The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - Councilor Lloyd Snook On CRHA + City Deal; Did CRHA Make A Bad Deal With The City?

Episode Date: February 16, 2024

The I Love CVille Show headlines: Councilor Lloyd Snook On CRHA + City Deal Did CRHA Make A Bad Deal With The City? Councilor Lloyd Snook On Gentrification In CVille Mayor Juandiego Wade On Upzoning CVille What Will Smart Phones Replace Next In CVille? Future Of Retail, Restaurants, Music, Destinations Wake Forest at UVA, ESPN2, 12 PM, Saturday UVA Prof Brad Wilcox – The I Love CVille Show 2/21 Read Viewer & Listener Comments Live On-Air The I Love CVille Show airs live Monday – Friday from 12:30 pm – 1:30 pm on The I Love CVille Network. Watch and listen to The I Love CVille Show on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, iTunes, Apple Podcast, YouTube, Spotify, Fountain, Amazon Music, Audible and iLoveCVille.com.

Good Friday afternoon, guys. I'm Jerry Miller, and thank you kindly for joining us here on the I Love Seville show. It's a pleasure to connect with you guys through our network that is growing. We have a couple new shows that are perhaps very soon to announce and launch, which we're excited to see the content that's created in this studio become more robust with its perspective and its coverage. Those details I would quantify in the top of the seventh inning, heading into the seventh inning stretch so perhaps next week we can make some of those announcements that's called a tease in the broadcasting business we had a show this morning that is approaching a five-year anniversary on the I love Seville Network and that's a real talk

with Keith Smith and real talk with Keith Smith this morning had two gentlemen on the program that are pillars of the Charlottesville community. And Juan Diego Wade, the current mayor, and Counselor Lloyd Snook, the former mayor. I closed Real Talk with Keith Smith by complimenting former Mayor Lloyd Snook by saying his legacy in Charlottesville history books is already cemented, and it's a legacy of impact, a legacy of commitment, and a legacy of positivity. And I sincerely, sincerely, sincerely, and I think he knows this, meant those words. Mayor Snook took over government at a time when government was in one of its worst forms and fashions. activist mayor and questionable leadership by former councils that had the reputation of bickering and fighting and distrust and, frankly, not getting along. So when the former mayor, who's right down the hallway from us, took over as mayor, two-term mayor

actually. He came in and brought a calming presence, brought an organized presence, and what I call returning government to being boring and in the background. Now, he also navigated upzoning and the draft zoning ordinance, and that is clearly a challenging topic for many in this community. We'll hear today from Juan Diego Wade on the impact of upzoning in this community. We will hear from Councilor Lloyd Snook. We'll get some color or some perspective on the CRHA deal that the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority did with the city of Charlottesville. We'll also hear from Councilor Lloyd-Snook on gentrification as it pertains to his neighborhood, Greenbrier.

The morning program, Real Talk with Keith Smith, from start to finish, was just rooted with hard news and topic matter that was fresh or had not been heard. And much of that was because Counselor Lloyd Snook is unabashed and unafraid to have conversations of meaning. He is not one to beat around the bush or utilize word salad. He speaks frankly because he understands frank conversations are the first stage of impact. They're the first stage of tangible production. And I salute him for that because there's many politicians that are hesitant or cautious, maybe even afraid to have real conversation. Counselor Snook is not one of them. Judah Wickhauer's cut sound from the morning show, which we will play today, sound that is fresh for a new cycle that I think you will appreciate that needs to be heard again.

You have the first sizzle reel ready to go on Counselor Snook on the Charlottesville Redevelopment Housing Authority and City of Charlottesville deal. Judah? Yeah, that's the long one. Yeah, approximately how long is that? It's 15 minutes. Wow, that's a substantial sizzle reel.

That almost is a segment of the show. I need to play this for you. On this program, and I'll give you some background and some color here, the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority, I've covered this extremely well on this talk show. They own two properties in the city of Charlottesville, one on Avon and one on Levy. I question for the last few weeks why CRHA was taking these two properties, one on Avon

and one on Levy, and selling them to Charlottesville City for $4 million. I question that arrangement because I know the CRHA had hired a third-party consultant to give them a roadmap or a plan for what to do with their properties on Avon and Levy. And the third-party consultant said, look, these have a market value of about $11 million. $11 million if you bring them to the open market. $11 million. CRHA is instead choosing to not utilize the open market, the free market, to sell its properties on Avon and Levy and rather is choosing to do a $4 million deal with the city of Charlottesville.

The city of Charlottesville likely is going to take those properties on Avon and Levy and create some kind of housing for houseless individuals. And I salute them for the commitment. Counselor Snook did not utilize the word shelter. Instead, he made reference to the crossings, which is over there by McDonald's and Wendy's and across from the county office building, and the chance to potentially see a crossings 2.0 at the Avon and Levy site. More background and color on this for you. CRHA is going to take $2.6, $2.7 million from that $4 million deal

it does with the city and purchase a building on the downtown mall that was formerly the home to Vita Nova, Henry's Restaurant, the Charlottesville Escape Room. This building has been on the market for a period of time. Currently, Colliers has the listing. CRHA, inexplicably, oddly, strangely, curiously, whatever adverb you choose to use, is going to take a portion of the $4 million from its sale of Avon and Levy, not selling it on the open market for $11, instead selling it to the city for $4 million from its sale of Avon and Levy, not selling it on the open market for $11, instead selling it to the city for $4,

take $2.6, $2.7 of that money, buy a building on the downtown mall that has an elevator and that needs over $1 million in remodeling. That $1 million number was a reference point by the director of CRHA in a recent article in the Daily Progress that I read. I raised red flags over this deal three weeks ago. I highlighted the fact that buying a building on the downtown mall is not within the mission

or the MO of a housing and redevelopment authority. I highlighted the fact that there's very little housing in this building. In fact, there's three units on the top floor that the director of CRHA is saying it's going to have to go for market rent and probably not going to be utilized to help folks that are struggling financially for housing. I highlighted the fact that there's an elevator in this building. I know firsthand with elevator buildings that those require upkeep and maintenance.

And I also highlighted that having housing and redevelopment authority in the epicenter of the downtown mall did not fit the overall vision of the downtown mall. I want you to hear it from a counselor. Everything that I highlighted over the last few weeks you will now hear from a counselor and former mayor. Judah if you could play that sound in three and two and one. Thank you. What was your take on the CRHA, the sale of the properties? Was it one on Avon and one on Levy to the city? I think it was in the $4 million price range. Right, 4.2.

With a portion of those proceeds then being utilized by the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority for a 2.6 million in change purchase on the downtown mall, a building that's been sitting on the market for a little while? Well, the first thing I would say is that we have sort of an odd relationship with CRHA. We appoint the members of the board of CRHA. One of our counselors, Michael Payne, is on the board of CRHA, but we don't control them. We don't actually hire the director of CRHA, John Sayles. And so we're a little bit arm's length with them. I say a little bit because given the fact that we could in theory fire every member of the board and

appoint a whole new board, we can't claim to be completely hands off. But one of the challenges we've had in dealing with CRHA over the years has been that their finances have been pretty rocky over the years. Understatement and they were they were under the gun from HUD to have a long-term sustainability plan what what I think most most businesses would think of as a business plan well what's your model how do you expect to pay the bills and one of the problems, going back to the 1990s, Congress decided that they would underfund housing projects. And so the amount that TRHA was getting in funding was, by law, basically,

always going to be about 11% under what they needed in order to make their books balance. And that's what I said earlier when we talked about when a public entity is underfunded, they sacrifice maintenance first and salaries second. And that's exactly what has happened with CRHA over the years. And all of the problems that CRHA has had have been related to those two. And so they have come to the city every year and they want more money for operations and they want more money to help do this redevelopment. And that redevelopment, they've had a plan that's been developed now that I think is probably a pretty good plan that actually seems to be headed in the right direction.

And part of what they want to do is to get some other sources of funding, to have some properties that they can use for other purposes, maybe their market rate units or something. So they're looking in a different direction now from where they were five or ten years ago. And part of what, if we really want to look long term the next long term project for them is the redevelopment of West Haven which is going to be extremely expensive but it also has the potential to generate income from commercial applications and some of the properties that are you know that for example they could very easily

have a building with retail on the ground floor and housing above and that sort of thing. So there is some potential there. This is a long way around to getting to this particular point, which is that the property at Avon and Levy was bought by CRHA many years ago, really not so much for the property that faces on to Avon, but for the parking lot, what we now know as the parking lot, that was intended to be, in the original conception, a place where they would build some affordable housing units that they would move people into while they redeveloped West Haven or while they redeveloped South First Street or someplace like that. Well, over the years, they decided it was better for them,

for everybody, for the residents certainly, to try to develop the properties in some fashion that didn't require them to be moved twice. And so that's... You're talking people. The people. And so the need for that property, for the purpose for which they had originally bought it, faded away. So they've got now this property that they're basically letting the city have a parking lot on, which is definitely not the best and highest use of that property. And so the question is, okay, what are they going to do with it?

Well, if they're not going to put housing on it that they're going to put housing on, then what can they do? Well, one of the things they could do is sell it to the city, let the city develop it. Perhaps we're thinking maybe the property, the old gas station bike shop that fronts on Avon could be a commercial use. Community bikes. Community bikes, which is now out. So that piece could be for a commercial use, and that would probably be a better and higher use than having something, just affordable housing, for example.

The other piece that we're looking at is, and this is what has generated the most attention, is the potential to use it for permanent supportive housing. Just to keep everybody's terminology straight, if we look at the building that's called The Crossings at 4th Street in Preston, that is where people who are long-term or had been unhoused are able to get places that they stay in for months to years while they try to get their acts together and their lives together and be able to make something better for themselves. It is not a short-term transient two or three days, couple of weeks, and that's sort of an experience. It just creates a very different feeling for everybody.

So I think that the people who are in the area of the permanent supportive housing at Crossings would say that that's a fairly stable population. It's not a crime-ridden kind of a facility. And that if that's what we end up doing, having a crossings to, so to speak, on the Levy site, that that might be a very good use for it. I say it as very hedged and conditional and so on because we don't really have a full study done of exactly what the nature of the problem of the the long-term

unhoused folks really are how many are there how many are we planning for how are we going to do this now to get to the question so we had some some things that we think we might like to do, emphasize, think, it's a long-term planning process we haven't started. So we've got $4 million, which is like exactly the appraised value. We're not overpaying CRHA for it. Can I throw this to you? As the deal has matured and we've gotten more details, the city got a steal here. CRAJ had a third-party consultant assess these properties on potential market value, and it was in the neighborhood of $10 or $11 million.

They hired a third-party consultant to give them a plan or a value of what to do with these properties. And instead of going to market and selling potentially to a private buyer at 10 or 11, they went to the city and sold for four, and they took a portion of those proceeds to buy a building on the downtown mall that needs significant work, that was really long on the tooth with the days on market, has an elevator building. We know about elevator buildings in the Macklin. Elevator buildings have maintenance exposure associated with them.

And you and I both know about this firsthand with our businesses being here. I think it was a phenomenal deal for the city. I don't think it was a fantastic deal for CRHA, though. That's right. And people have asked me a lot about this, and particularly asked about whether it was a good idea for CRHA. That's right. And people have asked me a lot about this and particularly asked about whether it was a good idea for CRHA to buy that building for 2.7 or whatever the price is going to be. I don't have a good sense of that. I share the concern. A lot of people think, well, the city

went and bought the Milgram Center or Vita Nova, I guess. Vita Nova, yeah. We know it more. Apparently, CRHA's goal is they want to have, basically, their offices consolidated from a number of other places. They would like to have their offices closer to City Hall for a number of reasons, just politically and practically. They've got apartments on the top floor. I don't.

I frankly, although they have talked about maybe making some of those into affordable units, I frankly think that that's probably not likely. I think there's going to be market value apartments. I think there are going to be market value apartments, too, and that will help CRHA's bottom line. Potentially. And the other thing that's kind of interesting is the bottom level, which had been a restaurant, they're talking about more along the lines of… Incubator is the term they use. An incubator for the retail food operations

where we've already got a kitchen that's being established with city funds to be an incubator for these food service businesses. And so if we can keep with this business incubation model, it's an opportunity for the business incubation on the basement level, offices in the middle levels, apartments, perhaps market rate apartments on the top level,

generate a little income, be able to support the incubator model for the businesses and consolidate their offices. I understand the theory. I'm not going to defend it particularly because I don't know enough about it, but it seems facially to make some sense.

I know you want to jump in. I'll throw a last thing for me here. It would seem that, and this is just one man's opinion, pay a lot of taxes in this city. It would seem to me that selling Avon and Levy at market value for $10 or $11 million, as opposed to selling Avon and Levy to the city for $4 million, and then taking a portion of that $4 million to buy a building on the downtown mall at $2.6, $2.7 million, that they straight up have said needs another million dollars in remodeling to get up to speed.

They straight up said that. They said that. Dave McNair did a fantastic report on this on the DTM. I read it three times. It would seem to me, and he quoted an unnamed source that was previously on the board of directors of CRHA. I did a little crystal balling. I think that unnamed source is Dave Norris that is super tight with Dave McNair. So I'll throw this to you and I'll close. And I'm curious of what Councilor Snoke has to say. Why not sell for $11 million, take that $11 million in the private market, and then just go and build housing with that $11 million to put people in it? So let me jump in, because that's where I wanted to go with this.

I've been staying away from this topic specifically, but look, this was just a bad business move. I guess that's the point I've been making on this network for two weeks. I'm just going to be a little bit more direct about it. I don't get it. It's a great business move for you guys. That's what I've been saying. Great business move for you guys. I'm a recovering developer and builder.

I kind of know this world. This is my world. And I know John well. John sells well. He's a good man. I know him well. I don't know what they were thinking. I don't know either.

Right? Because they could have got 10. They could have walked away with an extra 5 million in their pocket. Wow. And I would have asked for it. 7 million. No, no, no. I'm talking about by the time that they sell it, they carve off the cash to buy it, renovate the building.

They would have netted about 5 million. I just did some quick math on it. Which they could, believe me, we just sat down yesterday with some folks from the city, the city manager and folks, we meaning the land trust, trying to work on getting some capital to make some happen. I can't tell you what good we would do with $5 million on the land trust in this town. And I just don't understand the thinking. Now maybe we don't have, I don't know the folks that are on the board. Maybe there's not enough business people on the board or people that have my experience

on the board. But that's always been my... How does the city navigate being a fiduciary for what's the word, the city's relationship with CRHA? It's not a fiduciary. It's a separate body. There's some skin in the game the city has with CRHA. How does it manage being a parent to a child, if you may? If I'm using a metaphor.

Well, there are a lot of problems with the relationship. One of the problems is that the board is constituted with a lot of residents of the public housing projects on there who do not have business expertise. And I've never been to one of their board meetings. I don't know what goes on there exactly. I've watched a couple of them on Zoom. And I have tried on a number of occasions to try to get people with some actual business experience to be involved in some way. So far, that hasn't panned out.

The missed opportunity is enormous. And it's unfortunate. It's great for you guys. They'll get a building, but they will not have revenue to deploy to make a difference. And an incubator in the restaurant space is almost an oxymoron.

Especially on an eight-block epicenter that's saturated with restaurants. What's the highest failure rate of any business? We're business people here talking, and we're looking at this as business. Then here's another follow-up to this, and there's so much we've got to cover with you. I love when you come on the show, Mayor Snook.

It's just a fascinating discussion. Former Mayor Snook. Excuse me. Former. Counselor Snook. I'm sorry. Counselor Snook. Or Lloyd, either way. My friend. Former mayor. Excuse me. Counselor Snook. I'm sorry. Counselor Snook. Or Lloyd.

My friend. My friend. The follow-up would be this. How does having a CRHA headquarters fit with the vision and mission of the downtown mall? That is clearly hurting, which we both know, right?

Yeah. If I were God here, I would probably not be having CRHA buy that property. But the point... No, no, please, please, let him finish here. Well, I'm concerned for a number of reasons from CRHA's standpoint. I'm not sure that I – I know that one of the things that they're concerned about in terms of space is that they think once we get around to redoing West Haven, we're going to need room for a lot of – things are going to have to – operations are going to have to move out of West Haven. The West Haven Community Center is no longer going to be there for at least during the construction process.

Who knows what it's all going to look like. They've got a lot of work to do. I don't know what all their pressures are, but I agree with you all. I mean, I'm sitting there looking at the money and trying to figure out what makes sense for them. I have to assume they know their affairs better than I do. I think who's on the board is the problem. Which is tough because we have a counselor on the board. Our former counselor is the chairman.

We have other people on the board who are nice, good, liberal people. Oh, yeah, yeah. No, no. And I tried a couple of years ago to see if we could get some people, you know, to go recruiting some people to be on the board. And it was very difficult to get people with some actual

knowledge of how the world works to want to get to be on that board some color some commentary from the former mayor of the court current counselor lloyd snook i appreciate his straightforwardness on this deal um city of charlottesville got a steal here got a steal you got to give props to the city of charlottesville got a steal here. Got a steal. You got to give props to the city of Charlottesville and City Hall. Counselors and anybody associated with this. 65% haircut or reduction in actual value is some of the best real estate move-in and shake-in that I've seen in some period of time in this community. Some of the best move-in and shake-in that I've seen

since the two Wendell Wood deals, the one on High Street, the one at Ravenna Station. If the city utilizes Avon and Levy to create Crossings 2.0, and if Tony, prestigious, affluent, wealthy Belmont residents, Belmontonians are okay with that, then props to everybody involved. You put Crossings 2.0 in Belmont, you would think that's going to impact the market value, but if Belmontonians and those that are in near proximity

of Crossings 2.0 don't care, then go for it. City wins, houseless population wins, Belmontonians don't seem to care. I think it's important to highlight just the absurdity of taking $11, $12 million in market value, shrinking it to four, buy a building at two six that needs a million plus of renovation,

and then having three apartments on the top floor that you're going to rent at market value and not to people that are struggling financially that need housing. And the concept of a restaurant incubator is restaurant incubator is nonsense. A restaurant incubator is the Charlottesville farmer's market.

That's what a restaurant incubator is. It's a farmer's market. It's what a restaurant incubator is. It's a farmer's market. It's not a basement storefront on the downtown mall. It's already saturated with restaurants. Just being straightforward here. And that's also doing a disservice to the other restaurants on the mall. Other restaurants on the mall who are already struggling for patrons that are paying astronomical rents. To then have to compete with a housing authority who's going to offer discounted rents to merchants that are going to come downtown to

take customers away from the ones that are struggling to pay their full market rent right now. You have to see you have to see the what's the word I'm looking for? Writing on the wall?

You have to see the... It's just set up for... It's set up for beef and friction on so many different fronts. And this is something we talked about and covered extremely well over the last few weeks. I go to bat for the small businesses on the downtown mall. I go to bat for the small business owners in Charlottesville and Almar County and Central Virginia. And a small business

owner in Charlottesville on the downtown mall. They're struggling for staffing. They're struggling to pay their rent. They're struggling to attract customers. Now having to compete against the housing authority that's going to offer discounted rent to an incubated concept restaurant that's going to take customers away from the ones that have been here for years, if not longer, that's a travesty, a travesty. And it should be highlighted in vocal and visible fashion like I'm doing right now. All right, a couple other pieces of sound. They are shorter that I need to play for you. The next piece of sound that I think is important to hear is on gentrification in the community, in particular to the Greenbrier neighborhood.

How long is this sizzle reel, Judah? This is the Juan Diego Wade one. Are we going to go to Juan Diego Wade on upzoning? I believe so. Okay, this is Juan Diego Wade on upzoning. Here's the mayor, right? This is, yes. This is talking about the, uh,

are you on a two shot here? No, not yet. Yeah. If you, if you, if you're vocalizing, we should get you on a, on a two or always on screen. So you're not the voice of God. This is the Juan Diego, uh, Wade sound the mayor from real talk this morning, right? Yep. Okay. Fantastic. Um, in this sizzle reel, you'll hear an interesting little tidbit here that in this sizzle reel, does Mayor Wade make reference to city manager Sam Sanders? Yes. And does he make reference to, is the reference to him living in the city currently? Yeah, seems that way. You can confirm that, that he is living in the city currently?

I can confirm that it sounds like Juan Diego Wade is saying that he signed a lease for an apartment. But do we confirm the jurisdiction of residency? I don't think so. All right. The reason I'm asking that question is because he's the city manager of the city. Yeah. And I believe that is part of your requirement that you live in the city. So I'm just curious if that is the case.

How long is the Juan Diego sound? Juan Diego Wade, Mayor Wade sound? I believe it's roughly two minutes. This is two minutes long here. This is from Real Talk this morning. Maybe I'm seeing 320. 320 on the Juan Diego Wade sound? Okay, sounds good.

If you could play that for me in three. This is the mayor of Charlottesville, Juan Diego Wade here. Three, two, one. One of the viewers put in an assessment on it that I think the 250 and below is like 11% jump, which I kind of have a problem with because the people that can afford it the less, the least, are the ones that are going to go ahead and get it. So I just, you know, how are we going to reconcile this? How are you going to hire people, pay them well,

and get them to move into our city? I know this is a very rhetorical question. Yeah, yeah. But other than use the land trust. Yeah, well, the land trust is definitely going to be one of the tools. Yesterday during the chamber state of the city and county address, both Jeff Richardson and Sam Sanders addressed this in some form or fashion,

the issue of housing. Sam has said that he is, you know, he has options, and he is still finding it difficult to find a place here in the city to live. And so he's looking for that. For himself personally? Yes, yes. We gave him a year to buy a house or to get a residence in the city. And this is a gentleman who's making total compensation, a quarter million dollars.

Right. Right. Yeah. He had just signed a lease when we offered him, you know, for an apartment. So, but anyway, and if I have the numbers correct, I think, you know, if we have some Board of Supervisors officials, they can state it. But in the county, I think, you know,

they were talking about the housing issues there, but that last year, they, between, it was 147 units, homes sold between one and two million. If you tune on Wednesday, I've got Woody Fincham coming in, and we're going to focus on the million and up market. We'll have specific data for that. Yeah, so I mean this is – A world with which I am unfamiliar.

Yes. So I think that one of the issues that – one of the reasons that I really supported the zoning ordinance that we passed is that, in my mind, in my belief that I think that it will produce not only more housing quantity, but different types of housing. And I think that that will have a big outcome on the prices, supply. And I think Monday is the first day it officially goes into effect. I'm excited to see that. I know it's going to be probably several months, maybe even a few years before we really see the impact of it. I can speak to this as the chair of the land trust. We're excited and we're trying to

I was teasing you guys about money, but we'll take some, to make some magic happen because we're kind of built to do that well on it. We've got some properties that are designated i'm excited that since uh you guys passed the thing the zoning we have property owners calling us the land trust right we just need capital to to make it to make it work uh but juan diego you know we're two brothers from a separate mother and you know i've said publicly this is a five to ten year cycle before it has some serious impacts on it folks should be a little patient and I'm excited about the I mean the devil's in

the details and I'm excited to see what the details are so I I take that and I don't know what the viewers and listeners think but it was pretty clear to me that he does not live in the city. With the comment that the counselors gave the city manager, Sam Sanders, a year to establish residence in the city. And that's totally fine, you know, if he's working to establish a residence of some kind or a permanent address within city limits. I understand the concept of signing a lease before he's been offered the job as city manager.

So highlighting that. We'll play one last piece of sound from the former mayor on gentrification. In particular, this applies to his neighborhood, the Greenbrier neighborhood, right? And how long is that sizzle reel? Let's see. Two minutes. All right, so this is a two-minute piece of content.

And after this two minutes from our morning talk show, then I'm going to offer some commentary. We'll weave Judah Wickauer into the mix. And these are just a few highlights of the show we did this morning that I thought was just from start to finish fascinating, dynamic, and from start to finish crammed with hard news. Let's hear the two minutes of sound from the former mayor, the current counselor, Lloyd Snook, on gentrification and city limits, in particular how it applies to the Greenbrier neighborhood. I'm in your hands. If you could play that in three, two, one. I'm curious of Counselor Snook's thoughts on all this, the zoning ordinance, market conditions that are out there, how we pay people more money without raising taxes on citizens. You mentioned you don't know much about the million-dollar market. I will slightly push back on that.

There's a comp that's relatively close to you that's starting to flirt with the million dollars in the Greenbrier neighborhood. Well, that's right, and values have really just taken off. I mean, I use the Greenbrier neighborhood where I live as an example and, frankly, a rhetorical talking point about a number of things. One of the points that I make, excuse me, that I've made frequently during the debate was to talk about the people who were moving into the Greenbrier neighborhood who didn't really want to be in the Greenbrier neighborhood,

but they couldn't find anything downtown. They couldn't find places, homes, condos at McGuffey Hill were basically the only option. Maybe one would come on a market a year. And so we've got folks in our neighborhood who didn't particularly want to be right next to the school. They're retired. They don't have school kids, but they were buying houses next to the school

because they couldn't get anything what they really wanted and taking off the market a house that some family with kids who are going to go to Greenbrier would love to be able to buy. And they were coming in from out of town. They were coming in with the equity from the house that they were selling in northern Virginia. And they could pay cash over and above the listing price and could basically buy any listing that they wanted to buy. So I'm looking at available single family detached in the city of Charlottesville.

There's 24 units available, homes available. The average sales price, list price, $928,000. Those were just a few highlights of the show we did this morning on the I Love Seville Network, Real Talk, Real Talk with Keith Smith, which you can find anywhere you get your podcasting content. I'd encourage you to listen to that show from start to finish. I want to

weave Judah Wickhauer into the mix on a two shot. I highlighted this and I had this conversation I actually highlighted this on Real Talk this morning. I think Mayor Wade said up zoningoning goes into effect on Monday in one of those clips. And I've been fairly adamant that the impact of upzoning would have the opposite effect of what it was intended to do. I had this conversation in person with Deep Throat recently.

You take a neighborhood like Lewis Mountain, which is on Ivy Road, right across from Foods of All Nations and Ivy Square Shopping Center, right on the urban ring, smack dab across from where that Truist Bank site is, where an apartment tower is being brainstormed on the Truist Bank site. And I'm close with the homeowners association, or I have insight into the homeowners association over there, on a couple of different fronts and you're

starting to see real estate in the lewis mountain neighborhood coming on market and more is coming on market in the near future these homes are coming on the market to the tune of 1.5 million 1.6 million 2.1 million 2.4 million coming on the market north of 2 million coming on the market, north of $2 million coming on the market in the high, $1.5, $1.6, $1.7, $1.8 type price points. And at those types of price points, the barrier of entry, the cost to entry is so high that they're not going to be converted into housing density. Because when you're paying that kind of money for homes, the math doesn't pencil out to then pay that kind of upfront money to tear something down to build housing density upon it. You're going to buy those type of houses

at those price points to live in as a single family, to have the quality of life and the experience of being able to walk to Vivace or the Boar's Head or Foods of All Nations or, you know, the UVA Corner, the University of Virginia, to church, to Midtown, the downtown mall, the farmer's market. You're not going to pay $1.5 million plus

to tear something down to build housing density. So we're seeing the early stages now as Lewis Mountain, which is very much in the eye of the storm. Why are they in the eye of the storm? Well, they're in the eye of the storm for the following reasons. Reason number one, the apartment tower and the Truist Bank site. Across the street from them. Reason number two, upzoning. They're in the city. Folks in the city are concerned of how upzoning could impact their quality

of life. Reason number three, the University of Virginia is trying to take that entire corridor and turn it into Academic Village 2.0. Reason number four, they can sell right now for top dollar and take top dollar elsewhere and do something else

and get more bang for their buck, potentially. We're seeing the first stage in effects, the first cause and effects of upzoning right now, and it's there as a perfect example. This neighborhood's a perfect example. It's not going to create the affordability that housing activists or advocates or upzoning advocates would suggest. It's going to do the opposite. We're seeing it here. I want to highlight that.

Anything you want to add? I haven't woven you into the mix yet. I mean, was upzoning ever expected to create affordability in a neighborhood like Lewis Mountain? In a neighborhood like Lewis Mountain, the idea was it was going to make it easier to do a granny flat or a basement apartment or a backyard ADU, which would have been an additional doorway or bed for people to sleep on in the city. And the added supply would have potentially stabilized prices. Okay.

But if you have a house that you're paying $2 million for and you have a granny flat or an ADU in the backyard, you're going to be extremely selective of who you rent to. You're not going to rent to somebody, most likely, that's going to be... It's going to throw ragers. On the financial margin. I mean, I think anyone would be surprised to think that somebody in Lewis Mountain was creating a grainy flat to rent to a low-income family. Highlighting what I don't think is obvious to many.

Fair. On the talk show today. I do... I am grateful for the mayor and Councillor Snook coming on the talk show. I thought they did a hell of a job. Sincerely mean that. This is a topic from yesterday's show

that I want to highlight, how smartphones could potentially replace new trends in human behavior in Charlottesville moving forward. Yesterday, we highlighted how smartphones are impacting dining in restaurants, where smartphones have made it so easy to order food that Gen Zers and younger are choosing instead to eat in front of while watching Netflix in the comfort of their house, as opposed to going to dining in restaurants. We're seeing dining inside restaurants, the numbers slip since COVID. We've highlighted on this talk show that smartphones are impacting how you mail packages. You took a package yesterday or the day before to the post office. You had a QR code on your phone.

You showed the QR code and you sent the package. Showed the person at the window the QR code, gave them the package. We highlighted on this show how Showed the person at the window the QR code, gave them the package. Yeah. We highlighted on this show how smartphones are impacting a will call or ticket office or ticket windows at venues. How many wait in line at ticket venue or ticket office boxes anymore? How many just have their ticket on their phone in a digital setting

and their passport on their phone and just show it at the window? If you're not waiting in line at a concert anymore, how does that impact social norm and human behavior, shopping habits, and tie it to Charlottesville. We can take a look at this from a retail standpoint, a restaurant standpoint, a music venue standpoint, and a destination standpoint. If you'd like to go first, I've done a lot of talking today. I'm happy to hear some of your perspectives. I mean, I think the iPhone in, in a league, that's not the word I'm use for, like, a stool. You use the yellow pages for a stool? Because who uses the yellow pages anymore?

You can look up any number on Google or your browser of choice. I mean, it's going to... We've talked about libraries. The fact that people aren't even going to libraries in some cases, I see stuff about people talking about having extra Audible credits

and what should they buy with it. Those people are obviously not going to be visiting a library. Being able to go to McDonald's. I mean, if you really want to go to McDonald's, now you don't even have to wait in line. And you've talked lots of times about how there's like two people working at McDonald's. They really just need one person on the window and one person, you know, like working the grill. And you can... No, they need one person working the drive-thru window, many people working the griddle and the kitchen.

Because they're still getting the same business. They're just not getting the business as walk-in business or dining room business. So they need back-of-the-house staff. They just don't need front-of-the-house staff. They're able to cut down on payroll by trimming front-of-the-house staff while maintaining the same back-of-the-house staff clip. If they only had one person working in the kitchen, they would not be able to keep up with the demand.

The demand is still there. It's just serviced differently. I think you'd be surprised how much one person can do at a McDonald's, but either way. There's no way a McDonald's is running with one person in a kitchen. I didn't literally mean one person, but go ahead. Yeah, yeah. That would not work.

They're cutting cashiers, and instead of cashiers, people are going to kiosks, and they're encouraging people to use apps to order food and have pickup at either the drive-thru or inside, but the back of the house staff is not getting clipped. I'll take,

I'll offer this perspective here. What do you call, what is it the, what's the name for the Apple headset that's out there Apple headset yeah the brand new one that's in the news lately

let me look it's expensive right now $3,000 plus that number is going to come down if we have such a full, fully immersive experience, Vision Pro, what's the cost of Vision Pro? $3,000 plus, right?

What's it say on there? $3,500. Okay. $3,500 is still a lot of money. That number is going to come down. If Apple Vision Pro, Facebook has a version of this, Snap has a version of this,

this is clearly going to be... Wearables, when it comes to technology, are clearly going to be the next innovative leap for hardware companies and social media companies. I'm going to ask the viewers and listeners this question. If the next leap for hardware and social media companies are wearables that offer a truly immersive and multidimensional experience, how is that going to impact music venues? Why is somebody going to spend hundreds of dollars to have a mediocre seat at a music venue

when they can use their Vision Pro or whatever other wearable out there to have a front row seat at the same concert while sitting at their house and not having to travel. They're going to pay a streaming or licensing or ticket fee to go to the concert. The concert is going to be just like what's happening to higher education. If you're Ken Elzinga at UVA, economics renowned professor,

or Larry Sabato, UVA renowned politics government professor, Lou Bloomfield, UVA renowned physics professor, Dr. Patrick Hopkins, renowned engineering professor at the University of Virginia, and you're able to teach through Coursera tens of thousands of people, thousands of students across the globe, as opposed to 25 people in a classroom or 500 people in a lecture hall, you're probably going to want to connect with thousands if not 10,000s of people around the globe where you can charge those thousands if not tens of thousands a fee to take your course, essentially becoming a free agent professor,

where you can be like, you want to learn physics from me? I'm going to create a platform where you can sign on digitally to learn from me and pay me a fee, and then I'll get you a digital entry to my classroom and my seminar where you can learn from one of the best of the best. This is the future of higher education. That's the same thing for music venues. Like if you are Taylor Swift and you're selling out arenas all over the world, would Taylor Swift not prefer to sell out arenas all over the world

while also selling an additional 25,000 tickets to people with a Vision Pro that are sitting in their living room in every Tom, Dick, and Harry city in the world? I'll take it a step further. If you're Taylor Swift and you have such a known brand and commodity that you can change fanship in the National Football League, Taylor Swift drove the highest ratings for the Super Bowl and has got more women watching football than ever before. That shows the influence of Taylor Swift. Would Taylor Swift choose to travel from music venue to music venue, country to country, to perform in front of fans? Or will Taylor Swift eventually say, I'm going to create a venue in my own house where I put on a badass performance, and I'm going to give a digital ticket for anyone who can utilize their Vision Pro,

any kind of headwear, to watch my show. And that ticket I sell to these fans is going to be significantly lower than the thousands of dollars people are paying for my tickets for in person. It's going to be a fraction of the cost and they're going to have the same immersive experience. And if that's the future of music venues impacted by Vision Pro and headwear like this, what is the value 10 years from now of a music venue as an anchor on a destination district like these eight blocks in downtown Charlottesville? Will it carry the same momentum, impact, influence, and effect of attracting 8,000 to 10,000 people to the Ting Pavilion and having those people shop and dine beforehand. That's some of the ideas that I'm thinking about constantly and I like to relay to folks on the show. The smartphones and technology are not just going to be

kiosks at a McDonald's replacing front of the house staff. Smartphones and technology are not just going to cannibalize selling widgets on a shelf in retail. Smartphones and technology are not just going to be a ticket that you buy and you show on your phone to get into a venue. Smartphones and technology could cannibalize the venue altogether. Could cannibalize dining altogether in a restaurant. Dining in a restaurant altogether. When the food can be delivered to you instantaneously or within a couple minutes and you can eat in your tighty-whities or your bathrobe while streaming more technology at your house.

And how you stay ahead of this, I don't know. I do not have that answer for you. I think the people that stay ahead of this, the ones that stay ahead of this, are the content creators. The folks that can position content or fully immersive experiences on the hardware, on the social, and on the

technology are the ones that are going to stay ahead of it. Kelly Jackson knows a bit about this. Dan Pettit, welcome to the program. Kelly says, lots of restaurants are moving to an ordering kiosk or only just online, and even sit-down restaurants are moving towards a QR code for menu, ordering, and paying. She's got 18 or 19 restaurants under her purview,

so when Kelly Jackson leaves comments on this show, I listen to what she has to say. She also says there's just something about the experience of going to live music that you can't replace. I agree with what you're saying, but I still go. I still go as well, Kelly, but I think you and I, and we're relatively the same age,

are not the future consumer, though. And I think the Apple Pro, what is it, Apple Pro, is that what it's called? Apple Vision Pro. Apple Vision Pro. It's such early stage. It's like early stage iPhone,

or first or second generation iPhone iPhone or first or second generation iPhone or first or second generation Apple Watch. Like, wait till they get to iPhone 12. What are they on right now, iPhone-wise? What number? Like 12 or 13, right? You compare the first iPhone to the iPhone that we have now, and that's the type of leaps that the Vision Pro headwear is going to have.

We are going to be able to sit in our living room on a couch in our tighty-whities putting on headwear watching Taylor Swift in concert. And Taylor's going to be like, I'm not doing tours around the world anymore. That's too much work for me. I want to see Travis Kelsey and I don't want to get on a jet from Asia or China or Japan, wherever she was before the Super Bowl, and have to take a red eye overnight to watch the Super Bowl to see my man play. Instead, I'm going to create a concert venue because I'm a billionaire woman in my house. The venue is going to have top-notch technology, top-notch audio. My band's going to be right there. We're going to play from my house

and we're going to sell digital tickets. And these digital tickets will be purchased by tens of thousands of people, which makes me more money as the artist, makes the label more money. The people that purchase these tickets are going to get a discount on the ticket when compared to the actual in-person ticket cost. And they're going to put on a headset in their tighty-whities, in their bathrobe, while stuffing their face with food that they ordered from Uber Eats or Grubhub, wearing clothes that was delivered to their doorstep

by Amazon or Target within minutes of getting their order, and drinking beer that was sent to them by Instacart or grocery delivery, never leaving their house, and that's going to not only impact the retail experience, the dining experience, the music venue experience. And that

should scare the absolute bejeebus out of all of us. Alright, I've got to get out of here. I've got a 2 o'clock meeting. Anything you want to add? Brad Wilcox is on the show on Wednesday. He's the UVA professor. Brad Wilcox.

That wrote the book about marriage and the impacts of marriage. Professor Wilcox. His book and his research indicates that if you're married and you stay married you have more happiness your children are more likely to graduate from college your children are less likely to be incarcerated and you are more likely to be wealthy and create generational wealth brad wilcox on the show on wednesday to talk about his book that's making the national news cycle. He's going to carve out an hour of his day to spend with us on this program. UVA basketball is playing as well on Saturday at noon against Wake Forest.

Wake Forest, UVA, ESPN2, National TV. Any closing thoughts for the viewers and listeners? Charlottesville high school is presenting SpongeBob the musical and it's playing until Sunday. SpongeBob the musical. There you go. Charlottesville high school. Thank you for that. Are you going to be going to that? I don't know if I'll be able to make it, but, uh, I would dearly like to see what they, what they put on. Who's your favorite SpongeBob square pants character? I've never actually watched the show, but I know the theme song. Okay. I don't know the theme song. How does that go? He lives in a

pineapple under the sea. SpongeBob SquarePants. Oh, SpongeBob SquarePants. Thank you, Judah. I hope you have a chance to go. Wish you the best of weekends as well. The Friday edition of the I Love Seville show, ladies and gentlemen, we'll see you on Monday. Thank you.