Ed. — From the Sunday, Oct. 8, print edition.
COURTHOUSE — A rezoning request that would bring multifamily housing to agricultural land near the municipal center is scheduled to go before the Planning Commission this coming week for a second time, and it has been fast-tracked to go to the City Council later this month.
In August, the Planning Commission recommended the City Council should allow an earlier proposal for the rezoning, with only one member of the commission opposing the plan to build 176 multifamily units on 6.26 acres, including workforce housing that is meant to make living in the area more attainable.
The council never had a chance to vote on it. Concerns emerged that part of the land is in the Interfacility Traffic Area between Naval Air Station Oceana and Naval Auxiliary Landing Field Fentress, which is in Chesapeake. Dense housing development is not allowed in the ITA.
Additionally, the Navy had never been consulted about that first version of the project, as they are required to be.
Those issues are now addressed, according to the developer, which is headed back to the Planning Commission because the site plan changed. The residential buildings have moved to part of the property that is outside the ITA.
City Councilmember Barbara Henley, who represents District 2, which includes the land in question, has raised a series of concerns about the project, and an advisory committee which reviews projects within the ITA opposes it.
“There are so many bad precedents that will be set with this,” Henley said during a recent meeting. However, the project appears to have support on the council, including from Mayor Bobby Dyer, who has expedited the revised version of the proposal so it will go to City Council on Tuesday, Oct. 17, within a week of the Planning Commission’s scheduled Wednesday, Oct. 11, hearing on it.
Also, the revised plan has reviewed by a group that includes a representative of the Navy, according to a report prepared by the city planning department.
The Franklin Johnston Group, which in 2014 was approved to developed the 240-unit Southern Pine project in Courthouse, seeks essentially to add to that effort and considers this a second phase. The new project includes a workforce housing component that has support among some on the council.
On Friday, Sept. 29, Freddie Fletcher, senior development manager of the Franklin Johnston Group, said the developer saw an opportunity this year when the property became available to expand upon the existing Southern Pine development nearby. It made its formal application this summer and went to Planning Commission in August, meeting with the ITA advisory committee and attending a district forum hosted by Henley.
He said they tried to address concerns, including the height of proposed four-story buildings, eventually dropping one building planned for along Princess Anne Road down to three stories. The initial Southern Pine project also faced opposition in its early days, but it seems to have been well received since then, and the developer said the new phase will provide needed multifamily housing and affordable housing in the area.
It was after its initial plan was supported by the Planning Commission that “we started to see more concern and we heard we needed to shift the buildings out of the ITA because we could not locate residential units within the ITA,” Fletcher said. He added, “We had to go back and revise our plan and push the units into the area outside of the ITA and then shift our parking and amenity spaces into the area within the ITA.”
Fletcher said there is support for the project, which will fill “a critical need” for workforce housing serving the area. The Franklin Johnston Group, he noted, is providing more workforce housing units in its plan than are required to earn a density bonus. And the developer has a track record of creating needed affordable housing, he said.
“There has to be a mix,” he said. “Otherwise, we’re not going to have room for teachers. We’re not going to have room for other folks to live in this portion of the city.”
Henley discussed this “most unusual application” during a district forum for constituents on Thursday, Sept. 28, and there have been sometimes heated discussions about it with colleagues on the council.
“As we saw it last month, the units were on the entire 6.2 acres,” Henley said during the forum. “Well, it turns out that the line for the Interfacility Traffic Area, the ITA, goes just about through the middle of the property.” Henley said the project essentially is placing all of those units on three acres because the rest cannot support the housing.
The city made a commitment to enforce restrictions in this area in an agreement with the Navy about encroachment, and Henley said the Navy asked the city not to allow more “incompatible uses” to protect the air station, generally excluding residential development greater than that allowed on land zoned for farming. She has spoken about the project at recent meetings, warning about precedents for how other properties partially in the ITA may develop down the line.
“Because ‘affordable housing’ is the buzz word these days, it’s got all kinds of support from the City Council,” Henley said.
On Tuesday, Sept. 26, Henley during a council meeting said concerns about the project have not been met, noting she had asked for the project not to be considered until the council had tackled how density should be counted involving properties partially within the ITA. She plans to offer a resolution to study the issue. It may be heard by City Council the same day as the rezoning.
The City Attorney’s Office has said that it could be allowable because the zoning ordinance does not specify about such a situation, Henley said, adding that she was “distressed” to see the item had been expedited and would be considered by the council shortly after Planning Commission hears it.
Mayor Bobby Dyer said he had requested the expedited schedule for the proposal, noting that affordable housing was a priority for the city – and for the Navy, too.
Henley is not alone in her concerns.
Lisa Hartman, chairperson of the Transition Area/Interfacility Traffic Area Citizens Advisory Committee, on Thursday, Sept. 21, wrote to the council to say the committee still opposes the revised rezoning request.
The committee faulted the use of the entire acreage of the property, including the portion within the ITA, to calculate its density. “There are no residential uses for the property within the ITA,” the letter said.
The committee also questioned why the plan seeks to “transfer” rights from the half in the ITA to the half outside it and calls the proposed density “preposterous” while noting that the first Southern Pine project did not consider the new property, calling combining the properties “disingenuous.”
The letter say the initial plan went through Planning Commission virtually unopposed without the city hearing from the Navy.
“This is a failure and a grave concern, as it is the responsibility of the city of Virginia Beach to maintain those discussions and protect against encroachment,” Hartman wrote to the City Council.
“What I’m concerned about, first and foremost, is the density,” she said in an interview.
“They hadn’t talked to the Navy and it was in the ITA,” she said, speaking of the initial plan for the land. “Planning recommended it without talking to the Navy.”
The second time around, the Navy was consulted.
The revised plan was presented to the Joint City-Navy Review Process Group, which is supposed to review projects within compatible use areas meant to avoid encroachment on Naval Air Station Oceana.
The group found that the revised “proposed development does not include any residential dwelling unit within the limit of the ITA,” according to a Wednesday, Sept. 20, summary of that finding prepared by the city.
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