Church solar panels, tax change legislation fails, and MPO tried again for funding for pedestrian bridge
You can learn a lot about what’s happening in the overall community by reviewing the first several minutes of one of their regular meetings of the Charlottesville Planning Commission. The following all comes from this last Tuesday’s event.
Commissioner Phil d’Oronozio told his colleagues he would be a representative on the new appointed body that will review applications for funding from one of Charlottesville’s affordable housing pools. Applications now go through the Office of Community Solutions, which is headed by Alex Ikefuna.
“Alex expressed to us that if Commissioners wanted to have a participatory role on the CAHF allocations or the Housing Advisory Committee to see if they qualified for a category and apply which I dutifully did,” d’Oronozio said.
A round-up on other candidates who have filed so far for 2023
There are 263 days left until the general election on November 7, and more candidates are emerging in the community.
This week, Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Rivanna District filed paperwork with the Virginia Department of Elections to run for re-election. She won election to a first term in 2019 in a race that was technically unopposed but write-in candidate Mike Johnson received nearly a third of the vote.
Johnson raised $99,336 for his write-in campaign, according to data from the Virginia Public Access Project. That’s among the highest amounts ever for a Supervisor race in Albemarle County. That amount compares to $23,476 for LaPisto-Kirtley in 2019. She won the Democratic primary that year against Jerrod Smith.
This year, LaPisto-Kirtley may have an opponent in the General Election.
David Coleman Rhodes filed paperwork to run as an independent. I contacted him to confirm his candidacy and he said he didn’t have much to say yet.
“I am a lifelong resident of Albemarle, don’t like the direction this community has taken, and believe the Supervisors need a different voice,” Rhodes said in an email to me on Thursday.
Rhodes said he would not run if another candidate emerges.
So far, the only other candidate to announce for the Albemarle Board of Supervisors is Michael Pruitt, a Democrat who launched his campaign last November. Read that story here.
Other candidates:
A third candidate has filed for the South District seat on the Nelson County Board of Supervisors. Mary Kathryn Allen is running as an independent. Republicans James C. Bibb and Philip Purvis have both filed to run for the seat. The incumbent is Robert Barton. (read story on Information Charlottesville)
David Michael Goad is running for the Fork Union seat on the Fluvanna County Board of Supervisors. He filed as an independent. The seat is currently held by Mozell H. Booker, who was first elected in 2007.
Joe Chambers has filed to run for another term as District 6 representative on the Buckingham County Board of Supervisors. Chambers has been on the Board of Supervisors since at least 2003. The Department of Elections online records for local races only go back to 2000. Chambers ran unopposed in 2003, 2007, 2015, and 2019. In 2011 he ran as a Democrat and won against a write-in candidate who got 29.1 percent of the 581 votes cast.
Daniel Reed has filed to run for the Fork Union Seat on the Fluvanna County School Board. The seat is currently held by Perrie Johnson who was first elected in 2015 with 54.5 percent of the 974 votes cast.
Stephen C. Harris will seek a fifth term representing the Cuckoo District on the Louisa County School Board. He was first elected in 2007 and has never faced opposition.
Patty Coleman Madison will seek another term as Clerk of Court in Louisa County. Madison was elected to the position in 2017 after the retirement of Susan Richardson Hopkins.
Democrat Angela Fortune Hicks has filed to run as re-election as Treasurer in Nelson County. She was first elected in 2011 when she secured 73.7 percent of the 5,418 votes cast that year. Hicks won with 81.4 percent of the vote in 2015 and was unopposed in 2019.
Likewise, Henry Binns Wash has also filed for re-election to run again as Louisa County Treasurer. Wash first won in 2011 in a six-way race in which he won with 24.8 percent of the 8,105 votes cast. In 2015 he won in a two-way race but this time got 62.2 percent of the 7,627 ballots cast. Wash ran unopposed in 2019.
Democrat Jim Hingeley has filed to run for a second term as Commonwealth’s Attorney in Albemarle County. Hingeley defeated incumbent Republican Robert Tracci in 2019 with 56.27 percent of the vote. Tracci had defeated incumbent Democrat Denise Lunsford in the 2015 race with 51.26 percent of the vote.
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Before you go: The time to write and research of this article is covered by paid subscribers to Charlottesville Community Engagement. In fact, this particular installment comes from the February 17, 2023 edition of the program. To ensure this research can be sustained, please consider becoming a paid subscriber or contributing monthly through Patreon.
Ten years have passed since the Virginia Department of Transportation analyzed the Route 151 corridor in Nelson County and now it’s time for another study to begin. Such work can help identify projects to address safety concerns, and the Nelson County Board of Supervisors got a briefing at their meeting on Tuesday.
“And I’m happy to say that we’ve had success not only through the Highway Safety Improvement Program but also through Smart Scale getting a number of projects vetted and fully funded and constructed along this corridor,” said Rick Youngblood is a planner with the Virginia Department of Transportation’s Lynchburg District.
“There’s still more work to be done and that’s why we’re looking at this study again,” Youngblood said.
The firm RK&K is working with VDOT on the study, which Youngblood said is not a land use study. The land use work will be done separately as part of the county’s Comprehensive Plan review that is under way. That’s not directly related to this study.
“The part of the study aspect is not to define future growth or the possibility for future growth,” Youngblood said. “We’re trying to correct the measures and issues that are on there now in preparation for the future based upon the data that we collect.”
A slide from the presentation given to the Nelson County Board of Supervisors
This study will cover a fourteen mile stretch from Afton Mountain Road to about two and a half miles south of Beech Grove Road. They will look at crash data and locations as part of the work.
“Seven intersections total and these are what we call [Potential Safety Improvement] intersections,” Youngblood said. “They meet a certain metric to be identified as a high accident intersection. We are aware that there are other intersections that have come up.”
A stakeholder meeting for the study took place in mid-January and Youngblood said data collection is about three months behind schedule in advance of going to the public for comment. There will eventually be an online survey as part of the public involvement.
“We’re hoping to be able to catch folks that are coming through the area as well and not just those that live in the area,” Youngblood said.
The 2013 study included some recommendations for multimodal improvements such as bike lanes, particularly in the Nellysford area. Currently there are almost none. Youngblood characterized the landscape.
“You’ve got rolling terrain, you’ve got short shoulders, there are crossover accidents, there are road departures, there are no bike-pedestrian facilities throughout the corridor,” Youngblood said. “Mind you, when these recommendations come up they will be pricey. Bike and ped specifically. Bike and ped facilities are pricey and expensive and they are high-maintenance.”
A website will be created for the study and there will be two public meetings that are not yet scheduled.
Additionally a project to convert the intersection of Route 151 and Route 6 has been recommended for funding in the current Smart Scale round.
A slide from the presentation given to the Nelson County Board of Supervisors
Before you go: The time to write and research of this article is covered by paid subscribers to Charlottesville Community Engagement. In fact, this particular installment comes from the February 17, 2023 edition of the program. To ensure this research can be sustained, please consider becoming a paid subscriber or contributing monthly through Patreon.
Information Charlottesville 