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CPPC 03-12-07 Meeting AgendaCOUNTY of FREDERICK Department of Planning and Development 540/665-5651 FAX: 540/665-6395 TO: Comprehensive Plans and Programs Subcommittee (CPPS) FROM: Michael T. Ruddy, AICP, Deputy Director RE: March 12, 2007 Meeting and Agenda DATE: March 5, 2007 The Frederick County Comprehensive Plans and Programs Subcommittee (CPPS) will be meeting on Monday, March 12, 2007 at 7:30 p.m. in the Board of Supervisor's Room of the County Administration Building, 107 North Kent Street, Winchester, Virginia. The CPPS will discuss the following agenda items: AGENDA 1) Discussion of Subdivision Streets. Staff is seeking additional input from the CPPS regarding the use of public or private streets within the community. A continuation of the discussion of this issue is attached for your information. 2) Other Access is limited during the evening hours. Therefore, it will be necessary to enter the building through the back double doors of the Board of Supervisors Room, located in the rear of the new addition of the County building. I would encourage committee members and interested citizens to park in the County parking lot located in the rear of the building and follow the sidewalk to the back double doors of the Board Room. MTR/bad 107 North Kent Street, Suite 202 • Winchester, Virginia 22601-5000 Item #1: Discussion of Public and Private Subdivision Street Requirements. This is a continuation of the discission held by the CPPS at their February meeting. During the Frederick County Planning Commission Retreat held on February 24, 2007, members of the Board of Supervisors provided additional guidance regarding this issue. It was clearly the Board's desire to evaluate how this proposal could be accomplished should the County ultimately believe such a program should be implemented. Staff is currently coordinating a meeting between representatives from the CPPS, DRRS, Transportation Committee, and Public Works Committee to establish a joint effort to address this issue. Monday, March 26th, at 9:00 a.m., in conjunction with the regularly scheduled Transportation Committee meeting, has been identified as a potential meeting time. Staff will also be coordinating with representatives from Fire and Rescue and Frederick County Public Schools. A further evaluation of this issue and the selection of representatives from the CPPS is desired. Previously, the Board of Supervisors at its meeting on January 10, 2007 provided direction to the Comprehensive Plans and Programs Subcommittee and Planning Commission to study and make a recommendation to the Board regarding a change to the Frederick County Code to require subdivision streets not to be maintained by VDOT; however, the streets should be built to State standards. The Board of Supervisors discussion and motion is provided at the end of this report. Current Policy The Frederick County Subdivision Ordinance requires that all lots abut and have direct access to a public street or right-of-way dedicated for maintenance by the Virginia Department of Transportation. The vast majority of new lots created in Frederick County are created consistent with this policy. Exceptions to this policy include multifamily, single family attached, and single family small lot housing types which may abut private roads, parking lots, or access easements, and Minor Rural Subdivisions. In the case of proffered age restricted communities, the Board of Supervisors may provide a waiver to the public street requirement. However, the private street must meet or exceed VDOT Standards. Virginia is a state that manages and maintains the maintenance and operation of local streets. Therefore, in Frederick County, VDOT maintains the local streets. VDOT's Subdivision Street Requirements (SSRs) establishes the criteria governing VDOT's acceptance of new roads. Each locality is responsible for establishing new streets and roads within its jurisdiction, including those that VDOT will maintain. These new streets are usually built through the efforts of land developers. To qualify for VDOT acceptance, new streets must: - Be available for unrestricted public use, - Provide public service sufficient to warrant maintenance at public expense, - Be located on right-of-way that is dedicated to public use; and - Have been fully and properly constructed to a standard adequate to sustain the traffic volume anticipated when the land served is fully developed. Historic Perspective Prior to the requirement for all lots to have access to state maintained roads, many lots in Frederick County were provided access via private easements, which in many cases were not improved to any particular standard. Frederick County historically had little involvement in the ongoing maintenance of the streets or their administration. Most of the lots and access roads were rural in character with the private property owners and users being responsible for their maintenance. The County's involvement was limited and consisted of responding to citizen concerns regarding access to their homes. Frederick County's most significant involvement with roads occurred in Shawneeland. The Shawneeland Sanitary District was created in response to a variety of public health, safety, and welfare issues which were occurring in Shawneeland. As a result, the Shawneeland Sanitary District has a program for improving and maintaining roads in Shawneeland. Policy alternatives In lieu of the current system of constructing and maintaining residential subdivision streets, two alternatives are available for consideration; l) Public maintenance of subdivision streets by County, and 2) Private maintenance of subdivision streets by Home/Property Owners Associations. The Board's discussion sought to transfer this responsibility to Home Owners Associations. Issues for discussion In general, public street systems, in particular residential streets, are designed to balance considerations of safety and efficiency, cost effectiveness, livability, and community attractiveness. The entire community benefits from street improvements that are functionally adequate, durable, and cost effective. Current County and State policies seek to achieve this. Any future policies should seek to ensure this position is maintained or enhanced. Regardless of the approach taken by the County, a significant increase in the County's transportation and infrastructure construction and maintenance capabilities would be needed to effectively administer a road program. Such a change in policy would in essence transfer many of the roles and responsibilities currently provided by VDOT to the County. Frederick County Public Works Department has expressed that this would include the adoption of road standards, the addition of personnel, and potentially the acquisition of equipment. An alternative would be to contract for the same. Overall, the fiscal responsibility for such programs would also need to be increased. A significant consideration of the public maintenance of the streets by the County is the current status of Frederick County's Stormwater Management Permitting. The Frederick County Public Works Department has advised that the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) recently ruled that Frederick County does not have to obtain a Phase II stormwater discharge permit. Should the County assume responsibility for the roads within the County and their associated drainage infrastructure, Frederick County would be required to participate in this expensive stormwater program. The application of a Phase II permit to Frederick County would require a major investment from the County. The private maintenance of subdivision streets by Home/Property Owners Associations, which the Board's discussion sought to achieve, would be a major policy change for the County. The function of Home Owners or Property Owners Associations should be a significant consideration when evaluating requiring private streets for all development in the County. Such a responsibility would be beyond the scope of such an organization's customary duty. Recent experiences throughout the County would indicate that Homeowners Associations do not typically function effectively. Therefore, to require such associations to be responsible for privately maintaining a public street system would require a great deal of consideration and, ultimately, oversight. The transfer of all public streets over to the ownership and control of the Property Owners Associations of Subdivisions within which the Public Streets are located would appear to have many important considerations for the County and the Community. Such considerations include but are not limited to the following: - Maintaining the Public Health, Safety, and Welfare of the residents of the Subdivision and the Community. - Public Access. - Emergency responsiveness. - Maintaining property values and quality communities. - Increase the financial responsibility of the residents of the Subdivision and Community in their on-going maintenance of the public road system. - Long term life cycle costs of road programs_ - Equitable distribution of taxation revenues. - Potential source of conflict between the County and residents. - Additional fiscal impacts to County. An alternate view of the proposal might suggest that transferring the responsibility for Subdivision Streets to the County or a Private Home Owners Association may provide additional flexibility in the design of the streets beyond that which is presently afforded by the State. However, this point is immaterial if the private streets have to meet VDOT Standards. Such a proposal would appear to reduce the financial responsibility of the State in their on-going maintenance of the State's road system. Virginia State Legislature Current discussion at the State level related to this issue was in response to a bill that included provisions for VDOT no longer accepting roads into the State System. This is a transportation issue with budgetary constraints, the on-going restructuring of VDOT, and the financing of transportation improvements within the State having a bearing on the bill's consideration. RB3202 was ultimately approved by the State Legislature. Final resolution at the State level is pending. VACO and VAPA's positions were generally opposed to this road reversion legislation based upon the transfer of this responsibility from the State to the Localities without a revenue source and the use of general funds for transportation. Board of Supervisors discussion and motion (01/10/07 Supervisor Dove stated that the Board approved resolutions tonight (1/10/07) dedicating roads to VDOT, which put more burden on the State to maintain subdivision streets. He would like to make a change in Frederick County that all subdivision streets would be maintained by the Homeowners' Association. He went on to say that if the Board does not do this then they will be forced to when the State mandates it. Upon a motion by Supervisor Dove, seconded by Vice - Chairman Fisher, the Board unanimously directed the Comprehensive Plans and Programs Subcommittee and the Planning Commission to study and make a recommendation to the Board. Chairman Shickle stated that this suggestion should go to committee because it needs to be discussed. Supervisor DeHaven stated that he did not oppose discussion because there were a lot of issues associated with this proposal that needed to be discussed Supervisor Van Osten stated that it was reasonable to look at this, but she also had interest in waiting to see what comes out of the State. Supervisor Ewing stated this proposal was worth studying. Supervisor Lemieux stated that his only concern was the homeowners' associations trying to fund this maintenance because they often do not have the cash to pay for these types of expenses. CPPS Update. The CPPS considered this item at their February 12, 2007 meeting. The CPPS discussion was thorough and additional input was received at the meeting from representative of the Blue Ridge Association of Realtors. The CPPS unanimously recommended that no change be made to the County's current policy. The CPPS expressly stated that the responsibility and maintenance of streets should not be the responsibility of Homeowners Associations. A summary of the CPPS's comments is provided. CPPS Comments (02/12/07) The CPPS discussed the possibility of private street maintenance for all new roads created in the County with the understanding that existing state roads would remain state roads. The following points were made regarding this shift: In favor of turning to private maintenance: • Faster response time on road issues when owned privately verses owned by the state. • HOA owned/operated roads don't result in an increase in taxes for county residents. Against turning to private maintenance: • School Buses will not service private roads — School system expressed significant concern. • Private roads will more than likely lead to gated communities which demolish previous attempts at interparcel connectors during rezoning applications. • Public access is a concern. • HOAs in Frederick County have typically been unsuccessful at managing even small projects within their development, how can they maintain something as important as roads? If given to the HOAs, a strong oversight committee will be necessary to ensure that work is done and the associations don't just default. • Who is responsible if the HOAs default? • "HOA owned roads will result in total anarchy for the county", "HOA owned roads are inefficient to maintain." • HOAs will need to charge high dues/fees in order to compensate for road maintenance which could create an undesirable living environment in new developments — individual property owners are not going to want to pay $10,000 HOA dues • The development community would be opposed to the change. Change would create uncertainty in the development process and reduce value in projects. • VDOT has experience maintaining roads and recognizing problems requiring immediate attention • Currently, the school's transportation division notifies VDOT if they see issues or problems (potholes, signs down, etc). VDOT has been very cooperative with the school board in quickly fixing these issues. The schools won't be able to identify issues like these on private streets if they don't service them. Comments from representatives from the Blue Ridge Association of Realtors: • HOA maintained roads means a decrease or total lack of affordable housing options, creation of gated communities or HOA's with higher dues means the depletion of affordable housing • The BRAR is totally against a move towards HOA owned/operated roads • This option creates undesirable subdivisions due to the fact that schools won't service the roads and the severe increase in HOA fees • Currently, HOA contact information is nearly impossible to keep up to date for perspective home buyers, members of the board for HOAs don't return phone calls on small problems — how will residents get in touch with them over issues like roads? • Private roads reduces growth due to higher fees • Who will enforce speeding and road safety on private roads, private safety officers? • Increased chance of involving civil liberties groups, activists, political groups, etc if county moves towards private roads. A motion was made by Gary Oates to keep the current policy regarding roads in Frederick County. The motion was seconded by George Kriz and passed unanimously by the CPPS.