The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - Ned Gallaway And Neil Williamson Joined Jerry Miller On “Real Talk With Keith Smith!"

Episode Date: December 13, 2024

Ned Gallaway, Albemarle County Board of Supervisors, and Neil Williamson, President of Free Enterprise Forum, joined Jerry Miller on “Real Talk With Keith Smith” powered by YES Realty Partners and Yonna Smith! “Real Talk” airs every Wednesday and Friday from 10:15 am – 11 am on The I Love CVille Network! “Real Talk With Keith Smith” is presented by Charlottesville Settlement Company, LLC, El Mariachi Mexican Bar & Grill, Fincham & Associates, Inc., Free Enterprise Forum, Intrastate Service Co and YES Realty Partners.

Good Friday morning, guys. My name is Jerry Miller, and thank you kindly for joining us on Real Talk with Keith Smith. A chilly Friday in Albemarle County, the city of Charlottesville, and central Virginia. Our star, Keith Smith, is experiencing quite the opposite. He is working on his suntan with his beautiful seven eights, as he says, beautiful better half, Jonas Smith, maybe sipping a Mai Tai right now with 90-degree temperatures. I shudder to think it would be in a Speedo bathing suit. I don't think Keith wears that. But I can guarantee you he is working on his tan right now.

But have no fear. Ned Galloway and Neil Williamson are here. It is budget season. We have three spots on the Alamaro County Board of Supervisors up for grabs. We have a lot to talk about, including some comments that were a bit pointed by a school board member, some fantastic content created by Neil Williamson from the Free Enterprise Forum, and much, much more. Judah Wickhauer, studio camera, and then a three-shot.

Gentlemen, it's a Friday and you guys are here. I've been looking forward to this show. Thank you for coming today, Neil and Ned. It's great to have you guys. Neil Williamson, my friend, happy holidays and Merry Christmas to you. Merry Christmas and welcome to Real Talk Without Keith Smith. Neil Williamson, I think, is on his third cup of coffee today. So get ready.

We'll start with the supervisor, Ned Galloway. My friend, how are things going? How's the week treating you? We are two weeks and change away from the end of 2024. Yeah, that's crazy. No, it's going well. December is always an interesting one for elected officials because most of the meetings that take a whole month to do get jammed into the first two weeks. So like the

NPO Policy Board meeting, we've already had our, like my Community Advisory Committee meeting gets moved forward. So a lot, just a lot to happen and we throw in an extra meeting with some legislators, a joint meeting with the school board. So for 10, 15 days, business days in the first part of December, boy, it can be, a lot

is happening. So, a lot's happening. And it's all in gearing up for budget season, which will be upon us quickly once the new year starts. Absolutely. Transit has been a topic. And joining, was it an authority has been a topic for you guys? Big deal. I think it's a very big deal. Neil Williamson, my friend, what has caught your attention or tickled your fancy of late in Albemarle County?

Well, at the five-year projection, I believe that the county executive had what was perhaps the most precessant quote ever in 20-plus years covering this. he turned to the supervisors and said, we can do anything you want. We can't do everything you want. That in itself sums up what the budget game is. Every year. A budget game where the schools are asking for quite a bit of money, which we'll talk about with Neil and with Ned. Obviously, I think the first question a man's got to ask when you have a man who's facing the expiration of a term is,

are you going to run again, Ned Galloway, in the Rio District? Well, I'll tell you this. I'll make that announcement after the start of the new year. Every person, well, I don't know if every person well I don't know if every person what I typically do for any office that I have run for is you know you go through a little bit of some conversation with people that you trust and are kind of your inner circle or your brain trust if you would and that conversation simply goes with well what are the priorities you know you obviously you want to think of the lay of the land in terms of do you have potential opponents you you want to you know it gives you a chance to go well what are your constituents like what's been the response over the last four years from constituents so that's really where i'm at right now going through

that process um you know christmas time you know people start to check out you know on this stuff right around now right like this this weekend everybody's going to be shifting gears and everybody's going to be thinking about other things through the new year. So I think there'll be time for me in January, February, be looking for an announcement then. This would be, should you choose to run, would be your third straight term. Third term, yeah. Third term. And how many of those were opposed elections? Zero. No opposed elections. For Supervisor. I think Supervisor Galloway has accomplished quite a bit in two terms. His track record speaks for itself.

We are hearing that there is a very well-known commodity in the Samuel Miller district that is contemplating a run. Someone new to the game, Jim Andrews, currently in the seat. I read the free enterprise form on a regular basis. Every day I check your website. Sincerely mean that, Neil. I read the free enterprise forum on a regular basis. Every day I check your website. Sincerely mean that, Neil. I sincerely mean that. You're great at creating content and following what's going on. You put a nice little profile of all the seats

that are up for grabs locally. Seats available. Put that in perspective what's happening, Neil. It took him two minutes to get that one in. The reality is that we have local elections for our local boards and city council come up every two years. In groups that have an odd number of participants, which is what the Free Enterprise Forum prefers, unlike Albemarle, they have years where they elect a majority. So, for instance, I believe Fluvanna has four seats on a seven-seat board that's coming forward.

Fluvanna County, I'm on your website, three of five. Three of five. Chris Fairchild, friend of the program. Mad Dog, Mike Sheridan, friend of the program. And Tony O'Brien, friend of the program. Well, you've got a bunch of friends that have the opportunity to uh run or not run yeah and we'll see what happens there um and the in louise i think it's the four of the seven that's right um in green i think it's two of the five that's right uh in charlottesville it's two of the five that's right and in albemarle it's half of the board that seems exactly right and that's from memory sorry i don't have the

computer with you you you got it right you score uh you score uh an a minus on that one right there an a minus um what do you make of juan diego wayne and brian pinkston running as a ticket announcing at the same time running as a ticket incumb announcing at the same time, running as a ticket, incumbents on council that said they still have a lot of work to do. I found it also interesting, Pinkston's comments, that the runway of figuring things out took a lot longer than anticipated. And it wasn't until the end of the first term that he started feeling like he really knew what the position was about. I think that's fair, and Ned won't take joy with this comment, but I have a kind of a saying.

I call it the Dick Van Patten rule that for local elected officials, eight is enough. Once you've been through two terms, you've seen a lot of ideas, and you have had the opportunity to really weigh in on a lot. And I've had local officials ask me if they should run for a third term, and I've told them, well, you know, Dick Van Patten rule. And they said, well, I think I'm going to run, and then the voters told them Dick Van Patten rule. So I think it's an interesting thing when we have people who've served, know going going on 20-year terms on the board of supervisors when you have a large locality I like having new ideas come to the board but I do think it takes a while to understand just how everything works together what is this MPO thing and how does that work with our transportation? And how do I work with all these different people? So I think having two terms is really almost a minimum to get done the stuff you need to get done. That's a perfect segue for you,

Supervisor Galloway. You have Mike Pruitt in his first term, early in his first term, Jim Andrews in his first term, finishing his first term. Then you have institutional memory with you at the end of your second term. Supervisor Malik, I think in her fifth term, right? Supervisor McKeel is at her third term. McKeel in her third term. She's up for re-election. Can you speak to the dynamic of, you know, the institutional memory of yourself, of Supervisor McKeel and Malik, and maybe the fresh perspective of an Andrews and Pruitt with the supervisors. Yeah, I like the mix of having both on the board, for sure. I've been paying attention, if not on a board, in Albemarle County since 2009. So, you know, like I can appreciate what Vice what vice mayor Pinkston had to say about, well,

it took a while to do that. That was his first piece, if I'm not mistaken, into any sort of elected or even appointed politics in the city. So when I came onto the board of supervisors, I had a term on the school board. I'd been going to meetings. I'd been paying, you know, it was a different transitional period, not anything special with me. It was just that I was focused on it for a while. So, of course, if you bring more background or information to the table, it's going to be a different time frame. So for folks like Supervisor Andrews and Supervisor Pruitt, yeah, this is their first real push into it. I would imagine that it does take a little bit longer. Just simply, when you get handed six, 800, sometimes 1,000 pages of information the Thursday before your meeting, just figuring out the process to get through that information to be prepared and ready to go by the following Wednesday,

that in and of itself takes a while to figure out how to do that. And you get more efficient at it over time. Do you read those pages? Yeah. You read them all, all those pages? I have found most supervisors in most localities do their homework. They really do.

Well, I'll tell you the, and you want a real selfish reason why you do? I don't want to be up on that day as getting caught asking a question that was in the packet that I didn't read, because then it's like, well, who's this guy? Right. So you don't want to look unprepared. Yep. Because then it's like, well, who's this guy? Right. So you don't want to look unprepared. Yep.

Now, that's the selfish, don't get caught, you know, doing this at the dais or something like that. Sure. That could be embarrassing for you. The more important piece is, is how else are you going to make a decision if you're not well informed and if you don't know the information that you're coming in with, then you're asking questions to learn the information, not build on top of what you think you understand. If memory serves the at-large seat on the school board for Supervisor Galloway, to beat memory serves Cindy Burkett in a relatively close race. And it was actually a third opponent in there, Joe Otto, I think his name was.

Yeah, he's moved since then. Very, I mean, he pulled in a little bit. It was the at-large seat little bit was the at large seat it was the at large seat yeah so there was actually three of us that ran yeah um cindy and i uh it tended to be between the two of us and joe i mean he was making some interesting comments back and forth between the two of us throughout that race but it ended up that yeah that that was between mainly between it's an interesting idea having an at large seat in order to make an odd number on a board and deal williamson has floated that on the Free Enterprise Forum.

See, you know what this is, though? This is because I get to take shots at Neil from the dais, and he can't say a thing in response. So he has to get even at this point. Well, the reason Neil wants the odd number on the Atmore County Board of Supervisors is because anything that finishes in a 3-3 tie, nothing happens. It means nothing happens on a 3-3 tie. That's why he wants the odd. That's why you're saying it, right? Right. If 3-3 dies and having a

simple majority just makes things easier, there are those that argue that having to get to a super majority makes it so that you get a better end result. I feel that way. I feel that way. That if you have to get to a super majority, it means that that was what's best for Albemarle County. But I respect your point.

Now, look, this would change given the numbers, because, you know, it would. But when you're dealing with six and seven, you still have to get to four votes on both boards. Right, right. So I get it. On the school board, if it's four or three, you're not going to have a failing vote

because it's not ever going to tie. So the tie is really what gives you heartburn. But both boards require four votes to take action. Diantha McKeel, school board member at one time as well. It's a perfect segue. At a joint meeting, a very recent joint meeting last week, Alamoor County School Board, get ready for this number of viewers and listeners, requested more than half a billion dollars, $560 million for school construction to keep up with

population growth. $560 million. Why don't we start open-ended with that for Supervisor Galloway? Anywhere you want to go. It's a big ask. It's a big request. The school board's job is to determine what they think they need and then communicate that to not just us, the board of supervisors, but to the constituents, and that's what their charge is. I mean, the state of Virginia is very clear on that.

So if that's what they think they need, then they need to bring that forward and tell us about it. Now, what happens after the request is made is the process has to play out and we'll see what can be done. Are they going to get $560 million? We don't have that kind of capacity in our CIP. They knew that coming in, but that doesn't, they can't be concerned about that. They have to say, here's what we think we need. And then, you know, when I was on the school board, I would have done the same exact thing. You ask for what you need, and then you work within the parameters of what's possible. And once you know what your allocation is going to be, then you have to start making decisions. So within that $560 million, this school board is going to have to determine what their highest priorities are.

Because that number in and of itself is not a possibility. It's just not. And I'm not going to sit here and pretend to try to gain any sort of political favor for those that support our school division and suggest that it would be. So we went through it that day. Based on our capacity, it looked to be about $60 million would be available in the coming year for some additional capacity in the CIP based on how we do it to protect our triple AAA bond rating, how we have determined by policy certain thresholds that we will not go over from a

debt load capacity and that sort of thing. So, you know, but am I mad? Am I frustrated with the school board for doing the ask? No, they're doing their job. That's what they're supposed to do. Lonnie Murray, thank you for watching the program. Scott Thorpe, Rob Neal, thank you for watching the program. Local television watching the program. Neal Williamson, your thoughts on this?

Well, it's part of the Virginia model. The Virginia model has school boards being tasked with spending money and boards of supervisors and city councils tasked with raising the money and allocating the money. It's different in some other localities in other states whereby school boards have taxing authority. I'm not going to say that's better or worse, but one of the things when people talk about quality of life in Albemarle or any other locality, schools always come up. And it is interesting that it feels like this time of year, Santa's wish list for their CIP request, because they don't have to deal with the reality of what the caps are, and that is by design.

That being said, there was a really uncomfortable discussion started to be had, pressed by one supervisor, B. Lapisto-Kirtley, asking about class size. Well, if you increase the class size by one or two students, what does that do? And the school board, not required by law to worry about costs, pushed back and said, what about the educational attainment and where is the best? Now, Supervisor Lapisto-Kirtley has an educator background, and I believe in the meeting she said that the sweet spot was around 33 or 22, I don't remember. 33 kids in one class? 22.

I think it was 22 kids in one classroom. And that got some pushback to saying, well, your special education classrooms can't have that. You have a lot of English-learning students, I think is the new proper terminology, that need more attention. And so the question becomes one of, okay, if you need to build 300 classrooms to have 18 students in a class, how many classrooms do you need if you have 22? And that seems to be arithmetic to me. It's a tough question because there's plenty of educational research out there that shows regardless of why a child would need extra support,

it doesn't matter why they need it. If they need it, then smaller class sizes helps those students. And for those students who don't need added supports, then class size starts to have a little bit less of an impact on how well they can grow and learn as a student so when you if you in a pragmatic terms of trying to pull that off and managing a school division how you go to a community now that may not need and say well your community can have larger class sizes and here's why and then this community because of supports now again not getting into any of the reasons that can be a difficult conversation to have. So you try to do it across the board policy-wise.

I know when I was on the school board, one year we had to make, what, $9 million in cuts, $8 or $9 million in cuts, and we had to go to class size partly to do it. And we tried to protect the lower grades in moving class size, so we did a little bit more of a class size bump in middle and high school trying to protect those lower uh and because we felt well that was the

from a grade level standpoint those were the levels where really having the smaller class size can have more advantage than than at the upper grade levels this is a tough conversation but it was a substantive conversation between the school board and the board of supervisors, perhaps one of the more substantive conversations that I've seen. Because you have to be careful because the board of supervisors can't spend the money. Or tell them how to. Or tell them how to spend the money. So you're always dancing around that issue. So I appreciated the supervisor, Lapista, who's currently bringing that out to the open in what could have been seen as kind of a powerful, awkward conversation. And another one that could have been seen as a powerful or awkward conversation was school board vice chair, Kate, at Cuff's comments on a new development coming down in Almar County.

I want to highlight some population numbers. The school division is projecting 4,350 or so additional students in Almar County public schools. So they're trying to plan for what they see will be essentially more demand on their infrastructure. I got to talking with a man that I trust that watches our 1230 show who spends a lot of time on the Weldon Cooper site, and he highlighted this. The total population of Albemarle County was up 30% over the last 20 years, while school enrollment was up just 12%, an indication that the folks that are moving to Albemarle County, perhaps due to the cost of living in Albemmore County, are more retirees or empty nesters as opposed to, or going to private schools, absolutely, or going to private schools,

where I will say, speaking from firsthand experience locally, the teacher-student ratio in those private schools is about one and a half, two to 16, a teacher and an aid and about 16 students in those private schools. Um, at least from a first grade standpoint. Um, now I want to throw, um, this topic to you guys, and then we'll get into, um, vice chair, uh, cuffs comments about, uh, the development and now Mara County net anywhere you want to go on that. And then I'll ask some pointed questions. You're, you're talking about her, the cringing about, anywhere you want to go on that, and then I'll ask some pointy questions. You're talking about her, the cringing about... Why don't I read it for the viewers and listeners, then I'll get out of your way. Kate Acuff, school board vice chair. Every time I drive down the road, I see another development and I cringe. Not because I'm not pleased that

our community is growing, but just that I know the impact on our schools. She said this on the record in a joint meeting. Yeah, I mean, I understand why she said it. I can appreciate that sentiment, and I would suspect that there are a lot of people living in our community that have a similar response, and not just in saying, I cringe what the impact is going to be on our schools, but on our roads and on the other services that the county has to deal with. So, I mean, growth is a reality, and I don't think any, I think there are, there is a segment of population out there that would like us to make policy decisions that would inhibit and stop growth. But I don't agree with that. I don't know how to do that one, and I think that if folks want to come to this community and live,

then I'm not somebody that's about building a wall around Elmer County and preventing them from coming here or starting to make policy decisions that's going to encourage them to live elsewhere. That's just, so if I announce at the beginning of the year that I'm going to be running for re-election, I make these kind of statements and take these kind of votes. I would take other votes, would that be fair? I would vote a different way if I was about trying to stop it from happening. Now, that doesn't mean that it's not incredibly difficult to make these decisions with the resources we have

to provide the services that folks expect and want, given that every time we have growth, regardless of the percentage, that it puts a harder and harder strain on our resources of how we're going to provide what we need to provide. That's schools, that's roads, that's police, that's fire, that's parks, that's recreation, that's housing, that's affordable housing, everything falls under the umbrella. So, yeah, all right, I could cringe, I guess,

but what I'm going to do is lean in and figure out how to do this, what we have available, and try to come up with the solutions that will attempt to solve some of the problems that we're having as best we can, given what we have. That's where I'm at. I'm reminded of a business person who once said, you know, business would be just fine if I didn't have so many damn clients. I mean, really, when you have new customers, Kate, you have new challenges. You also get more money from the feds, from the state, and from the locality. I think that it's the ebb and flow. We've seen the ebb and flow of school populations.

There are some, your numbers with regard to demographics coming in. Population growth. Population growth. I think the school population growth does mirror the lack of affordability. I might say that Jerry's a bit of a black swan, being someone who moved in and had children here, because most people who move in tend to have had their children, gotten done rearing them, and now they're ready to retire.

And I... Well, not always. I grew up here. Went to UVA, single, engaged, married father. Right. So the sandbagger from Williamsburg, um, is, is, is stating nativeness. But the, the reality is that many years ago, I wrote a piece and gotten a lot of trouble trouble with Peter Thompson from the Senior Center because I compared Central Virginia, specifically Albemarle and Charlottesville, to Santa Barbara, California. And I literally wrote the words, well, it's for nearly deads and newlyweds. And Peter took great umbrage at that.

And I don't blame him running the Senior Center, which was known as the senior center then. But I think that we're starting to see Santa Barbara in, it was 10 years ago, 15 years ago, 30,000 service workers commute in and out of Santa Barbara County every day because there's nowhere for them to live. Tell me, where does an HVAC tech live in Albemarle County? Yeah, I think that's definitely something that's happening now. Well, here's the additional part. We always talk about the growth coming into the community. We hardly ever talk about who we're pushing out.

So folks that have lived here that no longer can afford to live here. So if the population is continuing to climb, and we know that we have new people coming in, well, there's a certain amount of that climb in total population that's not happening because of who is pushed out. The economic report that we received a few months ago from the folks at Virginia Tech that works with our finance team says that the poverty levels in our area have declined. Poverty levels have declined. Well, does that mean that we made everybody richer on all ends of the spectrum? No.

That means that there are some folks at the bottom end of the socioeconomic structure that no longer live here, and they're not living in Fluvanna Green and Nelson either. We have pushed them not just out of this county, but out of the entire region. And that's something we have to grapple with and contend with, because there's only two answers. You're okay with that or you're not. And if you're okay with that, well, then that's certain policy decisions. or you're not and if you're okay with that well then that's certain policy decisions if you're not those are different policy decisions neil well that brings us to the the idea that um on tuesday night the planning

commission considered a uh proposal and we don't take positions on proposals, but this is identifying a policy whereby it was a landowner who wanted to create a manufactured housing park in southern Albemarle in the rural area where it is not efficient to deliver government services. And this would have provided 50 affordable units. That's not going to solve the world's problems, but it's 50 units. I know what the policy decision and the recommendation from staff was. I did not see today for the final vote, unfortunately. But this idea of manufactured housing as a housing type that opens,

gets you on the first rung of the housing opportunity ladder is something that Albemarle hasn't really embraced. And that's why staff was recommending against it. Was it fit? And I'm sorry, I don't know the project well enough yet. I mean, I don't, until it gets in the runway to us. I mean, we started to receive some emails on it. I know it was at the PC. But was it, what was the total development? Was it? It was 50 units total.

So all the units would be affordable. All the units and all the units would have been affordable. And, you know, the applicant indicated, you know, the rent for a space there was going to be about $500 a month. And if you, in this applicant's math, they had said, you know, you're looking at for a manufactured home, which are very nice homes, by the way, about $100,000 for that these days, which kind of blew my mind. I remembered 60 or 70, but I'm old. So it's $100,000 for that. But if you put that mortgage together along with the rent and stretched it out over, I think it was 30 years,

if you compare that to rent on Avon Street for a two-bedroom apartment, the rent would be about $1.1 or $1.2 million, and the expenditure for the home would be about $568,000. I may be off by a little bit there. That's my recollection. But the presentation is available at albemarle.org if you click on the Planning Commission website to see the presentation. The pushback, though, is that creates sprawl,

infrastructure strain, and is not where the development is supposed to happen. That's the pushback on that. It's not where the development is supposed to happen. And Lonnie, I'll get to your comments. Mr. Murray, I'll get to your comments here in a matter of moments. It's, you take what's happening in Crozet. Crozetians are screaming at the top of their lungs right now that we have water concerns.

We have fire and rescue concerns. We have congested roads. If there's an accident on 64 or on Ivy Road and folks are trying to drive to Crozet, it's creating hours of backup time. It's a completely different Crozet than it was 20 years ago. And I understand that Crozet is a designated growth area. So anyone who pursued a home ownership or chose to live in Crozet 20 years ago and is now banging their head about it, the growth, this is what you signed up for. Southern Albemarle in the rural area is not what they signed up for, though. I understand that. One of my favorite editorial cartoons has a split screen where it shows a bunch of neighbors having a barbecue in front of the sign,

phase two coming soon. And then on the other side it shows those same neighbors politicking against phase two of their own development. I think that there is a need for space. And there have been, this morning I posted on the Free Enterprise Forum blog a note, there's going to be a wake tomorrow morning at 10 a.m. for the death of 3,100 home sites. That's going to be at the Biscuit Run Park opening. So much hyperbole and metaphorical speech from Neil Weems, and I love it. This is Lottie Murray. I'll be there. For Supervisor Galloway. I think in this caveat, because we are talking about Albemarle County, we should highlight that Mr. Murray is a planning commissioner

here. A thoughtful planning commissioner. Yeah, he's good at his job. He's a great planning commissioner. He says the economic report Supervisor Galloway references also highlighted the big wealth gap and admiral between wage earners and those who get their income primarily from investments. That is a topic that deserves more discussion, encouraging us to discuss that on the show here. And it falls right under what I believe I was talking about. The folks at that bottom ladder who are pushing out are wage earners, and they're going somewhere else to not – who knows? They might still be working here. That's the part. We might have pushed them out from living here.

I think there's a very good chance they are still working here. It is very much the case. Twenty-five years ago, I was living in northern Virginia, and I would drive on Route 7, headed into town. I worked in Arlington, 13 miles from my home, and it took me an hour to commute. Traffic is relative. But if I went in early, you saw lots of West Virginia plates. Right.

That is where the working class was living to service Fairfax and Arlington. Which further suppresses the working class because time spent commuting and the costs spent with commuting basically shrinks the bottom line and take home pay for the working class. This really stood out to me. We had Joe Plantini and Mike Kochess on the show on Wednesday. Chief Kochess highlighted his police department, I think 112 to 125 officers. And he said of those 112, 125, three can afford to live in the city of Charlottesville, and he's one of them. Yeah, well, I mean, 126,000 is area median income.

80% of that's what, 100 grand? 124,200, according to HUD, 2023 number. So 80% AMI is about 100 grand. So then that puts you 50 is what 60 some. So what's the starting salary for a police officer in Charlottesville these days? Probably 50 some. I don't know that number off the top of my head. I want to say that it's

in the 60s right now. So right now the starting one puts you at 50% AMI. So this is when we start talking affordable housing issues and people are like you know all of the policies have pushed 80% AMI. We're trying to get to 60. But hear that. For a first-year police officer in Albemarle, Charlottesville, they're not even at 50 percent of the area median income for their starting salary. And none of our, well, not none, but most of any movement we can try to make on affordable housing is

projecting at the 80% mark, which is $100,000. He's exactly right. I will highlight that the median income is a family household income that does take into effect two wage earners, but Supervisor Galloway does make a very good point. So if you had two officers, you'd still be at 80%. There you go. That's the follow-up point from Supervisor Galloway right there. Neil Williamson is going deep into the binder for his comments here. And Planning Commissioner Murray encouraging us to have this discussion about the economic report that Supervisor Galloway referenced. And before we go there, real quick, this was Justin Schimpf. Is that who brought that development forward? It's so hard to have. It's never really been discussed, manufactured homes or anything like that at the board level.

So until someone brings a development like that forward, you're not going to have the discussion, right? I mean, we could theoretically or I guess have it as a policy. It's snuck in here and there. So, I mean, I appreciate him bringing the development forward because it forces the planning commissioners and us to deal with it and contend with it and discuss it so the people know where we're at. Justin Schimpf, the wizard of new development. Justin is an engineer. He owns Schimpf Engineering. And he was complimented by Karen Firehawk, I want to say, about eight or ten months ago when he brought it forward.

And just because he pushes the envelope with innovative solutions. And, you know, I love people that push the envelope with innovative solutions. He certainly does. I like people that hear us say, well, we need this to happen before we can discuss it. And you have folks that are willing to bring it forward to force the discussion. I love that. That's great because I, like like brought forth a resolution of intent in February of this year

and the board endorsed it 6-0, the idea of allowing residential and commercial in office. And I've heard crickets since then. Well, I mean, there's a reason for that. We know the reason for that. Oh, the staff

can't get to it. They're busy. They're very busy. Other comments are coming in. You pulled out notes. Is this in reference to Planning Commissioner Murray's request? It's actually a part of that poem that I read in the bleak mid-comp plan where we were discussing the idea of public safety workers. Enough of the NIMBY reactions worshipped day and night.

A few new colors on the map could give homes for folks to stay. Enough for teachers, firefighters, and police who make our community thrive, the waiters and the clerks, to live among us rather than drive. I encourage you to go ahead and go to the Free Enterprise Forum website to get the whole thing. In the bleak mid-comp plan. Not exactly a jolly tomb. We've seen a number, for example, in the F&B category, restaurants close. Jax's just announced it's closing in Crozet.

Moose's, Blue Moon Diner, Mel's Cafe, Lumpkins, to name a few. And they close for a variety of reasons, but you speak to any restaurateur, and the headwinds with finding labor in this market are one of the first things they will highlight. And they also have said that because the labor is so short and lacking of supply, they're having to pay more for said labor, which is increasing expensive, which is passed along to the customer and increased menu prices. Comments are coming in quickly. Supervisor Pruitt watching the program right now as well. Supervisor Galloway, it's not an easy fix. And I know in some ways you guys are

stuck between a rock and a hard place here because a large portion of the community, I would say a majority of the community is not necessarily anti-development, but a majority of the community is prioritizing infrastructure ahead of development. And one of those items I think is the schools for me, especially as a father of two young boys, many of the public schools have what they call learning villages. When I was growing up, those were called trailers, where the kids were learning in, not villages. And parents get frustrated with that. They get frustrated with class size. And some parents are now pointing to the school system and test scores and results.

And in some cases that have struggled and are pointing to the overpopulation of schools as a result of that struggle. How do you navigate that dynamic of development, infrastructure, and what the populace wants? Well, the current state of affairs, and it's just truth. Everybody knows it to be truth, those on the school board and those on the board of supervisors. We put ourselves into a hole 15, 18 years ago by really just stopping all CIP from 2009 on. We cut back on Greer's expansion.

And gave a tax cut. And gave a, what was it? It was a two-penny tax cut. So we really, during that time, in hindsight's always you can go back and make commentary. But if we would have continued doing CIP projects, I'm not saying we wouldn't be in the situation we're in, but we'd be in a better situation now. And it could have meant doing it, especially learning the lessons of supply, chain issues, inflation, et cetera. But what would that have done to our local economy at the time that was struggling? Well, if we would have been doing some construction projects when nobody was

doing them, we could have been putting people to work and had a little bit of a different outcome maybe here locally. And Charlottesville is somewhat insulated when national things go bad. Based on the economic reports that we've received over the years, you see a corollary trend, but a less, the lows are much lower lows are much higher than the statewide lows. Because the University of Virginia, the $1 billion yearly impact from tourism,

I think it was $956 million to be exact. And the Defense Department. And then the Defense Department, $1.3 billion. So the needs specific to the school division, and you could have this conversation about our roads and infrastructure and sidewalks and other. I keep kicking you under the table, Neil, sir. That I mean, all of that can be because those other items were not really being done at that time either. So not only is it a tough thing to be dealing with if we hadn't done that, but we did.

So now we're trying to dig up out of that hole. So, I mean, we're building two in the next five years, we've got two brand new elementary schools planned. And we have the school division decided back in what, 16, 17, to do the high school center model, as the way that they were going to expand high school education that was done for educational purposes. Not just to say, I mean, you know, a comprehensive high school at the time would have cost about $150 million to build. Kate pointed out, Kate Acuff pointed out that it would probably be about $200 plus million these days.

Fluvana learned what it was to build a new high school. So they decided to do this center model. So we're building a new center now at Albemarle as well. So we are attempting, and those are infrastructure items and trying to help the population issues that the school division are handling, one in the south, one up in the north. Can we do all of them at one time? No, you just can't. But, you know, if you would have told me six, seven years ago, if you were a school proponent coming to me and going, you know, you're running for board of supervisors, I want you to build two elementary schools and

a high school center in the next five years, that's probably not going to happen. But here we are. We've got the capacity into the CIP. We recognize the need and the request, and we've got them slated to do that. Now it's going to be we're going to have to continue to do that for a while. It's just not going to be we can't build eight new schools all at once. So let me ask Ned a question because I'm doing research on this right now and I think the public should know. This week, because it's December and so we had our meeting, the board had their meeting early, the Albemarle Board, and you could have known this if you follow me on Twitter,

Albemarle Board of Supervisors learned their unassigned fund balance is $89,625,129. Some of these are already designated but not assigned. Put in perspective unassigned fund balance first. Sure. put put in perspective unassigned fund balance first sure the idea of an unassigned fund balance is that well actually i'll let ned do that because he's the elected official well he's quoting the accounting piece of this oh sorry quoting from the audit was accounting versus budgeting is are two very different things so albemarle does right from the top from policy uh we have our 10 reserve uh and that's basically like the top from policy. We have our 10% reserve. And that's basically like the 10% reserve.

The pandemic would have been a good example of why that exists. So what we were able to do in the count, we didn't know federal funds were going to be coming. So our budget did a complete turn in that pandemic time. And we actually were able to manage it without even necessarily having to get to that 10 million because we just put the brakes on to a screeching halt, then started to learn that federal funds were going to be coming. So we were able to use funds locally. Then when the federal funds came available, that backfilled the local funds. But that, like if a hurricane came through, we saw what happened in North Carolina for a hurricane. Disastrous type stuff like that comes through. Right off your 10% is your kind of your rainy day disaster fund. And that's 10% of the operational budget. Then we have a 2% stabilization reserve and a 1% board reserve.

And those are specifically set aside for board strategic type things so that we can have some cushion and some flexibility to quickly maneuver if we need it in a given fiscal year. So right away, that 13% is more than half of that monies. Now, some of that monies is monies that was needed to be reallocated from the prior year to the current year. So there are some accounting things there that it's not really surplus in the way that you could think of surplus funds. Then there is some surplus in there. Surplus both from the previous year that we knew that we used, that we were going to say we're going to use the one-time monies for the following fiscal budget, which we did in our budget process. So that money's lumped in there. I think last year that might have been in the six, seven million dollar range, if I'm remembering right. Then you actually have surplus, which is, all right, we put in the new,

the cars and the real property, and that backtracks in the previous year. So now that money has to be re-put into the current year. And if your expenses are lower than you projected, and your revenues are higher than you projected, then that's going to create surplus. And to Neil, he, and I just remember in past articles, I don't recall Albemarle ever being told we had excess funds like he did with the Green County's board this past time. But he said they had excess funds and that that's a good approach to budgeting, which it is. So we have excess funds. And in a year where you don't have excess funds, I'd be more concerned about that. I'd never want to see a negative. I'd rather have some of the excess because we can then try to tighten up the following year what our projections are.

My first year on the board, Mr. Richardson was in his first year as county executive, and what we started to do that year, this would have been 2018 the budget cycle for the following year's budget albemarle used to only update the revenue projections in december and then do all of their budget which didn't even end till what almost may with it never really doing any new revenue projections or cost analysis when mr richardson came in in March, we redid the budget calculation to rehone or refocus what the revenue projections would be and the cost expectations would be. And it created, at the time, the school division needed about $500,000 they didn't have in their request. They had a little bit of a gap. And just that projection going, no, we're comfortable, even still in a little bit of a conservative way looking at what those projections are,

we're comfortable with saying, let's tighten up what we think is going to come in and what we think these expenses are, and that created a little bit of headroom to be able to put into an operating budget. That's important because if you don't do that, then that $500,000 or $1 million or whatever falls into surplus, and then how that gets used the next year per policy or per our direction is it's only going to be used for one-time monies. Well, that 500 grand that year got to go to, could have been teachers.

It could have been something that was an ongoing fund. So that retuning, and they have done that every year since, which I'm very pleased about, allows us to try to tighten up as best we can so that we're not just leaving money sitting off to the side that will turn into surplus that will then turn into one-time money. That was long-winded. That was a great explanation. Are those interest-bearing accounts?

I hope to gather interest-bearing accounts. There's probably one in there that is, but it's not, no, not, no. So is it $89 million? It's $69 million. $69 million that's generating no interest? But the 10% is the biggest chunk of that. But if you back out doing cocktail napkin math, I still count $30 million sitting on the table. Well, that's real money.

But if you go to the budget, it's not that. It's going to end up probably. I mean, I haven't seen it. We'll see it when the budget, it's not that. It's going to end up probably, I mean, I haven't seen it. We'll see it when the budget comes out. We'll see what the true surplus funds are that have not been assigned or used. And then you'll be able to see very clearly the 10%, the 2% stabilization, the 1% board reserve. So that will all be there. And that is purposely not assigned.

And then we'll be able to see what the true surplus is because we protect those other pieces. And the accounting, the CAFR, the comprehensive audit, does not highlight it in those ways because it's an audit report. The budget will dictate so that the community can look at this and go, wait a minute. All this stuff the deal is talking about, where is this going? Well, it will be very well defined. And on page 44 of your financial procedures manual, it indicates that any excess at the end of the year that is beyond the 10% for operational use, the 2% for the supervisor slush fund, I mean the rate stabilization fund, and the 1% for the slush fund.

I don't think people knew that one. Ned and I got it. But I don't think people knew that one was a joke right there. There's no supervisor slush fund. It's the supervisor's directed fund. Call it what you will. But that is real money and we need to be paying attention to it. I think so too. I mean, the businessman in me immediately bristled a little bit that $30 billion, what's the number that's sitting in the account? $69 million is the excess of unassigned as reported from the audit that was fully endorsed audit without any qualification. The businessman in me is like, that money is actually losing value if it's not earning interest, if it's just sitting in a bank account doing nothing. It's not keeping pace with anything that's going on in the world.

That's just the businessman in me talking here. The point was the financial policy, again, page 44, indicates that anything left over after those would roll over to the capital fund is what it says in your policy document or anything else the Board of Supervisors wants. That's right. And we've done that. Last year, we put some in CIP. We put some cash in there. The split that went to the school division, they also put some cash into the CIP, which really helps, I mean, building some capacity in your capital improvement plan.

You know, the Board Stabilization Reserve that you refer to as a slush fund, do you remember why we set that up? Why don't you enlighten me? You don't remember? I do, but go ahead. I like that he pushed back on you right there. There are things that happen in the community where you want to, and I was there. I was the one pushing to have this type of reserve set up.

And it's not, we have other reserves for emergency type things. But one complaint often lodged against local governments are they can't pivot, they can't react quickly, it's very difficult that if something comes up that would fall in line with our strategic plan that we had not planned for or budgeted for specifically, that it's very hard to react to that. And that stabilization reserve is exactly set up for that so that if if perhaps something comes up that you is a dire need in the community that you didn't think about and you want to be able to react to it we can go to that reserve fund specifically it is tied to strategic planned initiatives so that folks in the community can go well it's not just anything that the board

of supervisors desires to do. It is tied to the strategic plan, but it could give us the ability to react and have a fund source right away to go to that in an emergency in the sense of if something dire happened in the community that you wanted to quickly be able to react to. Or maybe it's an economic development investment, or maybe it's a housing investment of some sort. It's only been in existence for, I'm trying to, I don't remember the year now that we put it in, but I think it's only been in existence for three or four years. So what's your total budget annually? Well, it's more than, it's less than the current CIP request that we received. About a half a billion dollars. And so 3% of a half a billion dollars is what, math whiz?

3% of a half a billion dollars is what, 315 million? So you have $15 million at your disposal for these 2% and 1%. Well, the 1% is the one that I was specifically talking about. So that would be $7 million. Yes, the 2% was specific to, because that's a financial stability reserve. So the 1%, so it's $7 million that you have in that, whatever fund you want to call it. We call it our board stabilization reserve. I think that's a good name.

That is a word salad. I don't think slush fund is a good representation of what that is. Do they have that in Greene County? I didn't write that report. What do they do. Do they have that in Greene County? I didn't write that report. What do they do with their excess funds up in Greene County? I believe they're going to give some of the money back and put some of it into other

expenditures is one supervisor's proposal, but feel free to read about it at the Free Enterprise Forum. Free Enterprise Forum. I'm on the website every day. We are at the 55-minute marker here. I would love to get Supervisor Galloway's update on what happened with transit and the authority. This was on the agenda, was it? Yeah, it was great.

This past meeting. Two days ago, we voted to form the Charlotte-Swabmar Transit Authority, or Regional Transit Authority, CARTA. That's the first step to be able to do what we need to do to form the authority. And then having the authority formed will allow us to start I mean the next steps will have to put a governing board together and structure together hopefully start building out the other partners that we want to have part of it Nelson Louisa flu Vanna and green can be members of it but it's all been discussed initially that Charlottesville Albemarle would be the initial founding members to get this up and going and then start to see how it goes

but this this is a big deal here regional transit authority I made the comment at the board meeting the other day back in when I was running for the first term on the supervisors and supervisor McKeel was also running I remember in in a candidate forum, although we didn't have opponents, we were invited to one candidate forum because all the other candidate forums said, well, you don't have opponents. We don't really care what you have to say. But in that one, we went out, and I remember talking about regional transit authority, and I remember myself sitting there thinking, well, this, I don't know,

this may not happen in my time. But here it is. It's seven years later, and it is formed now, and it is moving forward. And with some of the other really cool things going on in transit right now, MicroCat, the fastest growing transit project in the state of Virginia is MicroCat, which was reported by Garland Williams to my community advisory committee last week and via or via the company that manages it they said it is the fastest growing project they have managed nationwide in the last three years so micro cats taken off so the regional transit authority is about forming a new type of regional approach and partnership to delivering transit services, not just to Charlottesville, not just Albemarle, not just to UVA, but putting everybody under one umbrella

and trying to have not just an efficient, well-working system, but one that works for our area, meaning not just the urban areas, but also our urban ring, also our rural areas, and let's figure this out, plus the University of Virginia. This is a very big deal. I had this conversation a couple years ago with Ted Reek, who was the CEO of Jaunt for a couple years. Now, interestingly, the Glenmore lover is an aspiring novelist, Ted Reek is. And we talked about unifying all the splintered transportation organizations under one umbrella, getting the University of Virginia at the table and the counties in the Nelson, Flavana, Orange, like you mentioned, because a lot of the folks that need the transportation

have been pushed to the outer counties. And putting it under one umbrella, making the system vertically integrated more efficient and more consistent with its route running. And he said that would go a big step into helping solve affordability concerns with those that are living on the cusp of not having affordability or being pushed out of the area. So this is a really big deal that I think is flying under the radar and maybe was lost a bit in the media cycle because it happened around the holidays

and in budget season when some other storylines were going. But this is a big deal. How do you get the University of Virginia at the table? Well, they have, I mean, they've been discussing with us. We've done two different groups to Champaign-Urbana to learn about their transit system and specifically about hydrogen-powered buses. And they had representation. Colette Sheehy, the vice president, attended on that last trip along with their transit director. That was, again, city officials and county officials, again, or staff and some electeds. And Ms. Jacobs, the executive director of TJPDC, went. So seeing a place that is very much a university town but then also has more than one, I mean, it's what?

Champaign is a city, Urbana is a city. Then there's the county that surrounds, so it's at least three jurisdictions. It might even be a fourth one in there. But to go somewhere that is very similar in population size, that's not this huge city but has a lot of rural around it,'s very similar so it's a it's a great system to go learn from so yeah university of virginia has said they're interested in having the conversation i think all three entities albemarle charlton uva see the value add not just for the folks that could what the potential could be for folks to have a better quality of life

without having to get into a car, but also understand that this type of entity is going to help us bring in additional resources that takes the strain off of local dollars to be able to provide this service to everybody. This is an interesting comment that's come in here. I love when you guys come on the show. The engagement's significant. He highlights that he's speaking here as a citizen and not as an appointed official. This is from Mr. Murray. He says, I'm speaking as a citizen here. If we want to achieve the density we want in development areas, I think

it makes sense to strategically invest in infrastructure that can unlock that potential, particularly for underperforming properties with potential for redevelopment. When you look from the space at 29, you see acres and acres of empty parking lots doing nothing for nobody. Robust incentives like TIFs could make development areas more livable. Compact development saves taxpayer money. I've heard it cited that it costs one-third of sprawl, compact development. And here's a perfect segue for Neil Williamson to highlight his push for the conversion of shopping centers to residential housing. Well, I've often thought, and we once had an economic development director

in Albemarle that did this kind of work about parking decks and created... Who was that? That would be Roger... Roger Johnson? ...Johnson. Yeah, good guy and he um and one of the things that could spur such development if you allowed residential and commercial would be to have the locality pay for the parking deck have it free public parking

in your development corridor and the landowner would have to donate the land but the the tenants could park there for free well then all of a sudden you freed up a lot of asphalt that could be redeveloped now that's an innovative idea that isn't really being talked about it is an expensive idea very expensive um but if you want to have dense development, you need to grow up, not out. And right now, the parking requirements, as well as the market, are not embracing structures over six stories. We have time for some closing thoughts here. I want to highlight this. I think you are going to run Supervisor Galloway.

I certainly hope you do. I think you've done fantastic work for Elmar County. Appreciate that. I've been fortunate to have you in your seat for two terms, and I think you'll get a lot done, even more done in the third term. I appreciate the folks that are asking questions. I hate using acronyms. Tax increment financing, for those that are putting in the feed hate using acronyms. Tax increment financing for those

that are putting in the feed is what a TIF is. Some closing thoughts for Supervisor Galloway. Well, you know, we have a small area plan in an area that allows for height, that the county has said that we would invest in public spaces. Now, to your point, we've not had that. You're right. We've not had that conversation about the parking garage in that area. It doesn't mean we couldn't or wouldn't, but we put the overlay in, and we made it optional. It takes people now trying to execute under it. We put a form-based code in there.

We've tried to do it. Without a willing property owner. So folks have to come in and do that. And I appreciate Mr. Murray's point, owner so folks have to come in and do that and i appreciate mr murray's point but sometimes what you have to ask well why would a site sit not developed or redeveloped for a long time well sometimes he made the comment well that's not doing anything for anyone could be for the property owner sitting there like that there are ways to let things languish that sometimes is better for your bottom line than redeveloping it. This is where I go, Dewberry Hotel.

So, you know, that is a reality. And local government, what are we going to do? We can't go in and force their hand, per se. Neither could Charlottesville. So you have to wait for something to happen on that. Is the county open to those conversations? Yeah, yes. And the small area plan was our attempt to even take that openness, or us just saying so, and taking it a step further.

Now we have to see it come forward. I'm really going to be curious what happens after the Home Depot opens, since Home Depot owes the rest of that property. What are they going to do with that? Because that could be a significant portion of that quadrant. And there's one other project that I think is talking to us about trying to figure out how to work in that too that's going forward or trying to move forward on Raya Road. Home Depot is going to be one of the most important and critical. I mean, they're developing here in Albemarle County with this project.

I mean, they're reimagining one of the most critical corridors of Albemarle County right now. I mean, and the box store is one thing. But, yeah, whatmoro county right now i mean in the box store is one thing but yeah what do they do red lobster the parking lot that entire gateway that's right so you know in terms of closing thoughts the board understands there is so much that that folks get concerned about when we're talking about growth. Infrastructure, I mean, the transportation, the schools, all of that, not to mention what kind of constraint it puts on water quality and water usage and environmental protections and things like that.

So there's a whole lot of concerns out there. The supervisors are aware of those. I think a lot of times you think your local government's not listening, but we are, and we are attempting to, with what we have at our disposal, to address those needs and those concerns. Infrastructure, to do it ahead of development, if we're talking roads, that just doesn't work that way in the state. The state doesn't, the way they score smart scale is with development that's already happened or decisions have been made on. So it's almost impossible to try to do road projects before development. You could do it with schools, but when you're behind and in a deep hole, you've got to take what you have available and fix the current needs as opposed to trying to get in

front of the what could be a need five ten years down the road so it's it is a tough conundrum but i always tell folks i've said it before in this show right budget's coming that's when you need to pay attention to us that's well you should pay attention to us all the time um neil does but we how what we say what we a politician anytime, that's when you have to compare the words coming out of our mouth to the votes we take at budget. Because that budget document and how we program those funds is the most cleanest way for a constituent or voter to see what our true priorities are. To see where the rubber meets the road.

Absolutely. Neil Williamson, the show is yours, my friend. Well, first and foremost, I want to wish everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy Holiday season. I do hope that Supervisor Galloway runs, and he knows I mean this in the best intent. I also hope he has an opponent because he could use one. It sharpens the saw. And competitive races make better politicians and better elected officials. Do you think we see there's three spots on the board. What is it? Samuel, Miller District,

Jack Jewett, and Rio. Do we see competitive races of any kind there? My prognostication on that is if we look at prior cases, folks, that have been there, the answer is probably no. And that's disappointing for a community our size with the diversity of opinions that I know he gets in his e-mail box. There should be someone that feels compelled to put forth their name. And it may be that we expect too much of our supervisors. I firmly believe that there are so many committees. It is more than a full-time job, and they are not really well compensated.

I go back to Dennis Rooker who said, where are the living wage people today when they were talking about compensation for supervisors. That being said, I hope to see competitive races across our footprint. It makes for better engagement and we can discuss the issues better. and Ned gets invited to more candidate forums. It does sharpen the saw. I invite, you know, I've run both competitive races and non-competitive races. You campaign either way, but how you campaign is definitely different in a non-competitive race versus a competitive race. So you always, always plan. I have never taken it for granted.

You always, that's why I have never taken it for granted. That's why I say at the beginning, I'm going through the process right now of planning. Well, okay, if there's opposition out there, what would that be? So you plan for opposition regardless. So you don't plan for it, I guess, if you're not going to run. Ned Galloway, Neil Williamson, guys. Real talk with Keith Smith. Keith Smith, back in January, he's on a beach in the Caribbean right now

drinking a Mai Tai or probably riding his bike frankly, right now this show is fantastic, for those that are asking and I see a bunch of you are, the show will archive in its total form on iloveseville.com and wherever you get your social media and podcasting

content, I mean it's on all the platforms Judah Wickauer is behind the camera total form on ilovecevil.com and wherever you get your social media and podcasting content. I mean, it's on all the platforms. Judah Wickauer is behind the camera. Thank you, Judah, for helping us run the show smoothly. Support the Free Enterprise Forum and get ready for 2025. It's going to be a busy year with elections, which frankly is a content creator's dream right there.

The I Love Seville show guys up in one hour and five minutes. Take care. Excellent work, gentlemen. He's going to tell us when the mics and cameras are off. Good to ask you what you're having. The I Love Seville show guys up in one hour and five minutes Take care Thank you.