. So I just wanted to put that on the record as to why I will not be voting with Councilwoman Bagley's decision. Thank you. Okay. Any other thoughts? Let me just offer my perspective. You know, I agree with all my colleagues that this one is a difficult one and it puts Council in a different spot than we normally are. This is not purely a ministerial act, but also not purely a kind of subjective policy decision for us, although this is kind of the results of policy that we have made. I think as Commissioner Lyle said in her presentation on behalf of the commission, and I think the commission struggled with this a little bit too, that we're dealing with some language presentation on behalf of the commission. And I think the commission's traveled with this a little bit too, that we're dealing with some language that is probably more of a term of art than precise language in the code. And I think if given some of the policy decisions we've made, most notably what we did last year, as it relates to zoning. And they were going to need to make clarifications in our code language to avoid these kinds of discussions, because quite honestly, when the city council is considering whether one house or two houses can be constructed. That's a failure. That's a failure of the process. The council, the policy bodies should not be in this mode too often. And increasingly we will be. I think everyone needs to acknowledge that the lots that are out there around the city that are coming forward now that are suddenly economically viable are because we have incredibly low supply and very very high value of land and suddenly lots that were never buildable never never kind of surmountable for a landowner to try to develop are suddenly there and so we're going to see a lot more of this not not less of this as we go forward and and I think making sure that we have clarity for our staff, making sure that we have clarity for landowners on kind of what is buildable and what is not, is kind of how we are going to be okay with adjusting lines, I think is really, really critical. So I also support the motion. the lines I think is really, really critical. So I, you know, I'll support the motion. I'm comfortable supporting the motion. It does look like the motion's gonna fail. But I think the bigger issue that we're gonna have to sort through here is how we handle this going forward. Because I think otherwise we're going to be in this situation a lot. And I don't think the way this decision gets made is good from a government perspective. Because it promotes the opportunity for a lot of inconsistencies around the city. And I think certainly either way we went on this one, you know, you could probably make an argument of inconsistency with various other decisions that have been made around the city over the years. And I think that speaks to kind of a failure in how we've interpreted this code going forward. And I think it speaks to some of the subjectiveness there. So Councillor member Bagley. And sorry, just sort of a, yeah. I want to just adopt the language there about. And return to Dave Brown, who we all keep returning to. My motion today does not indicate satisfaction with our zoning code language in this regard or with the way that this has had to play out today. And like Dave Brown, who did ultimately vote in favor of the subdivision, but noted his displeasure with our zoning code and our subdivision process. So that's the way it broke for me, was I share the mayor's comments that this is, these should not come to us, you know? This isn't the best way for this to happen, but I am stuck in the law and the code as it appears written presently. And so, you know, following sort of Dave Brown's final comment, which was, you know, given where I am though, I'm supporting it. And so I just wanted to join that as a direction to staff on some level, as we continue to revise our zoning code and revisit the needs of housing supply in the city, what can we do to avoid these sort of questionable circumstances moving forward? Yeah, and let me just say one other piece. And I think this is perhaps the part that it means we need to make adjustments to kind of how we look at this. Is a lot of the discussion, a lot of the points we've heard, a lot of the emails we've gotten on this case focus on issues that are either not a valid part of our consideration in whether to subdivide this land or are things that we cannot control through the subdivision of this land and making subdivision decisions. They are policy questions that we can address with large when we adopt zoning and master plans, but not necessarily on this question of whether we are subdividing this property or not. And we go to the next step, which is this suggests that the result of this decision is not only could, but is often, is potentially likely to have implications that perhaps some who supported the decision are not necessarily gonna want to live with. And I think again, it speaks to kind of some of the impreciseness of using this venue to make a decision of this nature. So, all right. Any further discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor of Councilmember Bagley's motion, please signify by saying aye. All opposed, aye. Nay. All right. So was that a, we're going to show hands because I didn't hear all the voices. So all those in favor, please show hands. All right. I see three hands up. All those against. All right. I see four, including councilman in a gerry. So the motion fails three to four. At this point, I would entertain a motion to deny the application. So moved. I'll put forth a motion to deny the application. Motion by Councilwoman Gaskins. Second, vice mayor Jackson. Vice mayor Jackson. All right, all those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. Nay. The motion carries four to three. All right, we are going to take a, what time is it right now? We're going to take a 20 minute break, so we'll be back at 10 after 1 for the next item. Ren recess. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. time. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go you just because that's not easy to not give people what they want. It's like it's so fun. Thank you. No, it's not all over. Thank you for all the time. Honestly, Holly, that actually means that to me. I was listening. This isn't like a... I'm not really sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. So, like, this room is empty. Oh, okay. It's okay. The room is clean. I'm sorry. Sorry. What? Yeah, we're good. I'll get them. Okay, I'll wait here. Thank you. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. Oh, thank you so much. I'm sorry. I think that's the deal of the leaders' chance for this how we get this. I'm just going to take you out with that. Yeah. I'm just going to take you out with that. I'm just going to take you out with that. I'm just going to take you out with that. I'm just going to take you out with that. Yeah. I'm just going to take you out with that. I'm just going to the bridge and he's out counting seconds. I got a question. I was just, I was really, I think. I think that's the possible. But I say no. Like, you look at the thing, you should not be exactly over there. He seems like a guy, but he always sounds a bird. He usually does joke in that. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm not sure if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good person. I don't know if she was a good writer and was like a primary animal. I was very happy to meet people who were not. She was like, I didn't understand. I was looking at the clock and getting the last and we can join a study group and then there's not my hair. She was like, I thought, you're, mom. I thought I was going to start looking for a better touch with these boys. Like, just as a casual conversation, I'm going to watch her report now. I don't know if you talked about being bored. Like just as a casual conversation, she was like, I feel like there is not a person who really kind of wants to be bored with that. So that it never really does. It does not mean that this is all the time. But it's just a casual and kind of thing. And she's like, and she's even finally in her own cup. This is a question in on campus. She's off campus. And she's still kind of like a house town. She's like, yay, yeah. And the same issue for that. The acronym for God of the Name, State God of the Wind and the Director of the Diver, Jim Marlano, and the NAO, and the NAO, and the Wendt, and the Director of the House, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm 16. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I don't know if it's a public interest. I'm going to go over and bring more of them instead of looking at her. It's not a bad idea. I don't know if it's anything else. They can't come. I'm going to go over and bring more of them instead of looking at her. It's not a bad idea. I don't know if it's anything else. They can't come. They can't come. They can't come. They can't come. They can't come. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. either to I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. I'm going to go to the right. So, um, I see, uh, I see, uh, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I see, I line number, like, is just, uh, ways of just numeric, like, like, an hour or a car, like, it was so mandatory, right? Just, like, a little ground, some measure on to the top, like, I could do it right, right? Did you drive a lot of the vehicle? Yeah, a lot, so, for this flight, I, uh, just, like, you know, with, you know, the heads, so. I'm not a head. So, I was cool. It's been tough like our father. And I like the river. Yeah, I thought I was going to be a little bit stuck in the same place. I was like, I'm going to be a nice, nice, nice, nice, I was going to be a little bit stuck in the water. I was in shock. I got it. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I'm going to go to the next slide. Yeah. I don't know. That's something someone knew, right there. She was moving something like the most separation. Let's see if the blood's moving or so on. Whatever. It's here to get the blood. So, I need to solve the needed right now. You know exactly what I was talking about right now? Yeah. I'm a director. I'm a director. I do know what's happening with the sheer amount of blood. Right. I think that's what I thought of this. I think that's what I was thinking. Right. It would be a good idea, like, I was sort of in the middle of the first field, right up in this three-second row catch-free, not like this. I'm going to take one of this and then bring this in here. I think that's what I'm going going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to go ahead and do a little bit of the first one. The first one, the first one, the first one. The first one, the first one, the first one. The first one, the first one, the first one. The first one, the first one, the first one. The first one, the first one. The first one, the first one. The first one, the first one. The first one, the first one. The first one, the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. Right. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Fuck yeah. Some of this is a small moment. I was very, like, you know, like, I felt very sad. I was, yeah, more of a way. The best I've ever had is old. I'm not like, but, I'm totally was cry. Yeah. I just like, I just remember, like, I saw a movie, a movie, and I just, I wrote a movie, you know, I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I'm going to say that I've got to be heard. I think I've been getting my mom to do that. So, yeah, I think that's what you just have to do. I think that's the reason why I think you've just like, I think I've got to hang out with her. So, you know, I think you've been involved in that. I think you've been involved in that. I think you've been involved in that. I think you've been involved in that. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to have to be careful. I'm just going to get a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a I'm going to go to the next slide. You can see the line here. I'm going to go to the next slide. And the line here. You can see the line here. You can see the line here. There's a button. You can see the line here. You can see the line here. You can see the line here. You can see the line here. You can see the line here. You can see the line here. You can see the line here. I guess I mean, that doesn't mean that I do that. It's not for you. Good. I'm going to be able to say that. I'm going to say that. I'm going to say that. Yes. I'm going to say that. I think you're going to be able to say that. I think you're just not able to say that. I think you're going to be able to say that. I think you was a nice, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We're going to have to work with the other members of the community. We're going to have to work with the other members of the community. We're going to have to work with the other members of the community. We're going to have to work with the other members of the community. We're going to have to work with the other members of the So I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go ahead and ask you. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I'm going to go over to the other side of the panel. I don't know. I'm sorry. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, I'll just say, I'm going to have to change your favorite. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to the next slide. I'm going to go to show the email that I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I'm going to go to the next floor. I I'm sorry. All right. the . We are back. I hope everyone had a good lunch spring. Madam Clerk number eight. Vacation 2024-00101-00002 and 0003 public hearing and consideration of three requests to vacate various areas of the unimproved right away located between 404A, 404A, 406, and 408E's Alexandria Avenue to add an area to residential yards. Okay. Recommended excuse me denied six to one. Okay. Councilman Chapman. Okay. Well, Councilman Chapman getting his stuff ready. He's got to make a disclosure. We are going to have a staff presentation. I know we have a couple of speakers signed up and so we will start with the staff recommendation but first I want to let Councilman Chapman go. I've consulted the city attorney, which is a close disclose that I've accepted a campaign contribution and invitation to a campaign fundraiser from one of the applicants on this land use item. Therefore, I've decided to recuse myself from this vote of city attorney's advice that under applicable provisions of Virginia State and local government conflicts of interest act that do not have a conflict in the interest of full transparency and to avoid the even the appearance of impropriety I will not be participating in this vote. Hey, thank you, Councilman Chapman. All right, let's do the staff presentation and I'm just, I imagine we'll have some questions and we'll go from there. Good afternoon, Mayor Wilson, vice mayor Jackson and council. I imagine we'll have some questions and we'll go from there. Hi, good afternoon. Mayor Wilson, Vice Mayor Jackson and Council. I'm Brian Dauphin-Mire with Transportation and Environmental Services, presenting the vacation requests for the right away between 404A 40 the north side of East Alexandria Avenue and is surrounded by residential properties. It is owned R25 and is located in the Potomac West small area plan. The right away was created with the 1892 subdivision, but was never improved and currently functions as open space. The site meets three criteria identified in the Open Space Master Plan as a site that supports the goals of the plan, which seeks to identify, map, and repurpose public right away to be active and protected open space. The first criteria noted includes small lots in neighborhoods that are suitable for pocket parks, gardens, and green spaces. The second criteria noted is land with significant natural features, such as significant tree coverage. The third criteria noted is excess right away, which can be used as open space that enhances community access and environmental stewardship. The current condition at the site is a small area of right away that does not have a roadway use. The views here show the significant tree cover of this approximately 6,300 square foot area. Retaining property like this aligns with the city's commitment to maintaining and expanding open space acreage. The requested vacations include ones from 406 and 408 where they propose to divide the area in question as shown in the blue and red rectangles. They are not requesting development rights. 404A is showing the full right of way area and is asking for development rights. These requests were sent to city staff for review and evaluated using the city council established vacation criteria. In the staff analysis and per the open space master plan, staff determined that there is an existing and reasonable future used of this right away as open space and therefore criteria one and two are not satisfied. Criteria three is satisfied since the vacation would not land like any portions of the public right of way. In criteria four is satisfied if access to 408 is maintained. Criteria five is not satisfied since the use of this right away is open space is the existing public benefit. To summarize, the vacation requests do not satisfy all of the criteria to recommend approval of the vacations. However, if the vacations were to be approved, the layout shown is the recommended solution with the amount of vacation proportional to the frontage of each requesting lot and to the center line of the right away. Since all three neighboring properties are looking to assert their property rights for this right of way. Staff recommends denial of the vacation request and to retain the right of way as open space. We are available to answer any questions. Can I actually ask a question? Let me start with the questions. The first one, thank you for the presentation and thank you for staff's work on this. I'm actually wanna refer to the criteria analysis and make sure I understand how staff arrived here. So I guess let's start with five. So staff has also recommended some alternative conditions obviously if the council were to approve the vacation. And one of those conditions is condition four which says if no development rights are requested the property owners may not construct any building or improvements including driveways, parking spaces, etc. On the vacated areas which basically require, this condition, let me first of all makes sure I understand, is it staff's position that this condition would require essentially that they remain open space? At this particular area, I'm sorry the vacated area you're asking if that condition is applied it would remain as open space Correct is that is that the intent of that condition? That is the intent of that condition that end to not infer any Additional development rights on the on the larger overall parcel after it is with the inclusion of that land So I guess my question is is the is the public benefit that staff believes is derived by maintaining ownership of this property that's detailed in the criteria five and potentially in one and two, is that public benefit also achieved if the vacation were granted subject to that condition. And we would say no to that because we would want it to be publicly accessible open space. Okay, so I guess the crux of the analysis hinges on whether this, because obviously we have a plenty of passive open space in the community. Our open space master plan envisions that a lot of the open space we are to have and provides community benefit is just passive open space not open space where anybody's going to have a bench this value in that community. So it sounds like what staff's recommending here is something a little something more intense, a more intense public use than simply a passive park. Is that? And we do have some representatives from RPCA here that can talk about how it might be programmed. But the idea is that it could be more intensive use, but it even just says it is available to the public to go onto that land, because if it were to be vacated, then it would be closed off to the public accessing in any shape. I gotcha, I gotcha. Okay, all right, thank you. Other questions for staff? Councilman Pai. The current usage of the property includes a driveway used by one of the neighboring residents to access the garage at the back of their property. If we, you know, basically by, if we move to not do the vacation, we're not changing that arrangement anyway. Okay. Right, so if you, right, so if you deny the vacation requests, things would stay as status. I mean, changes, okay. Correct. Thank you. Can I actually jump on that for a second? So can staff speak to the current arrangement and how that's formalized? Yeah, so right now there is a letter from 2012 from the city's chief of surveys at that time that identified this as public open space and pointed to this driveway that is used for access. And noted that this driveway is, and clarified in that letter that the driveway is for the general public to use, right, including the owner of 408 to be able to get to his garage. But anybody else could use it to get to, say, the alleys in the back also. And then that has been in place for a while since 2012. Okay, so in this case, is it a private property encroachment on the property? So the letter at least identified it as public access. So that it was the stance in 2012. Is there an easement? There's not an easement on it. Okay. So we just give you a private property owner use of our land for free. Mayor, the letter doesn't include any payment terms. Okay, so we just give you a private property owner use of our land for free. Mayor, the letter doesn't include any payment terms. So, and we don't have record that it's an easement or an encroachment. So, we don't have other than that, we don't have anything that formalizes any sort of agreement for that use. Okay. Is this customarily if someone wanted to do what's happening here, I'm not sure if it's a little bit of a problem. Okay. Is this customarily if someone wanted to do what's happening here? What would be the proper process? How will we handle this? Someone approached us and said they wanted to traverse public property to access their garage. What will we do? We would consider whether it was more appropriate as an encroachment or a lease or a license or if we'd want to consider it at all. Okay, so there would need to be some kind of arrangement. The best approach would be to have some sort of written agreement. Okay. All right. Councilman Gaskin with Councillor McBagley. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I had a question about kind of the current conditions and a number of the letters that we received from neighbors talked about the fact that they did not feel the city has maintained the property, that they are often the ones who are doing the mowing in the maintenance. Can you just talk a little bit about what the city's current engagement has been with the property in terms of maintenance and then if we were to deny the vacation, what would be the expectation for the city to maintain it to the level that I think the neighbors rightfully are looking for? Sure, Jack Broin, Deputy Director of Park Services with the Department of Recreation, Parks and Cultural Activities. So this is sort of a two-part question. So we'll answer one and I think there were some concerns with regard to other aspects not associated with the Department of Recreation. So in this instance, this is a right of way. And we have a number of right of way properties across the city that are either unimproved or undeveloped. And the city maintains the vast majority of them on a regular basis. But there are right of way properties in which the adjacent property owners have assumed responsibility. And it's been that way for a number of years. It might not be the best answer, but they've been maintained in this instance when there is a complaint as to whether the property is overgrown or have been unmanaged, then we bring contract crews in, we clean it up and usually things, you know, kind of resolve themselves and it's been that way for, you know, many, many, many years. The Department of Recreation is prepared and can assume full responsibility like we would with any other private are publicly accessed space within the city. This would be put on our contract mowing schedule, likely a two week mowing schedule, and we would do that throughout the mowing season. So we are prepared to start that as soon as needed. Councillor Braggly? Thank you. That's right, Bradley. I'm going to say, I guess, wanted clarification that that letter in 2012 letter doesn't satisfy or isn't sufficient for the kind of documentation or like, you know, agreement that we want in the situation. I'm not saying it is. I'm asking. It's not. It's not something I've become accustomed to seeing when we've given rights for someone to use city property. OK. And so if our outcome today is to maintain the land within the city's open space right of way, ownership, I guess I'm just expressing that I think we should address that. And for the owner's sake, also, to codify if we intend to, their access to it, because certainly if they were to ever sell it, it feels to me like it would create a question potentially by the next user who might not hold that letter. And if it's not the sort of thing that gets recorded, that stays with the property or stays with the parcel. So I just wanted to be sure I understood that as an impact of what we do or don't do today. Okay. Are there any other questions for staff at this point? I think we only have one speaker signed up? We have more? Okay. You need to tell me the list because I can't get in the speakers list. So all right, well, let's start with Eric Taran. And then I understand that'll be more. So Mr. Taran. Yes, thank you. Ah, perfect. Good morning, Mayor Wilson. I'm Vice Mayor Jackson and Council Members. Thank you for your time and consideration for our application. My name is Eric Taran and I along with my wife are the owners of 404A East Alexandria Avenue. We have been residents of the city for 11 years and hopefully many more. If we recall, we were here in March with an SUP application to develop our substandard lot, which was the nine. At that meeting, Mayor Wilson pondered the idea of the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. We have a lot of things to do with the city. This is what staff for commands is our PCA has identified the site for repurposing as open space per the open space master plan The city's park and open space those three hundred twelve spaces with change from schools private spaces parks right away and some few other categories This light specifies right away along with 79 more the majority of them don't have addresses or lot numbers like this one My understanding is the city would classify this as a ask you to ask the number of the parking numbers like this one. My understanding is the city would classify this as a parking park due to its size of 0.15 acres. There are currently 24 parking parks in the city. They are all under 0.5 acres and a service in area of half a mile or less. The average size of these parks is 0.26 acres with. Four of them are corner lots, one is in commercial area, and one the most similar would-bite Totlock Park. However, this park services 134 homes with the same block. This vacant lot only services 34 homes with the same block. In addition, the subject lot is around 1,500 feet from Simpson Park, is 1,000 feet from George Washington Middle School, which also has a playground. And it's already less than half a mile from two other existing pocket parks at five West Brattick and Mason Avenue Mini Park. Doesn't make sense for the city to be using their budget to create another pocket park in this location when it might be better to service another location. How does it benefit the residents or the city of Alexandria? Option two, the other two applicants. A 408 East Alexandria and 460 East Alexandria. And they're proposing the same thing to divide the lot in half and each keep that half adjacent to the lot. They have requested non-development rights, which means the lot will remain open and they'll create large side yards for both property owners. They can leave the area open or fence it in. The majority of vacant lots actually in the city are owned by adjacent property owners, creating vacant lots. For the non-development rights, half of the lot is roughly 33,000 and the other half is about 46,000, creating $79,000 for the city for non-development rights. It'll be nice for these applicants to raise or property value however this is not a lot of money for this size of a yard in this neighborhood. So how does this benefit the residents or the city of Alexandria? Option three. The staff has provided diagram on page eight on how they feel the lot should be divided in the council of the size vacant a lot. 50% to 408 East Alexandria and 25% to myself and the owner for 60 style Alexandria. How right I feel this is fair to myself I'm going to be able to make a decision. I'm going to be able to make a decision. I'm going to be able to make a decision. I'm going to be able to make a decision. I'm going to be able to make a decision. I'm going to be able to make a decision. I'm going to be able to make a decision. and it'll be nice for us that our property values will be raised by how does that benefit the city or the residents of Alexandria? Option four, my application. It is good for me, but I also believe it's good for the residents and the city of Alexandria. Let me explain. There are fewer than 50 vacant residential lots left in the city which are privately owned. The majority of those are owned by the Jason property owner to create larger yards or our substandard lots. the city. This is one of the reasons why it's only for housing and passing that's been the last year. There is no other way because there is no more land available in the city. There must be creative solutions to build new housing in the city. Our application requesting development rights. Due to that request, the cost to purchase land is $453,960. There must be creative solutions to build new housing in the city. Our application requesting development rights. And due to that request, the cost to purchase the land is $453,960, or $70.75 per square foot. For the city's appraisal valuation. This is a lot more money going to the city than the $79,000 from the other applicants. Now, by combining this lot of 6,416 square feet and our lot of 2,416 square feet and our lot of 2,661 square feet, we will have a 9,772 foot lot. The zoning regulations, this allows a house of 4,085 square feet to be built. The massing characteristics would be of similar size and scale of the homes along East Alexandria Avenue. With the new guidelines passed for zoning for housing, one, two, four unit dwellings may be built on the sites. We are proposing to build homes in a residential community which conforms to the Zonia map and will bring much needed housing to the city. The development is not a one-time bonus to the city. For adding new homes and paying $450,000, $960 for development rights, it will also benefit the community on a yearly basis for money collected by property taxes. We have provided Exhibit C, which shows comparable single-family homes sold in the vicinity within the last two years and how much their property taxes are. The average home sales are $2,124,941, creating an average property tax of $24,000, $24,118.8. However, this being a new development to create one to four dwellings, it would have a higher selling price, creating more property taxes, and bringing new families to the neighborhood. Now, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a family of four Alexandria spends $11,996 per month. Breaking that amount down to only include costs of local expenses such as food, childcare, and other necessities, this comes out to $4,189 per month. This is an initial 50,268 to local businesses every year, which according to an American Express study, 67 cents of every dollar spent stays in the community by businesses paying their employees, by local products, and reinvesting in their businesses. The development of this property will bring in one lump sum of $453,960. We'll bring in yearly tax dollars of at least $24,000. And the new residents will be spending around $4,189 every month at Alexandria businesses. The light is now making money for the city, rather than sitting empty or having the city spend money on it. Now, last night I wanted to discuss the vehicle access that for eight East Alexandria Avenue users to enter their detest garage. There seems to be some ambiguity if this can be used as a driveway, as parking, and with safety concerns on the public property. The city maps currently shown Ali from Mount Vernon Avenue to do it Avenue, which means the owners of four eight East Alexandria could access their detest garage from here. However, from our property at 404A to 416 East Alexandria, it is not maintained if the zipping looked to exist. Rather than requesting the city to provide this Allia shown in the city maps, we have prepared exhibit D to resolve this issue. With this vacation request approval, we request that the city requires us to provide an easement on our property from the Allia entering from Alverning avenue to the detached garage. The exhibit provides what I believe is an accessible route. The final route and easement will be worked on with the transportation environmental services during permitting. By granting the specification request, we are bringing housing to the city, bringing in money to the city, and resolving the access to 408 East Alexandria Avenue to their detached garage. This is why I believe our application is a better solution. The city staff does not believe that our application satisfies the 2002 vacation member criteria however I believe it does one the existing public use the right of way is not used by the public and as other two applicants have stated The city does not maintain it. It is through the air for their efforts that it is maintained So this is not classified as a park apart. It is not used as open space It is a right of way and it's not being used by the public as the public does not use the space in our application satisfies this requirement. The two, reasonable future used. The city has had this right away for 130 years. There are 312 locations in the city's currently classified public use in the Open Space Master Plan. I agree with the Plank Commissioner, Mick Mahon, when she stated that she doesn't feel this being developed anytime soon. Why would the city allocate funds for this lot in the future when there are better locations that could serve more residents in the park space and take away from funds from maintaining the current location? The bucket park could cost the city $100,000 with a playground to build and we use wood buying taught lot park as an example plus the yearly maintenance. It doesn't serve the city if a lot sits vacant for another 100 years or costs residents or tech dollars, which is why our application satisfies this requirement. Number three, the Landlock Public Property. Prove of this vacation request would not create a situation where public property would be Landlock, which is why our application satisfies this requirement. And number four, Landlock Private Property Impaired Access. Now, approval of this vacation request will not impair the access to 48 East Alexander Avenue because they can still enter their home from the street. What is being impaired is access to the detached garage. If the council agrees to the proposed easement requirement as I previous discussed and shown the exhibit D, then there is no impairment. This allows continued use of the detached garage with paved access and safer conditions, which is why our application satisfies risk requirement. Number five, public benefit. Space is currently not being used by the public. From what I've been told and never has been, there is no mention of when and ever the space would be developed for public use. It is not in the public benefit for this property to be empty with no enjoyment from kids or taking advantage of tax dollars. As I stated, this property would produce around $24,000 of property taxes each year as a conservative estimate. I think the creative solution is for the Council to prove our vacation request, and if possible, allocate the property taxes produced from this lot to go towards building new pocket parks in the future. After four years, the property tax collected would be around $100,000, enough to pay for the development of a pocket park and its playground. After another four years, another park a park and so on and so on and so on. Rather than benefit only a tiny population that doesn't require another pocket park in this location, one up benefit residents from all over the city. In addition, the local businesses would have another family spending money in their stores and restaurants spending the public again. This is why our application size is why it's a requirement. And as we reviewed, we satisfied the five requirements from the 2002 vacation memo criteria. If we are granted this vacation request to develop the property, one, the city gets $453,960. Two, every year the city gets at least another $24,000 in property taxes. Three, local businesses have additional clients. Four, this home will fit the character of the neighborhood. And five, with minimal vacant land, to build in the city, this is a creative solution to provide much needed housing, the public and city benefits. I believe this is the best solution for this property. Thank you, councilmembers, and minister mayor, for your time, and I'm happy to answer any questions. I look forward to your discussion. Thank you, Mr. Duron. Any questions for the applicant? Question for the staff? Okay. Councilmember Bagley, go for it. I'm curious since part of this application and I'm glad you're still standing here in case I say this wrong, but basically, it proffers to provide an easement to the neighbor. The city wouldn't be a party to that easement, right? I mean, if we granted this application and vacated the land entirely to Mr. Turan, he's profaring essentially that hill sign an easement with 408. But is that something that the city can actually enforce? And I'm not imputing bad intentions, but like, you could walk away after today. If we grant it, do we have any way or would 408 have any way of saying? But you said you were going to give me an easement. We ultimately will deed a property to the person who we'd convey the property to. So we could make it a condition of that. But it wouldn't necessarily, we wouldn't have to, we can pay the property to so we could make it a condition of that. But it wouldn't necessarily, we wouldn't have to because that's not something that if the council decides they want to vacate it, you're deciding you want to vacate it because it has no longer has a city use. If you decided you wanted that to be something that would be worked out between the parties, that would be handled separately and he could grant the easement in a separate document and we could just deed the property to him without it. Okay, I mean, I mean, I guess clearly if can I just yeah, no, please so clearly if We look again at condition four that staff proposed on If we were to do the vacation even though you guys are recommended in aisle it it sounds like we can impose conditions on that transfer right? That's correct. Okay so and it says the de-divocation shall also appear as a note in the consolidation platt both of which will be approved so it sounds like the We believe that we can impose restrictions on Avocation that would then be recorded to the deed associated. That's correct. Okay All right other questions for staff before we go to next speaker Mr Councilman gas yes, thank you mr. Mayor and if all is Jack this is coming back to you other questions for staff before we go to next speaker. Councillor Gaskins. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And if all is Jack, this is coming back to you. But much of the applicants discussion talked about the benefit to the city and relative to the cost. Earlier I asked about the maintenance and what it would cost to keep up this property. Do you have an estimate about yearly what we would be spending if we add it to? I think you said the two-week meeting schedule. No, we have not calculated that. We could determine that this could be done by internal staff. As the applicant had mentioned that this is in close proximity to other locations, which the city does maintain. We maintain our properties both through contract and in-house staff. And it could be a determination that it would be more efficient for us to maintain it every two weeks as opposed to contract it out. But that is a number that we could determine and provide to the council to later date. Jackson, he would do it personally. That's what he's saying. Just keep it in the lower in their truck, right? Just drive around. All right. Any other questions before we go to the next speaker? All right. Next speaker. Oops, lost all this. There we are. All right. Next speaker is Will Raglan, followed by Alicia Montgomery, followed by Brett Rice. Just to be clear, because I didn't clarify this at the front and this is a bit unusual because we have three different applicants. I'm going to let the applicants have as much time as they consume, ask that they all be very judicious about that. And then any other speaker, those is three minutes. So it's Ragle. Great, thank you so much for the time. My name is Will Ragland. I live in 213 East Alexandria Avenue about a block and a half away. I have three little girls, seven year old, five year old, and a two year old. So I do consider myself an expert in playgrounds. And I know all of them very well, and it's one of the reasons why we moved here 11 years ago. Which is why I found it interesting that, and why I oppose the city's plan and fully support Mr. Terren's plan as someone who visits these playgrounds regularly and is a supporter of increasing housing supply in the city. By my calculations, there are nine playgrounds within a mile radius of this property. Some very new, some very well maintained and are great for my kids, including our favorite, the one that's right off the main line and Glendale. There are five separate open green spaces, some of which are new, including the one on the corner of Bratok and Commonwealth and other more passive green spaces, all within a mile radius. And then there's, I guess there's three massive recreation spaces also very nearby. We have the George Washington Middle School, which has a ton of recreational area and park space. There's Simpson Field, which also includes a playground and recreational fields. And then there's Mount Vernon Community School. And all of this has served our family very well. I don't think a pocket park, a block and a half away from where my family lives would serve us very well or other families. As someone who knows Eric and his wife, Danielle, are very well, they help build our house or renovate our house on the street. I think he is very respectful, loves the city of Alexandria and has really come to love our community in neighborhood and regularly joins a lot of our neighbors for gatherings and eventually wants to, I think, his future and his family's future in this space at some point. And so he's also a local business owner located in the city of Alexandria. He's not a big developer, he's none of this. So I do wanna mention that as well. I think this is a really good fit for the city. He mentioned the financial benefits. And I just think it makes a lot of sense as someone who also supports growing the supply of housing and trying to bring more middle income families into the community and the city writ large. So I'll leave it at that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Raglan. Next speaker is Alicia Montgomery, followed by Brett Rice, who is the final speaker on the side. Hello. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak here. I am one of the adjacent property owners and applicants requesting vacation of the right of way in the 400 block of East Alexandria Avenue. I'd like to explain why I'm making this request. Why I disagree with staff's assessment and why I believe this vacation should be approved. For background, I moved into my home in 2020. Definitely was drawn by the open space around my property. Since moving in, the city has neglected the space despite multiple requests for maintenance. As such, my neighbor and I have taken over maintaining the area. When the future of this area became a topic of discussion, my neighbor and I decided to formally request vacation to preserve it as open space and insurance proper upkeep. Despite your mention, Mr. Mayor of this area seeming suitable for vacation and documents indicating the city's support of the rice's prior vacation request years ago, city staff has recommended denying the current applications without a clear explanation or plan. I was not even asked about my intentions for the land until much later in the process, which feels like a misopportunity for dialogue. In fact, I did not even learn that Mr. Turan had officially submitted a vacation request until their decision was made, leaving no room for us to negotiate and rectify differences in our respective proposals prior to this decision. With this in mind, I have requested an amendment to my vacation application to reflect the 25% area is suggested in the staff report. I discussed this with Eric. Found that he was open to a proportional split as an alternative as if his full vacation request was not approved. My understanding is that staff cannot change their presentation to reflect this request in my application. So to be clear, my request is for the vacation to have a proportional division between all three applicants as proposed in their figure four of the staff report. I disagree with the city's recommendation and interpretation of their own criteria for right of way vacation. For example, staff claims that this area is a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not a public park. The public is not currently used by the general public and no future plans have been communicated for that. In conclusion, I believe that this vacation request deserves approval as it aligns with the city's established guidelines. It would provide a public benefit through the revenue generated by private ownership and by adjacent property owners. We are willing to compromise on a proportional split of the land as proposed by city staff. And I hope you will consider this a reasonable solution. If the answer today is no based on the notion that any unused land has a potential future purpose, then I am just left with two final questions. One, why are we wasting our time here? If the stand is not available, we will have a chance to see the a potential future purpose, then I'm just left with two final questions. One, why are we wasting our time here? If the stance is that every unused right of way in the city's open space plan has a potential future purpose, why was I even allowed to pay for a vacation application in the first place? Why have we wasted not only my time, but your hours of work by the staff and city council to review materials, letters, and our testimony today. If the city believes all such properties should be held indefinitely because of their potential, shouldn't we be working on a code amendment to reflect that, stating no more unused right of ways will be vacated due to the city's growth and the need to preserve green space for future generations. Secondly, why is the city not maintaining its property holdings? You've heard my prior testimony regarding the lack of maintenance. I've raised this issue for years through 311 request. I've asked city staff about this in May when their decision was released. When their decision was released. And I brought it up again last week. Interestingly, after the Planning Commission meeting, the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the last few days of the screen. I'll just put it on the side of the screen. I'll just put it on the side of the screen. I'll just put it on the side of the screen. I'll just put it on the side of the screen. I'll just put it on the side of the screen. I'll just put it on the side of the screen. I'll just put it on the side of the screen. And lastly, I would say and reply to a comment made earlier just today. The reason that adjacent owners appear to presume and use the right of way as their own private property is because we're expected to maintain it as such. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Montgomery. Next speaker is Brett Rice. This rice is allocated 15 seconds to speak. So it's a standing council rule. I only wrote 22 pages, so I'm gonna be that wrong. I will say I wrote good morning, but it's, I think we're talking about my time. Good morning everybody, thank you for allowing me to be here. I do wanna be quick, address a couple things. Mr. Dothel, my or spoke earlier about in case anybody wanted to go down there to get to an alley. There is no alley. There is not one. There is not an approved alley. It is fenced in on the entire street. It's an impossibility to get there. On the left side of the alley off of Mount Vernon Avenue. There are Verizon boxes, electrical boxes, metal poles, it's an impossibility. Cannot come down the alley, impossible. Forget the part that isn't maintained. Mr. Tran came up with an interesting way to force me into a possible easement. That's an impossibility again, because there is no alley. It's a paper alley. I think we all discuss if you go to your city code and ask about garages and two garages, you need a 20 or 25 foot radius to be able to turn into a garage. So I'm not sure how you'd even if there were an alley there, which is not there. But if there were one there and we took everybody's fence down and we just told everybody we were paving it and I drove down a 10 foot alley to make a turn into a garage that's back that way I would challenge TNES to come up with a solution that would actually make that happen. Which does come later into the right way but I'll get a real quick. I kind of wanted to just explain the request my right away which I think we actually already know what it is. It is the access to my garage so that to give some background on that, that garage has been there for 100 years. It was legally permitted in the city of Alexandria to be built where it is. My lot originally, before I bought the property, the original lot was a 37 foot wide lot, 125 foot lot and a 12 foot wide lot. They subsequently applied for the garage and the rear of that property. The only exclusive access, the only possible in history to ever get to the garage was that right away. And I think, again, Mr. Gothamaw brought up the alley. I think there are people that look at and say, well, can't you just use the alley? No, no matter what would happen, the alley runs behind my garage. So I think that for the clarity of this discussion, we should probably ignore the alley that's not even there in the first place we're accessible to start with. I will say over the last, prior to me purchasing that property, the city had written the previous owner letter saying your driveway, your curb cut on the right away. It has been there when we went to planning commission Mr. Dothamar, they asked me the question, how long has it been used like this and he said, well at least a decade. I think we know the truth is at least 30 years because they were writing letters. 30 years ago, twice, saying that your curb cut is in disrepair, it is a hazard and he's repaired. Nothing has been done. It is a hazard. Part of the issue is over the years, I've asked a number of times, what do we do about this access? Can I fix the curb? They said, no. Will you fix it? No. It's not worth an impasse. So part of the reason for bringing forth this is going to be that. Now, and again, there's been some discussion, and I'll get a second to the ownership, and it was really interesting to hear the last case before this about this. But part of the problem with what's going on in this is, per Virginia law, the city is required to provide me access. I think we've got some confusion about this. Like, do I need rights? We talk to the city attorney, talk about rights, and how we normally do this. Alexander city is not a normal city. I think everybody knows in old town, you've got alleyways running through people's front yard and the way they take the trash out. I mean, this is not an abnormal situation in the city of Alexandria. This happened because this lot, I mean, to give you some history, this lot was platted as it was said in 1892. What the staff is not really covering in this is there were multiple plaid acts in subdivision laws. This was platted in 1892 under the 17, I'm sorry, yeah, 1892 under the 17, I'm sorry, yeah, 1892 under the 1888 Plata Act, under that Plata Act, and I'll read it to you. It was plated by George Fadetto, that part's not as far. It was annexed and I think they might be able to 1930s. Alexandria, so this was in Arlington County, Plata, Plata in Ar, became Alexandria City after that. It was, so there was a first, second, four, fifth, and six streets. All of those streets outside of Fort Street, this right away, they went somewhere, they were improved, they were renamed, they went some there, they were used, they were not under the law legally abandoned. And we'll come back to that word abandoned in a little bit. So under common law doctrine, and this falls under the common law doctrine that governs the subdivision plasery that were recorded in 1892, abutting property owners were given fee title to the midpoint of or the center line of the property with only an easement for the public to travel. So I think that's where it gets a little odd here. I think people look at things in terms of today. This was plotted similarly. So if anybody in your house in 1970s home, you have to have it code of the 1970s, but they change the code. Do you have to change your home to today's code? No. The same thing goes on here. This is an 1892 subdivision platted to the abutting property owners would own to the midpoint, which unfortunately under Mr. Trans proposal would take away the property rights of the abutting property owners who are already assumed to have fee title to the midpoint with only an easement for the public travel over that. So in this particular situation, what's kind of unique is it appears that the land records appear to be silent as to the true title of this right away. My understanding and perhaps this would be a good question for staff that there were no conveyances found, no reservations. I mean, I say this because over the last 10 or 12 years, I have multiple times spoken to city attorney, the previous state attorney, to planning and zoning, to TNES and said, do you have title to the property? That is a requirement. It's not just a poof, we own it. That's not the way it works. So, I mean, the court has applied this common sense rule in, you know, of construction. I mean, the rules almost universally recognize in the absence of a stricter or controlling word showing a contrary attention, a conveyance of a land bounded on a public highway or street which has been dedicated by the owner of the land for public use conveys a fee to the center of the land for public use conveys a fee to the center of the highway. This is heller woodley. This is a court case. I mean, I'm not saying it. The Supreme Court of Virginia in Ettinger versus Oyster Bay reaffirmed a legal rule in Virginia. It provides that a conveyance of property bound by a road includes a conveyance of title to that right away to the center of the road, unless there's a contrary intent shown on the actual conveyance of the adjoining property. In other words, the abutting property and owners already have this fee title of the right away, the vacation would simply be vacating what you think of as an easement and the public rights of passage. These, this right attaches to the top of the right away. It's not under the surface where the fee title is, the easement would be above it. I would, again, I would ask City Council to ask the staff and City Attorney what governing law that they made. What is the governing law that they determined ownership of the right away? Do they have legal title to the right away? The staff has claimed that the ownership of this right away was made through determining exercising domain and jurisdiction. They mentioned fourth street across the street for me. There was, it was on both sides, went nowhere ever, but on the other side it was vacated. They could probably tell you, I don't know, 70 years ago. Interestingly in that vacation ordinance, they didn't have title to the property then. The other one is they say that they have maintained the property for 23 years. Again, my question would be please ask what 23-year period did they possibly maintain this right away. Now the last one I'm going to get back to I said earlier was the abandoned man. Staff has maintained and maybe it's a city attorney interpretation that we have not abandoned the road. I think there's some miscommunication in the legal term abandoned. Abandoned under legal term is means not used. I think any reasonable human being in this room right now can say that if that term abandoned means unused that property was unbanned it. It's never been used. There are no utilities under a site. There is no paving. There is nothing. And under, again, Virginia Applied Law, you can argue that possibly it was taken in with our parts of the streets, but the problem is, if you do not improve it, you do not use it. You do not put utilities in it. It's very questionable at that point, how could anybody interpret that as not abandoned. What we're doing here, and again, I'm going to quote the language of the first statutory enactment attempting to codify common law because this does matter. It's important. It goes back to Mr. Trans application to vacate the entire property while relinquishing the abutting property's rights. I not only have the right of private use but public use. So if we go back in time, I will just say, part of the reason for these rightuas and the common law and the abutting property ownership was exactly what we have here. They never wanted the original platter to plat something. The city not really accept it, and it's just left there as a strip of land that nobody knows what it is. So the original law said, we do know what it is. The abutting property owners would be, which would be Mr. Turan, myself, and proportionally Alicia on the other side. We already have the title to that property, and that's why I was set up. But again, to codify a common law, since a prescriptive interest in a way shown on a platter reference in a deed is the nature of a public easement of right. A right of passage, the public nature of a road, does not mean the fee symbol title is vested in the public or locality. These are important facts, which it appeared that staff took four or five months to figure out if they could figure out how legally they could show they've owned it I've been asking for a title. I've been asking for anything a dedication indeed Brian McAvoy great to get to me But he really didn't want to provide anything other than a recorded plat So I'm gonna have to assume there was nothing else on that Real quickly. I'm gonna finish up here because Mayor Wilson said I had 12 seconds. I want to quickly- You exceeded that. I lied when I said I had 22 pages anyway, so I'm about done. But you had 30. I will say, staff presented the Planning Commission report as a 6-to-1 vote for denial because they agreed with the planning staff. I think that's an incredibly unfair portrayal of what happened at Planning Commission. Other than Mr. Brown, who rightly by the way, interesting enough with Mr. Brown, he rightly figured out that, and he asked, do you use your garage? And I said, that was a very odd question, so I wasn't, if you why you ask that. And he said, well, it looks like you can't even get back there because it's all grass and overgrown. And I said, and in my mind, I'm thinking Mr. Brown, it's exactly what I've been saying all this time. The city didn't maintain it. The gravel is underneath the grass. It's there, barely, but ited with how the valuation set by City Council has to appease a property. They didn't like the idea that we trying to be good stewards of the neighborhood wanted to leave it without development rights. Wanted to leave the open space as Mayor Wilson said earlier as a passive open space that would have been enjoyed by everybody. We're not taking it from anybody. We would be codifying my right. Again, this discussion here gets very odd when I, by Virginia law, I have the right to use that. I'd like to have in writing, but I have the right. It's not a paid right. It doesn't work that way. But I would like that, and that's the reason for a vacation. I mean, Mr. Ray, can I ask a question for you? You can ask me anything. Thank you. So You gave us a long portion of your remarks about the title and the ownership and kind of your assertions on that We're here because you applied for a vacation of the of this property So if if the council were to approve that vacation, we would then go to a process where we would issue you a title, we would go to record a title, and you would pay the amount of money that staff has suggested for a proportional vacation. You're not in your comments that you made earlier suggesting that you object to that process. No, I object, which earlier. It was a lot earlier, Mr. Rice. But the- Feel on Dually. The part you opened it up there so The part where you suggested that perhaps we did not have proper title to the property in the first place I'm suggesting so there's a fix for that as well too. That's come up in the past no It well you can't re-vest title in something if they don't own it for example if a city were to say We don't own this property. Let's say in this situation, the city just cannot ask it. You know what? You're absolutely right. We don't own it. It still can be vacated because you're vacating the public use, the right of passage. That's all that means it's not. I guess what I'm asking you, Mr. Reis, because like, part of me feels like that's all very interesting and an interesting academic conversation, but not something necessarily we need to settle to the ground right here. If are you objecting to this process or if the council were to approve this vacation and you were to be sent a bill to pay the amount of money that staff is assessed for the value of what we would be vacating, you would pay that and go to record that and that would be the end of that. Correct. Okay. All right. All right. Are there any other questions for Mr. Rice? Okay. Is there a motion to close the public hearing? Motion by Vice Mayor Jackson, seconded by Council Member Bagley. Any if there's no further discussion on closing the public hearing? All those in favor of policing by saying aye. Aye. All opposed to saying that. I, the eyes have it, the public hearing is closed. All right, so let me offer a couple thoughts here and then obviously I can't make motion so you guys need to figure out where we go from there. So it seems like, and I learned a few things during this conversation today, which I didn't expect to learn, but that's okay. So it seems like we have, well, first of all, the reason we got here is largely my fault. I would take credit for that or responsibility for that. And I do feel like generally as a matter of premise, the city should not hold property that we do not have a reason to hold. If we don't have a public purpose for the property, we don't have a contemplated public purpose, then we should get rid of it. We should let a private owner maintain it, pay for tax. We should tax that property and get revenue off of it. And the original purpose for this property, and I think Mr. Rice may reference to this, I don't know if Smothers did too, was a road. I think if you look at the Google Street View, the satellite view, you'll see that the intent was to combine it with the right away across the on the other side of East Alexandria, and there was to be a road there. As was mentioned by Mr. Rice a second ago, the city long ago got rid of the other side. There's a garage in that right away now. And so, never more will there be, there will never be a road. We are never gonna build a road, which is the original intent of this property. So really the question is, is there another public use for this property? And I think our staff has suggested that there might be another use and that is the potential of it being a park. And I do think we really have kind of four choices here before the council. I think we have two development scenarios. If we seek to develop this property in some way and then we have kind of to non-development scenarios if we don't seek to develop it. So I think if we want to develop this property, we could approve the vacation to Mr. Turan and just vacate the entirety of the property and let him develop it in the way he seats fits and consistent with city zoning code. Alternatively, and I think Chair May 6th suggested this during the Planning Commission conversation, we could consolidate this lot and make it to build a lot and then just surplus it and auction it off like we would any other surplus property that the city has. I would suggest that if we are interested in development on this property, the second one of those scenarios is probably the fairer one of those scenarios is, and we'd probably be able to enable the city to get the maximum amount of value out of it as well, which would be just auctioning it off and selling it to the highest bidder and they can come in and do a land use application. And then I think we have two non-development scenarios here as well. And this is where I wanna perhaps might have some more conversation. So we could try to turn it into an active park. We could try to put playground equipment there, benches, whatever, and try to make it a park. I would suggest that I doubt there would be a support in the immediate neighborhood from that. Maybe in the broader doubt there would be support in the immediate neighborhood from that, maybe in the broader neighborhood there would be, but it sounds like there wouldn't be necessarily be support in the immediate neighborhood. Plus, I'm very concerned about the fact that we already have discussed for a while that the part of the property is being driven over regularly to access a garage which doesn't seem like a great place for a tot lot or a park, at least generally speaking, maybe some people would find that interesting. The other option is if we want to maintain this as open space, as true open space and just not have it developed, we can vacate it proportionally as staff has suggested as an alternative. Impose the deed restriction as staff has suggested that it cannot be developed. It must be remain open space. And quite honestly, any other deed restrictions we want to impose as well, which we haven't really discussed, and leave it at that. And so I guess there is, you know, if there's interest on the council in looking at a development scenario, which didn't sound like there was when we heard Mr. Teran's application a couple of months ago, but if there is interest on that, then let's have that conversation. But if there's not, I would suggest the last scenario of vacating this property proportionately and Saying that it should remain open space and perpetuity is probably the best way to handle Vice-Morning Jackson and Councilman Mike and then Councilman Gassins Mr. Mayor, I just want to say well said Thank you. That's my side so and I I would After weighing all those options, I would probably be more likely to vote in a way that shows that we have heard everybody, but what is the actual intent of how that property has been used currently? And that's what they're looking for is just relief and solidification honestly of how they can continue to go about their day and use it the way they've been using it as a passive property. Thank you. Thank you. Vice President Jackson, Councilman McPike. Yeah, in the interest of moving things along and facilitating for the discussion, I would move that the that we approve the three-way vacation proposal included in the staff report. 25% to each of the neighbourhoods on the east, 50% to the neighbourhood on the west, and 50% to the neighbourhood on the east, which would be the equitable split up based upon the property lines. All right, this is a motion by Councilman Pike, seconded by Vice Mayor Jackson. Councilman Gaskins. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just had a clarifying question for this scenario. One of the things you mentioned was that we could put forth. I think the way you said it is, any deed restrictions we want. I was curious, are there certain things you were proposing? Well, so the only thing that, and this may open up a whole can of worms. So let's first of all review what's in the staff recommendations. So staff recommendation says, if no development rights are requested, the property dinners may not construct any building or improvements, including driveways or parking spaces, and may not use the vacated land area to drive any increased development rights above and below grade, for the lands adjacent to the vacated area, including increased floor area, subdivision rights or additional dwelling units. The above and below grade restriction shell appears part of the deed of vacation and shall also appear as a note in the consolidation platt, both of which shall be approved by the directors of PNZ and Tess. The only other thing that, I hesitate to say this out loud, but the only other thing that potentially we could discuss is whether some form of light public access easement was desired. And that would be the only other thing we potentially could discuss. But I mean, today this operates as kind of private property and extension. I think most people who drive by it would assume it is part of a private property. And so I don't think you have people who are just kind of wandering on this property on a regular basis. But, you know, if we wanted to do something different, we potentially could. I'm not sure that's how much that would be even enforceable, but I see Miss Brown looking panicked. So. I would like to clarify that for your information, the 404 owner did come asking for development rights on his portion of it. And the, I guess my concern with putting a public access easement on it, it goes sort of, but we can put the restrictions on there, but it is different than what we typically do. We typically just restrict it to the development rights. So. I get rights so I get it I get it. Yeah. No, I'm not necessarily suggesting it. I'm just Saying obviously we could talk about other things so but Yeah, I mean I think we have a staff we have a we have a staff recommendation and we have an alternate staff recommendations So the alternate staff recommendations has a set of seven conditions Here and it sounds it sounds like the staff recommendations. It has a set of seven conditions here. And it sounds like the, what the first couple conditions are about the actual deed. And the last two relates to how we use the money and how they how much they pay. Councilmember, wait, who's, yeah, Council member Bagley. Thank you. I just want to clarify something about, so the motion is to do the proportional, which is sort of one long skinny in two boxes. Does the long skinny portion envision for 408 sufficient to meet his access needs? It's a great question. Like, Chris, go ahead. And he has indicated that that is the case. And he can correct me if I'm wrong. Are you nodding, Mr. Rice? I'm trying to be quiet. That's why I suggested that you nod. Are you nodding? All right, there we go. OK. OK. So we won't create a sewage situation where there's going to need to be another then arrangement between your two neighbors. OK. You just want to be clear about that. And then I have. So we were talking about other language we can include in the conveyance or other concerns and thoughts we had. So given the current nature, and I know there's some frustration and some history about how it's maintained and how it isn't. But it does have some existing trees on it. It does have some existing vegetation that sort of establishes the condition as people going by experience. And I understand there's not development rights, potentially. Your motion does not envision a vacation with development rights. It's for passive open space. No applicant has technically asked for the version that we have on the table. So I guess it could we include language or might the applicants be willing to speak to agreements about that land continuing to be sort of passively filled with trees and vegetation? And so the question is like, could we legally put that in the transfer? Or, you know, and should we or my colleagues, interested in that? All I'm getting at is like, if part of why we're doing this is to maintain the current condition, but clarify ownership, the current condition to me has appeal because it is like green and passive and a visual break amongst the homes. And so, I don't know, is there interest and is there any legality in being able to, convey that desire? Well, can I ask a question of staff? So is the crown coverage requirements would maintain here, right? Well, they would. And as you know, we have limited ability through just our normal ordinance in requiring people to maintain the existence of an existing tree. They are able to cut down a tree and then replace it with a new tree that would eventually become that big. But they would still have to meet the crown coverage requirements on these. Right, yeah. So I think to the extent that you're and that's what 25% I can't remember for this zone sorry. We can look it up. Someone will furiously look that up. So yeah I mean you want to go beyond that. No no no no I think I'm just as we're you know weighing our you know we currently have it which means nobody else can walk in and cut down a tree, you know, or do other things to it. It is in the condition it's in. And I guess I'm just expressing what I'm weighing a little bit, invocating it is that degree of control. And my preference, know, should I sign on to this motion that it continues to exist in basically the state that it's in, recognizing that there's a canopy requirement and, you know, the current usage. But I was just being conscious of, I'd hate to go by, you know what I mean, in six months, and it's been like clear cut and it just looks dramatically different. All right. Other questions while staff is seriously looking at Councilman Gaskins? Not a question just a comment in response to my colleague. I come to our bag. I like what you were getting at. I agree with you. I think where I would have hesitation, and I was calling over here, is it seems like the lot has more than 25% now. And I wouldn't want to put something in that enforces a specific number and then unintentionally incentivize the cutting down to meet that number or give that flexibility. So that would be my only pause on that sort of introduction into a restriction and the transfer. I mean, I'm ultimately comfortable, I'm sorry. I don't know, go, go, go. I'm ultimately comfortable supporting the motion. I just, I did want to verbalize, you know, to everybody invested in this that that was part of my hesitation, I think, coming into today with the potential vacation in any form that had been requested was I do have an investment in sort of the open space, the existing trees, just the passive, you know, on landscape spaces in our city that are available and so I am increasingly inclined, like I said, to support this motion, but just wanted to have expressed, to have expressed that preference for the parcel. Mr. Mayor, you are correct, 25%. Okay. Okay. So we have a motion on the floor and so just to clarify, the motion is to as their alternate recommendation. Our other question is to approve the proportional vacation. Subject to the inclusion of the seven conditions that staff has included as their alternate recommendation. Are there other questions? Staff clear on what is on the floor here? All right. If there's no further questions or discussion, we will go to a vote. All those in favor, please signify saying aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed, say nay. The ayes have it. And then since we have approved a vacation, I need to appoint viewers. The three viewers are PJ Palmer, Johnson, Chris Lewis, and Benjamin Klein. So those three who don't know that yet, because I didn't notify them in advance, will be our viewers on this case. So all right. Thank you very much, everyone. We appreciate the input on this. All right, that is our final item. However, we have additional speakers. And so we are going to go back to the public discussion period. And so we are back on speaker number 16, Daniel Roth, followed by Ann Marie Yoder, followed by Susan Miranda. and speaker number 16, Daniel Roth, followed by Ann Marie Yoder, followed by Susan Miranda. Mr. Roth, you're allocated three minutes to talk about what you were here for, and then since you sat around all day long, you can provide us two minutes of commentary on how you think we did today, so you can weigh in on that as well. Well, thank you very much and good afternoon, Mayor Wilson and members of the City Council. My name is Dan Roth and I'm with the Friends of Duncan Library. When you think about the responsibilities of our city's library staff, what probably comes to mind is how Duncan Library welcomed more than 14,700 patrons in August. And those patrons checked out more than 23,000 items. But an obligation you may not know about is how our city library staff is trained to save lives. Like the rest of the country, the opioid and fentanyl crisis is impacting Alexandria. But what is different is our approach. Alexandria's strategic plan to combat the opioid epidemic includes a goal to have Narcan, a powerful medication that can reverse and opioid overdose, available in every city government building. And the plan singles out our libraries to provide this life-saving drug. This initiative transforms our libraries from a system that promotes literacy to a lifeline for the vulnerable. Today we have met that goal. Alexandria's libraries now have educational resources about the danger of opioids and they have Narcan on hand. But having a medication in a building is only a start. Library staff have gone through extensive training to identify the signs of an opioid overdose and how to administer an ARCAN properly. And they have received advanced CPR training, which is critical in ensuring the medication is as effective as possible in the moments between when an overdose is identified and when medical professionals arrive. A ministering medication is a profound expansion of library staff responsibilities, and the staff members of the National's Arrive. A ministering medication is a profound expansion of library staff responsibilities, placing them directly on the front lines of this public health crisis. Library staff have proudly accepted this additional responsibility. Kayla Payne, Duncan Library Branch Manager, summed it up I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to you. I've come to put yourself in their shoes. This is very scary. And although library staff have not had to administer Narcan yet, doing so would be traumatic. Alexandria's libraries are truly the heart of our city. They are places to find publications and safe havens that invite the public to come through their doors. No questions asked. Now, I hope you have a moment today to get outside and enjoy the beautiful weather. But I hope that some point in the near future you will visit one of our libraries. And when you do, I hope you take a moment to recognize the responsibilities we ask of staff. And this ranges from responding to questions about upcoming programs to being the first responders when someone suffering from an opioid overdose is fighting for their lives. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Roth. Thanks for your appreciation for the great work of our library as we appreciate it. Next speaker is Ann Marie Yoder, followed by Susan Miranda, followed by Nikki Infield, followed by Marge McNaughton. Hello. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. by Marge McNaughton. Hello. Good afternoon. Yeah. Okay. Good afternoon. And thank you for your time and attention this afternoon. I've got morning on my paper. My name is Ann Marie. And I'm here today to speak in favor of the Trans Sanctuary Resolution. I speak to you today as one of the members of our community who is transgender and with the intention of sharing what this resolution means to me. This resolution is my local government, you, telling me that it's okay to think of Alexandria as my forever home. This resolution gives me the peace of mind that during Virginia State election years, I can still call Alexandria home regardless of that outcome. This year I know regardless of our November national election that I will still have a home in Alexandria for years to come. This resolution is one more step towards living the normal life that I've always wanted and living that life as my true self. Alexandria prides itself on its inclusiveness, something that I've experienced firsthand. When Old Town came up on our list of potential homes, I thought about a time early on in my transition, where a man working in one of the shops down here on King Street told me just a bit unexpectedly, honestly, that he supports what I'm doing. I didn't expect that at the time. Just, it, what seems like a really small gesture of support can mean a lot to somebody early in their transition. I would hope that other people, when looking for a home, can see that Alexandria is a safe haven for them, and be able to come here and set down those routes. On the 24th of September, I'm asking that the City Council pass the resolution to make Alexandria a tran sanctuary and help ensure that our city remains a safe forever home for our trans brothers, sisters and other siblings. Thank you. Thank you for testing me. We appreciate it. Next speaker is Susan Miranda, followed by Nikki Infield, Marge Minotten, Samar Nijja, Cliff Coleman, Kristen Phelps, Danamore, and Juliana von Zumbush. Hi, I'm Susan Miranda, and I was born here in Alexandria and I'm proud to call it my home. I have lived in my current home for over 20 years and right up behind the Masonic Temple in the George Washington Park area. My neighborhood is being impacted by changes that are coming possibly to Duke Street and the West Taylor Run intersection. Having been a resident of this neighborhood for over 20 years, I've also been active in trying to help the community and neighborhood with cut through traffic for over 10 years. We've been working, we used to have a policeman that would have to stand at that intersection for you all are nodding your head so I don't even have to describe it. He told me he sent his kids to college based on that over time. We no longer have that, we have worked so hard to make this intersection functional without the policeman and cut down on that cut through traffic. And we've succeeded. Our neighborhood is very pleased with how things are going right now. The changes that we have agreed to, which are sacrifices to our access during certain times, or even our total access to telegraph road, we now have to drive much further to get to telegraph road, have really helped in our overall neighborhoods happiness and enjoyment. The proposal to change that intersection is coming your way to change Duke Street all sorts of ways. It's going to undo what we've just done in over 10 years. We as a neighbourhood would really appreciate and we appreciate a number of the council members have come to our neighborhood and talked to us. But we so would appreciate if you all could make it so that you don't change what we have done. Right now we don't have a problem and a lot of the Duke Street changes seem like a solution to not a problem. We don't have a problem. It's a solution trying to find a problem. We don't have a problem. It's a solution trying to find a problem. I don't know if that money can be allocated differently so that it doesn't affect our intersection and change the direction of our Duke Street feeder road. All of that's working right now. And if that changes after that grant money's gone, our neighborhood's going to come back at the city and say, hey, can we spend some tax money to undo this? And that just doesn't seem like a really great way to spend our money. We know we like it now. And it's been 10 years of working really hard to get this solution to make it so that the cut truth traffic isn't coming. Please, please, please review this more for our neighborhood. And please come talk to us. We really, really are happy how it is now. Thank you very much. Thank you, Miss Miranda. Next speaker is Nikki Infield, fellow by Marge McNaughton. Miss Infield, she's here earlier and I'll see her now. Do we have Marge McNaughton? Hello, everyone. There you are. My name is Marge McNaughton, and I live on Upland Place in GW Park neighborhood of 419 households. I'd like to speak on the proposed change in the Duke Street West Taylor Run intersection. The data I reference comes primarily from the city of Alexandria documents. The Duke Street WTR intersection has been called one of the highest crash intersections in Alexandria. However, that statement is no longer true because it's based on old data from before 2020. Since 22, the 495 access from WTR was closed and the timing of lights changed. Accidents have decreased by 120% according to the TRED's data. One goal named in the project is to decrease backup on Duke. I couldn't find any field data on that evidence, not computer models. I couldn't find any data because of the right turn lane at the Duke's WTR intersection. The backup keeps moving as the right arrow cycles. Another stated goal is to increase safety. However, the purpose of a slip lane is not safety. It's to increase the speed of traffic flow, bypass a signalized light, and eliminate a stop. The purpose of a signalized right turn lane, which we have now, is to provide the highest level of safety by forcing traffic to stop at a complicated intersection. A slip lane will direct an on-stop traffic onto one densely populated street, East Taylor Run, to use as a cut-through to reach Janice or to return to neighborhood. That's a bare minimum of 250 cars going through East Taylor Run. ETR is a residential street with 81 housing units, mostly duplexes, with parking on both sides of the street because of few dragways, lots of young children, and there are no exits on that street for a quarter of a mile, meaning no bailout if there's an accident. People who want to return to the neighborhood are required to use ETR and adds 1.2 miles to the trip and the time increases by 316 percent to return. The Duke Street Transitway Advisory Group report called for removal or redesign of slip lanes for safer pedestrian crossings. That's a quote. Regarding the recommended separated two-way cycle track, the advisory group actually allows for change and reassessment. They said that a continuous bicycle facility may not be feasible on the north side of the street. Furthermore, on some service roads improved bicycle and pedestrian facility may be accommodated using public streets as a shared slow street while ensuring access to homes. The Federal Highway Commission calls for a dedicated bike lane when streets have traffic volume of 7,000 to 9,000 cars. On the Duke Street service road, both service roads have 368 cars over a six hour period during the rush hours. The intersection works. Finally, after decades of dysfunction, I hope you will reject the entire proposal as it is based on old data and redesign the Duke Street in motion plan on Duke Street, which I thoroughly support. Thank you, thank you, Ms. Wingnotton. All right, thank you. We appreciate the testimony. Next speaker is Samar Naja, followed by Cliff Coleman. Do we have Samar? All right, next up is Cliff Coleman. Do we have Cliff Coleman? There are no more. All right, Kristen is Cliff Coleman. Do we have Cliff Coleman? All right, Kristen Phelps. And Kristen's gonna be followed by Diana Marr, followed by Juliana Van Zombush, who's the final speaker. Zombush, I believe. Hello. Hi. My name is Kristen Phelps. My pronouns are she, her and the Aja. And I'm a resident here in Alexandria and here to urge your support of the Transsexual Resolution that will be coming before you soon. I'm a parent of two kids, including my teenager, who told us a couple of years ago that she's trans. Let me tell you, the weight that was lifted off of her, off all of us, when she said, out loud her truth, her identity, that weightlifting was palpable. Joy and light returned to my child, something that hadn't been there in a really long time. And so it's been my joy and my honor and my deep cry to support her in navigating and navigating and advocating for herself in school, in the legal system, for her medical and mental health care, to live her one beautiful and authentic life, to see the overwhelming relief and joy as she has gotten the name that finally fits, to see, to get the ID that has the correct gender markers on it, and to get the healthcare that is truly saving her life. To see her flourish as she gets what we all really want, which is to live in dignity and with respect and safety and in truth. Now, you might be unsurprised to know that not much scares me. After all, when you have survived parenting with a toddler and a teenager at the same time in the middle of a pandemic, a lockdown, not much can face you anymore. But I am scared about some things. And I'm scared and I'm worried about the attacks on trans folks in our community, in our state, in our world, including on our trans youth. And on parents, parents like me, who are just doing what parents should be doing, loving and supporting and celebrating their awesome kids. And so it matters that you adopt this resolution coming before you to stand up for the LGBTQI plus community that you stand resolute against the attacks that may be coming. Our family loves it here. We know we have interacted with many of you in many different ways. And as we watch in here, our friends and other communities making safety plans, figuring out what states or countries they may have to move to depending on what happens and whether it's safe for them to stay in the homes that they love. I just don't want that to be us. We wanna stay. We love it here. We've put down roots and we wanna stay here and be safe. So I thank the folks who've worked so hard on this resolution. And I hope that you'll adopt it so that Alexandria can continue to be an exclusive community and one that is safe, not just for my family and for my kiddos, but for everyone who wants to keep their roots strong here. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Next speaker is Diana Marra, followed by Juliana von Zumbush. Is Diana still here? Is she on Diana online? Nope. Okay. All right, and do we have Juliana? There you are. Hello. You can tell me how to pronounce it. I'm sorry. Did I do okay? All right, all right. So just wanted to start out by saying thank you very much and try to keep this short, especially because a lot of you have met with my community and part of the long view community. So I'm also speaking out in favor of keeping the Duke Street access roads one way. I think you've heard from a lot of us, but I think that that just speaks to how important this matter has become to us, especially because it really is our only way out of our neighborhood for large portions of the day to be able to go eastbound. I think there are a number of us who are really excited about some of the improvements overall to the Duke Street corridor, but we're also nervous that we are being penned in because this area has been identified as a pivot point which will determine other factors that it's being pushed ahead without full study and full analysis. Right now we've been presented with a number of options and when council last reviewed this a year ago they approved that initial concept with the stipulation that this area in particular really be studied more and that there be outreach to Bishop Eirton to mitigate some of the block up that really prevents us from being able to go westbound. What's resulted since then, we've been told that there has been some outreach and there has been additional traffic study done and there There have there have been several more surveys done But we don't see yet a comprehensive Plan that is incorporating all of those things and we the data that we requested Doesn't seem to be incorporating some of the volume from our neighborhood. So some of the plans that have been presented that suggest the minimal impact don't seem to be capturing where our volume will go. And right now, I think there was some really excellent description of the slip lanes. For us, the slip-rank lanes will have right away over all of our neighborhood volume if that's our only way out. So it really will pen us in entirely. And for us, we really want to see a version that has safety and access. And right now we're being told it's one or the other. So we really want the traffic staff to be tasked with finding a solution that works for both. Because we think the community and our neighborhood deserve that Thank you. Thank you very much All right That was our final speaker Is there a motion to close the public discussion period? Solution by vice-merge acts and seconded by councilman chap and any further discussion closing the public discussion period Hearing none all those in favor please be noise saying aye. Aye. Aye. The aye's have it as their motion to adjourn. Motion by Council member Bagley, seconded by Councilwoman Gaskins. Any further discussion hearing none, all those in favor please be noise saying aye. All those saying aye. I, but say nay, the I have it. Have a great weekend everyone. you you you