City Council Meeting

Not only an issue in Fairfax City but across the nation of leases and businesses kind of returning back to normal. And the city started these new grant programs, the Lyft Grant and the FIG Grant, to help attract some of those businesses and get that economic engine going. They do all sorts of programs. There's also a gift card program. And all these events and programs are really aimed at promoting local businesses. The EDA and the Economic Development Office is full of people that really care about businesses in the city. Every time I move to a place, I feel like I want to get involved somehow. I use the parks all the time. I'm heavily invested in after-school programs. That's what I do for a living.

So I like the idea of being able to be involved with a board that oversees the Parks and Rec Department. I figured that was a good way to get involved in something that I'm actually interested in. PRAB is really just a way for the citizens of the city of Fairfax to have a representative who is taking a look at the programming, the facilities, the way the Parks and Rec Department is operating, and really just asking questions like when a new initiative is coming up, you know, how is this going to impact our city budget? How is this going to impact the parks that we already love? Like what are we going to do to improve the great facilities that we already have? And I think PRAB's role is to just be that community voice and give feedback and ask questions

about initiatives that are coming down the pipe. In our city, the parks and the facilities that we have are a high point. They're something that people really enjoy and people really use a lot. People fall in love with the city of Fairfax because of those facilities and amenities and parks and things like that, and they think, oh, I want to move to the city now. So I think being able to make sure that we're offering top-notch amenities for the people that live here is a great way to attract businesses and attract residents and just really grow the city in a positive way. So it's important to, you know, if you have the opportunity to step up and help out and just be a part of the community. When I saw that the Commission on the Arts had an opening, I realized this would be a good way in.

I could, you know, give some of my expertise or at least my time to the commission, but also get to know some people that maybe I wouldn't get to know otherwise. We want to make the arts a central thing in Fairfax, make Fairfax, as it were, famous for the arts. People are emotional beings, and the main way we express emotions, I think, is through the arts. One of our main challenges is publicity. How do we get the word out about what's going on? We meet just once a month, and so it's not a huge, huge commitment, but it is something that makes a difference. For me, it has been an opportunity to interact with a diverse set of people who I normally would probably not even have met and work together towards a common goal, and I think that's very exciting.

When I saw that they were looking for board members, I thought, well, gee, I had just retired from Fairfax County Health Department, and I've always worked with older adults and people with disabilities, so I said, well, I'd love to continue my work and do that as a volunteer. One of the main objectives of Fairfax Village in the city is to provide extra help if they need a ride to the doctor, if they need to have their leaves raked or a light bulb put in. Volunteers will sign up to do that. The service is here, and there's people in the community that want to provide this service because they want to volunteer and feel like they're helping their community and giving back. Not only do we provide services to the members, but we also provide information.

It's also a good time to meet your neighbors, and you can socialize with people at that time. I've lived in Fairfax City since 1992. I had mentioned to my husband when we were looking to buy a home that I wanted to look back in Fairfax City because I enjoyed living in Fairfax City so much. I like the community feel of Fairfax City. For the Northern Virginia Workforce Investment Board, we're trying to foster relationships, build new relationships with employers and industry and trying to find out what they need. It's a double win. So it's a win for the workforce that we develop, and it's also a win for the companies that hire the people that we've developed. I'm the CEO of Guts. We have an accredited entry-level plumbing program and HVAC program.

Our mission is to get people started in the trades. I love living in the city of Fairfax. My house is in the city of Fairfax. My business is in the city of Fairfax. And when I saw it come up on the city scene, I said this would be a really good opportunity for me to give back to the city and help people start new careers. The Northern Virginia Workforce Investment Board realized how important it is to invest in our workforce and to build our workforce. It's a lot of fun to see results. It's self-rewarding. It really is. It's definitely a very positive thing that helps everyone. Civic Connection is a program that helps you understand what is the city, how does it work, how does it function. It is a comprehensive dive into learning how those things work here.

One of the things that I wasn't anticipating was how everything works together. I feel much more comfortable with the people who are holding this city together. I'm a real estate agent, and I thought that it would be really a good opportunity to get to know more about Fairfax City. Being a business owner in Fairfax, I thought it would be very beneficial to learn more about the community and just learning more about local government in Fairfax. Everybody that did their job really cared about what they were doing, and it was very uplifting for me. I learned so many things, and you can make the most of the city and appreciate the city that much more, and you can contribute too. Take advantage of this wealth of information that's being given to us.

It's a very detailed process, and you can tell that everyone really cares, and they're just trying to put in good work to get good quality work out. Coming into it with an open mind, you might know some things, but you might also learn a lot more than you would have expected when you sign up. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We are a primary care based medical practice.

being in the events. And I would even say from a family standpoint, I do appreciate the community type of vibe that they have here. We like to say that our demographic is moms to menopause. I'm actually in that demographic myself. So when I see my patients, when I take care of my patients, I truly do see myself in them. And I understand acutely like the different challenges that they are faced with, how we manage our practice, how we build our relationships with patients. So as a woman advocating for other women, I understand what they're going through. Sim Sim means sesame in English. I am originally from Yemen and my partners are originally from Palestine. So we came together to establish this restaurant here. This is a Middle Eastern

restaurant. We offer Yemeni and Palestinian and Shami in general foods. We offer breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We offer actually very authentic food. Also, we're bringing two different cuisines, Yemeni and Palestinian. And I think also the way we present our food, the way we take care of our space, you know, makes us special. The original idea was actually to open a breakfast place because there are no many Middle Eastern breakfast restaurants in Fairfax area. We have a very big community here. And most of restaurants usually open at 10 a.m. While we open at 7 a.m., then we expand it to have to offer breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We actually do a lot of events for the Arab community here and at our restaurant. We do a lot of

catering for fundraising, weddings, engagements, and different events. Also, we host Arab leaders, like Arab America leaders. They wanted to cooperate with us to, you know, promote the Arab Heritage Month, which is April. We donate food so that we promote our restaurant and also promoting our food as well. Arab community and also communities from around the world here will love Middle Eastern food. So we think that Fairfax is an ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for our restaurant. An ideal area for

for businesses of every size, but certainly small businesses. Nicole became a breast cancer survivor herself and I think that level of care and compassion to try to bring you back to feeling good about yourself. The city residents really feel like they want more here in the city. We're getting a great response so we have all the bra sizes and the lift and everything. A lot of people are like, oh don't you want to sell online? Don't you want to like that could expand your business. The magic happens inside the fitting rooms. That is how we are able to make sure that people leave with the perfect fit. We get lots of referrals, word of mouth, but people really do want to get out there and they want to shop in person. I put myself in their shoes. I am in their shoes. I am a survivor.

I know what survivors are looking for. I know what they're going to need. I can help guide them to other services in the community. It's fortunate for our business that we're able to help people even better on their journeys. We've been here in the city of Fairfax since 2019 and so through our partnerships with the economic development team and the Old Town Business Association we're able to get grants to move into this new space and by just moving down the street we're actually able to double our space. Huntington Learning Center is a great resource for parents who are looking for extra support for their children K through 12 and so that's your early learning readers and the SAT ACT prep courses too.

What we're seeing post-COVID especially is just a real degradation in the learning environment. Students are not achieving at the levels that they were achieving in 2019 and so we're able to meet students where they are. So it's very individualized and a caring concerning environment that allows kids to really grow in their academic journey. All of these things not only build academic skills for our children but it gives them confidence and at the end of the day it is about how students see themselves, how they see themselves as learners and see themselves as competent and capable and what Huntington Learning Center does is it gives them the academic skills but it also builds their self-esteem.

This is your neighborhood printing press. You can walk in and you can talk directly with the owner and a designer to help you figure out how to have exactly the right thing for your special event. Shrivani chose to put her Minuteman press here to do smaller jobs as well as larger jobs. It's a lot as a woman to not just open your own business but while you are multitasking doing a lot of other things like raising a family. Shrivani is modeling what that looks like here in the city of Fairfax. We have a variety of products that benefits the business starting from a business card, a banner, brochure, catalogs, flyers, binding books, anything that needs a print. You can come us. I lived in Fairfax for almost 15 years so this is like my home. It's not just the business. This is a new start.

We're connecting with the community and providing the creative service. I just wanted to have a place where everyone can come, feel welcomed with their projects. So this is the best place that you can start. We want to make sure every customer feels valued and supported. Fairfax is a home for me for many years. The community has given me a lot so today it's my opportunity to give back. Thank you for trusting us and celebrating this milestone with me. Having a business celebrate its 10 year anniversary is really important in the city. It is giving us a grade on how good a partnership with a business who continues to expand rather than move outside the city. Economic development and people on our city staff help get their vision to an operational point.

That rebranding from Bond's escape room to Bond's entertainment center was the result of getting a marketing grant from economic development to try to support businesses as they grow and embrace new things. We have chosen an independent view on how to run things and what our core values are. We have to have best customer service. We have to have great experience for customers and trying to create a fun and inclusive environment for our staff. When we started, the city was not as busy as we see today. As we kept working, we kept on bringing people from other cities. So we get to see the impact for the community. What we do really helps not only our customers but also our community. We serve and build not only escape rooms but also virtual reality.

We advocate on quality time for people. It's a great way to connect with your people. It can be fun. We serve and build not only our children. It's a great way to connect with our children. Early childhood should be rooted in playful, innovative, and creative experiences. It takes a village to raise a child. It also takes a village to support the parents. So when you have multiple children, you also have a place to come where there are age-appropriate activities in one place. So I think this business is going to be invaluable. I think for the children and their early childhood education experiences. But I think also for the parents and the people who care for children this age. We are able to curate all the experiences starting from the music and movement portion to the sensory bins.

And then all our children are able to connect with us. And it's the same pattern of weekly classes that they're able to connect with me and build relationships and connections. Because I'm the instructor in every class, I get to build real relationships. Not just with the children, but with the parents as well. It becomes a familiar, comforting space where little ones can form bonds and feel truly seen. I saw a need for a space that had sensory play available indoors. Creating an international space where messy play is freely explored. It was central to the location for a lot of our clients. And we know that the community here is very engaged. So we wanted to bring that to the city. The village is waiting for you.

And we would love to welcome and build that community with you. This music school chose this space. It's got high ceilings. It has lots of windows and lots of natural light. It allows them to have a very elegant space. We chose this specific location because we are surrounded by a good neighborhood. All the families are around us. I think it's easy for students, for the parents to bring the students to us in the future. And also we're surrounded by great school. We have a team of teachers teaching a variety of levels and a variety of interests. So it doesn't matter if you're interested in classical music or popular music. I'm happy to take all students here. We really thrive on taking people who are interested in music and trying to make them

really continue to love it. The study of music and Create a Music School focus primarily on the education of children in music. They're offering to become part of any occasion or festival or celebration in the city where their music or what they have to offer can contribute. I mean, what an asset for the city and what a bonus for them to be welcomed into the city that values things like that. We're looking to reach people through teaching as well as through performance. At our academy, we welcome everyone from babies to adults. We create a program from every stage of life because I truly believe music is for everyone. Alongside our traditional private and group lessons, we offer instructions in piano, violin,

guitar, voice, brass, drums, and more, all taught by experts and highly educated teachers who are passionate about both music and education. I personally develop programs for neurodivergent learners, including adaptive music experience that support different learning styles, sensory need, and communication approaches in an nurturing and strength-based environment. That was my main goal. I also develop wellness-based adult program because I believe music can be deeply healing and restorative. I think Madalina really has identified something that is so important, that all people are capable of loving music. All people are capable of learning music, but not all people can learn music the way it is taught in a

mainstream, even a public education setting. And so she's giving an opportunity for people of differing abilities to learn music. This school was in my heart for many years. It was a dream of mine. I want to maybe inspire other people too. When you have a dream, just go for it. Don't think twice. Just go for it. Don't think twice. The fact that Healthy Minds Therapy chose Fairfax City when they have two other locations says to me that they understand that the location of our city in the middle of Northern Virginia is an asset to them. Their patients have the option to come and be here in person or to do their therapy sessions virtually and that speaks to accessibility. Regarding accessibility, it made a lot of sense if we could find a place in Fairfax City

that would work for us and would also work for the community. Like our mission statement says, inspire thriving, healthier communities. And so the City of Fairfax really made sense for us and built our ability to serve more and more people. Accessibility and the fact that they have so many therapists because it's not just getting a therapist, it's getting the right therapist. We're happy to help find the right fit for any clients that might be wanting to start therapy or have been thinking about it for a while. We hope that it's an organic connection and we hope that we continue to help people to feel seen and heard whatever you are experiencing. Seeking mental health care is the same as seeking any other kind of health care and we should

not be afraid to say that we have a therapist. Seeking mental health care is the same as seeking mental health care. So here we are today in historic Fairfax City and you may have walked or driven past for years wondering what was inside if you've never been inside. And what we're here to do today is to welcome the expansion of Fairfax Fine Jewelry. We've been here since 2011 actually buying estate jewelry and a lot of that material we scrapped. We just feel like there's a market for repurposing it, recycling it, upcycling it. But really what we do is we provide liquidity for illiquid assets. We're constantly buying things that have been put away over the years for tuition, medical bills, or now payments for houses.

I think the reason to get in the car, right, and take a drive, there's something like 124 jewelry stores in Northern Virginia. It's a lot of jewelry stores. So it makes us different. And it's really the estate jewelry. It is a jeweler who is acquiring pieces from people's estates, who is shopping all kinds of outlets for people who deal in antique jewelry, fine jewelry, estate jewelry. And so Mother's Day is coming up. And as a mom, I just want to tell you, jewelry is always a great gift. And fine jewelry is an even better gift. And it's not just that diamonds are a girl's best friend. All the gemstones make moms happy. And so come into Fairfax Fine Jewelry and shop these one-of-a-kind pieces because what

you're going to buy here, you're not going to see anybody else wearing. And that is priceless in and of itself. Shopping local in Fairfax City just got much easier with the Fairfax City FlexCard. The Fairfax City FlexCard is an e-gift card program where 100% of all gift card sales remain within Fairfax City and you can use it at participating businesses from retail, restaurants, and spa services. You'll always find a place to use your FlexCard. So go to FairfaxCityConnected.com slash flex today to learn more and to purchase your own Fairfax City FlexCard. Shop small, shop local, and gift a FlexCard. For the very first time, shopپ's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's fan's

You know why. Please clean up after your pet. Hello, my name is Mitch Fetterman. I'm a firefighter paramedic with the City of Fairfax Fire Department. Today we're here at City Hall teaching hands-only CPR. The first thing you want to do is you want to check for responsiveness. At that point they would wake up or provide some level of response if they are not in cardiac arrest. If they are, the next thing you would want to do is check by using a painful stimulus. So either by pinching their skin or providing some other type of pain. The next step after you've determined that the patient is unresponsive is you want to activate the emergency response system. So that typically means calling 911.

If they are not breathing after looking, listening, and feeling for 10 seconds, at that point you would want to start CPR by providing chest compressions in the middle of the chest. So one of the things that we do to try to keep that 100 beats per minute is we try to sing a song in our head. There's also several apps that you can download on your phone that provide a metronome to give you the proper beats per minute to do CPR. So you want to do the CPR compressions for two minutes before checking for a pulse again or switching out with another person. So if you have one available, an AED or an automated external defibrillator can be an excellent tool. Press pads firmly. Once you open up the AED, a voice will start talking to you to provide instructions.

Press flashing button. Clear. The AED is completely automated. All you need to do is follow the prompts that it gives you, which is very simple to do. So I encourage anybody listening at home to practice these skills or take a hands-only CPR course because we believe that that is a vital and very important skill to help bridge that gap between when the medical emergency happens and when the 911 responders get on scene. That can be the difference between life and death. Hey friends, firefighter Josh here with the City of Fairfax Fire Department. And today we're talking about the importance of home smoke alarms and keeping them well maintained with a new battery in them at all times. Here in Fairfax we run incidents where the battery is either not there or dead.

Three good tips to remember when dealing with smoke alarms are to make sure that they're placed outside of each sleeping area in the hallway on every floor of your house. Secondly, we want to make sure that the battery stays charged and stays fresh. And lastly, we want to test it often to make sure it functions properly in case you need it. As part of a home fire safety plan, an emergency escape plan is very important. The second part of the emergency escape plan is to have a meeting location. That meeting location can be at a tree, a mailbox, somewhere that's well known by all members of the family. So that when an emergency happens, you quickly and safely evacuate to this location. Everyone knows that everyone else is accounted for.

And when firefighters arrive, you're able to ensure the safety of everyone. And the most important part of all this, if your home was on fire, get out and stay out. My name is Christine Vincent, and I'm the cultural arts manager for the city of Fairfax. It's a multicultural community, all sorts of demographics here. We want to have programs that will be attractive and educational and that everyone can enjoy. I would say 95% of it is free. The cultural arts department is supported by the mayor and the city council. They have been supporting the arts for 50 years. My department, under Parks and Recreation, is responsible for visual arts, performing arts events. And we also do some bigger events, such as Fiesta Fairfax, which is a lot of fun.

A lot of art, a lot of dance, a lot of culture. We have an art screen film program, and we have free popcorn, free candy, free professionals. Our Old Town Hall performance series, where we have 12 concerts over about eight months. We have the City of Fairfax Band, City of Fairfax Theater Company. We have the Fairfax Apart League, who has a permanent gallery space at City Hall. To be around creative people is like drinking an energy drink. Their energy is palpable. What I see in them is a collaborative spirit, which is beautiful. It's so good to come here and to have this quaint little, warm little town. So you will always see something here at Fairfax City. History is being made every day by women all over this country.

And we need to lift them up and celebrate them and give them their due. If we had told women's stories as frequently, as fully, as proudly as we have told men's stories for the last 250 years, I believe that perhaps equality would look a little different today. Let's tell women's stories. Let's listen to them. Let's share them. Let's share them. Let's share them. Let's share then. Let's share then. Let's share then. Let's share then. Let's share then. Let's share then. in the alcaldía. The residents can follow the reunion using their phones. So it's how it works. Scanee the QR code, click on the icon, and select a language between 70 options. If you prefer audio, use audífonos. Ajuste sus preferencias, como el tamaño de la letra, el espacio entre líneas, el estilo de texto, y las opciones para dislexia o alto contraste.

Lea, escuche y comprenda. La ciudad de Fairfax y MediaScribe, haciendo que el gobierno local sea accesible para todos. Meet MediaScribe, a simple way to help everyone stay connected during city meetings. With real-time captions and translations in over 70 languages, for meetings held in the council chambers and the work session room at City Hall. Residents can follow along right on their own phones. Here's how it works. Scan the QR code. Tap the icon. Select a language from over 70 options. If selecting the audio option, please wear headphones. Select your preferences, including font size, line spacing, font style, and dyslexia and high contrast options. Read, listen, and understand. Fairfax City and MediaScribe.

Making local government accessible to all. No love, no nothing. Until my baby comes home. No sir, no nothing. As long as baby must roam. No love, no nothing, until my baby comes home. No sir, no nothing, as long as baby must roam. I promised him I'd wait for him till even he'd it's cold. I'm lonesome, heaven knows, but what I said still goes. No love, no nothing, and that's a promise I'll keep. No fun with no one, I'm getting plenty of sleep. My heart's on strike, and though it's like an empty honeycomb. No love, no sir, no nothing, until my baby comes home. No love, no nothing. No love, no nothing, until my baby comes home. No love, no nothing. No love, no nothing. No love, no nothing. Yes, yes.

Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, yes. Are you heff to the jive? Are you heff to the jive? Are you heff, are you heff, are you keeping it step? Are you heff to the jive? Do you lace your boots high? Are you fly or you fly? Do you dig, do you dig, do you swing on a geek? Are you heff to the jive? Do you get in the groove? Does the beat make you move? Do you send yourself jack and then trilly on back again though that it's smooth? Are you heff to the jive? Are you heff to the jive? Are you heff, are you heff, are you keeping it step? Are you heff to the jive? Are you heff to the jive? Are you heff to the jive? Are you heff, are you heff, are you keeping it step?

Are you heff to the jive? Do you lace your boots high? Are you fly or you fly? Are you heff, are you heff, are you keeping it step? Are you heff to the jive? Do you get in the groove? Does the beat make you move? Do you send yourself jack and then trilly it back again though that it's smooth? Are you heff, heff, heff to the jive? How do you dig, dig, dig, dig, dig the jive? Are you heff, are you heff, are you heff, are you really getting step? Are you heff to the jive? Daisy is darling, iris is sweet. Lily is lovely, blossoms a tree. Of all the sweethearts I've yet to meet, well I finally chose an American beauty role. I thank you very much. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl.

I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. I love the girl. Why, she's clingier than Ivy And she's zingier than black-eyed Susan Springier than Maybell in June Born daffy as a daffodil It's laughable the way I thrill When roses are in bloom Pansy is pretty Willow is torn Violet's kisses Two lips recall How can I choose one I love them all Still I finally chose An American beauty role Say, she's clingier than Ivy And she's zingier than black-eyed Susan Springier than Maybell in June For I'm daffy as a daffodil It's laughable the way I thrill When roses are in bloom That pansy's so pretty

Willow is torn Violet's kisses Two lips recall How can I choose one I love them all Still I finally chose Can you guess who I chose Yep, I finally chose An American beauty role I'm the lonesomest gal in town Everybody has thrown me down I got no angel child To ever call me dear Got no honey man for me to cuddle near But I'm learning to roll my eyes And someday you may be surprised When I find someone's loving man And kiss him with a smack I'll hug him and I'll squeeze him But I'll never give him back Cause I'm lonesome So very lonesome I'm the lonesomest gal In this here town If you're reading the papers someday How some poor gal has gone astray Don't shed a tear If you should hear that gal was me

And if you see my picture in the paper With a smile on my face I was broken hearted That smile was out of place If you wanna save a gal from her grave Find me a man if you can I'm the lonesomest gal in town Everybody is putting me down I got no angel child To ever call me dear Got no honey man for me to cuddle near But I'm learning I'm gonna roll my eyes And someday you're gonna... Good evening I would like to call the regular meeting Of July 28, 2026 To order If you are able and so choose Please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance To the flag of the United States of America And to the republic for which it stands One nation Under God Indivisible With liberty and justice for all

I would now like to invite The Parks and Recreation Department To come down For the proclamation Acknowledging July Is Parks and Recreation Month Everybody looks wonderful Everybody's here Okay All right then Whereas The City of Fairfax Parks and Recreation Department Is dedicated to developing And maintaining Beautiful, safe And environmentally friendly open spaces For the public to use and enjoy Creating affordable, comprehensive And amazing experiences A sense of community That enriches people's lives Contributing to the well-being Of the individual Family And visitors to our city And whereas A strategic master plan For Parks and Recreation Was passed unanimously By the Fairfax City Council

In 2014 Committing city resources To ongoing investment In our 25 public parks Walking trails Open space Recreational programming Cultural arts And events And whereas Programming is offered To serve children Through camps Older adults Through the senior center At Green Acres And classes for all ages Held year-round At locations across the city Offering opportunities For educational enrichment Skill building And recreation And whereas Fairfax City events Draw people from all Over the region For our Chocolate Lovers Festival Our Independence Day Parade Most years Fall Festival And other celebrations Including Rock the Block From May to October All made possible By Parks and Recreation staff And their collaborative partnerships

With other Fairfax City departments And whereas Cultural arts events Such as The Spotlight on the Arts City of Fairfax Band performances And other theater And dance performances Held at venues Throughout Fairfax City Are facilitated And supported By the work Of our Parks And Recreation staff And whereas Environmental Sustainability And stewardship Is central to our parks Trails And open spaces Prioritizing a healthy Tree canopy And working to implement Best practices Regarding the planting And care Of the city's green spaces And whereas A vibrant community With events and parks Is central To sustaining And growing Our economic development Drawing visitors To our city And attracting New residents

Who choose to make Their home here And whereas Playgrounds Ball fields Practice fields And pavilions Within our city Provide children And their families A safe Accessible And well located Area In which to enjoy Outdoor play Sports And celebrations And whereas The U.S. House of Representatives Has designated July as Parks And Recreation month Now therefore I Catherine S. Reed Mayor of the city Of Fairfax On behalf of All residents Of the city Of Fairfax Declare the month Of July With celebrations Extending through August As Parks and Recreation month In the city Of Fairfax And I encourage Residents and visitors To enjoy All that our city Has to offer Through our investments Made in parks Trails

Programs Cultural arts And special events Let's give it up For Parks and Rec Thank you We just want to Thank Mayor and Council for Acknowledging us Through this Proclamation And we are Also lucky to Work in a Community that Is so supportive Of parks And recreation And our Parks, facilities Trails and programs Are so amazing Because we have An incredible team So thank you Absolutely And now a Photograph Alright Alright sir Everybody Squinch in Squinch in Short people In the front All right And big smile Couple more Not you Katie McCammon I need you back Here Who's taking this So Catherine McCammon Also known Affectionately Throughout the city As Katie Mack We have something Special for you And let me just

Start by saying For people who Do not know Katie Mack She has been With us for Almost 15 years She started out Here 14 years ago For sure As a Camp counselor Was hired As an intern Was hired In cultural arts Events management Have worked Your way All the way Up to recreation Manager And in that Time She has committed Herself To so many Things in this City That are not Even part of Her job Description Which is why Today We are going To honor Katie For this Right here The beautiful Design you saw All over this City For the 250th The celebration Was designed By Katie Mack Because she is Talented Because she is Talented And she is Generous And she does Things for the City Because after Almost 15

Years Everything she Does Reflects how Much she cares About all of us So in light And I'm going to Show you this Right here Because it has The logo on it Katie McCammon For your Exceptional talent Creativity And dedication In designing The official logo Of the city Of Fairfax Commemorating The 250th Anniversary Of the United States Declaration Of Independence Your contribution Will serve as a Source of Community pride And a meaningful Emblem Of this historic Milestone Helping to unite Residents In the celebration Of 250 years Of history Achievement And progress Thank you Katie For all you do For us Every single day But particularly For your gift And your talent That really set us Apart In this national

Celebration Would you like To say a few words Thank you I guess None of this Was happening So I appreciate it And I love Working here So thank you All for Everything that you Do to support Our department And allow us To make all These things happen Okay Now a picture And a picture Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you Thank you. Yes, hang on to it. For those of you who got a yard sign, and for those of you who have T-shirts, you know, the emblems on the T-shirts, hang on to those things. Really, we have the best-looking logo in the entire nation. I feel firmly confident about that. We will now move on to the agenda adoption. Is there a motion to approve the agenda? I move to adopt the agenda as presented.

Second. Okay. A motion has been made and seconded. A roll call vote. Council Member Amos? Aye. Council Member Hall? Aye. Council Member Hardy Chandler? Aye. Council Member Peterson? Aye. Council Member Bates? Aye. Council Member McQuillan? Aye. Motion passed unanimously. We will go on to initial general public comment. I had three people sign up by 5 o'clock p.m. today, and I'm going to call the first speaker up, which is Stacey Langton. Good evening. Good evening. In the fall of 2020, this city council apparently went along with the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors to remove so-called offensive monuments and landmarks. They voted on September 15th of that year to remove two U.S. Navy Civil War era howitzer cannons,

which stood on the lawn of the historic Fairfax County Courthouse here in Fairfax City, along with a large stone monument that marked this place as one of the locations of the first battles of the Civil War, and it marked the death of John Quincy Marr on June 1st of 1861, the very first Confederate soldier to die at the hands of a Union soldier in the Civil War. That summer, 2020, was the summer of woke, when political correctness ran amok nationwide, along with all of the looters and protesters of Antifa and other leftist groups who burned the downtown areas of several cities across our land. The idea of political correctness is a distinctly communist phenomenon. It was created by the Bolsheviks in 1918 when they murdered the Tsar and the royal family in Russia and took over the government.

Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin emphasized that strong adherence to the ideology of their new regime was an essential requirement of citizens. If you deviated from their political correctness, you would be severely punished. You would lose the ability to buy or sell, and you might even lose your life. The Bolsheviks' promulgation of Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto destroyed their society for the next 70 years and starved 60 million people to death. Now, here we are, 100 years later, and our country, the one that was founded upon the ideals and the bedrock of personal freedom and liberty, is doing exactly what the communists did. Lenin had an agenda he called the Plan for Monumental Propaganda. His monuments policy called for the removal of all monuments and statues dedicated to the Tsars as they were of no historic or artistic interest.

Sound familiar? I believe that was the exact excuse given in 2020 to remove the cannons. Here's a photo of them being taken out under the cover of darkness in the middle of the night. President Trump's March 27, 2025 Executive Order Restoration of Truth in American History, Executive Order No. 14253, states, we must take action to reinstate pre-existing monuments, memorials, statues, or markers that have been removed to perpetuate a false reconstruction of American history. I submit to you the general public is now sick of wokeness in society. It is communist in origin, and it is fundamentally un-American, and it is time to put the cannons and the monument back. Thank you. Our next speaker is Melody Bentley.

Good evening. I am president of the Old Fairfax Muse Homeowners Association, and I would like to address the combined properties proposal for the redevelopment of Courthouse Plaza. Our community of 74 townhomes is situated diagonally across University Drive from Courthouse Plaza. Everyone who lives there appreciates the proximity of this plaza, which provides us walkable access to retail, especially the desirable convenience of a nearby grocery store. We have a keen interest in any changes to this plaza. We appreciate several things about this new proposal that Combined Properties has submitted. There will be additional retail. The mixed use will provide much-needed housing in our area, and a park is included in the plan.

However, we have the same concerns now as with the first proposal that Combined Properties submitted, and which was detailed in a petition we sent to City Council last September. The building proposal is still six stories. It is two stories taller than the small area plan allows. It will dwarf and overshadow the rest of Old Town. A further reason to respect the four-story limitation concerns traffic. University Drive will soon be reduced to one lane in each direction in the vicinity of the plaza to accommodate bike paths. It will be quite enough to ask this road to handle the additional vehicles of three stories of apartment dwellers and retail. Five stories of apartment dwellers will introduce too much traffic congestion to this neighborhood.

Finally, there is the proposed architecture, which has barely changed from the first proposal. It is modern, busy, stark, and depressing with its large swaths of black facing. It is a jarring contrast to Old Town and can hardly be considered transitional architecture. I think Combined Properties is missing a huge opportunity. Their site, with its proximity to Old Town, if designed well, could become a locus of downtown activity. Imagine, for example, a public square surrounded on three sides with retail below and apartments above, with restaurants and outdoor seating, a public square where community gatherings and events could happen. Then Courthouse Plaza could really live up to its name. Thank you so much for your attention.

I appreciate it. Our last speaker under this item is Katie Johnson. Katie Johnson and the clerk has my address. This is a quote from Mr. Cunningham from one of the previous planning commissions. It says, from a perspective of zero residential units, we are now essentially at 2,000 bedrooms in this space with the possibility of adding more. Smart growth is just a euphemism for density. Back in, and I'm saying, please, please, please, when you are discussing this afternoon, or later this evening, the major density projects, I ask that your decisions be made to put everything on hold until the citywide level of service study comes back. It's not prudent to put commitments to things that we don't know how much they cost.

We shouldn't be committing our city without fully understanding the true cost and the impacts of them. So, also, a month's subscription to Capital Bike Share and a prepaid MetroCard is not adequate traffic mitigation. So, of those 2,000, if just 15% of those 2,000 bedrooms are school-aged children, that would add $7,159,200 per year to our budget. And that's only going to go up. So, please do not sacrifice our little city's cherished community character for the sake of density. So, thank you. We can move to the consent agenda. Are there any questions on any of the items on the consent agenda? Are there any items Council would like pulled from the consent agenda? Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda?

I move to approve the consent agenda, item 6A through C, as presented July 28, 2026, accompanying motions in the staff reports. And the accompanying motions in the staff reports. Second. A motion has been made by Council Member Hardy-Chandler and seconded by Council Member Peterson. A roll call vote. Council Member McQuillan? Aye. Council Member Bates? Aye. Council Member Peterson? Aye. Council Member Hardy-Chandler? Aye. Council Member Hall? Aye. Council Member Amos? Aye. Motion passed unanimously. We will go on to consideration of appointments to boards, commissions, and advisory committees. Is there a motion to approve the appointments to boards, commissions, and advisory committees? I move to appoint the following applicants.

Board of Architecture Review, reappoint Sucha Kemsuan as the architect and business representative for a three-year term extending through June 13, 2029. Commission for Women, reappoint Amini Bonani for a three-year term extending through July 1, 2029. Reappoint Brenda Coleman for a three-year term extending through June 30, 2029. Commission on the Arts, appoint Kirk Knoll for a remainder of a three-year term extending through December 11, 2026, with an extension of a three-year term extending through July 28, 2029. Fairfax Commission on Aging, reappoint Manisha Maskay for a two-year term extending through July 9, 2028. Fairfax County Public Library Board of Trustees reappoint Suzanne Levy for a four-year term extending through June 10, 2030.

Second. The motion has been made and seconded a roll call vote. Council Member Amos? Aye. Council Member Hall? Aye. Council Member Hardy Chandler? Aye. Council Member Peterson? Aye. Council Member Bates? Aye. Council Member McQuillan? Aye. Motion passed unanimously. We'll go on to public hearings. The only public hearing tonight is a public hearing and council action on proposed amendments to the Code of the City of Fairfax, Chapter 110, and Paren zoning, to amend portions of the articles and sections contained therein, including introductory provisions, zoning districts, and regulations, and definitions relating to detached accessory dwelling units. I'm going to recognize Eric Foreman, our city planner, for the staff presentation.

Well, thank you very much. Good evening. This agenda item is a public hearing. It's for a series of zoning text amendments that would permit detached accessory dwelling units, or ADUs, in Fairfax City. If you recall, City Council held a work session in May to discuss this topic, and at that work session, Council requested that a public hearing be scheduled to consider these amendments, and Council also asked for analysis of certain data requests. So, tonight's presentation is really in two parts. The first part is an overview of the amendment itself, and this is largely similar to what we had reviewed at the May work session. The second part looks at the specific data requests that Council had asked for in May.

We've held quite a few meetings on the topic of ADUs with various amounts of detail. We held some high-level work sessions and a community meeting in 2024. Last year, we held work sessions with Planning Commission and with City Council, where we reviewed options to potentially accommodate detached accessory dwelling units. In the fall, Council asked staff to draft potential amendments to modify our existing ADU standards in order to permit detached units. And that's what we discussed back in May, focusing on potential amendment details for detached accessory dwelling units. I should mention as well that the Planning Commission held a public hearing on these amendments last month. The Commission recommended approval,

and I'll discuss the Planning Commission meeting a bit more in a few slides from now. As you likely know, accessory dwelling units are currently allowed in the City under certain conditions. Specifically, ADUs currently need to be within the home itself or attached rather than detached. ADUs were first permitted in 2003 in Fairfax City. They were at that time considered a special use, meaning that homeowners needed to come to City Council and ask for approval. That lasted until 2016 when ADUs became a permitted use, meaning that they're permitted with subject to conditions. There also used to be an occupancy limitation limiting ADU residents to seniors or to disabled people. City Council removed that provision last year.

Now, detached accessory dwelling units didn't just pop up out of last year's work sessions. The comprehensive plan recommends this, recommends to look at expanding ADUs, and this is important, while ensuring that they do not negatively impact surrounding neighborhoods. And like we talked about at our work sessions, this is really the critical element when it comes to creating standards for ADUs. Now, the main characteristics of any amendment to allow detached ADUs would really be physical standards for the structures themselves. And there are other elements as well, but these physical standards, these are really key to making this work and reducing any kinds of negative externalities that the comprehensive plan mentions.

Like we had talked about in May, the subtlety from a policy perspective is that this is a balancing act, so trying to juggle that flexibility, flexibility for property owners, juggling that with the neighborhood impact that that flexibility might bring. So most of the standards that you see here today are similar to those that we discussed in May, and I'll point out where they differ. The first of these that we'll talk about is setbacks. And in our single-family zoning districts, the required rear yard setback for most houses is 25 feet. The required side yard varies by zoning district. It's 10, 12, or 15 feet, depending on where it is. Now, we had mentioned in our last work session that there are provisions in our zoning ordinance

for affordable dwelling units. This was added as part of the affordable dwelling unit ordinance back in 2020. And those affordable dwelling provisions include slightly reduced setbacks from what we call the general or standard setbacks. And the rationale is to provide some extra flexibility, but provide that flexibility without overly impacting the surrounding neighborhood. And as we talked about in May, these accessory dwelling unit amendments recommend setbacks, really, that correspond to those affordable dwelling provisions. And for the same reason, this is a way to balance that flexibility to give some preference to accessory dwelling units, but at the same time keeping the guardrails in place

to reduce those negative effects on neighbors' properties. So like it shows here, those recommended setbacks, and this is what's in the amendment before you, the recommended setbacks are 20 feet in the rear, so that's as opposed to 25 feet. And about a 20% reduction or about a 2 to 3 foot reduction on the side lot line, so 8 feet in most zoning districts, 12 feet in the RL district. And as we can see on the screen, you can see what it means to ADU placements. In this kind of hypothetical scenario, an ADU could go anywhere in the unshaded area, so it can go here or here or here and so on. So like it says here, this looks to balance, again, that property owner flexibility, balance it with potential neighborhood impact.

Now, Planning Commission did have a recommendation at one of their work sessions that's been incorporated into this proposed amendment. That involves ADUs that might be located on the side of houses where there's enough space to do that. The Commission was concerned about the aesthetic effects of having a detached accessory dwelling unit in a side yard and recommended standards to ensure that any side yard ADUs would be located near the rear of the house. And that, again, has been incorporated into these recommended amendments. Now, for setbacks in general, I think it helps to show how the proposed ADU setbacks compare with setbacks for other structures. So this shows a sample lot. This is in the RH district.

It shows three examples of behind-the-house setbacks. On the left here, this is the setback for main dwellings themselves. So if this house's owners were to build an addition or if the house itself were torn down and replaced, the house could not extend into that green shaded area. So that's the setback. That's the required yard. Again, four dwellings, four houses. In the middle here, these are the side and rear setbacks for accessory structures, so things like garages. And like it says at the bottom here, these are less intense uses than a dwelling, than a house. And the reason is because no one lives in a garage, no one lives in a gazebo, and so on. So these are permitted to be closer to the lot lines

than the dwellings themselves, and in this case, a minimum of five feet from the rear lot line or the side lot line. Now, on the right here, this is what's in the proposed amendment for detached accessory dwelling units. And again, this mirrors the ordinance's existing standards for affordable dwelling setbacks. And this recognizes that accessory dwelling units have similar levels of intensity as other dwellings, but it provides more flexibility. It provides flexibility by permitting these structures to be a little closer to the lot line than the main house can be. Just one more slide on setbacks here. At our fall work session, City Council mentioned that detached ADUs can be thought of as an alternative

to building very large houses, and that that alternative might be able to fit more appropriately into our neighborhoods. And that's a significant guiding principle because these standards view ADUs as that kind of alternative. And importantly, the setback standard that's in these amendments would avoid cases of property owners maximizing both house size and having an ADU on, having a detached ADU on the same lot. Again, part of that balancing act, this slide shows an example of that. These are two houses side by side unidentically sized lots. The house on the left is a newer house. It doesn't completely maximize the buildable area, but you can see it comes somewhat close. The house on the right

has a smaller overall footprint for the house itself. It has a more open lot. These amendment standards would enable that house on the right to build an ADU. Now, that house on the right could also build an addition. It could be replaced by another house and so on. But as it is now, that house could build an ADU in the yard. For the house on the left, these standards basically say that the square footage that could have been used for an ADU has already been used for the house itself. So again, avoids the instance of having a maximum sized house with a detached ADU on the same lot. Now, the other significant physical standard is height. There is a good amount of discussion on height standards at the work sessions,

the main issue being implications for neighboring properties. These amendment standards set a limit of 20 feet or the measured height of the main house and whichever is less. Now, 20 feet, this is roughly one and a half stories. The intent here is to ensure that detached ADUs don't overwhelm the lots that they're on, don't overwhelm the main house or neighboring properties. And one and a half stories would still provide for design flexibility, provides for the structure's placement on the lot and layout and so on. This gives kind of a quick visual representation of what we're talking about. So for a multi-story house like the one on the left, a detached ADU would have a maximum height of 20 feet.

So again, that's about one and a half stories. For houses like the house on the right here, houses that are themselves less than 20 feet, the maximum ADU height would be equivalent to the house's height. So again, the recommendation in these amendments is that ADU height may not exceed 20 feet or the height of the house and again, whichever is less. There are some other physical standards that are currently in place. These amendments recommend keeping those standards. I won't spend too much time on these right now since we talked about these standards at previous meetings, but these standards are all proposed to remain the same as they are now. You can see here, there are standards for accessory structure footprint,

also standards for ADU square footage. And again, these are recommended to be kept. Like it says at the bottom here, these standards really can work together to account for different sized lots, different house sizes, multiple stories, and so on. The zoning ordinance also has standards on lot and building coverage, so both for lots in general and also for lots with accessory structures. So these likewise are proposed to remain the same. And you can tell these are all interrelated, and again, each of these addresses a specific issue. The amendments again propose keeping these standards intact. Moving on to parking, as you may recall, our zoning ordinance right now does have a standard for ADU parking,

but that standard is based on vehicles that are used by ADU residents. It's just not effective. It's not enforceable. In our work sessions, both Planning Commission and City Council were interested in exploring a different approach to ADU parking. So the standard proposed here takes a different approach. So like it says here, it says that a lot, a property with an ADU, must provide no less than the minimum number of parking spaces that are specified in the off-street parking section of the ordinance, which is Section 4.2. So that standard for detached houses and for duplex houses, that standard, like it says at the bottom here, is a minimum of two off-street parking spaces for a house, and that means

two driveway spaces effectively. So what that means is that if a house already has at least two driveway spaces, then that house would comply with this standard. Now, some houses don't have a driveway or like the house that's shown here, have just a small driveway that just fits one car. So in those cases, the house would need to be brought up to the city's regular parking standards in order to have an ADU. ADU. So this house that's shown here, if the owners were to add an ADU, they would need to enlarge the driveway so that it could fit another vehicle before getting, before the city would issue an ADU permit. the reason for this standard is to not automatically trigger a parking shortage with the addition

of an accessory dwelling unit, but still to guard against parking shortfalls where they might be more particularly problematic. Now, Planning Commission did express some concern about parking at their public hearing. The concern was that this standard may not go far enough. Planning Commission's hesitation seemed to be that some neighborhoods already have not enough parking and that adding the possibility of more ADUs might make that kind of situation worse. Now, the flip side, and this was discussed at the Planning Commission meeting as well, is that it's tough to make the case that an ADU would generate more parking demand than an addition to a house. So, for example, right down the road from City Hall,

we have a house that has 10 bedrooms, for instance. That kind of addition can be built without having any parking requirement. So, it's a difficult leap to make to say that that kind of thing can be built without a parking requirement, but adding a 500-square-foot cottage in the backyard triggers a parking requirement. So, there's a lot going on with the parking discussion. A few Planning Commissioners felt uneasy about this. Now, not enough to suggest changes to the amendments, but just a feeling that there's an existing problem that might be made worse, might be made more problematic, I guess, by allowing detached accessory dwelling units. Now, one more topic here, and then we'll move on to some of the analysis

that City Council had asked for. We had talked before about how to best deal with the potential conversion of existing structures to ADUs, and specifically, existing structures that do not meet whatever standards are in place for ADUs themselves, meaning that they would be considered non-conforming. So, under these proposed amendments, if a property owner would wish to convert an existing non-conforming structure to an accessory dwelling unit, that property owner would go through the Board of Zoning Appeals. And this is the same as we had discussed in May. I bring it up because one of the City Council's requests has to do with accessory structures. BZA is set up really to handle exactly this kind of situation,

special exceptions that can be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. And this is really the default set up with our zoning ordinance, and there are just so many potential variations of non-conformities like this that it's an issue that's best addressed outside of rigid type of standards. So, those are the main standards for what's proposed here in the detached ADU amendment that you have before you, the full amendment text is in your packets. Like I said, I went through kind of quickly. I can always go back and explain some more of this. But as I had mentioned, Council requested additional analysis on certain topics, and staff has done that analysis. And the next few slides will summarize the results.

City Council, and again, this is back in May, had asked a few questions regarding potential impacts that detached ADUs may have on real estate assessments, so both on the ADUs property itself and also in general or citywide. Like it says up here under direct impacts, when a detached ADU is built, that ADU would be assessed similar to other structures or similar to other additions. And what that means is on a per square foot basis. So there's no set amount for valuation. It would vary, like it says here, it would vary based on the details of the ADU itself. Now, Council also asked if a jurisdiction allows detached ADUs. Would that permissiveness result in increased property values citywide? So not just for the properties

that have ADUs, but a general increase in property values. The concern here was whether that by enabling property owners to build these kind of structures, would property values increase in general? And really, since there would be a new option for essentially monetizing properties to a greater extent, would that raise property values, raise property taxes, and harm affordability? Our real estate staff examined this question, determined that across the board, property value impacts due to a detached ADU ordinance is not something that we would expect. Now, to reach that determination, our assessor's office reviewed existing studies on ADUs, did not find evidence of this kind of effect. They also conducted

their own local analysis, so based on Arlington County. Arlington is the jurisdiction around here that's had detached ADUs for the longest. Like it says here, our staff, again, the real estate staff, analyzed neighborhoods in Arlington that have had detached ADU property sales, so properties that have detached ADUs and have sold, analyzed these neighborhoods over a five-year period. and the finding was that the general property appreciation in those neighborhoods tracked extremely close to the countywide average for appreciation, and countywide is Arlington County because that's what this is looking at, so by extremely close, I mean within one-tenth of one percent of the countywide average, so these neighborhoods

actually went down by one-tenth of one percent, but really that's so close to the baseline that we would consider it, like it says down here, just not indicative of ADU influence. Just to put it in a dollar amount, that one-tenth of one percent, which we would consider really a plus or minus, is about $10 in property tax payments. Another request from City Council was to see for other Northern Virginia jurisdictions or jurisdictions that have already approved detached ADU ordinances, how many of these units have actually been approved within those jurisdictions. The most instructive localities around here are Arlington and Alexandria. Both of those have had permitted detached ADUs now for five or seven years.

You see the numbers up here. This is the number of permits issued. What's perhaps most instructive here is the average annual number of permits issued. And you see that here, it's 11 in Arlington County, and this goes back a five-year period of 2021 to 25. 14 annual average in Alexandria. And you see at the bottom how that translates into annual permits per 1,000 homes. So that's helpful because it accounts for the difference in size between the jurisdictions. Now, council also asked for information on Falls Church and Fairfax County. Fairfax County allows detached ADUs right now on properties that are larger than two acres. The county has issued 10 permits for these types of ADUs since 2021.

Falls Church is the most recent jurisdiction locally to allow detached ADUs. They have issued one permit so far. Now, that number per 1,000 houses, if you take these two numbers that are on the screen for Arlington and Alexandria, if you combine those two with Fairfax County, so again, two-plus acres, but Fairfax County has 7,000 homes over two-plus acres, so that's a pretty big data set. If you take the ADUs per 1,000 houses, apply that to the city of Fairfax, I hate to make direct comparisons because each jurisdiction is different, but that would get us in the area of about 50 detached ADUs over a decade. Now, I said I'm a little bit uncomfortable saying that, but of course I just said it.

I'd give it a bigger window, I'd say a few dozen over a decade, make that a pretty big plus or minus, but hopefully that gives some kind of indication of the prevalence of detached ADUs locally in northern Virginia in places where they're allowed. Another question, like I had mentioned before, involved existing structures. Council wanted to know, just as a frame of reference, how many of these kinds of structures are in the city right now? So for this, we looked at property records, we looked at all existing residential structures, so of all types, not just garages, but any structure that, but with a minimum of 350 square feet in size, which are more likely to be converted to ADUs. In total,

there are slightly under 400 of such structures in the city right now on residential lots. about a quarter of those, or like it says up here, 104, are within what we would call the buildable setback area for detached ADUs, so if you think back to the previous slide with the green area, that would be outside of the green area. So 104 are within that buildable setback area. The remainder are, like it says here, outside of that buildable area. So that gives some kind of an idea of the number of these structures in the city. It is very important, though, the point that's at the bottom. We can examine the number, we can examine the size and the placement of these structures, but like it says at the bottom here,

not all of these are really convertible to someplace where people would want to live. So either from the standpoint of the type of construction, the foundation, the cost of modifying the structure, and so on. So just an important thing to keep in mind, it's something that's non-quantifiable, but we gave you here the information that can be quantified on the number of existing structures. Now finally, there were some questions about the permitting process and specifically whether the city, the main question that came up in May's meeting was whether the city would verify that properties containing detached ADUs are in fact owner-occupied. It is required. It's required in the zoning standards. It's a current requirement

that we're recommending to keep in place that the property owner live in either the main house or the accessory dwelling unit. Now, first of all, city staff will update the permit procedures if detached ADUs are allowed by city council, so this will be updated. And one area where detached ADUs would differ from attached ADUs is that they would be subject to the city's rental occupancy permit program. So this is a program, it's an existing program in the city where rental houses are registered and are periodically inspected. Because detached ADUs are separate structures, they would be made part of this program. And those periodic inspections would include a verification that the property is owner-occupied.

So this is not a verification that would happen on an annual basis. It's a verification that would happen when the property is inspected. But that is one additional level of check that would not ordinarily be there. And aside from that, city staff would still be able to respond to complaints about potential zoning violations and that includes potential occupancy violations as well as is currently the case. So that concludes staff's presentation for tonight. I had mentioned that the Planning Commission held a public hearing on these amendments in June. The Commission recommended approval. It was a unanimous recommendation. The Planning Commission did express some concerns about parking like I had mentioned.

Planning Commission also expressed some concerns about overcrowding and occupancy enforcement. So regarding overcrowding and occupancy, some of that discussion pertained to whether, you know, really similar to the parking issue, whether the option of having detached accessory dwelling units would make existing overcrowding issues worse and whether the city's enforcement mechanisms for all rentals were sufficient to be on guard for overcrowding types of situations. Some of the discussion really drifted into a more general overcrowding and inspection type of discussion. Planning Commissioners did realize that that's somewhat outside of the boundary of what's being discussed here with a specific focus

on detached ADUs. So outside of the boundary of these amendments, but it was identified as a concern by several Planning Commissioners and there was a bit of a discussion on this topic at the public hearing. So with that, we'd be glad to answer any questions that you all may have. Thank you so much for the presentation. Council Member McQuillan. Thank you. Thank you so much. That presentation was fantastic. I am looking at slide five about the setbacks. Can you explain why eight feet versus ten feet was chosen for the ADUs? So we did want to align it with the existing affordable dwelling unit setbacks. You know, the affordable dwelling unit setbacks were put in place, again, to give a little bit

more flexibility to something that was considered desirable. but to still maintain neighborhood character and maintain a decent amount of separation between one property and the other. Eight feet was considered to be appropriate with the affordable dwelling unit ordinance that achieves the same type of goal that we're looking at with accessory dwelling units. Okay, so for the flexibility, just the extra flexibility. additional flexibility while keeping those kind of guardrails, not letting these dwellings and the dwellings have a higher bit of intensity than other structures, not letting those dwellings being too close to the property line. Thank you. I was just curious as to why they didn't

choose the ten foot like they do with the, but it sounds like they need more flexibility. Is there, was there consideration regarding topography of the lot? And we're discussing the height. I'm thinking about the height and how you mentioned you didn't want it looking over or looming onto the permanent dwelling that's there already. So was that already taken into consideration? As far as height, yes, and that's part of the reason why the recommendation was 20 feet, was basically one and a half stories instead of two stories because if it is built on a hill, that one and a half stories would look more, would look bigger than one and a half stories. We didn't want anything too large. Two story accessory dwelling

built in that situation on a hill would just be too looming. So one and a half felt that was perfect okay good. So you did consider that. So as far as that kind of topography, yes, the kind of topography that we just can't consider is if a certain portion of a yard is sloping to the point where it makes construction difficult on a map like this, it might seem like there's plenty of room to build an ADU but there may not be. Same kind of thing with trees in the way in that there are certain types of things that we just can't account for topography and trees are two of those. Thank you. I just want to make sure that that was considered exactly what you said with, you know, if the lot was increasing

in height in the back. Is there a financial cost for the applicant to convert the existing structure to an ADU conversion? There is a zoning permit cost which I believe is $70 or so. Now, depending on what is required, there would be inspections from code administration as well. These things would really pale in comparison to the actual cost of construction or the cost of providing utilities and whatnot. It is a minimal city cost to some of this but it's very small in the overall picture. Okay, good to know. And then of the local cities that you used to make a comparison, which one most closely aligns with the ordinance that were currently being presented this evening? I would say Arlington and Falls Church

would most closely align. Perfect. Alexandria is much more permissive in terms of setbacks and I think that has to do with the types of houses and the types of neighborhoods they have in Alexandria and a lot of existing structures that were built long, long ago and are already there. But Arlington and Falls Church are close to them. Excellent. Thank you. That's all my questions. I appreciate it. Council Member Amos? Thank you. Excellent presentation. The more comment than question. The only thing I would flag, I do echo the Planning Commission's concerns with parking and I know that came up in our one-on-ones as well and I imagine that's a concern that many of us share. The main thing I would recommend

just because it's very, and I do appreciate the language you added to make it more enforceable. I think that does a good job. I would just recommend tracking code violations over a certain period of time and similar to that, tracking the number of permits that are applied for and comparing the two. We also don't want it to be a case where we have a certain number of violations but they're all attributed to similar properties or one or two outliers. By code violations, what kind of code violations do you have? Rather than code violations, just violations, for example, for not providing adequate parking or over-parking in certain areas. So applications that trigger that need for an additional parking space?

Okay. Yes. Gotcha. Council Member Hall? Thank you. And thank you for the extra time and energy that went into asking or answering the questions that we proposed previously and the other concerns. So I'll be honest. I thought you were making a mistake when you called them affordable dwelling units but then you made a reference between 8 feet and 10 feet for affordable dwelling unit versus accessory, detached accessory dwelling units. So I've been over here trying to do some additional research but can you... There is an affordable dwelling unit ordinance. Folks aren't very familiar with it as it pertains to single family houses because we haven't had anything like that since 2020 when it was approved

but the affordable dwelling ordinance that you all are more familiar with requiring a certain percentage of 6% of multifamily residences be affordable. There is an equivalent for detached homes as well and just like the building standards were relaxed a bit for the affordable dwelling unit or affordable dwelling units in multifamily, they were relaxed a little bit for single family as well and that was increasing the setbacks or decreasing the setbacks. Okay. So that's where that comes from. Thank you. Yes. Yeah. I feel like we need new acronyms that are not identical. Excuse me. Page 7 with regard to the parking, I do... I know we like to think that people are going to bike everywhere and walk everywhere

and take shuttles but I really have concerns about the parking especially in neighborhoods that already have, you know, parking issues. I don't think it's too much to ask to move this to three spots as opposed to two spots. I think the picture that's on slide 11 is kind of a prime example. As you were saying, you know, there's a requirement to do this for the two required spots. I was thinking to some of the neighborhoods that are in the city where they don't have a driveway at all or they have a short driveway just like that and I was like, well, those don't... That's not how things are right now. So I recognize that it would need to be brought up to code in order to do that but I don't think it'll hurt

in most cases to add a third spot instead of just two. And then page 11, I think... Oh, sorry, that was the same thing. Yeah, bring up to code for two spots. And I'm... Okay, so I'm flipping back and forth a little bit between the staff report and the presentation. So on page 8 of the presentation, it talks about the height of the houses here. So I think, you know, in the city we have a lot of houses that might not be cookie cutter in some ways or they might have... Like my house specifically, we have, you know, we put in like 16 foot ceilings which you don't see from the outside because it looks like the same height but then in the front, when we did our garage, we did a peak, I guess, whatever, I don't know what it's called.

Like the one roof goes this way, the other one goes that way. Hipped, I think. Yes, thank you. A hip, yes. How do those hips get decided? Like what's the height that you're looking at when you see a tall portion of a house versus the majority of the roof is another height? How does that work? So a hip roof and a regular peak roof are measured the same way that the height is measured halfway between the eave and the peak. Okay. So in this case, 20... So a house can be 35 feet tall. That 35 feet is not measured to the peak. It's measured to the halfway point between the eave and the peak. Same thing with the 20 feet here. It's measured halfway between the eave and the peak and also halfway between the slope of the ground

if the ground slopes. It is a complicated procedure. We don't feel that it's something that we're dumping on residents as much because if you have one of these built, you have an architect who has to take those measurements in all cases so the same architect can take measurements of the house as well. It's not a bit of information that property owners would tend to have at the ready for their own property, but it's something that in the course of construction is routine. Okay. And so then let's picture that you have a lot where the back is significantly higher or lower. How does that factor into the roof of that space? So the measurement is taken, if the ground slopes like this, the measurement is taken from the halfway point

of the high point and the low point of the structure. So the halfway point of the ground to the halfway point of the roof. Okay. So that's your 35 feet or your 20 feet. Okay. So let's say my house out front is normal when it comes to my neighbors, but then my yard significantly goes up. Am I going to be able to build a house that is as tall as my house, which means now this house in behind is significantly taller, or am I limited to the height even with the additional hill in the back? So if your house is on a slope and if the measurement for your house comes out that your house is 25 feet tall, for instance, the maximum height of the ADU would be 20 feet because that's the tallest that it could possibly go.

Okay. So I understand you're explaining the same thing to me multiple times in different ways. I'm still not visually... Height measurement is not easy to understand. No, it's not. The two structures would be measured independently of each other. So if your house is measured at over 20 feet, your ADU could be a maximum of 20 feet regardless of what the topography is. Okay, so it is possible then if you have a very large hill in the back that your secondary ADU could be significantly taller than your front house. That would be extremely unlikely. I don't want to say it can't happen. Okay. I feel it would be very unlikely. It would be a, you know, like if you had this house on the right and then you had the property slope down a lot in the back,

then you may have a situation where that looks the case, but it would still have to keep to 16 feet. And the reason that we have it as... The reason we have it as that is to build in some additional flexibility because we didn't want houses... We didn't want a situation where a house, where an ADU would have to be an unreasonably small number. Right. But on the flip side, we also don't, now that this house is going to be significantly closer to a side yard, we also don't want it to be towering over where the front house wasn't already just because of a topography thing. Correct. So just trying to understand that, those nuances. Okay. On, in the staff report, I think this is on page six, item L,

it's on page seven. It talks about the zoning administrator may inspect the property if there is a complaint registered with the city or if the official has other reason to believe that the owner or occupants are in violation of the accessory dwelling unit approval. From what I understand of our enforcement abilities, there's not a lot of teeth to them. And I totally support people's right to do what they want with their own houses, but I also don't want to see that right impede upon their neighbors. And so I know we've had issues in the past where we as a council have been notified that there might be X number of people living in a house and they're like, no, it's boyfriends, girlfriends, but they're really there all the time,

but they don't qualify as house residents. But there's a parking situation that comes or other things that come with that. So I would like to see a little bit more enforcement ability, whether or not we have enforcement power or enough staff members to do that. I think that's likely not going to be something that we need to add in order to manage this, but those are part of my concerns. The next one also goes then to item N, as in Nancy, where it talks about if there's a change, sorry, they took that out. If an accessory dwelling unit no longer complies with the conditions, then the use of the space as a separate dwelling unit shall cease. The physical arrangement of the space that created an independent housekeeping unit

shall be integrated into the primary dwelling unit and the space shall not be independently leased as a separate dwelling unit. Again, I feel like that's something where we tell someone they can't do something because they violated a rule or an ordinance. But again, we don't have a lot of ability to go back and actually follow up on it. So I just think there needs to be something in there that's a little bit stronger because from what I understand, if we go and we knock on the door and no one answers, well, we might go back another day and no one answers again legally. And we shouldn't have the ability to enter their yard to do things, but if they're not complying with something, it seems like there needs to be some other way

to have some additional enforcement. So I'm not suggesting, you know, I mean, tax levies, like there's all these different things that people can do, like they boot your car, right? Like all those things that they do when you don't pay your parking tickets. I just think that there needs to be some other conversation that is in place to be able to move forward with this. And that's not dissimilar to the conversation that Planning Commission had last month. It just, and you know, we reminded Planning Commission of this as well, and occupancy enforcement is awfully tricky from the city's perspective, because there's no way to check on the occupancy of a dwelling without having city staff go into that dwelling

and look at the beds and look at the bedrooms. And that's something, obviously, that's not taken lightly by the city. There's just no other way of doing it. So it does kind of, you know, wander into another discussion on occupancy in general, but it's a pertinent discussion. Yeah, well, I know like with the noise ordinance, right? If you're not getting the response you need and the neighbor is still continuing to do things, there's an option now to go to the courthouse and swear out a warrant and go that legal route. Obviously, a disgruntled neighbor is not going to be able to go and swear out a warrant against their neighbor for not having the right number of people in their house or whatever it is.

So I just think some of these things are just a slippery slope. And I think the more we can be on top of them and try to have stronger language where needed, again, just gives us a little bit more opportunity to have that conversation rather than realizing it was too soft and then we can't go back and do anything about it. My other question about that section N, it talks about like when the, I'm sorry, it was section K, talks about they do an initial inspection of the accessory dwelling unit. And then in addition to any renewal of the accessory dwelling unit, use or transfer of ownership. So when would a renewal apply? Are people applying for an ADU for one year, three years, five years? Or it's for the life of their property

in which they live and then it transfers to the new owner? I think the renewal applies to the transfer of ownership. I'm not sure why it's written as an or situation. Okay. The zoning permit, the applicant signs an affidavit acknowledging that it has to be renewed when the property transfers. Okay. I will say the wording of this made me think, and I guess similar to what the Planning Commission was saying, and I also, you know, I think people are landlords for a very long time and people don't always check up on the house or make sure that it's being maintained in the way that it should be, especially when you might have college goods renting and there's a lot of transiency and things like that.

But maybe we do, as a separate conversation, need a little bit more of a stronger conversation around making sure that when a tenant takes possession of the home, that it really is truly in a good, safe, rentable, smoke detectors are working, all of that kind of thing. You know, I know that they pay an annual fee to have a rental unit, but I think we could potentially be doing our renters a disservice by not making sure that things were up to date. I know they used to do it in college and all that, so it's just a thought. Page 17. I guess I already asked this, was how do we respond to a violation if there's no one answers the door? Okay. And then my last question, and I've been asking this since I think the beginning,

is why are we so afraid of doing this by special use permit? I recognize that we think there's only going to be a handful. You said that there might be, did you say 50 over 10 years? Right. Okay, so we're doing special use permits for chickens. We're doing them for daycares. This to me is something that it impacts you as a homeowner that lives there, but it also impacts every neighbor that's around you. And I know that when we were doing our renovation and we wanted to get an exception to the, which is now it's even smaller than what we asked for, but for the side yard, I mean, we had to send out certified postcards and have all of our neighbors not really have a problem with it and have that conversation.

To me, this is a really big decision that you are making as a homeowner that is impacting all of those around you. And I just, I would have a much easier ability to accept this if it was by special use, but just willy-nilly by right, I think, I'm hopeful that there's not going to be an extraordinary amount of these, but I don't think it hurts to do the special use. I think it makes sure that we just have that extra layer of rubber stamping it, essentially, to make sure that it is what it is. And I think it gives, like I said, the neighbors around them a real opportunity to understand what's going to be happening next to them and what they're going to be living next to. So I would really, really like to see that added in here.

I think the aversion to having ADUs be a special use permit, just drawing back to 2016 when that was discussed, because ADUs used to be a special use permit, I think council felt uncomfortable about having individual homeowners come to a meeting like this at city council to explain improvements that they wanted to do in their home, while other, you know, a brand new home could be built, three-story, 35-foot-high, 5,000-square-foot home could be built without coming to city council, but adding an accessory dwelling unit brings people to city council to a meeting like this. The chicken, this was before chickens. Before the chicken. Yeah. I think the, you know, the thought is that council doesn't necessarily

want more individual property cases coming to public hearings like chickens. I think this council member does, to be totally honest. And I, you said back in 2016 when they did this, but we didn't have detached accessory dwelling units. We had attached accessory dwelling units. So you're saying that that requirement was removed in 2016 for attached dwelling units? Correct. Okay. Okay. And I understand too what you're saying about tear down and build a 35-foot house. I mean, I think we've all seen the one on Warwick. But again, I think you have very angry neighbors that are really unhappy with what happened there. So I think if we're really only expecting 50 over a 10-year period, to me, check the box, special permit,

special use permit, easy breezy, and we get it going. So I'm not sure that I can support this without that. Thank you. Council Member Bates? So with regard to height, well, actually both height and setbacks, the requirements that are proposed here are actually more strict than the existing requirements for non-dwelling unit accessory structures. Is that right? Correct. Yeah. And then, which, you know, also certainly don't require any additional parking. Granted, they don't have anybody living there. But, you know, and additionally, residents are able to, as you mentioned, build additions onto their house, add additional bedrooms. And then, of course, we have attached accessory dwelling units allowed.

And so really, to my mind, this is taking what is already allowed and providing some simply additional flexibility in terms of where it can be located and perhaps even additional flexibility to allow for it to be even less overwhelming to the existing structure since it can be separated a bit from the existing house. And additionally, as you mentioned, someone can build, you know, a house without a permit. And, of course, we've seen additional houses built on lots that have been subdivided and sold off. And so this, to my mind, also provides an alternative to that, you know, that is perhaps a bit less disruptive, you know, or less impactful to the, you know, the streetscape, the existing aesthetic of the property.

And with regard to the question of requiring a special use permit, would that require the applicant to pay the special use permit fee as well? Correct. Yeah, yeah. So I have concerns about that, given, you know, for chickens, for daycare, you know, that kind of thing. You know, certainly you can say that, you know, hens produce eggs, daycare provides an income stream, but it's not something that is directly necessity for the, you know, the people living there necessarily. But, of course, housing is for the, you know, the people who live in the accessible dwelling unit itself. And so from a housing availability perspective, I would have concerns about the burden that that fee might place on people who want to do this.

And also I would imagine that the process for that would be a lot more labor intensive, right, than, you know, for chickens or daycare because it's a matter of building an additional structure on the lot. So there would be, you know, a process involved for that. So, yeah, and then again, you know, parking, we can, you know, of course, an additional house on, you know, subdivided lot does require additional parking. But other than that, you know, additions or attached dwelling units, I believe are under similar conditions. They have to fulfill the parking requirements for, you know, the house but don't have to add additional spots for those. Is that right? Yeah. So from that perspective, I see what's proposed as really only fair

to the homeowners in the city. Councilmember Hardy-Chandler. Councilmember Hardy-Chandler. So I want to thank you for the report and I also want to thank you for certainly following up on the wide array of questions that we had. I know I was particularly interested in looking at our neighbors and what's happening around there. I was surprised at the low numbers that are pretty consistent across this region. So we're talking about 50, possibly 50 over the course of 10 years. When we go back to the parking, is there any indication that the existing dwelling units that are attached, are they clustered in our city in any way or are they dispersed throughout our city? They are spread out. There's about two dozen or so

and there's no neighborhood pattern, no geographic pattern to where they are. And there's the expectation that this would follow that same pattern or there's no information to indicate that these might be just clustered in one neighborhood, causing some kind of parking problem for five a year. Right. There's not a unique enough element to say that certain neighborhoods would only be suitable for these or not. Yeah. And I go back to just sort of our general desire desire to have a wide variety of housing options and our policy or our desired policy or aspiration of wanting to have people who are single family owners, accommodate renters, those kinds of things. I see this as another viable option.

It isn't a huge option. Clearly, the data that we requested looking at the region shows that this is a possibility for some, but it opens up an opportunity for some families. I know of a neighbor who has an attached dwelling unit and the prior owner of the house is living in that and her children are living in the main house. It's a wonderful arrangement. These kinds of opportunities for homeowners are ones that I absolutely support. We're not talking about large volumes. We're not talking about every household having a hill that's going to distort the height, but I do think we're talking about an opportunity that's going to make a major difference for families that choose this option. So thank you for your report.

I appreciate all of the information that you gathered to answer our questions. Council Member Peterson. So what is the list of different permits that a homeowner would have to obtain to actually put in place a detached ADU? From a zoning perspective, there would be a zoning permit and then there would be code administration building permits as needed. So just like any other construction project. And that is the equivalent of a construction permit? Correct. Okay. So those are two. All right. Just I think one quick note on the special use permit question. One thing that seems a little bit different here is a detached ADU has proximity implications for neighbors that are different than an attached ADU.

And that may raise the bar a little bit in terms of reactions that people have in terms of something being proposed and built. So it's probably worth considering as we think about whether or not a special use permit is something that we should do. I would like to go back to the parking issue. And I know we've said a lot about it. But and I just want to say also, I appreciate very much. We had an opportunity to have some staff briefings on this and had some conversation around street parking. And I'd like to go back and just understand there there's a potential, at least in some places, that there's a risk that the amount of street parking would increase in certain locations. It could be for a couple different reasons.

There just isn't sufficient expansion capacity on the lot, whatever. What's the remedy if that does appear to be the case? So a remedy from a neighborhood perspective would be to petition the city for a parking district. So that that would be if if a neighborhood has a parking problem, that is the remedy that the city has established. Is that the answer that you're looking for? Well, I'm not sure what the answer is. I'm just needing to understand for those situations where that could be a problem, where that goes in terms of being able to address it. I'm not sure what's involved in becoming a parking district. But I just wonder, maybe this gets back also to the question, Mark, about a special use permit.

Is that a way in which that kind of a situation would be caught and addressed? If it is that one of the options for that or no? I suppose that's a consideration that council could use in a special use permit situation if it was a special use permit. Okay. And the issue is not that there would be so many detached ADUs in one place that it would contribute to volume. The issue is more site-specific where you'd have a circumstance where there just isn't a configuration for off-street parking sufficient. So you're forcing it on-street where you already may have it. Right. So it stretches that. Yeah. So the special use permit being at the discretion of council, council can pick and choose. And that's the plus and that's the minus of the special use permit.

You know, the plus side is that council can make that spot determination. You know, the downside from a homeowner's perspective is the unknown that they have to go to city council and petition for this to be done. Right. If I could just switch gears to the numbers game a little bit. Sure. I think the... Thank you for doing the assessments. There are two of them that I think we asked for that are very helpful. One is the effect on property assessments for people who choose not to bill just because the legal option is created. And it looks like that's a non-issue. But there's a little bit of a caveat in that I think our comparative data on this is coming from places that are inside the Beltway, predominantly the outside the Beltway

with Fairfax County is a little bit different because those are two-acre lot minimums. So we're a little bit different territory. Sounds like it doesn't look like there would be an issue here. But I just want to note there's a little bit of variation in the data sources here. The other thing is the numbers. And if I understand at the end of the day, our best estimate, again, with some of the same uncertainty because of apples and oranges here, we're looking at like maybe five a year. Is that where this landed? Right. Okay. Helpful to know for a couple different reasons. It doesn't look like there is likely to be a land rush. But it also looks like five a year is a manageable number if it was determined

that we did need to do a special use permit so it wouldn't be an overwhelming surge. I'm not arguing for or against at this stage except I'm sympathetic to the concerns that arise and lead to the need possibly for a special use permit here. I think the other thing that when we discussed this was just helpful to know is this, while we do have attached ADUs, we have a lot of experience with that, the detached ADUs are a little bit different ballgame. It's not exactly the same. And it sounds like there is some merit in taking it a step at a time in terms of how we implement a new policy so that we are going through a process of discovery in terms of how this works and being cautious at the early stages until we get a better feel for what we are really in for

in terms of the volume, the complexity, the impacts, and all that. I don't want to overplay it because at five a year it doesn't sound like a big deal. On the other hand, it does sound like it would be prudent to approach this in a way that is a little bit step at a time and helps us get the feedback we need to determine whether or not and at what point this can be a more automated, if you will, approach to this. That would argue, again, back for at least considering the possibility of a special use permit in the early stages to see how this goes. But I did want to just bring that conversation forward because I appreciate the fact that we talked about that and that from a policy implementation perspective that it's almost like treating this as a pilot

and taking some special care in its early stages. Otherwise, I do want to thank you for all of the work that you've done here. There's been a lot of assessment. It's been responsive. And there's been a lot of work done on both the design and the assessment side of this that I think has been very helpful. So much appreciated. Thank you. Council Member Hall. Thank you. Excuse me. Thank you. I just had one follow-up question. I just did a quick search, and it looks like the special use permit is $600. Does that sound? Okay. That might be correct. I'm not certain offhand. Okay. Yeah. No, I just wanted to see what it was. And I also did some additional research, and it looks like to build a 400-square-foot house,

you're looking between $175,000 and $275,000. And to build an 800-to-1,000-square-foot ADU, looking at $300,000 to $450,000. So I do recognize that $600 is an extra fee, but I feel like for people that are likely going to be doing this, $600 is kind of a drop in the bucket with all of the other costs. So I still strongly support a special use permit. Thank you. Thank you for the presentation. I do agree it was thorough, and you did answer questions that previously came up in the work session. As far as the parking goes, there is a parking problem. We have a lot of rentals in this city that have college students in them, and there's no mechanism for enforcing limitations on how many vehicles a rental can have.

So what we're basically saying is if there's a parking problem in a neighborhood because we have a rental with no mechanism for limiting the number of vehicles, whether it's three, four, five, or six, instead we're going to put the burden on an ADU to meet these requirements. We have a parking issue, I grant you. But giving a free pass to renters in this city and putting the burden on renters of an ADU, or not even renters because I think we're overlooking the fact that a lot of these ADUs may be for family use and they're not rental properties at all. I don't think there should be a greater burden on properties with an ADU than we are placing on lots of rental properties that have lots of vehicles.

So that would be my feedback on that. And as far as the buy-write use of building an ADU, the city is full of yards that have sheds and garages and lots of external uses that are the basic footprint, maybe not the height of the square foot, basic footprint of what we're talking about with an accessory dwelling unit. And while there might not be people living in there, the fact of the matter is the city is full of yards that have sheds and garages in them. And no one came to us to ask if we like the design or the location or anything else. We can do it by right. We can do it by right because we own the property. And so I do have an issue with thinking that this dais or any dais or every dais that's elected every other year

should have an up or down vote on what people want to build in their yard because we don't do that for the other structures they're currently building in their yard. So I fully support the fact that two parking spaces is adequate, understanding that parking is not an insignificant issue for neighborhoods, but we've already got a problem with vehicles for rental properties anyway, and the fact that it should be by right because at $300,000, we are not going to have a lot of people who invest in that. Think to yourself, if you build something for $300,000, how many renters you'd have to have over what period of time to make your investment back. My feeling is probably that people are going to choose this

because they have significantly greater reasons having to do with their family to invest $300,000 and that it is not a money-making enterprise because that kind of money-making enterprise makes no sense financially. So just putting that out there. And with that, I will ask if there is a motion. Oh, sorry, public hearing. Skipped a step, sorry. Okay, I will open the public hearing. Ms. Shinneberry, has this public hearing been properly advertised? Yes, it has. Someone has signed up prior to the meeting to speak, and then after that person speaks, we'll open the floor if there's anybody else in the room. So the one person that spoke is Katie Johnson, or will be speaking with Katie Johnson. I came tonight to ask that ADOs be approved by special use permit.

I'm happy to hear Council Member Hall's concern. I share those concerns. I generally support ADUs, but only with very strong guardrails. I ask the city to retain the ability to ensure appropriateness and ensure no negative impacts on neighbors or neighborhoods. Parking is absolutely a concern and should have a plan for enforcement. City should also have in place a process, much like the city retains the right to inspect chicken coops. The city must have the ability to enforce the ordinances. The shed at my house, there are places that I cannot put my shed. I cannot put my shed in the RPA. I cannot put my shed. I had to get special exception to put my shed where it is. So there are rules about where sheds belong.

But my concern also is we have the ability to inspect chicken coops to ensure that the chickens are safe. Why do we not have the same ability? Why can't the city retain the same ability to make sure and ensure that the people living in these small places are safe as well? Thank you. Okay. Is there anybody else in the room that would like to speak on this agenda item? Good evening, Mayor Reed, members of council. I'm Jim Gillespie. I live at 3604 Colony Road. I'm speaking tonight on behalf of the ADU ordinance amendment. As we all know, there's a regional shortage of housing, housing at all price points. There's a shortage of housing for young adults. There's a shortage of housing for seniors.

There's a shortage of housing for everybody in between. And the ADU ordinance would be a modest but meaningful step in the direction of providing housing for some people who need it. Now, you may think, 50 housing units over a decade or so, well, does that really do anything? Well, it does a lot for those 50 people. They are getting a home when they did not have it before. And I think a little bit about a situation in my own extended family. I have a close relative who is roughly my age who is disabled and at this point is living in a senior living residence and barely affording it. And I think about what it would be like to have that person come and live in my home. And we could make it work, but it would be difficult.

It would be a sacrifice for us. It would be a real sacrifice to the dignity of this person to be a border in my home. And an ADU kind of arrangement would provide that person with more autonomy, the feeling of living independently, of having more responsibility for their own life. So I thank you for all of the work that staff has done, for all the many efforts that you have done to study this issue, to assess it. And I hope you will vote yes. Thank you. Is there anybody else in the room that would like to speak? Is there a motion? I move to approve an ordinance amending Chapter 110, Zoning, to amend portions of articles and sections contained therein, including introductory provisions, zoning districts, and regulations and definition.

Is there a second? Second. Motion has been made by Council Member Hardy Chandler and seconded by Council Member Peterson. A roll call vote. Hang on. Are we going to have discussion? Oh, is there a discussion on the motion? Council Member Peterson? Yes. Is this something that we need to do tonight, or is it possible that this could be allowed some further public review of what we just saw tonight before we make a decision here? Council always has the discretion to defer action on an item with an appropriate motion. And I would be interested in the sense of the body here whether that's something that would be acceptable. It does seem that we're voting on something we just saw. I know it's been around for a while.

On the other hand, we've seen some new information. Do you want to make a substitute motion? Is that how we would proceed, Mr. Lubkeman? That would be the mechanism. Do you want to make a substitute motion? Yes. I will need help from Mr. Lubkeman to get the exact wording correct. If I may, I assume you'll just be asking to defer action on this item to a date certain of blank. The next time we get together, next earliest time we get together. September 8th, I think. September. I believe that would be September the 8th. That would be fine from my standpoint, but I'm. We'll need to make a motion. Let's defer consideration until September 8th. Is there a second? Second. A motion's been made by Council Member Peterson and seconded by Council Member Hall.

A roll call vote. Is there a comment available at this time? Do you want, yes, discussion on the motion? Yeah, I just, I really, I think that we gave a lot of time for the noise ordinance, and then the City of Fairfax government put out a post, and people are all up in arms about it. And I just think that something of this magnitude, while it very well may pass, and people might be very, very supportive of it, I think that the timing of the more finalized versions of this came out in June. Now we're doing this in July. These are historically vacation months. People are not here. So I just think that we need a little bit more time to be able to give people to understand this. I'd love to see the city put out something about this so that we can, you know, share it all around

and really garner some additional support, whether in favor or against, just so we know that we're making a decision with more information. Thank you. Council Member Amos? Just two quick comments. The first being, you know, part of it is we're not going to know what needs to be fixed until it's implemented, unfortunately, especially when it comes to parking, to the actual number of ADUs, and we gauge interest on where this is popping up and if we're going to hit that 50 target in the next 10 years or maybe lower, if it's higher, that's something we'll need to track. The other, I'm very hesitant on the special use permit particularly because I just feel like that people have a right to their property

and they should be allowed to develop it within reason. I do feel like the Board of Zoning Appeals is capable of assessing that. The point about deferral and the discussion on the motion, I guess my question would be why wouldn't we defer more actions that happen over summer in general when people are traveling? Unfortunately, you know, business has to get done. It's my personal feeling on that. Council Member McCoolham? I would like a defer because I would like to ask a little bit more information, gather more information regarding the special use permit process. My understanding is that it can take quite a long time for some people, so I want to better understand that process more. This is something that just came up this evening.

This isn't something that we really discussed in detail prior, so deferring this to the next meeting would allow me that ability. Thank you. Council Member Bates? So first off, this is something that, as I recall, has been in the works since at least last year, is that right, if not earlier? And so it's not something that was introduced, you know, just a month or two ago. You know, it's been on public agendas. We've received feedback about it. With regard to the special use permit, first off, is a resident required to pay that fee regardless of whether or not the city council ultimately votes it up or down? Yes, that's correct. So, again, you know, we don't know what the financial means of the applicant, you know, every single applicant is going to be.

They may have an agreement with someone who may be the very first occupant of that unit where, you know, they pay to build it, what have you. And then they're in a situation where they're out almost $1,000. And plus the, you know, whatever additional costs they may have incurred through having somebody help prepare whatever documentation they might need or what have you. We don't know what goes into that. And, you know, without anything to really show for it. And additionally, the, you know, the, I recall from reviewing the language of the ordinance that, and I believe it was also actually mentioned here tonight, if the property is, you know, due to whatever circumstances, gets to a point where it's no longer in conformance with the requirements set forth there,

they're no longer allowed to use that ADU. Is that right? Yes, that's right. And that exists regardless of whether or not there's a special use permit process. And would there be any difference in enforcement of that if there is a special use permit process or not? Well, that's up to council. The bare minimum for a special use permit, what the changes would be in the zoning ordinance, there's a table in the zoning ordinance called the accessory use table. Accessory dwelling units are listed in there. Accessory dwelling units are listed as permitted uses in the RH, RL, and RM zones. That could be changed to a special use permit to cover all ADUs, or it could be split into accessory dwelling units attached and accessory dwelling units detached.

One would be special, one would be permitted. In that case, we would need a definition of each in the definition section. But that's the bare minimum, and the standards that we reviewed today could stay the same if that's council's wishes. If council wishes to add other standards, you all could do that as well. Yeah, yeah. But so with regard to the enforcement mechanism, would that be any different in terms of, you know, occupancy parking? There are similar enforcement mechanisms to SUPs that the SUP is permitted, you know, for whatever is applied for, and if that changes, then that would be out of conformity, and the property owner would have to come back for a new SUP if that changes. Mm-hmm.

But in terms of how that's enforced with regard to, you know, what's proposed, it's, would you say that it's similar to, you know, that provision that's currently in there, you know, and it's not in conformance and in the longer functions? Correct. That would be similar. The difference would be if council imposes additional requirements as part of the SUP process, that that would be something that's above and beyond what's in the zoning ordinance. Right, right. But we could also, if we wanted to amend or, you know, set the requirements as is, you know, regardless of whether there's an SUP or not. Correct. Yeah, yeah. And so we've already discussed those requirements previously. Anyway, so just, you know, some clarification.

That's very helpful. Thank you. Okay. Councilmember Hardy Chandler. I think, put simply, what concerns me is adding a burden to people who may want to pursue this option and a burden that wouldn't be in place if they were doing something else, like simply improving their property in a different way. So the added burden that does not feel fair to me is not something that I'm wanting to consider. I want it to be an encouragement for people to consider this when it's right for their family and right for their financial circumstances rather than sort of punishing them and adding extra hoops for them to jump through in order to have this happen. So I'm in support of continuing with the vote today.

Councilmember Peterson. Yeah, just to clarify, my interest here was actually not to address the special use permit issue, which sounds like there's still some conversation around. But really to give residents a chance to digest this a little bit, sometimes it seems like it's a little bit much for us to receive new information. People are giving, we invite people to do a public hearing the same night, and they've just seen it and in some cases have not even yet seen it. It's difficult for people to be able to access some of this information ahead of time and digest it. We're actually getting explanations here that help them do that. And then we turn right around and we vote. And if there's no harm in giving a little bit more time for people to digest this

in case there is something out of that that's meaningful, I don't see why we wouldn't delay. And I, in terms of the July timeframe, I mean, people are busy all the time. I will say, however, I have received some comments from residents who have expressed the concern that they've been out of pocket pretty badly in July and are having a hard time keeping up with what's going on in terms of city business. So this is a time when it's been a little bit tougher probably than normal to do that. Again, I would think because of significant new information that we're having in front of us tonight and the lack of the opportunity for people to really have time to digest it and for us to be able to hear from them.

And, again, there may be no feedback whatsoever, but as in the case of the noise ordinance, there may be quite a bit of feedback, in any case, it would be great to give us that opportunity if possible. And I don't think it's a major burden in terms of a postponement here for another decision. I also don't think it would require a particularly large amount of time to act on this when it does come back. So that was really the intention that I had here. Thank you. Councilmember Hall. Thank you. I do also want to remind everyone that this was the body earlier this month who delayed the implementation of an otherwise agreed-upon council code of ethics to allow our boards and commissions time to review it

when it wasn't even decided that they were going to be subject to it. So I just have a hard time not allowing additional time for our 24,000 residents to make sure that they've wrapped their heads around this potential change to their neighborhoods. Councilmember Amos. And just for clarification on that, in that meeting, I asked Mr. Lubcom in if the timeline was affected if we did that action, and he said no. So the timeline was not changed because of that. So if there's no further discussion on this motion to defer, can we take a roll call vote? Ms. Shinneberry. Councilmember Amos. Nay. Councilmember Hall. Yes. Councilmember Hardy Chandler. Nay. Councilmember Peterson. Aye. Councilmember Bates.

Nay. Councilmember McQuillan. Yes. Motion failed three to three. So the original motion, which was made by Councilmember Hardy Chandler and seconded by Councilmember Peterson, is there discussion on the original motion before we take a roll call vote? Councilmember Hall. I'd like to make it very clear that I think that this could be an excellent opportunity for our community, for our residents. I simply do not feel that those that are away and that have spent the summer since their kids have been out of school have sufficient time to truly understand and digest what is included here, which is why I strongly support it and was going to ask for a delay myself. So my vote tonight is not a no against ADUs.

It's a no against the process that is not allowing our residents sufficient time to absorb this information. Thank you. Any other discussion on the motion? And I will simply say we've been working on this ADU amendment, I believe, since I was elected mayor. So it is not something new. We have had work sessions on it. There may not have been work sessions you saw previous to being on this council, but we have been talking about this ADU ordinance since at least 2024, if not 2023. So with that, a roll call vote. Okay. Council member McQuillen. I too wanted to state on the record that I will be voting no on this because I too, in our last meeting, was convinced. And in being collaborative and trying to ensure that everyone and my colleagues had enough

time to speak with their constituents and do their due diligence, I decided to go ahead and agree with the rest of council that we would delay adopting our code of ethics. And this evening, I was also kind of in the same boat here where I was going, okay, a special use permit for $600, that's a lot of money. I know some of the timing, the process can take a long time. However, I'm not even given enough time to speak with constituents and talk to them about this to ensure that they understand that this is what's going to happen when this is approved this evening. So I just want to let everyone know that I'm not saying no to ADUs because I actually support them fully. I'm very frustrated that the process tonight that we're saying that we don't care about

what our constituents think about this. We have all of this set out really nicely now. We know exactly what it entails. And our constituents can look it over and give us really good, accurate feedback. They're all on vacation. Everybody is gone this summer. We know this. They're going to return next month because school starts in August. Can we really wait for one month? Yes, we could, but we're not going to tonight. So my vote will be a no, but it's not against ADUs because I do want affordability and I want housing here. However, I'm very frustrated that we feel like it's okay to just push things along and not give a deferment. Thank you. Not anything going on. Got it. Council member Peterson.

Yeah, it is, I think, a little bit frustrating for everybody to be in this position. I support the detached ADU approach. I do think there's a little bit of unfinished business here. And if we're not going to be able to give ourselves some breathing room to let people give us feedback and tie this up with a nice bow and we get back the way we really ought to, I would just say that I would hope that our city manager and city staff would move forward in a manner that would retain flexibility as needed to address needs that may come up as a consequence of public feedback that we receive after this evening's vote. And that we stay flexible and responsive every step of the way. And that could be special use permit, but it could be any number of other things.

As I mentioned earlier, this is going to go into an early implementation phase. It will be an early period of discovery. It will be much like a pilot. And I will support this, but it will be based on the assumption that we will take seriously feedback that we receive and that we will act on that feedback without hesitation as necessary and retain the flexibility we need to do that. And so I will be supporting this, but I must say I have real reservations about the way in which we're doing this and we're not giving people a chance to kind of have a last look at something that has some new elements to it. Thank you. Any other comments? Seeing none, a roll call vote. Council Member Amos? Aye. Council Member Hall?

No. Council Member Hardy-Chandler? Aye. Council Member Peterson? Aye. Council Member Bates? Aye. Council Member McQuillan? No. Okay. Most room passed 4-2. Okay. We will go on to second general public comment. Is there anybody in the room that would like to make a general public comment tonight? Okay. All right. Seeing none, we will now recess the regular meeting to go into a work session. We'll take a five-minute recess to move into the work session room. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Now, going back to the project for the project. So, this is a proposal. Thank you. Thank you. Any questions that you have, the potential applicant is also standing by for questions. Thank you, thank you, I'm going to be here, I'm going to be here, I'm going to be here, and I'm going to be here. I'm going to be here, I'm going to be here. of the several benefits that the redevelopment of this property will just inherently bring forward. Thank you. My next question in terms of height. So the what's currently there, I think I saw on the plane it was 28 feet if I'm correct. And then you have proposed four stories. What's the gap there? What's the difference? That's correct. The two story buildings, I think you're you're you're

correct or about 25 28 30 feet in story. Excuse me, feet high. What we are proposing at this point is a maximum height of four stories or 60 feet. The 60 feet would be the two over two units, the stack townhouse units on the left side of your screen, the west side of the site, fronting on Cambridge Road. Those will be a little bit taller than the single family attached the townhouse units. One of the reasons we did that was to kind of establish that frontage, establish that bookend of the site, create kind of a gateway as you're coming into the city by concentrating that mass there. But that four story 60 foot height would be the maximum the townhouses would likely be a bit shorter than that. But again, we're early in the process. And

so all of that information will be provided if and when it moves forward. Absolutely. And I know it's early in the process. So for example, you know, I'd be curious our economic development director's thoughts, what exactly is driving this? Is it vacancy rates? Is it? I mean, what are we what are we looking at for this? Yeah, and I'll ask Greg to chime in with a little bit more detail. But the reality is these these buildings are really approaching or at the end of their useful life. They're about 50 years old at this point, and they're deteriorating. And frankly, the costs of getting them back to where they need to be to release these these spaces are it's it's it's approaching the point where it's cost prohibitive. And so that's why the property owners in the position

now where they're looking to the next phase, the next step for this property. And so what we've come forward with is what we think and what we hope Council agrees is a step in the right direction, something that's consistent with the small area plan and continuing the the progress of development here in Norfax. Greg, do you want to add to that? That's exactly right in terms of the condition of buildings. And in terms of the product mix and the direction of the plan, we looked kind of holistically in this broader market. And we're really excited about kind of the canvas that's been painted already. We have a senior housing building, we have a rental apartment building coming out of the ground.

What we don't have is home homeownership opportunities. And in this small little plan, we fit a lot of we think great things. There's the two over two units, which will be the smaller of the smallest of the units, and then a mixture of 16 foot wide and 20 foot wide towns. So in this plan, you have three different types of home ownership opportunities that will be the first kind of in this broader area. And we think that all of that residential activity, in addition to the two hotels that already exist, brings a kind of a nice diversity of pedestrian activity and will kind of start to activate it as a whole. So we're really excited about that. Thank you. My last question is related to the retail portion. And there's kind of two things

built into that one for the retail. I mean, when, when you say retail, do you mean more commercial office space? Or do you more so mean, for example, restaurant usage or something like that? Just for clarification. Yeah, so our hope is that it's neighborhood serving retail. We intentionally had it front on the linear park because we like that interface between that activity in the park interacting with the retail. It's very, very early to try and determine what will the lease in that space. Our hope would be, though, it would be neighborhood serving retail rather than commercial uses. Understood. And part of the reason I ask that is because it just felt a little odd to have that retail space fronting, well, not fronting technically, but closer to the chain bridge roadside. I would think,

considering you have an adjacent shopping center on the University Drive portion, you might get more consistency putting that on the University Drive side. I wasn't sure what went to your thought process on that. Yeah, so the retail actually is on the right side, east side of the site on the University Drive, correct. And the reason for that, just so you're aware, and, you know, when we first met with staff about this, they emphasized the importance of having that retail frontage there because that's what the small area plan recommends. If you look at this site, this site, the hotel site to the south and even points to the north across Eaton Place, it's envisioned in the small area plan that that linear

park has a retail frontage. And so what you see here is the product of several conversations we had with staff early on to advance that design. I am very happy to hear I was wrong about that. So thank you. I didn't say you were wrong, per se. I'll say it to myself. No, that's good to know. And that was it for my questions. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member McQuillen. Thank you. How much commercial will be preserved? So the existing office buildings are about 16,000 square feet, a little over that, Council Member McQuillen. Those will be removed and replaced with the proposed retail that we have here, which is just over 2,700 square feet. 700. Okay. And then how much room is there? I'm looking at the renderings and they, I actually really like this plan a lot. I'll be honest with you.

I really like this plan a lot. I like the retail on the side. But the renderings, is there a lot of room for changing the look to look less square and modern and like everything else I see in everybody else's city that's being built? Absolutely. And this is Bob and my first opportunity to work together. And he said, you know, you don't really need renderings at this point. It's just conceptual. And I said, let's put something in there and facilitate a conversation. So the answer is absolutely. And we want that feedback. And we want this whole project to feel like it's part of the fabric of the city of Fairfax. Great. Great. I really, I do like the setup. I like the green space. I like where you have the retail. I'd like to see a little, or the commercial.

I'd like to see a little bit more preservation for commercial. But I, the renderings and the look of the appearance, I think you could go a long way if it really matches our community well and keeps to the character. So thank you. Great. Thank you. Council Member Peterson. Yeah, I've got a, for staff, a couple of questions here. Just on page one. And just a couple quick math questions for you. On the far right bottom, activity centers plus outside of number of units. And there's, you drop down, you go to a total of 3,022. What is that number? Okay. Sorry. Can you repeat your question? I was looking at my presentation on the staff report. That's okay. So I'm going to the staff report. Yes. And I'm going down to bottom right corner of page one.

Okay. And so you've got a couple tables here that give you the tally of what are known, what your benchmark estimates, but I'll circle back to them on the very far right. And they have numbers for the first two for North Facts and then activity centers plus combined. The last one is activity centers plus outside of, and it's blank. But if you drop down to the very bottom, it's 3,022. What does that mean? Yeah. That's all like one table. So that means the projects that are in a land use process right now, including activity centers and those outside of activity centers. Those are in a land use process. How do you reconcile that with the first two boxes, one for North Facts and one for activity centers combined? The North Facts one has 1,400,

and the small area plan benchmark estimate for activity centers is 4,700. And Ms. Schweiger, if you could pull up that slide as well. I think that might be helpful. I forgot it's in there. Might be helpful. So the 1,400 units, Council Member Peterson, is the benchmark estimate for the North Facts small area plan. And so that's what's identified in the plan in terms of a benchmark estimate over the near-term development in North Facts. So there is not a benchmark estimate for areas outside of activity centers. So in that final table on the far right of this slide, you don't see a benchmark estimate. So what's included there is in total number of residential units at some place within the development review process

that could be considered by City Council at some point in time if those proposals or projects proceed. Those are the figures associated with that. So under construction, approved, under review, and in a pre-application phase. And so those are the units that are somewhere in the development review process with the city. That's the 3,022? Yes, sir. All right. So just to check my math. So if you look at current population in the city of Fairfax, which is 26,340 or something like that, and you add 47 to it, that's 4,700. That's knocking the door at an 18% increase. If you add another 3,000 to it, it's like a 29% increase over base. So just adding the numbers up, again, just a math thing, where you have a current population.

I'm trying to get a sense of how much that current population expands. I'll take your word for it, Council Member Peterson. Blame it on the iPhone if it's wrong, okay? And my thumbs, which I have too many of right now. All right. So there's that. Then you said near term. What does that mean? So the small area plans identify a 10 to 15-year near-term development window. And so as shown in those plans, there's a full illustrative build-out of what redevelopment in those areas, which are designated redevelopment areas in the city, might look like. As those plans are being developed based upon market conditions, what is included is what is estimated redevelopment activity could result in. Okay. Over that 10 to 15-year period.

So for Northfax, it was 1,400 units. Great. But so, and we've talked about this, so you'll correct me if I don't exactly get it right, but those benchmark estimates are what market conditions could result in. That is not, however, a public policy goal that's been adopted by the city. That is correct. And that's a very critical point for everybody to recognize. So I think we need to be cautious about any presentation, and I'm not pointing fingers at this one, that might suggest that we are trying to attain these particular goals. That is not the case. We're simply tracking metrics. But I'm curious also. I don't see our economic development director here, although maybe she's hiding somewhere.

But we have a metric here, which is housing units. Are we also estimating commercial expansion market potential, and for that matter, retail? And I don't even talk about industrial, but let's just talk about commercial and retail over the same period. I don't see those benchmarks here. We are. And that's information that we can provide to city council moving forward. I think this table is put together in response to a previous request, so we included it in this presentation. But we can add additional information regarding commercial square footages as well. Well, I mean, it gets to a strategic question, I think, for the council and the city as it is trying to address public interest, and that is the goal that either we have or we've certainly discussed of expanding the presence of commercial redevelopment and or development in the city.

And we don't have parallel numbers here to tell us what those numbers look like next to residential numbers. So the conversation is a little bit one-sided. We're just talking residential. We're not talking commercial here. This is a case where we're reducing the – so there is certainly an interest in expanding commercial. And in this case, we're actually reducing it from 16,000 to 2,700 square feet. I think that's a really big hit on a commercial square footage. And, again, our economic development director is not here, but she will, I'm sure, be listening in on this. It's my understanding that just across the street at Brightview, one of the objectives there to address this very problem is to add 7,000 square feet at least of commercial there.

So I guess my question is, if we are trying to expand commercial in this area, why aren't we focusing the approach on this particular site in a manner that's consistent with that? Because that would seem to be consistent with the city's goals. I'll defer to the applicant or the potential applicant regarding this potential site. Sure. Thanks, Mr. Hart, and thanks, Council Member Peterson, for the question. And I think it's a good one, right? You know, this site has been a commercial use for the last 50 or so years for the reasons I described. The existing facilities on the site, the buildings themselves are just – they're at the end of their lifespan. And so the question then becomes, what's next?

And so when we looked at this property and working with the owner, trying to figure out what made the best sense for North Vax, what made the best sense for the city, as Greg was mentioning earlier, we thought that introducing opportunities for homeownership here were appropriate. Now, I acknowledge that there will be a reduction in the amount of commercial space, certainly compared to what's there today. We are bringing forward what I do believe is a meaningful number, 2,700 square feet. But I think looking at the bigger picture here, what these future residents will do is support the existing commercial uses that are already in the area. The shopping centers down the street, the future growth yet to come in North Vax.

And so I do think that this application, this proposal, which is a relatively small piece of North Vax and the bigger picture, does have a role to play. You've got the botanist coming online right now. It's under construction. I think that's bringing about 5,000 square feet. I forget if you mentioned that or not, Council Member Peterson. But looking at this site and working through this development program, we felt that this was the highest and the best use for it and certainly something that can be a valuable part of the overall North Vax community. So I think it would be great to maybe have an expanded conversation that I would like, if possible, to have the benefit of our economic development director to be a part of to understand the commercial status mix

and potential goals in that area because right across the street there is, of course, quite substantial commercial redevelopment going on. And I don't think the issue here is trying to make use of the 50-year-old buildings. I think it's pretty clear that this is a redevelopment scenario under any scenario here that's taking place. But I think the question is whether it's really the right time and place to be knocking out so much commercial given these circumstances. And I'd certainly like to understand that more clearly. The other thing that factors into that is in terms of the type of commercial development that is consistent with future market conditions and could actually those conditions could be shaped a bit by proactive things that we might do here.

My understanding from our economic development director is that where the city shines and could shine is smaller scale commercial sites that would be of interest to firms that don't want to go into the really big office building developments that are outside of the city but are looking for smaller scale and, by definition, more affordable, also that are amenitized. And it creates a set of conditions that those firms are looking for. And we have some competitive advantages there. And this would be a case where this is a site that could potentially be acting on them. I'm not sure how much of the formulation of this proposal has involved conversations around economic development and commercial development in the city.

But to me, that's kind of the white elephant here. I appreciate what you've brought forward. But I do want to acknowledge that we have kind of a big picture issue here for the city in this particular location. I would feel more comfortable if we had a chance to unpack that a little bit here as we decide what works best here. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Hardy-Chandler. Thank you. I really appreciate slide four because I think, as I mentioned in a previous meeting, sometimes we look at projects individually and we don't consider what else is going on in the area. So I think that we did ask for, particularly on the residential side, what else is going on and where this falls. So in North Facts, is this proposal included in the pre-application number that's in the upper left side?

Okay. Thank you. The other question that I had was for retail, you mentioned neighborhood serving. What does that mean specifically? Can you break down what that means for me? Sure. Sure. And I think it's- Who might shop there a person? Yeah, it's things like small boutiques, perhaps a coffee shop, a cafe, a small restaurant, things that could, as I was mentioning before, you know, be used by the future residents here. And so I'm sure Greg would agree with me. It's still, again, we're on step one of 100 of this process. It's still relatively early. I think as we move forward, hopefully that vision gets fleshed out a little bit more. At this point, anyway, we're hoping to maintain as much flexibility as we can to expand the universe of potential uses.

But what we're thinking is most likely is something like I described, a small restaurant, cafe, store, something like that. Thank you. I just wanted to understand the category. Sure. I did read in the report where you were talking about the buildings being at the end of their life. So can you talk a little bit about the current tenants? And so it's at the end of its life. Something is going to have to happen, right? These buildings are not sustainable at all. Some choice is going to have to be made. So for the current tenants, I guess a couple of questions there. Any very early thoughts about what might happen with them in terms of a plan? And also what is the current vacancy of those buildings?

Yeah. The current vacancy is about 40%. And that's going to grow to the buildings are set to go entirely vacant over the next 18 months. The buildings are structurally, you know, I don't want to say unsound, but in poor condition. And it no longer makes sense to continue to reinvest them. So in any scenario, those buildings will be closed here in the next 18 to 24 months. Okay. And you mentioned, if I heard you correctly, in another response, you mentioned this as being different from some of the other projects that you're involved in. Is that what went into the decision for this particular kind of proposal? Because I think there was a mention of rental properties and other properties. So was this to diversify?

Well, in terms of this particular plan, it was diversifying the housing opportunities. In this sub-market, right now there's a rental product coming up and there's the senior housing and so forth. And so we saw a distinct opportunity, specifically in townhouses that are smaller, more attainable. The two over twos will be even a lower price point. So we felt like that hit a real sweet spot that wasn't an opportunity there. So having differentiated product was very interesting. The other thing that's about the site that is important to note is it's a small site. It's just over two acres. There's with the hotel to the south, there's no real opportunity to grow that to do a more substantial project.

And so this was an opportunity to kind of pack a lot into a small bag. So it checked a lot of boxes. Thank you. Appreciate it. That's my questions for now. Thank you. Council Member Hull? Sorry, can you give me another minute, please? Thanks. Council Member Bates? I certainly do overall like some aspects of this project, the layout of overall the sidewalks and site access. I will say that the smaller area plan envisions this site being all commercial, understanding that, you know, there might be room for compromise here. But I would like to see ideally at least half the commercial space that's there replaced. And, you know, there are things that could be done in terms of perhaps structured parking.

You know, we've seen other sites in the city where there's, you know, a small office filling with a small parking garage or something like that. And in addition to, you know, the retail frontage is certainly needed there, you know, at an absolute minimum. But the smaller area plan envisions that fronting onto the linear park, which I think is perhaps maybe just a matter of moving that sidewalk around to the other side and, you know, having it front onto that sidewalk on that side. But, yeah, again, more commercial space, office and or retail. But still certainly, you know, I think that having some for sale units here add some diversity to the housing stock in this part of North Facts. Thank you.

Council Member Hull? Thank you. Sorry, I forgot my reading glasses. I'm having to, like, zoom in or go over to the screen. Sucks getting old. I have a couple, I don't know if they're Clara questions or not, but back to slide four. I know we're spending a lot of time on that. The benchmark estimates of 1,400 for North Facts and 4,700 for the activity centers combined, that equates to 6,100 units, correct? If you're adding those two together, or is the 4,700 inclusive of the four? Inclusive. Okay. 4,700 total among all of the activity centers. Okay. So, sorry, we're going to have to do math real quick because I did it the other way. So, what I found, sorry, wrong buttons. 41. Okay. So, what I found with a quick search was that in 2024, the total dwelling units in the city was 10,467.

So, these proposed residential development plans to add 4,700 units, which is 45% of what we currently have available for dwelling units. So, we are adding an extraordinary amount in this overall proposal, not your specific proposal. Let me be clear on that. And then, of the 914 units that are currently under construction, or am I doing that wrong? It should be 4,30 under construction, or is it 4,84 total under construction? 4,84 total under construction among all four of the activity centers. So, then, 4,84 divided by 4,67 gets me to, let's call it about 5%. So, there is 5% of the total dwelling units in 2024 that is currently under construction in the city. I trust your math. I didn't at first, but then I went back and did it the right way.

Okay. So, what I'm hearing is that we're going to be adding, based upon this slide, 45% of our existing housing stock. We're going to be adding an additional 45% of that total, based on what we have on this slide. I think those are really important numbers. Now, to your specific proposal, and this might be, again, a clear question first, but on page 6, the residence inn that is right near this, I believe that is a four-story building, which is roughly 48 feet tall. I believe it's five. I'm going by memory. I Googled it, but it said four, but is it five? I think so. I believe so. Okay. So, five feet would be roughly 60 feet tall? 60 feet. Okay. So, your building, then, for that frontage there is going to be similar to the residence inn?

Correct. Okay. I will say that makes me feel a little better, but still not great. So, I actually live across the street on Eaton Place. If you go across and down, I'm in that neighborhood there. So, this is very, very close to home for me. You might be surprised, based upon my other comments along the way, that I actually do like this. I do have some suggestions, though. I do feel, even though the residence inn apparently is taller than I thought, I do feel personally that townhouses where the stackable units are would make more sense. I think it would keep the height a little bit lower there as you're driving along Chainbridge Road. And then, maybe you could potentially repurpose some of the interior townhomes to be the stackable units.

That way, you have that extra height, but it's not looming over the street there. I know across the street from there is the assembly townhomes. I believe, again, someone can correct me, I think they are three stories tall. So, it might give a little bit more balance to what's there. I like the green space. I cannot wait until those connections on that service road are closed off. So, this gets us there a little bit faster. Very happy to see the 10-foot sidewalk on Eaton, the 8-foot sidewalk on University. The parking that is available, the 88 parking spaces, again, my old eyes are failing me today, but it looks like there are some guest parking spots, Amazon drop-off deliveries, those kind of spots available in addition to what's at the residences themselves.

Correct. So, the surface parking spaces are really, they could be used for both. So, the ones on the left side, so the west side of the site adjacent to the stacked townhouses, I think there's eight or nine spaces there, but some of those would be kind of dedicated to the stacked townhouses. The stacked townhouses will have one-car garages. Okay. And so, the rest of the parking would be provided in that surface parking area on the left. The surface parking area on the right primarily would be devoted to the retail, the commercial uses, but, you know, after hours in the evenings and weekends when that space is maybe not functioning, those would be theoretically available for guests, visitors, things like that.

Okay. While I have the opportunity to speak with you, Council Member Hall, just real briefly, one of the reasons we provided that open space area on the south part of the screen here was to serve as a buffer between those units and the residents. It's about 8,000 square feet, give or take, and we thought it was the right move to provide a little bit of a buffer there, but I appreciate your suggestions about potentially looking at shifting things around a little bit. We'll look at that. I just didn't want to miss that. Okay. No, I appreciate that. And I do also appreciate the buffer, and I'm sure people that live there will also appreciate it. These are all going to be for sale units, correct?

Correct. Okay. And based upon the number that you're putting in, 6% of them will be affordable? I believe for the townhouses, it's 10%. Mr. Harden's nodding his head. Correct? 10%. 6% would apply to multifamily. Okay. I wasn't sure if the combination of the townhouses and the... And it would be split. So 10% on the townhouse and on the 2 over 2s, the stack to those would be multifamily per zoning, and so that would be 6%. Okay. So I think it's 3 or 4? 3 or 4. 3 or 4, I think. Okay. And I don't mean to be naive about the 2 over 2 units, but when it says 8 2 over 2, does that mean 16 units total, or that means 8 units? 8 total. 8 total. 12. Okay. Correct. Okay. I'm happy to see the dwelling units per acre at a reasonable 17.7, in my opinion.

The private street you're referring to, is this, the trash and all of those things would be handled entirely by the complex itself? Because they're townhouses, right? So they don't... No, so they do get city services. 6, yeah. Correct? The townhouses would get city services, yes. But the stacked units would not? That's correct. I don't know how that's going to work. Similar situation in Mount Vineyard, at the corner of Oak and Main Street, has similar setup townhouses and 2 over 2s and condominiums in that development, so it is split. Okay. I would imagine... Different colored trash cans on different units, I think, is... Okay. I was going to say, I was going to imagine fighting over some dumpster space, but maybe not.

And again, I know this is step one of 100. I do think, again, I live right near here. What I think we are lacking is, like you said, a cafe-style place, a place that does sandwiches, a place that does a nice lunch. You can get some stuff for dinner takeout. I love coffee shops, but when they don't serve sufficient food, like we have enough coffee shops right now. So again, I know that that's in the weeds, but I live here. I have a vested interest in seeing something like that succeed. But I have to say, I am pleasantly surprised, and I'm sure those that are watching at home are like, wow, she's actually supporting something, right? And I am. Again, I would like to see maybe the shift of the stackable over to the back, but I think there's a lot of really good things here.

You did mention that the current tenants were 40% vacant right now and expected to transition out in the next 18 months. Is that simply because the owner of the building knows he or she wants to do something and is not renewing leases? The value of the leases are far below the cost to fix the building up to the state where it would remain leasable, so it doesn't make any economic sense any longer. Okay, and what is currently in there, like medical space? It's about a third medical and about two-thirds office, so kind of local, small office kind of users. Okay. Do we know if we anticipate the people that are there currently wanting to remain in the city? Are there options for them, or is that just they're likely gone?

Yeah, I think, and the owner's not with us this evening, but we've had conversations with them. I think we would be absolutely very open to working with economic development and facilitating relocation in the city if that is a possibility. The ownership group that owns these buildings today have owned it for quite a long time, and so they very much want to do right by their tenants as they move on, as they move out. So that's something they'll be working through throughout this process and beyond. One more thing while I have the microphone, and I'd be remit, but at the risk of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory here, green space you mentioned on Chambridge Road here. Just to be very clear, what we did there is we took what's in the city's plans right now for the intersection improvements at Eaton Place and University,

and we kind of overlaid what that's going to look like in the future, just to be very clear. Okay, so not a pocket park there. Correct. That's really for illustrative purposes. That's going to be done in the future when the intersection improvement project goes forward, and so what we did is we just simply overlaid the city's plans onto these drawings to show what it will look like in the future when it's all said and done. I appreciate your honesty and transparency on that one. The other spaces on the site, we'll take care of those. Okay, great. Thank you very much. Thank you. Council Member Peterson? Yeah, I was wrong on my math, and Council Member, Hall was kind enough to recut the numbers, and I just wanted to reinforce that the 45% growth in households over 10, 15 years,

but let's call it 10 years, is more than four times, it's four and a half times the rate of household growth that occurred in the last, in the period of 2020 to 2025 in the city. So this just, again, this is not an issue with this particular proposal, but it is a general question and concern about the overall volume and rate of growth for residential units, because it far surpasses both in rate and volume, what we've seen in the last five years. Of course, the backdrop is we're down economic and population growth, so it's even more reason to be wondering how best to approach these things. I think it underscores the need to have this conversation about the commercial strategy for this area and what that looks like and whether there are yet opportunities that you all haven't been able to capture yet that might tap into that.

And I think it also makes us think a little bit twice about how we're approaching the residential unit additions across the board and small area plans. I appreciate what you all have done, and I appreciate your flexibility and openness here, and this is a first swing at what you've done, but I think it is good and fair to give you sort of some feedback in terms of this whole commercial issue and hope that we maybe can look into that a little bit more clearly as we go forward. Thank you. Council Member Bates. Just an additional comment. In the interest of perhaps having some give and take here, I could see, and maybe this is something that you might not necessarily even want to do, given marking conditions,

but I could see in exchange for a more significant amount of commercial space going to all two-over twos, for example, to maintain the number of units roughly that you've proposed in exchange for providing additional commercial space here. Again, ideally at least half what's there, but I also just want to point out that in addition to the five-story hotel that's directly to the south, the office building next to the assembly on the west side of Chambridge Road that basically backs right up to the community, there is also four stories, so very in keeping with the current character of that area. And additionally, the small area plan recommends a maximum of seven stories here, so you even have some additional flexibility, but I think that four stories throughout the site would certainly be reasonable.

Other questions or comments? Okay, so I think this is a good project. I like it. I think townhouses and two-over twos in this location is going to be very appealing because of its proximity to I-66. I predict they will be sold before they're completed. It also backs, it gives access to the I-66 trail, a very significant, and there are just additions and implementation for the I-66 trail, and this housing is right there. As far as the retail, what I see, I see what you see, which is you've got two hotels, you've got the botanist over here, and the retail is probably going to be the services those people want to walk to. That just makes sense, that that's the kind of commercial retail that's going to be there,

is the kind that serves that community. I like the fact that it's so few units because these smaller units on these small parcels give a better opportunity to create a closer community. I mean, you look at some places in northern Virginia that have townhouses, communities that are just hundreds and hundreds of townhouses, and I think with the number, we have other small townhouse developments. It just gives a greater sense of community, I think, but the proximity to I-66 and I-66 trail are going to make them highly, highly desirable, I believe, and so I really like the project. I know you've gone above and beyond on the green space in the linear park, and you're paying attention, not only to what the small area plan calls for, you're paying attention to what you've historically heard the feedback from this council on other projects.

DPI Adaptive Fitness is in this complex. They're on the first floor. I don't know what other businesses are there. We have vacancy in the city for, like, accountants and medical space and things like that, but DPI Adaptive Fitness is a very unique space that has been configured in a specific way, and so I think I haven't spoken with Devin or anyone else over there, but the city obviously has plenty of time to work with them to find another location in the city, but, you know, so it's important that we know who our businesses are. I believe that they'll want to stay here in the city, but we are the first step of 100. People are now on notice that we need, and I think our economic development team will, in fact,

find spaces for the businesses that want to stay here, and I hope they all want to stay here, but I think the fitness definitely will want to stay here, so I have confidence. I really have confidence in this project and look forward to seeing you come back based on the feedback you've gotten. So thank you very much. Thank you for having us. I appreciate the feedback. Ms. Shinneberry? Before I announce the next item, and it was a little early, but I'm just doing a time check at 945. Okay. So our last work session item is a discussion of a request by Combined Courthouse LLC C-O Combined Columbia Glade LLC-20049 for the redevelopment of 10300 Willard Way in parrens 572-2004D and 392 to Blenheim Boulevard in parrens 572-2003A.

I'm going to recognize Claire Schweiger, our city planner for the staff presentation. Okay. Moving right along to Courthouse Plaza, this is a work session to discuss a redevelopment proposal at 10300 Willard Way and 3922 Blenheim Boulevard. We are currently in the post-submission phase of the development review process, so the applicant has made two submissions of the plan, and staff have given the applicant comments on their application. A work session was held with the Board of Architectural Review on June 3rd and with the Planning Commission on June 22nd. On the right here is an aerial of the site. The site is bounded by Blenheim Boulevard on the east and University Drive on the west. To the north is Democracy Lane and Plaza Drive, and to the south is the library.

The site is located in the activity center place type and is subject to the Old Town Fairfax small area plan. The site is currently zoned CR Commercial Retail and CG Commercial General in the Transition Overlay District, and the applicant proposes a zoning change to PDM plan development mixed use. The applicant proposes a phase development with phase one including 315 residential units, a 72-foot height maximum, which does require a special exception. The applicant has submitted a special exception request to exceed the 48-foot height maximum in the Transition Overlay District, and the small area plan recommends a six-story height maximum on this site. Phase one also includes 12,500 square feet of first floor retail,

roughly 30,000 square feet of open space, a plaza to the east of the existing retail, new landscaping, and two new streets. It also includes new and widened sidewalks. The applicant is also requesting a special exception for sidewalks to allow some sidewalks to be narrower than 10 feet. The plan also shows 741 parking spaces in service and structured parking. The applicant is also requesting a special exception to reduce the minimum parking ratio from 1.5 to 1.25 parking spaces per residential unit. The plans also include facade updates to the Courthouse Plaza Shopping Center and public art along the proposed Street 1 facade. Phase two would require a future amendment to the master development plan.

So if this application is approved, phase two would need to come back to this body at a future time for approval. In phase two, the applicant proposes 315 residential units, a new north to south street, 50,000 square feet of first floor retail, in addition to one of the pad buildings, 90,000 square feet of open space, and 980 parking spaces across surface and structure parking. Here are some renderings of the proposed building for phase one. These are more renderings. These are renderings of the center that would be refaced. And then on the right image, you can see a proposed plaza to the east of the existing retail. And then next steps for this application are planned resubmission and staff review,

public hearings with the Planning Commission, City Council, and the Board of Architectural Review. And that concludes my presentation. And the applicant is here to present next. Yeah, do you want to switch or do you want to? Yeah. Sorry. One moment. There you go. Good evening. My name is Molly Novotny. I'm an urban planner with Curata Partners, and I'm pleased to be here before you tonight with the combined properties team. I have Aisha Hill at the table with me. Significantly to this body, combined properties owns four properties in the city. Scout on the circle in the upper portion of this image, Pickett and Turnpike shopping centers, and then Courthouse, which is what we're talking with you about tonight.

This image you saw when I was here before, it shows the area in magenta, which will be removed. That is the only portion of the building that would be removed with this first phase, and then rebuilt with a mixed-use building. Everything in green is existing retail that would be renovated with this project. We have made significant, significant revisions to this application before this body saw it, since this body has seen it in 2025. Additionally, we've made significant revisions since the images that Clara presented in her presentation. So you're going to see different architecture in my presentation. You're going to see additional commitments that we've made, because we have been working with staff,

the Planning Commission, and BAR over the last six weeks to be able to address their comments. So significantly with this application, we're now rezoning the entire property to the PDM district. We've also proposed that second phase, which was something staff had requested before. We've removed several of our special exception requests, including the request for parking. We have upgraded our architecture. So you're going to see a lot of red brick integrated into the buildings. You're going to see the commitment that the Safeway gets refaced with this phase one. We've also reduced the height of the building at the corner of university and democracy. Some additional things with landscaping. We've added a central park in phase two.

We've added a linear park along Blenheim. We've really created and established new open spaces and also added interim open space if phase two gets delayed. And then for site conditions, we have removed the pinch point at the sidewalks so our sidewalks facing public roads are all 10 feet and we have widened some streets for vehicular traffic. But to set the stage, this application is here before you because your small area plan in 2020 asked for this application. It identified this site to be redeveloped to include multifamily apartment buildings up to six stories in height and to be grocery anchored. The area in this image in this part of Old Town had 0% residential in 2020 and that plan called for a 58% mix of residential.

And that's, again, from your small area plan. And so what we've done with phase one is we've focused on the left portion of the project. We've got the parking garage, the interior courtyard, and a mixed-use building. That building will have 12,500 square feet of new retail. And all of this green space will be all open space available in phase one with new pocket parks throughout. And then when we come to phase two, what we've done is we've established the street network. We've established the street trees. We've established the building envelope. We hadn't had these details before you when we were here in 2025, but we have now committed to this as a phase two plan to start to show you how the full site could redevelop

and this entire site would be rezoned. Additionally, we've shown an additional building on the pad site. That building could locate in different areas along that pad site. We could put it along Street 2 or along Blitam as we've shown. Architecture. This is an image that was in Clara's presentation and is what was included in our second submission to staff back in May. Since that time, we've heard from your BAR and staff, they would like more red brick. So what you're going to see is a significantly revised building. What this building does is it removes the white brick and it converts any black brick to be an accent material and it integrates red brick throughout. These facades, Democracy, University, and Street 1 are primarily brick.

The only element on these buildings besides accents that isn't brick is that champagne-colored fiber cement. So we've really done a significant overhaul with the materials and the color palette. This is a corner of Democracy and University. You can see how we've lowered that building height to help with that transition at that corner. And then again, just looking up Democracy. This is the Safeway. The top image is what it looks like today. The bottom would show a refaced Safeway, which would occur prior to residential occupancy. And then the overall center being a completely renovated and integrated development. Existing tenants. Yes, we will be relocating existing tenants that are there. We have commitments in our application that commit to rent subsidies

for tenants in good standings to help them relocate to find other properties in the city. We also have a commitment that we're going to reserve some smaller space in our building for startup customers and to continue to work with your economic development. We think those are important commitments, and we're proud to have made them. In terms of connectivity, this site is incredibly porous. This image shows in orange all the vehicular routes through the site, and then all of the pedestrian routes through the site, really interlinking all components of the project. These are just going to show some images of these sidewalks around the site. We've got at least seven feet of walking area on Street 1,

and then it enlarges to at least 10 feet of walking area everywhere else, if not 12 feet or wider. You've got lots of room for outdoor space, lots of room for tables. And then we've got significant open space. Today, the site only has 4.3% open space. It's ridiculous. It's a surface parking lot. At the end of phase one, we will have increased that open space to 12.3%, and then we've added interim open space. If by 2035, we haven't moved forward with the next phase, that bolsters that open space to 13.4% before bringing it to the 20% with the full build-out of phase two. So just some images to show you and give you that feel of how we've articulated and really activated the open space. Retail park along Safeway, proposed linear park along Blenheim,

and then again a reminder of the significant revisions that we've made to this application since 2025, and I'm happy to answer any questions. Council Member Amos. Thank you. This was a great presentation. Just to go into some of the likes, the open space plus the linear park, that's pretty impressive. So I appreciate that. I'll come back to the tenant relocation plan shortly. My understanding is also you've been in communication with our economic development team, and I see that's included in here. That makes me very happy to see. And I think you'll probably hear it from my colleagues as well, but the color scheme is a significant improvement. So I'd really like to see that. For the tenant relocation plan,

just for clarification, and this is more just interest rather than anything substantial, for the graduated rent for smaller scale tenants. So where did that idea come from, and what's your ultimate goal with accomplishing that? Good evening. So the idea originally came from the current situation at Courthouse Plaza. Because we knew that we wanted the opportunity to redevelop it, we were left with below-market lease terms. So ultimately, for less-than-market rent, you could lease our space, and instead of 10 years, you might get three or five or seven, depending on the timing. And so there are some tenants that have this gap between what's technically market rent and what they're paying today.

And so recognizing that difference, we wanted to be able to help people along the way and help our tenants along the way in the event there isn't another below-market space available for them that we can help them get there. So over a three-year period, the details still need to be worked out how it would work with the other landlord and that sort of thing, but that we would fill that gap for them. And then on the other side of that, that there could also be an opportunity for new small businesses coming in or businesses that are currently there today that want to come back that might also need similar assistance as they get started and are early in their business, that this could be a place

they could come and start and grow. And would this be just for three years, or are you saying this is kind of like a process you want to implement moving forward over the long term? So for our existing tenants, it would be for three years. It's not something that we could financially handle into infinity. We could give it a little bit more thought on the new small businesses. Our original thought that it would be a similar three-year period. And they could choose to stay, though, in the space, but that their rent would gradually increase over time. And if they chose to stay, they could. Sorry, I asked my question poorly, and that's why there's confusion. What I mean is, for example, you have a business that moves in there,

and they're there for 10 years, and they decide to relocate, does the new business coming in get a similar program, or would they just go, I'm assuming, at the rate that's existing at that time? So, yeah. After 10 years, it would be that new market rate. Okay. Thank you. Other questions, comments on this? Council Member Bates. Thank you. So, certainly, you know, I think that there have been some improvements here that are much appreciated, as well as perhaps some lingering minor questions and issues to be addressed, and I understand that you all, you know, have another submission coming up. But I mainly just want to ask, do we have the current tree canopy percentage, as well, on the site, under current conditions?

We are working on getting you the current tree canopy on the site today. Okay. It's the way tree canopy is calculated doesn't necessarily measure the survivability or the quality of that tree. And so, rather, it takes into account the canopy of the tree, but if you go out to look at that tree, the health of the tree is not always at the standard you would want. And so, we want to be able to paint an accurate picture for you, and so we will be providing that calculation. But at any rate, I think that, the significant increase in open space, you know, particularly where there was simply pavement before in a lot of cases, represents a significant opportunity to reduce impervious surface on the site,

in addition to, I believe, that there are additional stormwater management improvements proposed as well. So, I think that's really important for environmental sustainability going forward, as well as, you know, stormwater management. Thanks. Council Member Hall. Thank you. So, I want to start with saying this is, in my opinion, very, very much improved. I'm really happy to see the changes to the brick. I feel like you're incorporating a lot more of what is our historic Old Town and so many areas throughout the city. Sorry, my voice is going away. I'm having some trouble visualizing some things and I'm hoping you can maybe help me a little bit. I'm also curious, did you, side note, did you happen to meet

with the Old Fairfax Muse HOA? We did. A while ago or recently? Two weeks ago, three weeks ago. Okay, because the, but did they see this updated? No. So, when, this is a work in progress and this is part of what happens in this cycle, right? So, we had been to the Planning Commission and the BAR before we met with the Old Fairfax Muse. We told them that those bodies had asked us to revise the architecture. We had shown them an interim option that we had shared with the Planning Commission but said we are still working on this. So, they have not seen these latest ones. You guys are the first to see them. Okay. I appreciate that and knowing that. I think some of the concerns that the HOA, I'm sure you heard them.

Yeah, I'm hopeful. Some of those have been, I think, moderately addressed in here. And this is where I'm going to need a little bit more of a visual. So, looking at this picture, Democracy Lane looking east. So, this. The flats are on the left. Is that the flats on the left there? That's the flats on the left. Yep. Okay. I'm standing at university. Okay. Looking up Democracy Lane here. Okay. I don't want that to help. I don't want that to help. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, right now, we're at five stories on the front side as opposed to the six that had been previously. Yes. So, let's. Let me go back a slide. Okay. So, this image now, I've moved down a street. So, sorry for the confusion. I've moved down a street.

This is looking, to the left is university and the flats are in the background behind that ghosted out tree. Street, our new street one is to the right here. And so, this is kind of our front entrance. I am looking, the old Fairfax muse is going to be up and to the left. Okay. So, I'm on university now. You're on university now. Okay. And so, you have here six story, a six story building along university. It drops to five stories at that corner of democracy. On the left side, it drops to five. Okay. Yep. Is it, so, I appreciate that the, I'm sorry, not the landscaping. The, the, these are your words. The way that the, the darker brick, I guess, is there in the forefront and then the whiter is in the back.

I feel like that visually helps a lot with the height feeling. I do still feel like that one section there where it says retail and the apartments is still a little tall. I would love to see that knocked down by one story if at all possible. But I do understand that, you know, you need to make a profit and all of that. I still think it's a lot of units, but visually, I think this is much more appealing and in line with what our residents had, have been asking for there. this is going to be a Clara question or maybe a Dan question, but I don't think I realize that University Drive is going to be going down to one lane to accommodate bike lanes. I thought we were putting bike lanes on there, but we were still keeping

two lanes of traffic. Sorry, I'm making, we're making you get up a lot tonight. And quite honestly, I'm not sure I should be answering this. I believe, I believe it's four, it's a four lane section as you get toward North Street. And then as you come back, headed north, going by this property, down the hill, and so forth, it transitions to a three lane section where you have a center turning lane and two travel lanes, but we'll check that. Our traffic engineer is here and they're nodding their head. That's correct. An agreement. Okay. For the city's plans, not our plans. Correct. We've just shown them, but they're the city plans. Yeah. What I will say for the city as large, whether it's you guys

or the city, but we have these nice 10 foot wide sidewalks, which could also be called a shared use path. To me, that could be a great place for a bike to go without taking out a total lane on university, recognizing not your situation. But I think we're going to get a lot of pushback when that starts to come out a little bit more. I don't know who I'm looking at, but all of you. So I think this is not depressing looking anymore, to quote the woman that came earlier. And I have to agree with her. I mean, I think before it was very, it was just too new. It was too fancy. It was too all of the things that I don't think were great. I still think it's a lot of units. And I know I've said that a couple of different times

and I'm not going to change my mind on that. But I really do want to give you credit for adding in as much of the open space that you have, adding in the green space. I don't know what your plans are for like the parking, but if there's any way to do some impervious, no, pervious parking spots in some of those areas with, you know, the fancy things as opposed to concrete or asphalt or whatever, I think that's another opportunity to take what is still a pretty large parking lot out in the open. I appreciate your, I'm sorry, I'm trying to find the pages here, but I appreciate your efforts to do the kind of the pocket park along Blenheim and some of the other things. Is this, yeah, sorry, there's a lot of pages.

Thank you. But there was another, there was another spot where you were kind of doing a little bit more of a park feature. There we go. Thank you. So we have, this is our phase one commitment that when the multifamily opens and then the darker green on the Blenheim side here would be an interim park space if for some reason we don't move forward with phase two. Okay. So right now, if you may, if you recall, Safeway controls the entire parking field with its lease. So we can't affect those parking spaces any more than what we've already done. but when that lease expires at the end of 2034, we can control that space and so we can commit to turn that into additional open space at that time if we haven't filed

a phase two plan. Okay. And does any interior Safeway work get done in any of these proposals? So that's Safeway's decision. It is our hope that they will do work on the inside of the building but they are completely in control of that. and not combined, unfortunately. Okay. I figured that was going to be your answer. I do like the brick. I like all the things that you have proposed there. Remind me again because it's a lot of pages here. How many units total are we talking in phase one and phase two? It's a total of 315 units per building and so phase one would be 315 and then if we come forward with phase two it would be 315. Okay. So 630 total. Yes. Over a significant time period, right? And we're not

asking for the approval of phase two of those details now. We are merely committing to the buildable envelope, the street network, the street trees, the open space commitments. But we want the market, we want the city's growth to be able to be absorbed and to really give us guidance on that phase two. Okay. And I think, again, it's a lot of units but I do think it's reasonable in the layout and the things that have come out of this newer design with it. Do you know roughly what your breakdown is going to be for one versus two versus three units, bedroom units? We can get you the specific breakdown for now. I don't have that in front of me but we will have the majority one-bedroom units. One-bedroom?

Yes. Okay. Okay. And will there be any amenities on site? Can you remind me for the residents that live here? Yes. So there's a structured parking garage fills the upper part of the interior building and then it's an interior green courtyard that would have a pool. We've committed to a pool. Indoor or outdoor pool? Outdoor pool. Okay. But it's a courtyard that is internal to the building, right? So it really creates that privacy for those future residents. Okay. And I was happy there will also be a fitness center and kind of co-working space and a lobby and your traditional, you know, pet spa, bike room, traditional class A apartment amenities. I'm sorry, was that pet spa? Yeah, so a spot to wash your dog.

That's called my shower right now. Right? I know. Okay. Sorry, question just left my head. Oh, I did want to thank you also for reaching out to every single tenant that's in there. I have actually heard from a couple tenants this week. I haven't had a chance to respond yet, but I think that the outreach was appreciated. I'm happy to see the plan that you've put in place and just to make sure I understand what that is, it's a commitment of low for up to three years with pre-negotiated increases of 3% per year. So after those, so this would allow them to temporarily relocate, come back into your new space for three years with a 3% increase. Is that correct? So whether, the relocation would be up to the tenant.

So we've committed to helping them find a new space if they would like, or if they do want to come back into the space, then we could help them in that situation as well. But it is challenging for tenants to move twice. Right. So there probably wouldn't be very many that do that, but we are open to them coming back if they would like to do that. Okay. And is there any way with the construction, and the answer might be no, but is there any way that these businesses could stay in place during some portion of the construction, like when you're working on the, I'm going to use the word left because I'm not good with East and West, with the left portion and those kind of things, or is it once you start,

you start, and everything to the left of the Safeway is kind of instantly gone? More than likely, everyone will have to vacate. Oops, is that on? More than likely, everyone will have to vacate for safety reasons. We usually have to cut off gas, power, water, and make sure things are safe. Okay. Okay. Well, it's never perfect for everybody, right? But I do appreciate what you are doing, and I think it's clear that you have gone above and beyond. I know Phase 2 was not something that you initially wanted to kind of commit to at this point. I know there was a lot of pushback on that from city staff, from members of council as well. So I do want to acknowledge that I can tell a lot of extra work

has gone into this. So thank you very much. Thank you. Councilmember McQuillan? Thank you. Thank you. So this is a much better fit than previous submissions. I really appreciate the work that you all did on changing the colors and the architecture look to it. It looks much more like it fits in this area of our community. I also like the reduced height at the corner of university and democracy. I think that really does make a huge difference. The 10-foot sidewalks, thank you. I really appreciate that. and the green spaces, I like that as well. The only concern I have, I do like your explanation about your approach and your strategy for phase two and the safe way. If you could do that, that would look great.

The only concern I have is density still. It's still pretty, it's still a lot of units there for me. However, it looks like there's, I guess the only question I have then is what community benefit beyond just housing do you see this offering? So we have a commitment statement. Within that statement, we've, you know, made commitments to financially fund the schools, financially fund Parks and Rec. I'm trying to get to the right page. We've made our tenant relocation. Sorry. I skipped right by it. So the city school fund, we've committed to $1,600 a unit, which is more than other applicants have committed to when we studied this last time. We've got $367 a unit for city recreational amenities.

We've committed to up to $305,000 toward undergrounding utilities. We've added $10,000 for commemorative signage on the site and a variety of things like that. Thank you so much. And then my last question was that the small area plan in this area, what is the top amount of stories that you can go for this spot? It calls for six stories. It's six. And that's what this says, right? Yep. And that's what we proposed. Thank you. I appreciate that. Council Member Peterson. Yeah. Just a couple of clarifying questions. I may need a little help from staff on this. I got the presentation this morning at nine and really didn't have a chance to go through this in detail. so pardon me if I have not been able

to capture everything in here and that I'm not able to capture everything with the questions right now. But just a couple clarifications here. You said there's zero residential density. There's zero residential. What were you referring to again? So in the small area plan when that was adopted in 2020, it identified that there was no residential. I can pull up the page number. No residential in this portion of the small area plan. So it's page 25. The small area plan, it has pie graphs on it and it noted existing mix of uses and proposed mix of uses. This portion, are you talking about the property? The Old Town Fairfax. The Old Town Fairfax small area plan. And there's no residential in that area?

That is what the small area plan document identified on page 25 with a pie chart. So when the plan was completed in 2020, there wasn't any. But now on page 8 of my staff report, I have the same table that you saw in my last presentation. So there has been plans approved since then. Yeah, I think the Planning Commission commented on 2,000 bedrooms in that area. Yeah, so some such figure. I was just a little surprised to hear that. It's my neighborhood, so I'm familiar with a lot of residences there. Maybe to go back, just to be a little clear. And again, I got the presentation, and I noticed something in it that said the small area plan, I think it was calls for 1,250 units, and it's my understanding,

this sort of goes back to the earlier discussion this evening, that that 1,250 is potential under market conditions, but it's not a goal. Right, yep. That's just an estimate from the small area plan. Okay, so it's not really calling for that. It's just saying that's a possibility under market conditions. Correct. It also is not requiring six stories. It is permitting up to six stories. So there's flexibility around that. Okay, so then the other thing, and not to be totally nitpicky here, but the guiding principles for redevelopment, I think are really focused on the kinds of design considerations that you've brought to the site, and I think you've been working really hard on that. It's clear, but I'm just wondering,

I mean, we're acting as a body here to make a public policy decision and are driven by community interest and public interest in this. And I'm wondering, are there, perhaps this is for staff, but there ought to be another set of principles here or a principle anyway related to the public interest? And how would you express that in terms of how this meets as a matter of principle, public interest to put this particular proposal in place? And I'm particularly noting, there's been a lot of concern about height and density. There's also been a lot of concern about the shift here towards residential versus commercial and the city's overall need for expanding commercial. In light of that, what is the principle here

in terms of the public interest for this? So this shopping center has been not the city's crown jewel for decades. And so we think the public interest will be represented by redoing this shopping center and creating it to be an active and vibrant community with strong pedestrian and particular connections through it, lots of new open spaces, and a wider and improved street presence along two central drives to the city, university and Blenheim. So we certainly hear a lot. There's been a lot of comment on this. You know, people love the grocery store, et cetera. I think the thing that is being raised that perhaps raises inconsistency with public interest is the height and density here. And the athletics have come a long way,

but still this is a lot in this particular spot. There is a lot of development here already, a lot of residential development. So I just want to acknowledge that I think we've all heard that there is a lot of concern about that. And it's really been raising the question of whether there's some modification that could address the concerns that have been raised about that. I recognize there have been some changes here. You all have worked very hard on it. But at the first blush, it looks very similar in scale to the proposal we've been seeing for a while. So and I'm hearing that from others in the community who are seeing this. And the general reaction is essentially the same. While there have been some modifications involved in this,

and improvements, it is essentially the same proposal as was originally presented. And that, you know, is a concern to a lot of people. I look forward to spending more time with this and getting a chance to digest this a little bit more. But I would hope that there would yet be a way for us to address some of those concerns. I also think that the Phase 2 thing, it is very helpful to have made additional commitments around Phase 2, but they're certainly not guarantees. And I'm not sure we're yet at the stage where we've seen a layout for what this area would look like under a fully developed approach here. I know that was a recommendation slash concern of staff. I'm interested in looking further to see

to what extent that's actually been addressed. But it would seem to me it's a valid request to have a closer understanding what a full build-out of this place would look like as it particularly pays attention to commercial and retail development. Thank you. Council Member Hardy-Chandler. So there is a great deal of evidence that you have been listening and integrating what you've been hearing into this next iteration of your proposal. I want to echo some of the positives that people have been talking about, the green spaces and those kinds of things, and add to that list that you also listened in terms of concerns about connectivity and the roadway spaces as well as the pedestrian spaces. I do think that, and I don't have a question.

My questions have been answered. I do think that you are making an attempt to balance what's needed in terms of development against what would happen if you did nothing, right? And I want to highlight what you were starting to say about that being the public policy of it not being the crown jewel and really looking at how we're uplifting the whole activity area. I get the concerns about density. Those are definitely an ongoing balancing act. And yet, as has been mentioned, I think by the mayor several times, you know, just in terms of having people near the spaces to support the retail aspects, I think is an important contribution. Something has to be done there. And I think that every attempt has been made

by the organization, which has invested in the city, which that is another point I want to highlight, that you have made other investments in the city. This is, I try not to look at things in isolation. This is yet another investment that you're making in our city to kind of collectively elevate our city. So I appreciate the work that you've done. I appreciate listening. That's evident to me. Doing nothing is not an option. And I think I supported this project in its prior iteration. So with the advancements that you've made and showing once again that you're willing to listen to the feedback, I appreciate the changes that you've made. And I just want to highlight that. And again, for me, no development on that very central spot in our city

is an option that I think goes against public policy for our city. Thank you. Other comments? Council Member Peterson? Yeah, just underscore. I don't think I'm hearing from anybody. There's a preference for zero redevelopment. I think everybody, like many other spots in the city, virtually everybody is interested in that. The question is how? And that's really where the feedback has been. So again, I would hope that we would be able to focus a little bit more on the fundamentals of what that question really involves from the community in terms of what happens here. Thanks. Council Member Amos? Last comment I'll make. And it's a quick one just because I see some similarities to it. And a lot of this depended on Phase 1 getting approved

and then Phase 2 ideally happening. But that Phase 2 location does give me elements of Fairfax Quarter in it. And I do appreciate that. Other questions or comments? I like the project. I've been looking at the Safeway now for, you know, since 1981. And it is right in the center of our city. And when we talk about getting feedback from the public, that is the point of having a public hearing. And I do expect that we will hear from residents who have a vested interest, including the people across the street who are residents. But I hope we have a robust feedback from our businesses. I hope our businesses step up to say what it means to have 360 units right next door or right behind their buildings.

The Flats at University was our first foray into having housing in the downtown, which is great. But those students aren't there 12 months out of the year. So our summertime doesn't look nearly as active as our fall and our spring. And so I hope our businesses will come out to talk about the economic impact of having housing in this location. We need to hear from everyone. And I do think that is why we have a public hearing. And I do want to acknowledge the fact that you didn't have to come back and give us another chance, but you did. And you incorporated so much of what you heard, including the people from the Muse who said, I don't like the color. I think you have done your best to negotiate what works financially

and from a property ownership standpoint, what works for combined properties. Again, I agree with Council Member Hardy Chandler. You've been deeply invested in our city for six decades. And we appreciate the fact that you keep improving the properties that you own here. It's a long-term relationship. And I want to acknowledge that we appreciate all the work that's gone into this. And I do think there is an opportunity through public hearing for people to come and give us more information on this project. But I do like the project. I believe it is in the best interest long-term of this city to redevelop this piece of property so close to our downtown. It is just something has to happen there.

So thank you so much for the presentation, and we look forward to seeing you again. Ms. Shinaberry? Okay. Thank you. I will now reconvene the regular meeting and kick it over to our city manager, Mr. Alexander. Thank you, Mayor and Council. As you know, after this meeting, it will take us into a break for a month, and then we will be back for a robust work session on September 1st. Reminder that it is scheduled to start at 4 o'clock. You will see a number of items on that work session for a reason, and we certainly wanted to try to do as much workshopping as we can on those sessions. So you'll see pre-application briefings listed there for 3250 Blenheim, 10560 Main Street, and 3570 Chain Bridge Road.

We will also bring back citywide level of service and dynamic capital impact modeling for discussion. We will make a full way into our legislative program, and then we will have a discussion, which you'll see on consent later, regarding the reappropriation of general operating capital and enterprise funds carrying over to 2027 from 2026. So again, that'll be a pretty robust work session on the 1st. Looking ahead to the 8th, on consent, you will see construction contract for University Drive bike lanes, and the consideration of resolution to cancel the VDOT project listed there. And then, as I mentioned, you'll see the introduction or consideration of the resolution for the reappropriation that would have been workshopped on the meeting prior.

Also, items not requiring public hearing will be the consideration of adopting the code of ethics on the 8th. Looking ahead to finishing out September, public hearing and council action on a redevelopment of existing office into 14 townhouses at Mantua, 94-95 Silver King Court. And then, if needed, a public hearing and council action on the resolution for reappropriation on that night. And that would wrap up September. October would be our second work session starting at 4 o'clock. Happy to answer any other questions on items that we've discussed or otherwise are ahead of us. All right. Questions on future? Councilmember Hall. Just two questions, I think. The University Drive bike lanes, that's the same conversation we just had a few minutes ago.

Can we get a refresher on that? Did we see that as this council, or was that a previous council? Am I just totally forgetting that? We've talked about it for a while. I know, but did we do a recent public hearing and all those things? I mean, I'm sure that was closed out a while ago since we're at the consideration phase, but I'm just really wondering, and in light of the 10-foot sidewalks that they're considering, is there maybe a better solution to a shared use path there? Well, what we'll do is come back with some information generally about our plan and more information specifically about this ahead of this meeting, well ahead of this meeting, so you have that information. Yeah, I mean, we don't really have a lot of time

because I know we have the August recess. I'm certainly open to receiving information in August. Yeah. But, okay, and I will also do my due diligence and go back and try to check that out. My second question, and it's just a logistical one, is that we have a meeting on October 13th, which I think is the final day of the VML conference. Are we, is there any actual conference that day and then we're coming home, or? It's only half day, so they wrap up about noon that day. So we should be home in time then for a meeting. Okay, perfect. Thank you. Council Member Amos. Just one quick follow-up question. For September 22nd, the Highlands of Mentua project, if I'm remembering that correctly, I remember, gosh,

I don't know if that was a pre-application that we did or was it a post-submission? I mean, I think that was last year, if I recall correctly, and that's the one where we had the conversation about whether to keep the tree landscaping there or they wanted to put in a park, if I recall. Yes, I believe you are correct. That application has now gone to the Planning Commission. There will be a communication to each of the members of council and the mayor for individual meetings to give you an update on that project from the development team, and then any questions you may have. Thank you, just because it feels like it's been a pretty significant gap in time between when we spoke with them. Again, I think it was last year versus this coming up in September.

So thank you. Yes, sir. Other questions? Council Member Hall? Sorry. Are we going to talk about the buck slip at another time, or is this the right time? We can. I had it on the report out, so I can kill two birds. We can talk about it then. That's fine. Thank you. Council Member Peterson? Can you clarify the purpose and scope of the citywide level of service and dynamic capital impact model? I want to set expectations for what we will be receiving. What is the actual purpose and substantive application of that? Yeah, we previously, I think, presented in a work session to Council, but I'll go to the bullpen and ask Brooke to come up again. And this would be an update to that previous work session

that Council held, which was more of an introduction to the project and a review of what the effort would be undertaking and what factors would be analyzed as part of the project. This is to come back and share results of that analysis. It would not be a moment where we would ask for Council approval in terms of considering proffer policy or anything of that nature. we would anticipate that based upon this discussion, the Council would give staff feedback on those results and whether there's a desire to move forward with considering policies in terms of level of impact to various city infrastructure. And so that would be a future discussion. And so this will be to share the results, to give a sense of what those impacts are,

how those numbers calculate, and whether there's a desire to continue to move forward to look at policies that would be part of the city's development review process. Let me understand, if I might, a little bit more clearly. Is this providing guidance and benchmarks related to proffers? Potentially. Okay. So potentially that. Is this designed to be a regulatory impact or public policy impact assessment tool? It is a development impact assessment tool. And so the team has analyzed what expenditures are associated with development proposals, what that means in terms of the city infrastructure and whether or not there are, you know, what those financial impacts are. And so a level of service study would provide to the city

on a per project basis, what those impacts would be to things like parks and recreation facilities, school facilities, transportation infrastructure, public safety infrastructure. And that analysis could guide the city toward a proffer policy for all of those items. You know, what the approach has been to this point has been those have been negotiated on a case-by-case basis. And not to get too deep into the proffer thing, I think we've talked a little bit about that before, but the Commonwealth of Virginia in 2016 rewrote the rules in the state for proffers, which severely limited locality's ability to negotiate for proffers. Since that time, we've instituted some measures that have given us

a little bit more flexibility to do that. And so we've seen the potential for proffers to be offered, particularly in our activity centers, because the Code of Virginia carves out special provisions for areas covered by small area plans. And so that gives us some more ability to negotiate these things. What we would like to do is be a little bit more systematic in how we do that. And so it's not an unknown to the council. It's not an unknown to a property owner or developer coming in as to what those expectations are, but that will be totally at the discretion of the council. This first discussion is to merely share the results of that analysis. If the direction from the council from that point forward is,

yes, staff, we would like you to look at creating some policies that, again, could come back to the council and we consider whether that's something that the council wants to adopt, that's what we'll do. Is this an accounting tool? So that we know when we're looking at a project from an accounting standpoint, what the outlays and expenditures are for a particular decision we make? Is that correct? Accounting on whose books? Citywide accounting. I mean, services and infrastructure. From an accounting standpoint, the public accounting standpoint, what are we spending as a consequence of a decision on development? Is that the question this is answering? Not necessarily. That's something that the city does currently.

So the city does a fiscal impact analysis for each one of the significant projects that come forward to the council, and that's part of your staff report that you see at a public hearing that accounts for anticipated revenues and expenditures for any development, and looking at the city's budget and what those costs are to the city, and then in terms of the development proposal, what revenues that we anticipate coming in. So that's a part of what we do today, and that looks at city costs kind of across, you know, across the entirety of the budget. The level of service would look at physical impacts, would look at infrastructure impacts, things that the city can potentially get proffers for. The city can't get proffers for operational costs.

Localities can get proffers for physical infrastructure and expansion of capacity of physical infrastructure that's associated with the development that's being proposed. And so the level of services looks more at the infrastructure side of the equation, not so much the overall fiscal impact, but that is part of what the council receives as well. Is this somewhere where it already is scoped and we can look at its current status in terms of what it's covering? Is there something that, you know, I could read, for instance, or anybody else could read about the scope of this? We can certainly share the materials that we brought forward previously. We don't have necessarily have the materials that will be presented in September ready

to bring forward yet, but we'll share those as soon as they're available as well. Well, that'll be real helpful. I mean, I think the general thing is on February 14th, I think we had a discussion about development and land use applications and the city manager listed out a whole series of impacts that could and typically are included in assessments of the full suite of impacts associated with a development or land use application, safety, crime risk, you name it right down the list here. And that sounds like that, you know, it's a set of socioeconomic impacts, public impacts here. That's, this would provide only the fiscal dimensions of that with respect to services and infrastructure, but it's not, this is really not what impact are we able

to determine in terms of the effect of these decisions on elevated crime risk and the response that we'll have to, you know, engineer in terms of that, things like that. Is that a fair understanding? Yes. Okay. So there's a broader piece of this that this really is not looking at. I would like to see if I might, and I'm sure everybody would, what that is, because I think there is a broader question mark about how we assess from a public interest standpoint, the impacts and the opportunities associated with these decisions we make. And it would be great for that to be as inclusive as possible. So. I think we send you what we have up to this point. I'd also say at this point also that will offer each of you an opportunity

to have a conversation with the head of the work session, which will benefit the conversation at the work session. That would be great, and it would be great if there could be, with respect to the fiscal impact analysis that we do now, a little bit of transparency in terms of what's actually in that. I would love to see that. Thanks. Great. Any other questions or comments on the future meeting topics? Seeing none, we will go to the manager's report out. Thank you, Mayor and Council. As was mentioned earlier, we did send you this morning what's called a buck slip, informational item, buck because it's the size of a dollar, that we would like to maybe include in the personal property tax bills

that will be mailed out in September. The idea is to give us some more transparency and information on how our general fund dollars are spent and investments are made both on operating and capital. We provided you an example, and the timeliness issue really is one of, I know the treasurer's office wanted to know we had consensus from council before we coordinated with them in order to push that out. And so this is an opportunity to get some feedback from you on that item so that we can quickly turn it around and again coordinate the process of getting that out to our residents. So happy to take any feedback from you on what you saw and what you might want to see out of that understanding. It's this big.

Council Member Hall and then Council Member Hardy Chandler. Thank you. I know I've been asking for this for a while and I think actually with the interim. So I'm really, really happy to see that this is moving forward. I really just have two suggestions. One is maybe just add a thank you for paying your taxes. And also on the back side of it, there's an area on the bottom right where it had the percentages of certain things and there was a bit of an area available. I'm wondering if maybe we could add a QR code that would direct people to the fiscal year 2027 budget and just say, you know, here's a link to this. Hopefully that won't add too much extra effort, but that was just my suggestion to, you know, kind of,

here's the basic information and then if you want more information, here it is, nice, easy, ready to go. Thank you. Council Member Hardy Chandler. I think I responded that I absolutely support this. I think the visual helps people understand that it's not going into a black hole. It really is going to services and how those services are divided. So I absolutely support that. Is there any question of the cost of adding that to the mailing of the bills? No, we just wanted to ensure that we got consensus from council before we approach the treasurer again on this process. Well, I think it'll be very beneficial to all of the residents of the city. So thank you very much. Council Member McQuillen?

Yeah, I love this idea ever since Council Member Hall brought it forth. I think this is great. Thank you so much. Any other feedback? Council Member Peterson? Well, I think this is a separate thing. It kind of gets to the last conversation, but it'd be great to kind of boil this down to a communications format. Because every time we make a decision here, it has, well, not every time, but very often it has out-of-pocket expense implications on residents. And I like to use the term neighborhood math. People need to understand if you do this, what's coming out of my back pocket next year. And it would be great to be regular about lifting that information out of the decisions we make so that people who are tuning in

can know. And we need to invite other people to tune into that. So I don't think this is exactly the same thing, but I think they're related. I would say also, it's not just a matter when we make decisions of the out-of-pocket expenses that, you know, people are facing as a consequence of it. But just a reminder, we're also helping people save, reduce those out-of-pocket expenses. We've done energy, you know, clean energy things that are actually cost savings things. And then we've done things that proactively are designed to increase revenues, commercial economic household, etc. It just would be good from a communication standpoint for a resident to know when we make decisions, what's the plus and the minus,

you know, that's going on here. And again, that has to be in terms they can understand. And what they typically understand very well is what's coming out of my back pocket this year. So I know we don't have that exactly, and that may be ground for further creative thinking, but I just wanted to suggest it. Any other comments? I think that we have consensus that the idea is good. It is helpful for people to visualize where their dollar goes. So I think you've gotten feedback. And other than that, I think we're all nodding in agreement that this is a go. Thank you. Anything else, Mr. City Manager? That's it. Thank you. That's it for you. Okay, then we will do the council comments. Council Member Amos?

Thank you. So looking over to Melissa, she wanted to quickly go over the BACs and setting up that for August, I believe. Thank you, Council Member Amos. So each of you have a printout of the first two pages are our vacancies that's going to be advertised in the August city scene. As you see on the second page, it's the HCAB 17 positions that are coming up for reappointment or appointments. On the third page is the applicants I have on deck that would be ready to be interviewed. There are 20 people listed on here. And I'm bringing this forward because a council member had brought this up last week about maybe doing an August interview night. So I wanted to get feedback if there'd be a consensus

or at least four council members that would be available in August. And I would say either the, we keep it on a Tuesday, either the 11th, 18th, or the 25th. Because next week's National Night Out. Okay, so feedback. And we'll just start with Council Member Amos. August is a bit of a rough month for me, so it's unlikely I'll be able to. However, if I were to be able to finesse it, it would need to be towards the end of the month, so the 18th or the 25th. If we stick with Tuesday. Okay, Council Member Hall? I would prefer not the 25th as our kids go back to school the day before. So I am otherwise, the 11th or the 18th work fine for me. Okay. Okay. Council Member Hardy-Chandler? I believe I can do the 18th.

Okay. Council Member Peterson? I'm flexible. Okay. Council Member Bates? Any of those work for me. Okay. Council Member Mugland? Oh, sorry. The 11th or the 18th, please. Okay. It looks like the 18th is the winner. Okay. And just next question, like I said, I have 20 people on deck. Is there a certain amount you want to bring that night? Because we do four an hour, so that's a long time. If I can... Council Member Peterson? So I'm looking at the list, and if I've got it right, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, like 12 or 13, our Housing and Healthy Communities Advisory Board, did I get that right? So some of them have long titles because they represent a certain position on there, so really on there,

there's... Let me get my glasses on. Okay, yeah. My eyes are not... My eyes are not working. There's like six right now. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. Gosh, that was hard to figure out. Well, there's... Yeah. I didn't want to, you know, just put names on there. I wanted to at least, you know, show, like, what position they represent. But I wonder whether that's sort of a stack that we might set aside and do. That's a bunch of folks, and if we split it so that somehow or another we weren't doing them all at once, that would be an option for that being set aside. So their terms are not open until January, yes? So on the last page, I have a list of all the applicants who would be reappointments for the rest of the year.

They vary. Some terms end in September, October, November, or December. Okay, okay. Okay. I think my suggestion would be pull out the Health and Housing... I'm sorry, Housing and Healthy Communities Advisory Board and do them separately, and then we could probably get everybody else in one night. Okay. I agree with that. If everybody else agrees with that. Yeah. Okay. All right. That's all I need. I'll get back on the date. Okay. We can just see. Well, we'll see. Okay. We can do the 18th since everybody's pretty much on the 18th. Mm-hmm. Okay. We can start at 7 or we can start at 6. Your preference. 6 works for me. Okay. 6. 6? Okay. Well, I'm going to figure out the calendar. Go ahead. Yeah, I was like...

I was like, don't chime in unless you're definitely going to come. Right, right, right. Oh, right. I forgot it's still on me. Okay. Thank you. All good. So pivoting back real quick. Another, I guess, calendar clarification doesn't need to be during council comments. I know Brian Lubcomen responded to us about the Pickett's Reserve visit on Saturday. So if folks want a message on how we want to go about that, we can handle that separately. So I'll just mention that. Last two items, National Night Out, just want to celebrate our police and thank the communities who are hosting for them next week. And shout out to Courtside Ty on your 20 years of activity and serving the great citizens of Fairfax City.

So thank you. Council Member Hall. I want to thank Ornery for many, many years of service to our city. Very, very sad to see them close. It seems to be a tough spot there. And I loved you when you were upstairs. I loved you when you were downstairs. And I'm just sad to see you go. And I don't really have much else prepared. I wish everyone a quiet month in August while we don't have council meetings. I'm sure staff will appreciate the somewhat hiatus of dealing with all of us on a weekly basis. We'll make sure to check in, I promise. And as I said earlier to my colleagues, I just want to thank you all for your flexibility, for our remote participation policy with the things that were going on with my dad.

Things are definitely looking up. He went on his first solo walks and things are good. And if I owe you an email, it will be coming this week, I promise. And I know we had difficult conversations tonight with regard to the ADU conversation, but I do want to say that I think we had respectful conversation. I think we were all able to share our thoughts and feelings in a way that, you know, is what we should be doing on council here, whether we disagree or agree at the end of the evening about it. You know, we're all able to still get together and laugh and do the other things, which makes me think, I think we're also due for a night out to our planner over here on the right. I got you. All right.

Council Member Hardy Chandler. I hope everyone enjoys a restful break except for breaking the break for other tasks. Looking forward to National Night Out. I'll look forward to Trivia Night Day if we do get together. Happy summer. Council Member Peterson. Well, likewise. I think everybody deserves a good break, and I hope they take advantage of it. So I, believe it or not, was the last customer to leave Ornery on its last night on Sunday. Yeah, very, you know, sad. But I had a long conversation with the owner, and as it turns out, it's been a little bit of a busy week because just happenstance had long conversations with other restaurant owners in Old Town, some past recent and some current.

and I think the kind of sense that came out of all those conversations is that there is a conversation that hasn't exactly happened yet with that community about what their needs are and how they might be met. And I think, in their view, ain't so easy. There are multiple factors at play here, and I just wanted to suggest that we find a way somehow or another to have that conversation. That is perhaps something our economic development director could help with. I'm not sure, but I think my sense from talking with all of them, and these are people who are pretty capable business analysts as well as being entrepreneurs, they had kind of an advanced sense of the challenge that they're facing, and they're looking for a way to kind of unpack that in some meaningful way.

So I'd like to encourage us to find a way to do that because it's tough. People put their lives into these businesses. It's interesting. The one thing that small business people have in common, according to McKinsey, is that they work all the time and they go to the gym regularly. And this is a set of people who's an example of folks who work all the time. And to see this cycle kind of happen where people have to check out because they're not able to keep up is a hard thing. So I just want to shout out for them. I certainly feel their pain and want to do everything we can here to be helpful for them. Thanks. Council Member Bates. I just want to wish everyone a happy national night out and echo Council Member Amos' comments

thanking our local police. Thank you. Council Member Quillen. I, too, am looking forward to national night out, and I also was able to visit Ornery before they closed their doors this weekend, and we'll be sad to see them go. Wishing all of our staff a great month off. Thank you. Okay. And I want to remind everybody that Frozen, the City of Fairfax Theatre Company's production, is currently playing, and we'll be going with the grandchildren to see that on Saturday the 1st. So I encourage everybody to go see Frozen. I know you know all the words to the songs. We also have Restaurant Week from August 20th to 30th. So please, please support our local restaurants. Speaking of our local restaurants,

get out there, try some new ones, take friends and family. We did that in this particular time period because the George Mason students are returning to the campus on August the 26th. And please always keep in mind that Fairfax City is, in fact, George Mason University's hometown. So we need to kind of represent out there, welcome the students and their parents back when we see them around town. And with that, I am going to adjourn the meeting at 10.57 p.m. on Tuesday. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.