Good evening. We'll bring this March 18th, 2025 meeting of the Ashland Town Council to order. Thank you all for being here this evening. We start with a moment of silence and usually I'll talk too much. And tonight I think it's been such a beautiful day. I think we just need some silence. So please join me in a moment of silence. Thank you. Mr. Vice-Man, would you lead us in the play? As your Able, please stand and join me in the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and the Republic for which the hands one nation under God in the visible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. I will review the agenda here. We have our minutes from the March 4th, 2025, on a town council meeting minutes from the March 11th Town Council budget work session and also our invoices on the consent agenda after that We have citizen input time opportunity for anyone likes to come forward and speak to council on a matter other than what's on the Public hearing Then we have our public hearing Resonting 23-1031 and ordinance 2023-14, Patriotland. Miss Amos will bring this that. We have two action items, the 2025 Strategic Plan Revision, brought to us Mr. Goodman and the COU-118 Filming Public Meetings, also for Mr. Goodman. We have no discussion item tonight. We do have reports from the Planning Department, Ms. Amos again, Finance Department, Ms. Schugart, and the Police Department Chief Aaron Holt. And we will follow that with a closed session discussion or consideration of the annual performance evaluation of the town manager pursuant of Virginia Code 2.2-3711-A1. Do we have consensus for the agenda is presented? Yes. All right. Thank y'all. All right. So the consent agenda, I will say that I was absent from the work session, so I won't be voting on the minutes for that. But other than that, are there any comments or questions? Well, I'll tell you what. I guess I better separate them out. Let's go ahead and just do the minutes for that. But other than that, are there any comments or questions? Well, I'll tell you why. I guess I better separate them out. Let's go ahead and just do the minutes for the March 4th meeting first. All right? Are there any questions, comments or a motion concerning the March 4th minutes? Mr. Mayor, I vote to approve the minutes from March 4th as presented. I second. I. Ms. Barnhart. I. Ms. O'Paul. I. Vice Mayor Hodges. I. Mayor Trevett. I. And now that I did it that way, I'm fortunate to have three votes on this. So, concerning the minutes from March 11th, Town Council budget session will separate that from invoices because I should have done invoices first. Is there a motion concerning? Or questions are coming about the minutes from March 11th? No questions or comments. I move for adoption of the minutes from the March 11th, 2025 Town Council work session. A second. option of the minutes from the March 11th, 2025 town council work session. A second. Place Mayor Hodges. I, Dr. McGraw. I, Miss Barnhart. I, Miss O'Pall. I may have some. Epstein. Right now for the invoices since I've done that way. A motion concerning the invoices. A Motion to pay the bills. I second. Place may our Hodges. I Dr. McGraw. I. This morning. I miss so Paul. I. I appreciate the cooperation there. Citizen input time anyone would like to come forward. speak to council on a matter other than the public hearing we have this evening would invite you to come up at this time and just give your name and address if anyone's interested. City's in input time? Yes. City's in input time. I'm sorry. City's in input time, but not on the public hearing So if it's not the public hearing you invite you this time now yes, sir and though we know who you are for the record need your name and address please it's always appreciative time for me to speak to council I really feel like you listen to our concerns and you think about it and your deliberations and that's why I'm here. I just want to reiterate my concerns from two months ago. You might recall what I was here. I'm a frequent runner and walker in Aslan. To give you an idea, last week my daughter and son-in-law and four grandsons came from Washington State. and we walked an excessive 10 miles while they were here. And they loved it. They loved walking Ashland and Hanover County. I'm here permanently and so I do most of the walking and I have concerns about it, particularly on those flashing lights. You just taking your life in your hands if you don't use extreme caution. Just this past weekend, the flashing light was on, a car here, I let it go. I made one step into the road as the chief told me, and I appreciate your input last time. I learned a few things. One step into the road and two big pickup trucks came by. And the car coming from this direction stopped, and I could have crossed if it was just that car. It's an ongoing problem. And I mentioned my three ideas of education, enforcement, and equipment. I'll just make mention of the equipment, seeing that this is a budgetary time. I would like to see a speed reader on England across, it can be in that general area, but across from the police station, for traffic coming west on England. I can see a lot of benefits there because after a lot of walking, a lot of thought, a lot of concern and thinking, speed is the problem. That is the predominant problem. The vehicles don't adhere to that 25-mile-hour limit. With that speed reader, it's a win-win situation, I think, for the police department. You could put an officer right there at that speed reader. Another officer down by the railroad tracks take license plate numbers relay it onto the office at the railroad tracks and you can get a lot of money. But the money is not the important part. It's a safety for people like me and other walkers. And I'm thinking also about when the railroad part comes into fruition, there's going to be a lot of families coming down England with children. And we're going to multiply our problem. So that's it. Thank you. Need your name and address please for the record. Pardon? Your name and address for the record. Even though we know who you are, we just want to have you give your name and your address. Now, yes sir. Okay. David Broda, 208 Duncan Street. Thank you. You're three zero zero five. And. Got you sir thanks a lot. Thank you. All right anyone else for citizen input? All right we're close citizen input time and we'll go ahead and move into this public hearing. Resonting 23-1031 and ordinance 2023-14. Patriot Glenn. Good evening, Ms. Amos. Good evening. So the public hearing we have for you this evening is Patria Glen, Rizzo and 23-1031 and the applicable ordinance to go with it, ORD 2023-14. Can you hear me okay, Doug? You're good, okay. So the same, I went through last month, a pretty lengthy presentation. This month it is gonna be much, much shorter. I'm giving highlights of, we'll go quickly over what the application is, but mainly I'm highlighting what you all discussed last month and the changes that have been made since that time. So as you recall last month we had an issue with our public hearing advertisement, so it got deferred until this month. The application is a request from Steve Ferris of Wilton Requisition LLC. And he's requesting that on behalf of the owners, Riley B. Low, revoke will trust, Helen F. Low, revoke will trust, and Hannover County. To change the zoning of three parcels from rural residential RR1 to R1, 1.16 acres, 7.21 acres of highway commercial B2, and 56.8 acres of land unit development. The parcels in total measure 65.04 acres and are currently mostly undeveloped. There is a tower on the property and the rest of the area is mostly wooded along with the Dominion Eastman. The future land use designation is mixed business and traditional neighborhood which calls for one to four units per acre. And here is an aerial of that property. And so you can see there, the blank area is where the Dominion right away, the power line goes through. And then you can see it's forward by woodside lane to the east and route 54 to the south. So again the proposal includes 1.16 acres to go with the existing telecommunications tower. There's a conditional use permit that talks about the buffering that needs to happen on that tower. and then the plan unit development proposal, which has been amended since the last public hearing or last meeting with the town council, is a residential community comprised of single family detached and single family attached homes with a maximum density of two units per acre as demonstrated in the most recent concept plan. So the preferred conditions have been provided to meet residential design guidelines. And within the B2 highway commercial zoning district, the applicant is proposing 7.21 square miles of unspecified commercial use. There are some architectural proffers as well as transportation proffers to go along with the commercial use and now a proper now we prefer to include having a certain portion of the commercial done prior which will go into that little further so again it borders here on woodside lane which is actually in Hanover County adjacent to two single family neighborhoods in Hanover County and towards the southeast, a commercial node in Hanover and then 54 runs in the front. Through the plan unit development, ordinance, you're required 50% open space so that is being provided. Approximately 40% of the site is wetlands, plus you have the Dominion easement. So a good bit of that open space is within those areas and now through the proffers and the concept plan a good bit of that wetlands will be preserved. There's also requirement to provide 10% recreation areas and so there's been a lot of talk especially over the past month and if there's a dog park or what those parks will look like and so the applicant has provided these amenities to meet that minimum 10% recreation area. They're also providing through proffers necessary road improvements that were shown through the transportation impact analysis as well as improvements that were requested through Hanover County as part of their purchase agreement to provide access to the park to the North Washington Lacey Park as well as a trail system. So here, just a closer view, probably still hard to see on your screen here, but a southern half of the layout, since the last, the middle, last review that you all had in February, the town homes have been removed. And so right now you just have single- homes and attached to complex homes. There are two different size of single families, so larger ones along that woodside lane and some smaller units with garages towards the back to the west. And then the duplexes are mixed in. And then toward the northern part of the project, you can see again a mixture of single-family homes and the dog park and he has added in some pickleball. I think that what the recreation areas end up being can be determined during site plan. And so there's some flexibility there after it is studied. there will be a requirement for 10% of actual active recreation space to go above or to be included as part of the 50% open space. We've also clarified within the Prophers there have been some proper amendments that you all received this afternoon. and I apologize for that late change, but we made sure that the concept plan was clearly included within the proper language. So here's an open space exhibit that you can see all the open space, the 50% that's being provided, as well as the 10% which is the hashed area for recreation areas. So just to go over again what the Planning commission saw, it's a pretty different project than what they had seen because they did have a larger number of town homes and a higher density. So they recommended 4 to 1 for denial. They felt that there needed to be a little bit more work on clearing up the prafers, that it wasn't completely in compliant with the housing goals for traditional neighborhood. There were some additional unresolved traffic impacts and incomplete details in the proffers as I mentioned. Planning commission did voice overall support of the plan unit development's creativity and the applicants willingness to adjust based on comments, the connectivity features as well as the proper framework. They just wanted to see some clarity brought to that which I believe we have seen now. At the time they were at their time where they needed to take action. So planning commission also asked for more precise commitments on the housing diversity and traffic solutions before it came back to the council which which I do believe have been addressed. So when you all saw it on February 18th, just a very high level overview of what you all discussed, you voted to defer due to that issue with the Richmond Times dispatch. The proposal at that time was 131 units, a 67% of those being single-family detached, 33 being attached units to include town homes. We're now at 114 units and 86% of those being a single-family detached. There is some language within the proper where they could go down to 80% single-family detached just to give some flexibility. So there may be a couple more duplexes or there could be less just a minimum of 80%. So some revisions, the applicant, or you requested, the applicant reduced attached housing density between the Planning Commission before it came to the town council and matching with the town's single family home focus within the traditional neighborhood classification. Again, 50% open space recreational amenities, pedestrian friendly design and connectivity to a nearby park. The commercial zoning included for unspecified businesses. And so you all provided the following guidance based on that plan that was presented to you, that the applicant and staff as well as council and I really think each of you for your input over the past month to make sure that we could get this project right for this public hearing. That there was unresolved traffic impacts, in particular along the I-95 Southbound ramp in Jamestown Road, there was some confusion over the cash amounts that were tied to traffic impacts or improvements, but we needed to iron out and then the percentage of attached units versus detach and then concern over the commercial coming after the residential was in place and then the new tenants not feeling comfortable with resident or commercial coming in after they were already there. So they have provided for they reduced the size of the dog park. There was a concern that there's already a dog park down at Taylor Park. But this dog park is a smaller version that could be accessible by the property owners. and speaking of the recreation spaces, all of them are being preferred to be usable by the public. So they will be maintained by the HOA but would be available for anyone in the public to use and then there were also addition of pick-of-all courts. But as long as that's a recreational area, we can review that during cycling. So there are now 86 cottage type homes provided and no town homes. The cottage type really meaning a smaller single family home, but there are some larger single family homes along Woodside Lane as well as the intermixing of the duplexes. So to address the concerns over the housing unit, the total number of dwellings has come down from 131 to 114. A minimum of 80% of those dwellings will be single-family detached. Town homes were removed from the concept plan and the proffers to address the concerns for the traffic impacts. Excuse me, and the cash proffer amounts in some confusion that was in the language. It is now being cleared up. The cash proffer in the amount of $4,000 per residential lot shall be paid at the time of final inspection prior to a CEO of each residential unit. Improvements shown along the concept plan along route 54 in Woodside Lane and the bike and pedestrian pass along 54 in Woodside Lane shall be provided as part of the site plan approval for each of those sections. So really wasn't clear originally when that would happen and so that language has been added. A language regarding the pedestrian bicycle path was changed to specify that the path along 54 and route 54 to the county park will be done at a certain time and then a cash proffer of $200,000 will be paid to the town at the time of the first site plan approval in the V2 section to go towards transportation improvements. And the right of way, dedication will be provided along Woodside Lane in Route 54 as part of the subdivision platt approval. We had a great review from our town attorney and there were a few of these clear vacations came up from their review. And so including this edition of When Will That Right of Way Happen. So to address concerns over the commercial development, the applicant has offered that 1.5 acres of the highway commercial area will be completed, which includes parking and one commercial structure. And he's really looking at the larger structure in the middle of the eastern node before 50% of the residential units receive a certificate of occupancy. So this application has been reviewed and we believe that it is in alignment now with a comprehensive plan with a focus on single family detached homes and also meets the plan unit development and V2 zoning requirements providing a housing mix the numbers decreased from 131 to 114. You'll have a minimum of 80% single-family home with some flexibility and what those units can be. There is some still concern about the small lot sizes, but I think that we've gotten to where we're going to get to and I think it's for the issues you're dealing with with wetlands and the Dominionies but you're going to have to have a compact development. So I think they've done a really good job with that. But through discussions on parking originally with the townhomes not having parking, they are still showing the 40 foot wide paved streets but I think think that something in speaking with the applicant and with public works, that's something we can reduce as part of site plan. I don't know that it's your, you're not, I don't think you're going to have to commit to a 40-foot road. The town doesn't want to maintain a 40-foot road, cost us more to maintain a 40-foot road, and now that they've changed the units to single family and most of those having or either front loading garages, 30% of them have front loading garages or rear detached garages, there's more than enough parking and there's no need to have two-sided parking on each of the streets and I think the applicant is agreeable to that as well. Open space requirement is met but includes some of the wetlands and dominion easements and so we'll work with the applicant to make sure that those are protected during development. The proper improvements, the transportation cash proffers per unit plus the additional commitments is part of the site plan approval for the commercial development. Meet our concerns as far as transportation impacts and then the route 54 improvements tied to the residential development as well as the addition of the right of way and the trail system and they've also met the I-95 commercial impacts. So we felt that they have met all the needs that came out of the TIA as well as additional concerns about I-95. And then staff now supports the approval due to these amendments. Again, thank Council, the town attorney, and the applicant for working with us. It's been a long process, but I think everyone, hopefully, at least on the staff level, we're happy with where we've come today. So staff supports approval due to the amendments to include the proffer amendments and the housing mix adjustments and the outstanding issues we believe through the concept plan and proffer can still be worked through it at the site plan review. So happy to answer any questions or the applicant is here and would like to say a few things. Any questions for stay out of this time. All right, thank you very much. Invite the applicant, Mr. Wilton, or whoever, on your behalf. Good evening. For the record man named Henry Wil Wilton and I'm here again. I've got just a couple of short things to go over the changes and so on because Nor does such a good job at the presentation. You really don't need me. But just to go over some of the things that we did since the last meeting, again the removal the townhouses That seemed to be a problem We got the density down from 2.3 to 2 to 2 units to the acre Again, we changed the proper and gave some flexibility as far as 80% of it being single family with the with the balance being The only attached product would be a duplex. We reduced this out again of the dog park. We had a pickle. Pickleports, I did take away the lower field which was shown closer. Again, we had to cross the VEP co-easement and it was closer to the wetlands. We're not going to disturb that area at all, which is, it was, it's there, I'm sure a pointer on this. But they remember they can't see it. Oh, they can't see it. Well, okay, it was just the lower portion of to the west of, where the dog park and to the west of the VEP Coeasement, the other field was there, and we've taken that out and instead put in the pickleball courts as more of an active sport for the younger individuals. Although I've tried to play it. Again, that was is the only change really in the amenities and so on. If we can relocate the amenities further up into the park area, we'll try to go ahead and do that. I'll work with parks and rec and talk to Hanover possibly. And if we can do that, then we won't disturb any of that property over there. That'll be all underdeveloped. The only part that we're developing now is not in the wetlands. And that's the only part that we envision ever developing, unless again we can move those amenities up into the park. As far as the parking, 228 are required to per unit. We already have with driveways and on lot parking, 500 and 80 units. We don't need without all the townhouses that we had before. We don't need all that Austrian parking. So we can get the pavement down now. It's 40. We can get down to 32 on stone roads, 36 on some roads. Which we'll go ahead and give us breathing room on the lot to maybe expand some of the lots also. So it's a benefit there. The cash proffer is at $4,000 for the residential. I have a cash proffer for $200,000 on the commercial. In addition to that, you know, the transportation improvements all together to rail one million nine plus. So I'm going to do a million dollars of improvements and cash proffers, they're going to the county from this project. So I think it's paying its fair share at this point with all the improvements in 54 and also what's that. Other than that, I had a conclusion here somewhere. I just wanted to thank the staff. This has been a three year excursion. Excursion is probably the best word I could use. And the staff has been very helpful. I've tried to work closely with them. And there's a much different plan than the one we had approved at the Planning Commission and again I also thank you for all your comments. They were very helpful in coming to the final plan. If you have any questions I'll be happy to answer them. All right, questions? Right at this time. All right, thank you. We'll go ahead and open the public hearing at this time. Invited a one who would like to speak to this application. Come up and identify yourself by name and address if you would. Okay. Here we will be too loud. My name is David McCall. I'm 13400 Dyson Trail Circle in the Providence neighborhood that is directly across Woodside Lane from this new development. I'm also the president of the HOA Board, but I'm speaking on my personal behalf. I also want you to know that we did not receive the previous notification of this meeting as HOA, homeowner, I mean landowner across the street. We did receive this one, which is why I'm here, but we didn't receive the previous one. So I guess the glitch was fixed. I would like to speak. I'm in favor of this development. I'm not in favor of the commercial zoning on this side of the interstate at all. I believe there's plenty of commercial development on the western side of 95. I understand that that isn't necessarily a popular opinion on this council, but as a home owner on the eastern side of 95, I prefer the rural nature of the area. It's one of the reasons we moved into there. I understand it's a, you know, commercial, I mean housing development is gonna happen in an area, but I believe we do not need the commercial part of it. I understand the town wants the revenue, completely understand, but I do not, we don't need it. There's plenty of commercial development, there's plenty of open commercial development opportunities on the eastern side of 95. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Good evening. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. My name is Jim Bolton. My wife, Paul and I reside at 1382 for Providence Grace Lane. We're in the same neighborhood as David. Just by way of quick background, we just moved out of the area. My accent may be giving me away, but we moved down to this area about seven months ago to get closer to our daughters and our four lovely grandchildren. And one of the things that appealed to us about this neighborhood, we're on the other side of Woodside Lane, it's just, it's a beautiful area. It really is a beautiful area. All those green trees, ironically, I was taking a right off of Woodside Lane, on to 54, just yesterday, there's a sign, as you enter the town, it's a city of trees and there are these beautiful evergreen trees All around my wife and I walk through the Trails and all the other things we've enjoyed it tremendously so the concern I too don't have a concern with residential development or anything related to this project that talks about development in the back. I do have a major concern with the commercial aspect of it and specifically as it relates to the intersection of Woodside Lane and 54. I think logic would suggest that that's going to create some general traffic issues. There are likely to be some lighting and noise related issues and it occurred to to me today, as I was going down a, baby sent my youngest one-year-old grandson, that road is only a two-lane road each way. So as you have commercial development along, as I'm understanding the plan, it was kind of hard to read, because it was so small, but it looks like the seven-point something acres runs along the entire front. It's about a third of a mile, 1900 feet I think, and then it goes back about 200 feet. So if you have two or three or four commercial enterprises along that 54, you can imagine. People are coming out and they're going to go, I guess, east on 54. They've got a cross traffic, I guess the westbound traffic on 54. Similarly, people traveling east toward 301 on 54 are going to turn left into those establishments. I think actually that gives rise to a public safety issue. I think it really does. Also, residential is not an issue, but I do think, and I did a little bit of quick look at the town attorney for a second. I did five minutes worth of research and looked at your ordinance. So, there's a 26 and 21.4 lays out certain criteria that relates to whether or not you should be approving a change of zoning ordinance. So it's public necessity, convenience, general welfare, and good zoning practice require the change. I would respectfully submit that those criteria are not met here to the extent that you should require a change of the zoning ordinance. In conclusion, I would respectfully request that you reject this application or make changes to it that limit the scope of the commercial aspect of it, particularly as it relates to that intersection of 54 in Woodside Lane. I thank you for your time and attention. I have to say we love being in this area, we love the town, we love the area, everyone that we've met with No exceptions has been gracious and friendly. So we're real happy to be here. And thank you so much. Thank you. You certainly welcome. Glad that you're here. Yeah. We are. Thank you, ma'am. All right. Anyone else at this time? Going, going, going. All right, so we'll close the, close the public hearing now, bring it back to council. And first of all, if there are any questions for either applicant or Miss Amos, is there a start? Yes sir. I was wondering if Miss Amos might address the public comments about the commercial area and what the developer has done and the character of the property. Dressing the commercial concern. Let me share this, Mac. First I'll go back to the comprehensive plan amendment process, which happened I believe in 2023. There was a request to have this entire area change to traditional neighborhood. And at the time, the town council at the time determined that they would like to keep the front area shown as a commercial use and to have the rear as residential. And so the conversation kind of goes back to that. So that's what our comprehensive plan is based off of and that's what we bring to you all on staff is, we oftentimes look directly at our comprehensive plan. Now we have, the applicant has provided through comments over the past year and working through the Planning Commission and Town Council as well as citizens in folks in the Hanover County. We've had plenty of input from Hanover County taken out the option for drive-through restaurants unless it's for a small coffee shop. If it's just a coffee shop only, they can have a drive-through. Other than that, there will not be drive-through restaurants here. And I think that fast food restaurants were a concern as well as large gas fueling stations. And so the applicant has profit out certain uses and then will have conditional use permits required for other uses at which time that would come back to you all for mitigating issues to include if there were to be a fuel station. So right now their proposal is to have large restaurant sites, a mixed neighborhood hood related type unit, a farmers market and a coffee shop. That being said, all of that is speculative and they will have to go to market and see who they can get to lease or purchase these sites. There are buffers being provided along 54 and woodside as well as buffers provided behind the commercial into the residential. And so, and then the concerns about the traffic, a TIA, a transportation impact analysis was performed and they looked at the traffic for the commercial, which obviously commercial does produce more traffic than residential. And through that TIA process, they recommended changes to Route 54 and woodside as well as turn lanes on the site. And the applicant has preferred to make those transportation improvements at the time of development. So hopefully that covered everything. And I apologize that the notice wasn't received by the HUA. We've been using the same address list. I mean, we obviously do check and make sure that no one has moved. But we've used, I'm sure the HOA address probably hasn't changed. And if it has, we need to make sure that we have that on the GIS. Yeah, ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to ask the committee to chart which was presented in our last meeting. And updated and it should be provided on to our time. I'd like to share with the public. And I thank the poet being and has been raised that we've been working on this case for three years and the commercial I'm afraid was an issue back in 2022. The applicant did not ask for the commercial but the town felt that since this area was annexed and was part of the town and was close to the interchange that there should be some commercial, but the applicant has responded to concerns about not allowing for fast food other than or drive through, other than a coffee shop and has put limits that would require certain commercial uses and tense commercial uses. Automobile repair, for example, would have to come back and its own public hearing and could be denied. So we have heard the Providence neighborhoods concerns relative to the data center. And when we were doing the fact conference at Pl at plan amendment and we respect that area and do try to address the concerns we're not ignoring. I had other comments but maybe other. Anyone else who's done? Any comment? Just on this whole case? Mm-hmm. Yeah, I have a few. And a lot of changes have happened kind of quickly. I jot it down some thoughts before I got here. And so I hope it doesn't look like I'm rambling on. And I might be a little repetitious. First of all, the dog part. Initially, I thought there would be, I was thinking there's one right down the road. I think for people who like, excuse me, I just wrote this so it doesn't even make sense to me. I think for people who like dog parks, that promotes a sense of community because people come together with their dogs to run and play. Now I know that it's going to be open to the public. So I don't have a big problem with that as long as everybody can use it. And I was wondering I did have the question who would be responsible for the maintenance and everything of the parks and amenities. And I was told that the's association would be. I'm okay with commercial beginning before the homeowner start moving in so that they can get used to seeing what's going to be there. The light sizes were about 500 square feet and are now about eight I'm sorry 5,000 square feet and are now about 8,000 square feet because town homes were taken out. I think I'm right. Correct me if I'm wrong. When I was asked about my thoughts on the square footage, I did not realize that increasing the square footage would eliminate the town homes. Then all of a sudden, just like that, the town homes were wiped out. It is about 114 homes now with the 2.0 units per acre. I guess that's about 17 homes less. I understand having town homes would give prospective homeowners a bit more of an affordable option. Some might want town homes. Driving through Ashland, that is what I see, diversity and housing. We have that in town. Is disappointing for me to hear that all the town home options were removed. I was told that townhomes would not have enough yard, which of course we all know what a townhome is. You know those don't come with a lot of yard space, but there are amenities that would make up for that because there is plenty of space provided throughout the development. This is the town of Ashland. It should be about having options that are diverse, that are of diverse incomes and population choices. Town homes do give people more choices. Adding a bit of variety of options, which is what the comp plan talks about, variety and housing. Yes, we are in Hannover County, but we are the town of Ashland. Transitioning from driving out of the county into the town of Ashland, I would like to see it look like Ashland. These are just my thoughts. People should know when they get into the town and leave the county. That's why people like to visit our town and some make it their home here. That's what they like. They like Ashland just the way it is. That's to me, that to me is what makes Ashland, when people see more variety and diversity in everything, homes, places to eat, places to go, everything. So I'm not trying to change anything. I just wanted to say what was on my mind. Good, thank you. Appreciate it. All right, anyone else? Is this time? Yes, sir. Well, I probably will say what's not popular out loud, commercial is a big part of Ashland. And it is in our comp plan that we want commercial next to neighborhoods where people can walk to where they need to go to their doctor. They can walk to go get something to eat. They can walk to get a drink. They can walk to hang out with friends. And so I was really pleased with the way you've gone about being respectful to the surrounding areas, listening to what type of commercials people definitely were not a fan of things that they definitely did not want. And I thought you did a great job of lining out the things that would be acceptable and the things that might be questionable and then they might have to come back to counsel to discuss. I think you've done a great job with balancing, putting a neighborhood together with the commercial. I'm really pleased with everything that's been done. I agree with Ms. Soapal on that I would love to have a diversity of housing. I'm concerned with a diversity of housing in that area, mostly because it's connecting two neighborhoods, and I just, I'd be nervous about it being too many housing houses in that section. So I do appreciate that, and I have, I've identified them with Josh and Nora areas of town where, you know, I might be supportive of that type of diversity of housing that could also be good. I just, I get nervous about too many units on that section, so I'm actually pleased that the numbers have dwindled down and I appreciate your presentation, saying, you know, sharing that, you know, the road sides might be even smaller, when there's more chances for parking off street. Everything that I saw was good. that I like you've been responsive and yeah, I'm just thankful. And thankful for staff or chugging along for so long. And I'm not ignoring what I heard from Citizen Input. That is, even if I may be disagreeing in some way, it is still gonna stick in the back of my mind as we go forward of what concerns people have. So I hope you don't think that I listen to you and say, oh no, this is something we've thought about for a while. And I do appreciate the citizen input, though. OK. Thank you. Well, I do appreciate, too. I know the applicant has jumped through a lot of hoops over the last three years. It's been a long journey for you. And I know that at every corner, every turn, whether it's been with us or it's been with the Planning Commission, you know, you have heard what we've said. For example, I know the Planning Commission was very clear about the fact that they did not want fast food in that area. It's a very odd piece of property. It was, as we all know, is given to the town in the late 1990s for the sole purpose of having some property for us to develop for commercial use. And in order for us to take care of the people that want to move into this community, and we have had roughly a thousand moving, since the pandemic, we have to have a way of taking care of them and providing services for them. So as long as you're very mindful with the kind of commercial that you're gonna put out there, I agree with Councilman McGraw that it would not be a bad place for us to have something to help service that area. And I know across the street is the county and it's a different policy and it's a different this, different that but we also have to think about the citizens of Ashland that we have to take care of. A couple of things that I still am not totally sold on and that is the disturbance of that wetland with the recreation area. I would like to see that 10% go towards Washington Lacey Park it's already a park and there's people in that area that are used to going there I would hate to see that 10% go towards Washington Lacey Park. It's already a park and there's people in that area that are used to going there. I would hate to see the people in that community strapped with the liability and the maintenance of a dog park. I have three gray hounds. I know what it's like to have dogs and it's a wetland area. I'd hate to think of people not cleaning up after their pup and wanting into the wetland. So I'd like to see that dog park someplace else. I also, I'm looking at the pickle ball. There's a lot of things that go into putting together pickle ball courts. It's much fun as I know they would be. There's lighting involved. There's parking involved. There are people that do live in that area. and we have to think about them as well. So I am not a big fan of disturbing that wetland area. I hope you can put that into the park area that's north. I do hope that streets can be narrow. I drove through town and 32 feet is what I see. I mean 36 feet is what I see when I go to slash, and there's plenty of parking, plenty of room for people to drive. A 60 foot right of way for a street just seems mind-boggling to me that we would need that, and it would give people a little bit more space to stretch out on with their homes. So I'd like to see the streets a little more narrow. But I do appreciate the fact that this started out with over 240 houses on both sides of the power lines and you have managed to bring it down now to 114. As far as the town houses are concerned, I know we'd love to have some property in town that is more affordable housing, whatever that term means to some people. I don't know a $400,000 house doesn't seem very affordable to people, but I prefer having a smaller number of houses there. There's a traffic concern for everyone. Not just on on 54, but also for the folks that live on Jamestown Road, we have to consider them and obviously the people across the street as well. So I'm grateful that you've taken it down to 14. So as a right now, I don't think I have anything else that I'd like to add. Mr. Vice-Main. I just declare a vacation and appreciate the applicant's good faith effort to respond to the concerns about the location of the recreation area and the widths of right of way I was looking at the proffers and there's not language that speaks to the alternative that Mr. Wilton said he's willing to address, but is my understanding that the proffer number one that speaks to the approval of the conceptual plan which which shows the recreation area on the west side of the power line and the 60-foot right of way. That plan, if we approve the zoning tonight, would be approved, but there is language that speaks to the director of planning, being able to approve modifications in orientation amenities, roadways, location of dwelling, sidewalks, buildings, and density may vary from the plans along as the development is generally consistent with the plan. And that's the language I believe that Mr. Wilton is relying on to make a good faith effort to try to address the concerns that have been raised. Am I correct? I don't believe everyone has spoken yet. I don't know if the mayor has any comments. Well, I would echo what you just said that having that flexibility, not a very wide range, but some flexibility has approved by the Director of Planning cuts both ways so that way there can continue to be what's been happening, which is good conversation and I'll say cooperation between the two about we're able to make some of the changes that have been discussed because we're able through the site plan and I just want to say that you know we for the individuals that spoke we do care what everyone says we don't have a you know show me your Ashland citizen shirt card You know to get in the door. We don't have that kind of policy and certainly understand The concern but it has been said by Miss Barnhart Sometimes people say well, I know how the I know how the government is whether it's the town on state whatever They want the revenue and yes We do need the revenue. I'll say no matter how much revenue we bring none of it gives any extra to us. You know it's not an art interest but it is an interest of the town because one of the things we want to do is to make sure we can keep the town on a good healthy, good healthy livability throughout the whole town. And sometimes the new neighborhoods, they can help us with our revenue, with the commercial to be able to take care of all the town. So what happens in the development, it isn't necessarily, it's not limited exactly to that space as far as the dynamic of the town. So, yeah, respectfully, yeah, I do support having the commercial there. We talked elected officials from all over the country and some have the benefit of, hey, we've got mountains. And so we use our mountains for this, that this that and the other tourism and others. We've got the ocean. And so for Ashland, we've got the interstate. And the interstate is like a very good artery that helps the town's finances. And so that's why as we looked at this a good while back, we thought interstate commercial is an option that we have that we don't have in other areas of the town and a lot of towns don't have So so I take a lot of time But just want to explain that the viewpoint concerning commercial in revenue How that needs to have a certain percentage each to work for an area just want to explain that a little bit more, at least from my perspective. Anything else to say, sir? If you're willing to consider resolution at this point or motion. Yes. And before I do, I do want to rest appreciation to the applicant for his willingness to make numerous changes and address staff concerns. I appreciate all the effort the staff has put in on this case. And with that, I would move to approve. May I ask questions for you? Yes, sir. I just want to make sure that we are clear that we are asking him to please, I guess that's the way of putting that, with the width of the road and the possible moving of that recreation area, are we asking him to do that? Is this just going to be in good faith? Do we need to pose that? As a potential maker of the motion, I will. Oh, I appreciate that then. Okay. If I might interrupt one more time just to say if you're paying for a road It's in your interest to make it smaller if you can't okay, so I imagine there's an incentive to save money So well we had we had talked a little bit about it But I'm not I didn't know in my brain. I want to make sure it was clear Situation is appreciated. Well, I think it's an excellent. I'm sorry I'm glad you brought it up because I was gonna wait for the motion in the second to then clarify with you whether or not this met, so thank you for that. I think we're all absolutely. Okay. This has turned out to be a longer motion than I anticipated. So are we supposed to be done well? Yes. And as a preamble to the motion, I would say that the intent in making the motion is to recognize that we can't change the plan. This is not a conditional use permit where we could put our request in writing and make it part of the approval. This is a rezoning with proffers voluntarily given by the applicant. So we are, to some extent, relying on the good faith efforts of the developer, he has shown a willingness to make changes. But at this point, we can't change the right of way or the location on the map of the recreation area, but the applicant has stated in a public hearing that it is his intent to pursue the relocation and I've tried to put words what I heard to pursue the relocation of the recreation area into the Washington Lacey Park in conjunction with his construction of ten parking spaces which was part of his process to get the county to approve selling him four acres and return for improvements that would make Washington and Lacey Park more accessible. And hopefully with this developer's efforts, it would make Washington and Lacey Park more of a park that appeals to a broader, more of an active park than it is right now. of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of the state of mayor said in his interest to build the least necessary to meet the counties or excuse me, meet the county's, excuse me, meet the town's requirements. And judging over all of this, we're giving the authority to the Director Planning to for it to be in concert with the approved plan and the public hearing and representations at public hearing. So I think it's not a legal requirement, but it is hopefully a commitment that we can expect the applicant to follow through on. Having said all that. Thank you. I appreciate you taking the time to explain that. I appreciate that. Thank you. In that case, I would move to approve RE Z 23-1031 and ordinance 20 23-14 Patriot Glen with proffers as amended and submitted tonight. Second. Mr. Oppel. Aye. Vice Mayor Hodges. Aye. Dr. McGraw. Aye. Ms. Barnhart. Aye. Mayor Troubette. Aye. All right, thank you all. Thank you. Thanks, Steyr. All right. Before we move to action item, I just want to recognize Ms. Terry Abrie in the room, a former council member. Thank you for being here. Someone who's helped lay some of the foundation for decisions we made. All right, now we'll take up our first action item, 2025 strategic plan revisions. Mr. Goodman. Forgive me the pace. I'm getting there. You have a pace that's fine with us bring you the strategic plan as we brought to you, I guess, at this time last month, I'll actually earlier this month. And so to recap, for those who might be viewing from home or in the audience tonight, just want to kind of go over the process. You've course this council adopted a strategic plan in 2015 or in 2016, worked on it in 2015. Receive periodic updates in 2017, 2019, 2021 and the most robust update in 2023 where we were in here for a better part of a Saturday and all day and just really went through that and probably cut it down to about 60% of what it once was because so many of the initiatives and objectives had been accomplished. So it was doing really the work of the survey. That was left us with 59 initiatives in that 2020-13 version of the strategic plan. The current effort which also meets a strategic plan initiative which asks town council, I guess, to police yourselves, I guess, to go through review this thing on on a regular basis so we're trying to stick with that once every two years on nomenclature. So we review that plan this time a little bit differently with staff reviewing it and trying to do some homework for council. But influenced and armed with the information from the 2024 National Community Survey report which I think gave a lot of us some really good information about what our citizens like, what we're doing, maybe what they wanna see us put more effort into. And so we looked at that through the lenses of that NCS survey to make our recommendations. And as you see, we went over at March 4th, we presented these revisions to council, who made some suggestions to remove some initiatives that have already been completed and achieved. We made a couple of suggestions to maybe tweak the wording to make it more, the initiatives a little bit more apropos to what we're dealing with in our current climate and we came up with a few initiatives. During the March 4th meeting, we elected Council-directed staff to put back in the Fall line trail. We had taken it out thinking that okay from a staff perspective, our section will be done hopefully in the fall. We'll be riding our bikes from Ashland down the Chica hominian back. But you know staff definitely made it clear to staff that we want to make sure that it's in there. So the rest of the region knows that Council and our town is supporting the regional effort, not just the section of the path that goes through town. We also, you also asked staff to combine 3.3.1 with 3.3.4, which directed, addressed some housing and some affordability issues. We basically combine those and I'll show you that in just a minute. And added stronger language to 1.4.3 regarding the DC to RVA project and the issues with the future issues with the 323 solution. So that revision makes five, we still have five total focus areas, 16 objectives and 58 initiatives to put it. So if you don't mind, I'd like to pull that up and look at that and what you will have in front of you, this is the red line version. There is a final draft. Should you approve this red line version in the Granicus package and your printed packages? But what you'll see here is in red is what we changed, but also highlighting in yellow is what we as staff address since the meeting or address during the meeting on March 4th. So as we're going through this first fall, we added collaboration with the Economic Development Authority that was a suggestion that came from the Dias that night. When we get down further 1.4 per 3, we added this sentence as requested by Mayor Hodges. He provided the language which was extremely helpful to staff to revive that language for us to add that. Can you read that? Sure, I can. I want to read the entire thing so the way this strategic plan initiative was worded currently is 1.4.3. Monitor the DC to RVA real project for strategic response to negative impacts to the Ashen area. And I believe the discussion at the IS was we needed to be a little bit more tactical, a little bit more directed. What are we monitoring and how are we going to respond? So the sentence that was provided that we inserted as follows, the town should take average advantage of studies like the Richmond Regional Transportation Planning Organizations 2050, long range transportation plan to solicit regional, state and federal support for a viable long-term solution to the limited capacity of the DC to RVA 323 alternative that maintains the integrity of the town. Thank you. Thank you for providing the narrative, sir. So as we move on from this, again, that was a council agreed with staffs, changes, until we get back to here. You'll see with I can't pull up both for give me for that. But 3.3.1, we added the regional and community organizations when it was discussed promoting the development and re-evaliation of quality, housing and secure housing and affordable housing. And what we did is we eliminated the 3.3.4 here which discussed a diverse range of housing opportunities. Staff initially presented that that we felt like 3.3.1 was a duplication of the, I'm sorry 3.3.4 was a duplication of the first one. Council simply wanted to at least what we, what I heard was add in that community and regional partners and you hit the mark for us there. We're still talking about affordable housing. We're just talking about involving community partners in that process. We continue moving south through this process. That is the extent of the changes that were made either that meeting or with subsequent information provided that. I am happy to answer any questions or go over any other issues. Yes sir? You flipped it right to my question. We've reviewed this before. The in panel a committee to complete a detailed review and analysis of vehicle traffic congestion trends with a report due to Council January 2026 on recommendations for improvement or further action. My question, this implies this is gonna be done internally and And the question relates to county and regional sources of information. And maybe it's implied. And maybe the manager has addressed this before. And I'm not recalling exactly what he said. But didn't it to be an internal report, wanted to reflect both the region and the county due projections that impact the town and want to reflect those projections. I think we discussed this when we discussed it back on March 4th. I think that the challenge was we were definitely certainly as staff taken as much data as we possibly can take in. You know, V. Traffic Accounts, Traffic Information from the county, whatever we can take in. But I think if I remember the conversation correctly, we wanted to make sure that this will start as an internal review with internal staff members and that if we get to the point where we either have to, we can involve county or state players in this and it's not a council level discussion then possibly we can do that. But if it's something where we want we feel as staff that this is beyond our control for instance. This one solution is beyond our control. We would like council to formally request the state to take action or the county to take action or XYZ. We acknowledge the fact that it's be very difficult for us as a staff, it's going to be very difficult for any group to take three lanes of 70 mile an hour traffic down to two lanes going either way with stoplights and 45 and 30 mile an hour traffic and address this. But we can't keep ignoring it, but we can't keep hoping things will get better. We want to take diligent action to see what can we control as staff, what can we control as town, and then hopefully provide that recommendations to council that maybe we can, maybe there's some low-hanging fruit we can take advantage of here locally under our own power. But maybe there's the second part of that report is council we need your help, we need your resolution or what have you to ask for more help from the state or federal government. Am I capturing that conversation correctly? The plan is for it to be excuse me, something going on today. There will be a little committee that definitely would state and the county and regional resources, right? So I don't necessarily need the county transportation planner on that. I don't want to commit his time that much, but we'll use them as a resource throughout. And really what Doug's getting at is the end of the report won't necessarily have, we'll hopefully have some solutions and some recommendations for future action, right? More things that we need to accomplish. And that's the moment, I think, where we say, all right, we need to partner with the county and the state on this. We need to partner with potentially tech companies on algorithms for ways, that kind of thing. And so for it is very, very internal focus that we're going to be doing, producing the ideas, but it's going to be all resources for outside. And that's very helpful. I was just speaking as a member of the town county liaison committee that might be an issue that we bring up with the county to get their support in terms of providing resources, not necessarily participating in the panel. Yeah. I'm not ashamed to share it. Tomorrow I have lunch with the county administrators administration and since one of the three talking points we have to go over. So we would do it just that. Thank you. You've answered my question. All right. Anyone else on this at this moment? Yeah, I just wanted to. It might be the procrastinator in me. I didn't want to bring it up yet, right? But I'm thinking this is fast track. That's eight months away, basically, to a panel, the individuals that be part of the committee to define the task, decide the scope, seek the resources, and then provide a report. So I'm not talking about changing the language, though to me and my mind, I'm hoping we get a draft report in January 2026 because I'm not talking about changing the language, though to me and my mind. I'm hoping we get a draft report in January 2026, because I'm thinking with a draft report, then that'll help define some of the things we're talking about. Is it playing RVA, you know, planning district commission, you know, whoever we need to speak to. So, anyway, I think it's a very wise objective, initiative force, but I don't speak to. So I think it's a very wise objective initiative for us. But I don't want to tell staff drag your feet. But that's a tall order to get done by January. It's not just January 26. It's our next January this coming, which is 26. And I think part of that is kind of what I was saying earlier is what the draft will likely entail is direction or initiative to partner with, plan or meet and partner with our TBO2 and whether it's a study of trash, crash incidents or a traffic congestion or whatever it may be. So I don't think we're going to get all the way to that's a recommendation. The study is done. We have the study move and that is a study of absolutely. It's going to to be these are all the parallel steps we need to take really within five years to comprehensive Carry on That's all the changes I have for council. I'm I ears. If you have any other revisions or if you have motion language in your cheat sheet in front of you wish to go out and not route as well. Well I'll be happy to make a motion. I move for the adoption of the town's strategic plan as presented. Second. Ms. Barnhart. Aye. Ms. O'Paul. Aye. Vice Mayor Hodges. Aye. Dr. McGraw. Aye. Mayor Trebert. Aye. All right. Thanks to all. Excellent. Thank you. Thank you, Council. We appreciate you working with us on this. So the next item in your agenda, You have a staff important front of you, but I believe it's best to just kind of jump right into the council policy. It was brought to our attention that we may want to consider adopting a council policy regarding filming in this chamber, filming public meetings in this chamber. First of all, Virginia Code already allows for filming public meetings in council chambers or wherever they may happen but the law also allows for local government to adopt rules as to how does that actually go about. And so what we felt like and I believe this is an issue brought up by the Virginia Risk Sharing Association and one of their meetings that we ought to consider adopting those rules that how are we going to go about this where you know are we going to again, more of it is about logistics. So I've got it up on the presentation screen now. Excuse me. And essentially what we're trying to do, we restate the state code. Obviously that is there. And we really want to make sure everyone knows we are. This is not an attempt to impede any type of constitutional guarantees. In fact, this is just trying to make sure that everybody at the meeting can listen, can see, can participate, should they wish without having something obscuring their vision, such as a camera, such as or anything else that impedes this body in doing their work. So if you'll go down to the subsection B, if you will, there, what we're basically asking people to do is regardless of whether my media or Exitia not, you don't have to necessarily be a bona fide member of the press to have a media presence in our world now. So regardless of whether you're a member of the media or not, we just simply ask if you're going to have recording equipment, if it's going to be on a tripod or something like that, that's going to be larger, to be in the back two corners of the room or directly behind us under the ether existing camera that records every meeting anyway. And we've got plugs back there, and that will minimize any kind of trip hazards for plugs or minimize trip hazards if it's a tripod. We ask that if persons from the bullet number two, if they want to record and remain seated, if they're just recording with the iPhone, again that that equipment is not disturbing or blocking someone else's view. Think about, I've been at several graduations or something where folks may have their only recording device was iPad held up and it blocks someone's view behind them. That's not necessarily fair to the person that might be sitting behind them that now can't see the presentation or can't see their council members as they're speaking to something along those lines. The last one there is that we want to make sure that that camera equipment is either relegated to the corners of the room, again not causing trip hazards or from a seated position, but definitely not within five feet of the day. Again, trying to limit those trip hazards and trying to eliminate obscuring someone else's view. If you set a tripod five feet away from you guys on the day, you're going to score someone else's view or maybe even our own camera equipment that would provide that view to the viewing public at home. So this is essentially responding to the state code which allows council to establish rules and regulations of how this recording equipment is basically set up in their own council dies. And I did discuss this at length with our town attorney and they provided some excellent feedback on this process and they approved this final version. I'll just add's a small element of this is get things like this done before you need them. I'm not sure how they're having this policy in place. We're viewed by the attorneys before we have the next giant development case or it'll never happen I hope that someone in this room puts their foot in their mouth and we have recordings coming in so good to have the policy ahead of time and make sure it's fair when you're not in crisis moments. Yes, indeed. All right. Any other discussion? Or a motion? Not a motion, but I support the proposal. Speaking as the council member, most likely to be virtual, it's my understanding that the code only requires that my voice be heard if I've not that I be seen. And so if microphone is where would you place a microphone in order to hear what I was saying? So when we have developed the system for you or any other member of council or any of our appointed boards that you have pointed whether it be public arts commission or parks and rec. We have that piped in directly through the power of technology and again thank goodness for Mr. Richardson who is here helping us with our IT needs now. We actually have your voice will come and pipe right into the AV system. So there's no microphone that needs to be here to capture. It's piped over the AV system. So everyone in the audience can hear you from all of our speakers. And our friends at home can hear it clearly through their TV as well. We've tested it multiple times. I think we've used it now twice in real time. And I believe we've found it to be an excellent solution. Great. Good question. Thank you. I defer to council members. All right. Well, if there's no further discussion. an excellent solution. Great. Good question. Thank you. I defer to council members. Okay. Well, if there's no further discussion, I'm ready to make a motion. Yes, sir. Mr. Mayor, I move for adoption of COU-118 as presented. I second. Dr. McGraw. Aye. Ms. Barnhart. Aye. Ms. to the office. Dr. McGraw. I. Ms. Barnhart. I. Ms. Soapall. Vice Mayor Hodges. I. Mayor Trebeck. I. Again. Thank you, Council. Appreciate the work. And now we'll move to reports. First planning department. This amus. I'm just to highlight some of the items. Within that document, we are pleased to participate in a downtown Ashland Association panel that was part of the Virginia Main Street, main street directors retreat that was held here in the Richmond region and came to Ashland for their final day. I enjoyed sitting on the panel with Miss Soapal and answering questions from directors from around the state. I think they really enjoyed their time here in Ashland and we were able to learn from them as well. We held a Pickers Trail focus group so that name is up in the air might be the Treasure Trail Treasure Hunt but it's a really fantastic project that Kelly Frankie and her intern Amanda now temporary staff person. Amanda Maxwell has been working, working with some of our thrift stores and our art stores and other retail vendors here in town to create a trail and a map and which will go along with a fantastic marketing and advertising program. We had three wonderful ribbon cuttings this year, this past month and thank thank you all who were able to attend the Lakitrina around the table expansion and then Harris automotive ribbon cutting. And I will note that the around the table expansion received a grant from the economic development authority for $20,000 to go towards their expansion. And then in your packet you have a flyer that talks about our historic district education seminars. And so if you own property in town or a historic home or a business, we would love for you to come and attend these seminars and come to the kickoff at Caravodies and participate. All of those will be filmed. Tom Wolf is helping us to capture the information as well as go out to homes that are being renovated currently and to document some best practices. So we'll be talking about historic tax credits as well as an overview of our districts and how to preserve and protect your home while also making it economically feasible. So, very excited about that. A transportation item, and we'll be hearing more about this from the town manager and myself. But, as I mentioned a month or two ago, the list from V.STAF for the Smart Scale scale scoring and their project recommendation included our interstate interchange. It also showed that we got about four times as much if not more in investment from that recommendation, we, the Richmond region, then Northern Virginia. And so there's been some concerns expressed from our partners in Northern Virginia. And they will probably ask that some projects get moved down the list and others get moved up the list. And since we work towards the bottom of the list and it's a very high-ticketed item, it's something we're going to ask that we go and speak to our representatives about as well as attend the CTB meeting, the Commonwealth Transportation Board meeting in April. So we'll be in attendance. We're also working with our partners in Hanoi Brook County. I think they'll be there to speak on behalf of our project as well as one of theirs that may be at risk at falling off. I'm asked for clarification. Yes. So what I'm hearing is that we've been recommended by the staff to the CTB and CTB is not, excuse me, the Commonwealth Transportation Board has not made a decision yet, so they would hold like a public hearing and we would defend the staff's recommendation that we stay on the list. Correct, based on scoring. Yes, sir. Yeah. Full hits. Well, I was just going to say that I won't be able to attend the CVTA meeting next week, but hopefully we can get support from Chet Parsons with this Central Virginia Transportation Authority and others in making our case. Yes. Chet is working on his case and then Miles Bushing with the plan RVA transportation planning organization is also planning on providing input to keep the projects on the list. Not just ours, all the projects around the region. I probably mentioned this when we got the staff recommendations, but this is just an example of what the leveraging power of the CVTA, the Central Virginia Transportation Authority money has done. Every other round of smart scale, Northern Virginia and Hampton roads have been getting a majority of the pot of money. And the reason that ours is so high, I believe is solely because of the leveraging from the CVTA money that we were able to do so. It's nice to see what you hope to happen happen and it's it's working so. Well we're certainly willing to lobby just tell us when and where if we need to help with this process. We just found out about this yesterday I think this week so you won't be getting more information. My exciting. And then the other item I wanted to update everyone on which I hope you all know about but for the public the Ashlandon in Sweet's we had the course which is the property behind Panera that we've been having the maintenance code violations on for several years and working with Hanover County Building Department They took them to court last month and the judge did decide that they Were convicted in violation of the building code they had six week weeks to bring it up into compliance and if not The county was given the authority to move forward with demolition. And so they are actively advertising that in the Richmond Times dispatch and are, I believe, working on bids to get the demolition complete. In the meantime, there is also an advertisement in the Richmond Times dispatch that the first lean holder on the property is moving towards foreclosure and that sale will be held currently on April 11th at the Hanna Record House. So we're moving forward one way or the other. Happy to answer any questions you all may have. We had just briefly, I was really impressed with the preserving your historical homes and business program. I hope I'm sure you got the Ashland Museum folks behind you. And I don't know, it would seem that their historic homes and qualifying businesses in the county. This is a great program. You've got some wonderful speakers. Hopefully, the county is aware and can help support it. They are aware. It came to our attention that the person who runs their program over there is retiring and they do not have time to attend or participate in our program, but they have been notified and we do hope that they work with us to advertise it. Hope Becker in our office has done a majority of this work. She has just run with it and done a really fantastic job of putting it together. But we've also worked closely with the museum and the Black Heritage Society to find speakers and get all the contacts and make sure that we're doing joint advertising. Well done. Got a question. For anyone who has historical properties in Hanover County, wouldn't this seminar still be beneficial to them? Absolutely. Not even in Hanover County. Anyone who wants to come? Yeah. We have a speaker coming from Mary Washington. So anybody is welcome. More than Mary. I don't know whether another former council member in Mayor Roseanne Schauff. I'm sure she's excited about this. She has been attending our meetings. Yes she is. That's good. No, that's excellent. Thank you very much. Anything else? Thank you. All right. Finance Department. Miss you, Gart. Welcome. Evening Mayor, members of council. Tonight before you is the financial report for February 2025. A few notes of importance. Staff kicked off the accounts receivable module with Tyler Munis. That is projected to be complete by the end of this calendar year. So you'll hear me talk about that a lot. The 2025 business licenses renewals are due May 1st. If there's any questions for anyone listening at home, please contact the finance department at 804798650. The auditors are beginning their preliminary field work, the week of April 7th. So we are beginning to hold documents together for them. On the financial section you will see the charge that you are normally presented with, meals tax or February collections where what we were projecting were up 2.7% over the same period last year. Lodging tax, February revenue does continue to be lower than expected, but this is a trivial to revenue collections and not the actual lodging stays being lower. On sales tax, sales tax continues to be a strong revenue source, we're ahead of the same period last year by 12.5%. On real estate and personal property, both of those revenue sources have met the anticipated fiscal year 25 budget. The due date for those was in February, but we are still continuing to collect those that may have outstanding balances. On the last page, you'll see the status of the town's invested funds for the month of February. I'll be happy to answer any questions if you have any. Not a question. I appreciate the presentation. It's very clear. The graphic value of projecting the charts for those that are at home. We have access. Okay. It's just a suggestion. My wife watches, for example. She always likes to see that we're stable, searching for the right term. But anyway, that's a suggestion. Okay, thank you. We'll take that. Thank you. Good morning. Thanks. All right. Police Department. Chief Aaron Hm. Good evening, sir. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of Town Council. In your packet of evening, you will have the Asher Police Department report from the month of February. I'm happy to report, if you'll notice, in the report that's provided that we've had to decrease in part one offenses so far this year. One thing that may jump out as it does in town is we did have one robbery last month. We are currently investigating that. There's some inconsistencies and some of the statements and the investigators are trying to shore some things up and I have more report next month where we are with that crime. Also, something's very good to see is we're noticing a decrease again in aggravated assaults if you'll remember the last past couple of years. We have noticed a significant increase in aggravated assaults and I'm happy report that we are seeing a decrease in animal and that's going to continue. We're also have had a slight decrease in accidents this year. I'm hoping that trend continues as we're talking about the issues coming off 95. Hopefully that was trend will continue as well. Some highlights from this month. We participated in the divine assist and provided resource table for the Black History Month event and we have secured a $3,200 grant that will be used to purchase two sets of spike strips. Every police car, we wanna have equipped with spike strips that purpose of them is to terminate a pursuit without having injury. Basically you lay it in the road and when a car goes across it, it puts spikes into it and allows the tires to slowly deflate. They don't puncture them to the point that you have a blowout but it will slowly allow the air to come out of the tire. So if we'd were to have a pursuit, it's a safe way to stop them from happening and keeping the public safe. Also with that we will, you know, purchase a FN less lethal launcher, which is I've spoken to you about that before. It's a, basically, it's used for primarily for folks with edge weapons. It can be used for crowd control, but we do not allow that in our policy. It's only used for people or an active threat. It does allow distance. It shoots a polyprolling contained round that has an inner powder inside of it. So rather than having to ask the officers get close with folks with edge weapons, which can escalate a situation this allows us to engage with folks from the distance, maybe armed with a weapon although then a firearm. Also in line with what Miss Amos was discussing we've continued to meet with county and town partners to discuss hotel issues such as long-term stay and maintenance of properties we're starting that back again. So hopefully we'll have some more information in upcoming weeks and We participated in a presentation with the Kiwanis about sovereign citizens this month and As everyone's aware we did have the fire and I want to give a Public recognition officer Watts who coordinated with fire officials for the fire that happened in Omni Park place We had several churches that wish to help and he coordinated with fire to make sure that folks who were displaced received some food. And also we've been working within the agency to develop our budget and also our multi-year plan as the budget develop. We also determined that need so we consult the members of the agency and update that annually. So we have a plan as we move forward for next year's budget years and years to follow For the public out there some coming events this Saturday we will have the railroad run from 7 a.m. to 11 a.m And that's at the same time we also have the little league opening which will begin at 9 o'clock So it's gonna be very busy in the hand of our avenue area Also on Sunday, March 30th from 11 to 4, we will have the little league opening, which will begin at nine o'clock. So it's gonna be very busy in the hand of our avenue area. Also on Sunday, March 30th from 11 to four, we will have the Secretary event for Secretary Day. And I'm happy for that tomorrow, Captain Shohorso and Miss Book Walter will be headed to California to the Clear Conference to represent APD to hopefully bring back our calliocertificate. Fairly confident we'll get it, but we'll see. Thank you. And last. to represent APD to hopefully bring back our callio certificate. Fairly confident we'll get it, but we'll see. Thank you. And lastly, I'm happy to report. We have a familiar face back at APD. Officer Cameron Kraus, if you all remember, worked with us. He went to New Kent and has taken a position back with the police department. He is currently in a short and fuel training process just to get him reaclimated with any changes that we may have had. But he should be back in the street after about a five day training period. So we're excited to have him back. So that'll be happy to answer any questions. So Officer Cameron wasn't in town today because I thought I'd had to ask him. He's in training. You did. I thought You did. He is there, he's tall. Yeah, I remember him. He's very aerodynamic. OK, and the other thing, isn't there some kind of presentation tomorrow night? There is. There is going to be a presentation put on by Sergeant Hanlon as a part of her supervisory project. Every supervisor will be newly promoted, has a project they have to do within six months of promotion. Hers is going to deal with social media concerns. It's a national ex-child exploitation, so ways to keep, you know, monitor your children's behavior online, and to make sure that we can intercept, you know, prevent victimization from happening through good parenting. It is open to to the public right? It is and it'll be home right? Okay, because I'm leaving a meeting to come to and I want to make sure. 6.30 to tomorrow it'll be happening. So I can I will forward to town hall. There's actually a link and I can forward that to with all the information. I can share that with you as well. Well, I have it, but you can give it to us. Absolutely. That's not something that would be broadcast. I'm assuming. It's going to be broadcast. Yeah, okay. Mr. Richardson will be here in the A to us. Absolutely. That's not something that would be broadcast. I'm assuming. It's going to be broadcast. Yeah. Okay. Mr. Richardson will be here in the A.V. booth and it will broadcast just like this meeting can broadcast. So the public can just watch from the comfort of their home. Thanks for bringing that up. So Paul. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks very much. Thank you. Thank you. All right with that we finished everything. Other than our closed session, is there a motion concerning going into closed session? I'm afraid I've lost my sheet. Mr. Mayor, I move to enter closed session, closed meeting pursuant to Virginia code section 2.2-3711A1 to discuss or consider the annual performance evaluation of the town manager. I second. Vice Mayor Hodges. I, Dr. McGraw. I, Ms. Barnhart. I, Ms. O'Pall. I, Mayor Chulbette. I, all right. We'll return in the Hi. All right. We'll return and follow in the glue session. Bye. All right. The plan returning from our closed session is their emotion to certify. Mr. Mayor, I move to return to open meeting and certify that only those matters lawfully exempted from the open meeting requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and mentioned in the motion to enter closed meeting were heard, discussed and considered. The correct response is I so certify. I second. And the correct response is I so certified. Vice Mayor Hodges. I so certified. Miss Opal. I so certified. Dr. McGraw. I so certified. Miss Borenhart. I so certified. Mayor Trebeck. I so certified. Anything else to come before the scene? Nope. We're adjourned. All right.