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HomeMy Public PortalAbout2024_tcwsmin0108Council Work Session January 8, 2024 Council Chamber, 25 West Market Street, Leesburg, Virginia, 7:00 p.m. Mayor Kelly Burk presiding. Council Members Present: Ara Bagdasarian, Todd Cimino -Johnson, Zach Cummings, Kari Nacy (arrived at 7:07 p.m.), Vice Mayor Neil Steinberg, and Mayor Kelly Burk. Council Members Absent: Patrick Wilt. Staff Present: Town Manager Kaj Dentler, Town Attorney Christopher Spera, Deputy Town Manager Keith Markel, Director of Finance and Administrative Services Clark Case, Director of Utilities Amy Wyks, Director of Public Works and Capital Projects Renee LaFollette, Leesburg Police Lieutenant Chris Vogel, Deputy Director of Utilities Brian Stone, Assistant Director of Utilities Laura Jackson, Management and Budget Officer Cole Fazenbaker, Transportation Engineer Niraja Chandrapu, Clerk of Council Eileen Boeing, and Deputy Clerk of Council Lyndon Gonzalez Minutes prepared by Deputy Clerk of Council Lyndon Gonzalez. AGENDA ITEMS 1. Items for Discussion a. Financial Assistance Program for Utility Customers Mr. Keith Markel presented Council with information on establishing a Customer Assistance Program to help utility customers that may be facing hardships and are unable to pay their utility bills. It was the recommendation of staff to use $100,000 from the General Fund and to implement the program in July 2024 once the guidelines for the program have been established. Council and staff discussed the item. It was the consequences of Council to vote to approve the item on the Tanuary 9, 2024, Consent Agenda. b. Utility Rate Study Ms. Amy Wyks presented Council with the proposed water and sewer rates for the next five years. Ms. Wyks also noted the proposed amendments to the Town Code related to Utilities and Appendix B, Fee Schedule. Mr. Case, along with Walter Goldsmith who is one of the Town Financial Advisors with First Tyron, discussed the Town's long-term sustainability model with Council. Financial Advisor Courtney Rogers with Davenport & Company and NewGen Rate Consultant Mike Maker joined Ms. Wyks in the discussion with Council. It was the consensus of Council to move forward with a rate increase of4. 1% for the next five years. The item is on the January 9, 2024, Council Agenda for a Public Hearing and vote. c. South King Street and Leesburg Bypass (Route 7/15) Interchange Improvements Ms. Niraja Chandrapu presented Council with an update on the South King Street and Route 7/15 Bypass Interchange Improvements and provided staff recommendations. Assistant Director James Zeller with the Loudoun County 11 age Council Work Session January 8, 2024 Department of Transportation Capital Infrastructure was present and answered questions regarding the County's project to widen Route 7. Council, staff and Mr. Zeller discussed the item. Council directed staff to send a letter to Loudoun County requesting the South King Street -Route 7/15 Bypass Interchange Redesign be included as part of the County's Capital Improvement Project for the Route 7 Improvements —Route 9 to the Dulles Greenway. It was the consensus of Council to include approval of sending the request to Loudoun County on the January 9, 2024, Consent Agenda. d. Traffic Concems on Fort View Boulevard Ms. Niraja Chandrapu presented Council with an update on the traffic concerns on Fort View Boulevard. The road is still under the maintenance of the Developer. Staff will coordinate with the Developer for routine maintenance actions. Data collected by Staff indicates that a traffic signal is not necessary at this time. Council and staff discussed the item. No further action requested by Council. 2. Additions to Future Council Meetings a. Proclamation Requests i. There were no proclamation requests. b. Additions to Future Council Meetings ii. Vice Mayor Steinberg requested a future work session discussion on how to handle the potential development in the area on South King Street and the intersection at the Bypass Interchange. It was the consensus of Council to add this to a future work session discussion. 3. Adjournment On a motion by Council Member Bagdasarian, seconded by Vice Mayor Steinberg, the meeting was adjourned at 8.24 p.m. Clem it 2024 mwsmin0108 21 Pa g (2 January 8, 2024— Leesburg Town Council Work Session (Note: This is a transcript based on the video of the meeting. It may not be entirely accurate. For greater accuracy, we encourage you to review the video of the meeting that is on the Town's Web site— www.leesburgva.gov or refer to the approved Council meeting minutes. Council meeting videos are retained for three calendar years after a meeting per Library of Virginia Records Retention guidelines.) Mayor Kelly Burk: Let me call tonight's Town Council Work Session of January 8'^. Welcome back, everyone. It's been a while since we've all been here. I hope everybody had a nice holiday and we're back ready to work. Our first item for discussion tonight is the Final Assistant, Final Assistance Program for our utility customers. Mr. Markel. Keith Markel: Good evening, Mayor and Council. Thank you. If you remember before the break back in December, you all had asked for a discussion topic on exploring the possibilities of creating a Customer Assistance Program for utility customers facing financial hardships and maybe having a hard time paying their bills. Staff has looked into this, gathered some preliminary information, and wanted to present that to you this evening and then see what direction you'd like to take with this. You'll see that we do have a draft resolution prepared for your consideration should you want to take action tomorrow night at the regular session. Just by way of a little background here, we'll talk about the total number of connections here with the Town system, just to give you some perspective on the sort of situations that we see with folks in financial distress. We've got 16,770 odd service accounts in the system of which we had 293 accounts last year turned off, their water service turned off. That represents a little less than 2% of the overall total accounts in the Town. The average bill for an account that was closed off was just a little over $300 with the total outstanding balance of $89,000, roughly $90,000 in total outstanding monies. Of course, with the nonpayment issue, financial hardship would be the largest consideration when you see that we have these shutoffs, but other frequent issues that are also reasons for, and I know we're getting a little tinny here, so I don't know if we could turn the mics down just a little bit, so I don't annoy everyone. The other frequent issues here, we do have customers just forget to make the payment or thought somebody else in the household made the payment or they had a change of payer, new folks moved in and forgot that they had to set up their utility account. Little things like that often can create these communication issues and can be quickly resolved with our Town support staff. Just wanted to fill you in a little bit on some of the support programs that are currently in place right now to assist our customers. The tiered rate structure is first and foremost the best way to get a low bill, and those are for those small households. Households really practicing some good conservation measures. You might be elderly, fixed incomes, small households. Again, if you're using less than 6,000 gallons per quarter, you're going to get the best rate for your water and sewer service. The Town also, as you know, offers payment plans for customers who may be experiencing temporary financial hardship. If they make that phone call to the Town customer service staff, they can make those payment plans set up and of course, the water will not be turned off. We also provide links to financial resources and support groups out there in the community, faith -based community groups, other nonprofits that can provide financial assistance. That information is provided on our website. You can see here there's just a snapshot off of the Town's utility pages there. Provide some direction, some phone numbers, and some additional assistance through Loudoun County as well as those other nonprofits like Loudoun Cares in the community. We also provide the same information on delinquency notices that get mailed to the homes on their bills, and they'll also be on door hangers that get provided when the shutoffs are soon to take place. You also see that the County and the Town work together to provide additional financial relief. If you're elderly and disabled and you're qualifying for real property discounts and personal property discounts at the County level, that's an automatic qualification for the Town utility customers. The 11January 8, 2024 County provides that data to the Town and the Town staff and utilities implements that on the billing as well. That's a very quick way for folks to cut 25% off their bill. We have that also provided for disabled veterans and surviving spouses. There are no income qualifications or asset restrictions for disabled veterans or surviving spouses. Then also, if you're a member of the Housing Choice Voucher program, if you're one of those residents, you also get the 25% discount. Here's just a little bit of the information you can see that we provide on some of our forms that we pass out. Just to give folks a little idea of what that discount looks like in real terms when you're looking at the cost of gallons to the homeowner. We also have some State programs that were in place and have now run out of funding. The Virginia Low -Income Housing Water Citizens program was a program that came in during COVID and that was $14 million roughly, of Federal dollars that came to the State and that was distributed out to different utilities. Leesburg was able to take advantage of that and provide some relief to customers. We'll talk about those numbers here in just a moment. We also have nonprofit agencies such as Loudoun Cares, Loudoun County Network, and local faith community, again, providing additional relief. Bill assistance, you'll see during COVID, we had 262 accounts that benefited from that with a total of approximately $65,000 of those two-year period of relief provided. Through that State issued Low -Income Housing Water Assistance program. You can see there were 77 applications, 53 of which were awarded. They met the certain criteria, so a total of around $22,000 of relief provided through that program. You can see in recent years, a lot of folks have received some benefit. When were talking about implementing a new program, what that might look like, we've looked at other examples throughout Virginia to see what's out there and working successfully. What we found is that many are administered through the County or City social services. Now, again, the Town doesn't have a social services program. We rely on Loudoun County for that. That's one area we may want to explore. Then, again, nonprofit agencies are another great resource are set up to deal with that sort of data, those sensitive information, and could work with residents in partnership with the Town. When you're looking at criteria for these programs, you're looking at things like a document of requirement, how many times would you want to be providing the service per year or this relief per year per customer, how is income based and can't be applied to late fees or penalties or other charges. Many communities do not allow that to be funded through some of these aid programs. Here's just a snapshot from Virginia Beach, where you can see some of the guidelines that they have for their programs. There are certain need -based requirements, certain income requirements that have to be met. Those sorts of things would be things that we would want to consider as we look at implementing something here locally. When you're looking at how you might fund this program, our recommendation would be to use $100,000 of seed money from the general fund on a side fund balance as an initial way to begin funding the program. That is what's called out in the draft resolution, should you choose to move in that direction. An annual appropriation for future budgeting could take place during the budget process. Then you could also set up something that other communities have done where other residents, other customers could provide donations through their bill. They could round up. You can add an extra dollar. You can see Dominion Energy uses similar programs like this. You could have citizen donations going into this program over the duration of the program as well. Again, for policy considerations, things that wed all want to consider is who qualifies, how much assistance would you want to provide each time and throughout the year, how would the program be administered, and then again, the funding that we just talked about. For these next steps, again, we've got the resolution far your consideration tomorrow evening. We would like to return to you if you do decide that you want to move forward with this program later in the spring with more details and lay out a formal plan of how this would be set up with guidelines, and then we'd be looking to implement this in July of 24. With that, I'm happy to answer any questions you all may have. 2lJanuary 8, 2024 Mayor Burk: Thank you, Mr. Markle. I think this is a step towards where we're trying to get to, so I appreciate it. The thing I found interesting as I was doing the research on it is how many nonprofits do have programs, rent -assisted programs, and utility -assisted programs, and things like the Salvation Army and Catholic Charities and a number of other different organizations already have them in place. I hope that, and I think that you said that we would use a nonprofit to distribute it or the County, one or the other. I think this is a good program. It's a good idea. I want to recognize that our utility department has been very responsive to citizens that I send to them when they have rate issues or they're behind in their payments. They set up payment plans for them that are very reasonable. They're very helpful. People have been very grateful for how they've been treated and the customer service that has come from the Utilities department. I want to thank all of them for doing that. Tonight, what we're agreeing to is to give us the seed money of $100,000 to put that aside for this program and that you and staff will go back and look at setting up some guidelines, defining the program, how it will be, and then we'll implement it later in July. Is that correct? Keith Markel: That is correct. That's the way the resolution is currently worded. Mayor Burk: Okay, great. Anybody else have any questions? Mr. Bagdasarian, Council Member Ara Bagdasarian: I do have a question. Thank you, Keith. Out of the 293 accounts that had water service turned off, do we know what percentage of those were specifically due to financial hardships, and were they able to receive financial assistance to be able to have the service turned back on? Keith Markel: That specific information we do not have. Our financial system doesn't track it that granularly. I was hoping we would have that information, but that's not something to date that we've had a good way to measure. Council Member Bagdasarian: Okay, thank you. Mayor Burk: Does anybody else have any questions at this point? Will this be on the agenda for tomorrow if I'm not mistaken? Keith Markel: It is. Kaj Dentler: This is already listed on your agenda for tomorrow under resolution. If you're comfortable, we can move it to consent. If you want to leave it for resolution for further discussion, we can. It's your choice. Mayor Burk: Does anybody have a problem if it were to go on to consent? Nobody? Okay. You may as well put it on consent. Kaj Dentler: I think the only thing I want to just reiterate to the Council is the $100,000 seed money for just one year. We don't know if we'll use all of it in one year or might take multiple years. If you take the worst -case scenario that it was all used up, the Council will have to make a decision in the future if you're going to continue funding it or not. Mayor Burk: Sure. Absolutely. Well, thank you very much. Appreciate all the information. [pause] Our next item is the utility rate study. Ms. Wyks is going to be presenting that. Hello. Amy Wyks: Good evening, Madam Mayor, Vice Mayor, Members of Council. Happy New Year. I'm here tonight to give a presentation on the water and sewer rates that we've been discussing. We also have First Tryon, our consultant, here related to the long-term sustainability model. We have Davenport, the Town's financial advisor, and NewGen, which is the Town's consultant that supported utility staff with the rate study model. Tonight, again, the focus of the utility rate study has been to maintain our current quality of service. We want to make certain as a 365 -day 24 -hour, seven -day -a -week service, we want to be reliable, 3IJanuary 8, 2024 safe, and secure. We want to make sure that were maintaining our assets and completing projects and asset replacements. We want to make sure that were complying with the Federal and State environmental regulations for water wastewater treatment facilities, and we want to have a sustainable long-term financial plan. With that plan, looking at a 10 -year outlook or forecast with five- year rate adjustments. That's what we've done for the past two rate studies looking at that 10 -year forecast with five-year rate adjustments. Again, having the long-term financial plan will maintain the AAA bond rating that the Town has with all three agencies. As you know we've been talking about what had been the drivers for the utility rate increases that are proposed and recommended. Obviously, from an operation standpoint, inflation has impacted us, between electricity, chemicals, supply chain, as well as staffing costs. Then from the capital side, as we've talked about, for approximately $74 million, were looking at two big wastewater treatment facility projects related to the nutrient removals, which is known as the TMDL, as well as solids processing. We've talked about how we get much more solids capacity in from our residents as opposed to the water, because of the low flow fixtures. Then what's unknown for us in the horizon is what we're calling the forever chemicals of PFAS. That's in the news, and we hope in 2024, well get a little more direction from the EPA. We've been talking about our fiscal sustainability targets. There's two of them that we want to make certain that we're meeting in order to have the expectations of a AAA -rated community through the rating agencies. One of those is the utilities fund cash on hand balance of 270 days minimum. Then we have the debt service ratio coverage, which is 1.5 times the revenue for debt service. As we talked about from the utility rate study, the Town hired New Gen to model our comprehensive water and sewer cost of service for fiscal years 2025 through 2029. They did look at a 10 -year forecast. They concluded that the revenue collected at the current rates that we have isn't insufficient and doesn't meet the two fiscal targets we just talked about. The initial model projected a double-digit increase. Recognizing that was not going to be favorable, we worked with the consultant and Davenport in order to evaluate, and as a result, tonight, were proposing and recommending a 4.1% rate increase. As part of that going down from the 10.8 to 4.1, utilities department we have adjusted our Capital Improvement program. We've deferred projects. We're using approximately $16 million of cash on hand. Then that also is requiring less borrowing in order to fund the projects. Again tonight, we're here to talk about or present related to the 10 -year rate plan or forecast with five-year 4.1 average rate adjustments in order to meet the two financial targets. Here's a table that just shows the deferred projects and showing you the years in which we've deferred them. Two, the highlight is related to our sanitary sewer lining, as well as water line replacement. For the last 10 years, we've been putting annual money in there and now were recommending every two years. Again, that has the potential for reliability and service disruption in the event on those off years. At the November 28'" Town Council meeting, the public hearing that we had you requested us to evaluate 3 and 3.5% rate increases. As part of that, there's slides that we'll follow here. We did compare those alternate rates with the financial targets. The first one that we looked at is related to the debt service. As you can see here, green represents the 4.1 that's recommended. Blue is three and a half and red is the 3% average. Related to debt service, the 4.1 meets the 1.5 debt service coverage for the overall 10 -year plan, with the understanding that in 2025 neither, none of the three meet. Then at three and a half, which is the blue it meets for the initial five-year period, but it does not meet starting in 2032. The 3%, which is the red line, meets for '26 through' 28, and then it doesn't meet for the remainder of it as well as some years in the 10 -year forecast. Just remember that this is just one of the two that we're making certain that we need to look at. The second one that were looking at is days cash on hand. Again, its the same colors for the 4.1, three and a half and three. 4.1, the green line, the 1.5 debt ratio is met over the entire 10 -year forecast. 3.5 is only meeting for the initial five-year period, and then it's starting to not meet in 2032. Then the 3% meets the coverage only in' 26 through '28. 4IJanuary 8, 2024 Again, as it relates to the Town's AAA bond rating, having future years in higher rates could potentially be looked upon at the rating agencies of not having a long-term sustainable plan. What are the impacts of a lower rate increase than what's recommended? There is an effect on the utilities fund with the potential that I just said, higher rates later in the second five-year cycle. Obviously, there's less revenue and potentially further deferment of the capital projects that I showed. The cumulative revenue shortfall at 3.5% is just under 3 million, and at 3% is almost 5.5 million over the five-year study period. Again, in summary, staffs recommendation is the 4.5% average. Anything less than that isn't financially sustainable, does not meet targets for cash on hand and the debt service ratio of 1.5. Larger rate increases would be needed in the future years of those years, 6 through 10 of the 10 -year forecast. The three and three and a half is really only keeping up with inflation and would require further deferment as I noted. One of the things to also highlight related to asset replacement of aging infrastructure, we do try and align our projects with Public Works and what they're doing with the curb, gutter, and sidewalk, so that they're not doing their improvements, we don't focus on the water lines and then a year or so later, we're digging up the new pavement that they put down. With that, as I've said, we have our financial advisor, the sustainability model, as well as the rate consultant here tonight for questions and answers. Mayor Burk: Thank you. Any, either, or any of these people [inaudible]? Any one? Courtney Rogers: Madam Mayor, good to see you. Happy New Year. Happy New Year, everyone. Good to see you all again. Courtney Rogers with Davenport & Company. We weren't asked to present tonight, and as you, we all talked there at the end of last year. I think the one graph that I think really says it all is that 10 -year graph. I think that was something that we didn't really get into at the end of last year, was we were looking at the five years, but as we started looking at the 10 -year graphic that Mike and his at New Gen, the model that they put together, you can clearly see that while the 3.5% might work for a few years, there's a point at which we got to pay the piper. We're kicking the can down the road. We're going to have to come back with higher rates in order to fix year 6 through 10 for that model. If we were to show a 10 -year model like that to the rate agencies, we're basically showing them a plan that doesn't work. That's going to be a non-starter from our standpoint We'd have to really contemplate how we did that. I think that's really the big key from the rating standpoint is showing them a plan that actually works. They're very big on long-term planning and we want to be able to show them something that is sustainable. Happy to answer questions that anyone might have. Mayor Burk: [inaudible] Clark Case: I'm Clark Case. I'm the Director of Finance and Administrative Services. I want to introduce to you, Walter Goldsmith. The First Tryon advisors. They are the financial advisor who built and helps us operate our long-term sustainability plan. We actually have two, one for the general fund and one for the utilities fund. We relook at that financial sustainability plan and we include it in ACFR and in the budget documents each year. They are the ones who built the model, but one of the things we do is we use this as a cross-check especially between rate studies, to say, are we progressing where we should be? Are we staying on track for the sustainability? We don't spend a lot of time on it with Council, but I did want to give Walter a chance to talk about what he sees in his model, as well. Mayor Burk: Thank you. Walter Goldsmith: Great Mayor, it's nice to be with you. I thought I would just touch on the approach that we take in this model that's been referenced. It's a big Excel spreadsheet as you might imagine. There are really three things that we try to do. The first is solve for the minimum rate increase because that's the goat What's the smallest rate increase that we can have? The second, is that will fund the full $83.9 million of capital improvement projects. We want to be able to fund all of the projects. Then the third goal is to maintain the Town's AAA credit rating. To do that, the credit rating, we need to have those financial ratios look strong, but the coverage ratio and the days cash on hand, and show, as Courtney mentioned, the rating agencies that we've got a 51 -January 8, 2024 sustainable long-term plan. It's an iterative process that we keep running through that financial model. If we don't do the 4.1% increase, then we miss those ratios or we have to defer or cancel other projects. Just to put it in context, I know you saw 3%, 3.5%, and 4.1%. What that means for the average ratepayer, the difference between the 3.5 and the 4.1 is less than a dollar a month on their utility bill. Not to suggest that a dollar a month isn't real dollars because it does add up, but long term, that's where that puts you as maintaining all of those key financial ratios. We'd certainly recommend the 4.1% increase. Mayor Burk: [inaudible] Thank you. Walter Goldsmith: You bet. Mayor Burk: Does anyone have questions at this point? Mr. Cummings. Council Member Zach Cummings: Yes, thanks. [laughter] Real quick. First question is, in the rate study in the executive summary, there's something that's confusing me in terms of [inaudible] there are plenty of high-powered expert that can explain to me. Again, this is page four of the rate study, executive summary of the study. It talks about the average of the water and sewer bill percentage increase is for a typical customer bill blah, blah, blah. It's essentially saying that four equals 4.1 per year for the fiscal year 2025 through fiscal year 2029, which is what the bill said. Then there's this part that says, with resulted rated impact the combined water and sewer bill ranging from a 4.2% increase in the fiscal year 2025 to a 4.8% increase in the fiscal year 2029. Can anybody explain what that means to me? What that rated impact means? Mike Maker: Good evening, Mike Maker from New Gen, Happy New Year. I think we talked about this before, but the 4.1 % is simply the average of the actual percentages. We take them by themselves. The one you're looking at is a cumulative bill increase over time. Our true bill is what we mentioned in the executive summary, is that 4.2, and then it goes up until it's a 4.8. Council Member Cummings: We're not just raising rates every fiscal year 4.1 %, it actually is more for the customers. Mike Maker: Right again, 1 think it was the median customers, what that calculate comes out to be. If you take that median customer, those numbers are what they would see on actual. [inaudible] Council Member Cummings: Then, I wanted to follow up on some of these deferred projects. I'm assuming that the initial rate study that came back with an incredible amount that we needed to raise the rate by including all those deferred projects. Amy Wyks: Correct, it included the deferred projects in a different time year, in a different period. Council Member Cummings: [inaudible] Not in the from column. Amy Wyks: Correct. Council Member Cummings: [inaudible] Amy Wyks: Correct, and that represents a total of $33 million there on the table. Council Member Cummings: I guess from something like the standard sewer line and water line replacement, we added for, it was supposed to be about every other year it sounded like in the staff report. What is the industry standard for water line and sewer lining replacement? 6lJanuary 8, 2024 Amy Wyks: I would say annual, just because again, the assets are aging, so when you're doing every other year, then that gets back to you're not replacing the assets probably on a timely schedule. Years ago we were at 100 -year replacement. We've been trying to get down to the 50 -year replacement from that standpoint. Council Member Cummings: I guess that kind of concerns me. This deferred project concerns me, then is obviously you wouldn't come to us saying you can defer these if it was going to cause any problems, but what sort of issue or risk as to put the system at to take this step to referral, this $33 million projects? Amy Wyks: The risk is obviously for sanitary sewer lining. When were in there, were also checking the condition of the pipe. It's possible by not having the resources out there, we could have issues in the pipes themselves. Obviously, we have an extensive grease program right now that were going to a lot of areas with restaurants being. Our grease areas increasing, so again, their potential of blockages, backups related to that. Then the waterline replacement is again, just having more breaks and potentially impacts of service. Prime example is we were out at Edwards Ferry and front of Target and Costco today for a water main that probably was less than 30 years old when you think about when that development was built. Again, were seeing things fail at an earlier rate than 50 to 100 years of age, and so it's all unpredictable from that standpoint. Again, hopeful to not impact service, but that could be a potential also. Council Member Cummings: You are comfortable with the deferring of those projects, to get us to this4.1%? Amy Wyks: I still recommend 4.1%. [laughter] Council Member Cummings: No, no. [inaudible] At 4.1, we still have to defer these projects. Amy Wyks: Correct. Kaj Dentler: I can jump in to her defense. She's not comfortable deferring these projects, but our goal 10 years ago was to be able to get to the south of 4%. The staff and advisors and Amy worked hard to get to this point. That's why we've argued pretty strongly to go below this stuff. She is not going to ever recommend that we should defer these at all. If we don't defer the rates are going to be higher. Thus, to see the position that we've taken is to go less than 4.1 is really placing the system at more risk. Hard to quantify what that risk is, but if the car breaks down on the road, were stuck. The water sewer lines break, we got a big problem. Council Member Cummings: I guess going into what the Town Manager mentioned, so we know we're looking at a five-year projection for rates that 4.1% across five years, and you're doing a 10 - year outlook. Any sense of what rate, sort of increase well need in fiscal year '31 or '30 to '31 and on? Amy Wyks: I think as part of the rate structure is looking at the 4.1 across all of these years. Again, we've - Council Member Cummings: It's 10 years? Amy Wyks: Correct. We talked about having them be predictable. Again, smoothing it out so you don't necessarily want to have an eight -year to go down to a five to a three, having the customer's bounce. That's where, as part of the rate study, we are looking at smoothing it across the 10 -year period. Council Member Cummings: Is there no benefit to just locking 4.1 for the next 10 years other than coming back here in five years and having the same conversations? Amy Wyks: I think we've always done it as a 10 -year forecast the last two times. Courtney Rogers: I'll add to that. We don't know five years from now what the regulations might be. I think that was one of the slides you talked about earlier was with some of those PFAS and things like 7pJanuary 8, 2024 that, were still trying to get our hands around what those dollars are. To this point, this $33 million in and of itself is not the difference between 10.8% and 4.1. We also did some line of credits and things like that, that were going to be coming to you for approval here for long. That basically delays paying some of the principal back to push it off a little bit to try to keep these rates down. That was part of the back -and -forth that we did as well. If PFAS comes back in three years and all of a sudden we've got, I don't know, what's a reasonable number, $50 million of additional capital that we don't know right now, there's nowhere else to get it other than rates. Council Member Cummings: Alright. [inaudible] [crosstalk] That's all I have. Thank you. Mayor Burk: Mr. Bagdasarian? Council Member Bagdasarian: Thank you very much. [inaudible] To your point earlier, how do we get [inaudible] itself of 4% long-term? Does that require cutting back additionally, or how do we even get to that point, long-term? Amy Wyks: Do you want to talk about long-term? Kaj Dentler: [inaudible] I think in my perspective and what I've seen, if COVID hadn't happened and all the inflation impact thereafter, we wouldn't be talking 4, we would be in the 3, 3.5, is my belief. We can't predict that, but that's a pandemic and other things that happened right after that could not be foreseen. I think it's hard to totally know where to go with this, events are going to occur. I think the biggest thing we have to be concerned about, more so, than how do we get to that, is if we don't do what we should be doing now, this Council or a Council in the future will be faced with same very difficult rate increases. Which goes back to our history, I've explained to you all that. I think [inaudible] didn't raise the rate increases for 10 years put us in a difficult spot. Your situation where you got a 4.1 and 3.5 isn't that, but you can only kick the can down the road for so long, so someone has to pay for the toll. I think that's more the concern. If you don't do the right thing now, when you look at this slide, not only are projects deferred but we're using 16 million in cash to buy downwards. We may or may not be in that position in five years. We don't know all the variables that will occur. The good news is even though we set a five-year plan today, we do have the ability if things really change up or down, we can make that adjustment. This gives us the guidance when I show up at the budget time, that the increased rate corresponds to the approved schedule [inaudible] within that budget. I don't know if that addresses your question, hard to say, how do we get there, but if we don't fund it now, were not going to get there. Council Member Bagdasarian: [inaudible] historical cycle [inaudible] four Council Members that are new right now [inaudible] during this process. What were the rates, please refresh my memory. What were the rate increases prior to this, say the last 10 years [inaudible] for a while, and what were those rate increases? Amy Wyks: The first-rate study for five years, it was 7.5, and one year I believe was-- We actually have a slide for that. For five years, we were at three years at seven and a half, two years at seven. The last five years have been four and a half five, and then our proposals at 4.1. Council Member Bagdasarian: [inaudible] Courtney Rogers: That was all to catch up of course with the 10 years that we didn't have any increases. The other thing that I'll add to what the Town Manager was talking about, is that-- I know Mike went through this. The biggest drivers of any utility system, no matter who's running it, whether it's a private system or a public system, you have chemicals, power to run the plants, and people, and then it's capital. The capital is the big unknown. You know what's coming up when it comes to chemicals and power and people, you can control a little bit, but capital, we just don't know, especially with regulatories whether you're selling it off to somebody in our private system or if it's a public system like us running it. That's the hard part, is we get inflation at 3%, you're almost stuck at 3%. I know a lot of large systems- slJanuary 8, 2024 Mayor Burk: [inaudible] Courtney Rogers: Yes, ma'am. I know a lot of systems Mike probably can vouch for this of some of the places he's done modeling for as well. They do 3% every year and didn't skip years. They've been able to at least stay ahead, and then as capital comes, you increase or decrease depending upon what's going on with inflation from there. Mike Maker: Back on Council Member Cumming's question about the average bill being a higher increase. These plans before was the same increase to both water and sewer. It was a 7% increase to water and a 7% increase to sewer. It's a 7% increase. However, what we're recommending is, I think we shared before is a zero percent increase to water and the 2,5% increase to the account charge, and then an 8% increase to sewer. So by the sewer bill being more each year, it offsets why it becomes a 4.2, 4.3 so that's why you're seeing that. Yes. Council Member Bagdasarian: I just want to appreciate the analysis of 3, 3.5, and 4.1. Because just to be clear, it wasn't [inaudible] 3.5% but it's just coming very close. If you look at the difference in increase in the [inaudible] I think this verifies it and will serve me more ideas as to contact now and then [inaudible] increase in the future. The last question I have is most importantly are there any safe compromises that will result in not adopting 4.1%? [inaudible] Amy Wyks: Not at this time, based on what we've put together. No. Mayor Burk: Vice Mayor. Vice Mayor Neil Steinberg: Amy, in doing the [inaudible] to the [inaudible] Well, first of all, I want to talk about this [inaudible]. What if any are the regulatory/penalty if pitfalls should we have a system failure of some kind. Amy Wyks: Related to the sanitary sewer obviously, if there's a backup that is bad enough that it makes its way to the surface, obviously DEQ, and/or EPA could get involved if they determine that we're not maintaining our systems properly. That is where you can go down a Consent Decree, and they let you know how you're going to maintain your system. That's the ultimate or the worst part of the risk. Vice Mayor Steinberg: [inaudible] Amy Wyks: Correct. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Okay, thanks. Well, I don't have any more questions. I' ll just comment, just agree to establish a financial assistance program [inaudible]. I don't see how we can then turn around and [inaudible] system itself of the necessary funding that we need to maintain the integrity of the system. First, I think it'll be ill-advised to jeopardize either the integrity of the infrastructure or the [inaudible] assets of [inaudible] Town [inaudible]. As you said this already seems to be a [inaudible] rate increase. I don't see how we could possibly consider [inaudible]. Mayor Burk: Council Member Cimino -Johnson. Council Member Todd Cimino -Johnson: Looking back a few years here, have you done the analysis of what was modeled versus what actually [inaudible] [crosstalk]. Amy Wyks: I believe if you look at the last 10 -year plan, which when we adopted the four and a half, it projected that the rates would go to about three and a half for the next five years, which is what we're looking at here, but again, with COVID and some other unforeseen things with the inflation, those are things that were definitely not in the model at the time. We didn't think there would be a pandemic 10 years ago. I think, again, to Kaj s point. that's why we're at 4.1 today, which is a little bit higher than what was in the rate study. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Okay, the second question, you did a 10 -year analysis but the five years were paid for full analysis again, even if '25 to '29 is exactly what they modeled? 9lJanuary 8, 2024 Amy Wyks: We don't necessarily have to do another full study. Again, as part of this study, as well as other studies, we do get the rate model. It becomes the Town's property. We could internally with the budget as well as DFAS staff run that if that's something that Council is interested in and staff could come back with a recommendation based on that model, but we definitely look on an annual basis before we do budget, we're looking at what did the model say we were doing? Where are we at? Are we underperforming, overperforming? Then as part of the budget process, sometimes we typically come in to say stay the course. We're on target for what we're doing, we're good here, we're going to see what happens here. There's always an annual look at it, and so again, that's something that we can consider as we're coming to the end of the 5th year, do we need to do a full cost of analysis or are we comfortable with the model and what it's telling us. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Going back to that, my first question, do you have that over or under analysis report for these years, for '15 to '24, or '23? Amy Wyks: I would say it was part of the budget process. I don't know if we necessarily had it as a true analysis. Typically, when we did the budget into March is usually a part of the presentation. We would say the utility funds were in the fourth year or the third year of the rate study. Stay the course. That's typical been what the presentation is, not with specific numbers. That was part of what the analysis was with budget. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Okay. Thank you. Mayor Burk: Then [inaudible] I have [inaudible] this weekend doing a presentation for newly elected officials, and one of the presentations was on [inaudible] responsibility. Leesburg was cited for being a locality to look at, to [inaudible], and one of their things that they brought up was utility plan, [inaudible] built in a [inaudible] period, and how that was so beneficial, and it made the Town stable, and it was very attractive to the rating agencies, and they did mention a couple of other Towns, I didn't [inaudible], but they did bring up Leesburg and say [inaudible]. That recommendation from the experts down there was very [inaudible] to me. I was here when we had to go to a 7.5 rate increase and [inaudible]. That was something that was very irresponsible on the part of the Council at that point. They didn't want to raise the rates. They wanted things to stay at the same rate, and for 10 years we did that. No matter how many times some of us tried to move things forward and we were not in the best of places at that point. When we had to then come back and raise it to 7.5, that was a big hit for a lot of people, and it was because we didn't want to make the public angry by raising it less and not as high, we were able to keep it the same for those 10 years, and in my opinion, that was a big mistake, and it ended up hurting people in the end. People [inaudible] to begin with. I also think it was pretty short-sighted of the Council to do that. They wanted to be able to say that they didn't raise rates to keep people are getting upset about it, but a lot of times, as leaders, you have to get people upset. I'm not sure that this is going to be [inaudible] for [inaudible]. [sound cut] We need to take it very seriously. It is our job to make sure there are [inaudible] responsible. We don't want to [inaudible]. We want to get [inaudible]. We've seen that happen. We want to make sure that does not happen here, and so I think it's very important to have all of these experts. I appreciate all of the information that you all have created. [inaudible] you know it's [inaudible] than we do. I appreciate your input and value what you have to say. I want to thank you all very much for being here. For taking the time to do this [inaudible] obviously a big decision in the benefit of our community. [crosstalk] Council Member Cummings: Just because, again, with the folks here who do these rate studies, [inaudible] I've got to be honest, I'm all over the place on this and it makes it very difficult, and I am wondering around all day today, trying to find somebody who I could ask question [inaudible], and my concern is, and I understand. I hear the history, and I know, and I appreciate it, and I value it, but we're looking at forever. Oh, great. We get to forever tell our constituents that you don't have a 10jJanuary 8, 2024 choice. If you live in Leesburg, you have Leesburg utilities and you're going to have an increase for the same service every year the entire time you live here. Folks, they make a decision who they want to serve them with the utilities. Not by going and finding another company, they pack up and they move, and so at this point, we don't have to worry about that. We're doing pretty well, but how do I look at constituents who may not send emails saying that that 4.1%'s going to cause them trouble, but at the end of the day, they're going to have to make decisions with increased utility bills. Because its not just Leesburg utilities that are increasing their bills every year. It's Dominion, it's Washington Gas. It's everything that we see. Property taxes go up every year. Mayor Burk: What's your question? Council Member Cummings: My question is, what do I say to folks when they say, "Why can't you all work, run the system with the money you're getting? You're getting a lot every year. Why can't you just run the system?" Just give me a good succinct answer I can give them of why it's going to have to increase 4.1, at least for the next 10, if not forever. Walter Goldsmith: I think one thing that you might want to share with them is that we start with what's the minimum amount that we can increase rates. We don't come at it with a random, "We want to look at a 4% or a 5% and what can we do with that?" The marching orders are, what's the lowest amount that we can increase rates by? And, most of our clients want to leave the system better than they found it in terms of maintenance and condition of the system and maintain the AAA credit rating of the Town. That's really what were solving for, if we know we have to make certain capital improvements to maintain the system. I think most constituents would agree that you have to maintain the system. There's certain operating expenses that are beyond your control, utilities, staff cost, chemicals, and you want to maintain the AAA credit rating so that you keep your interest cost as low as possible. That's the real benefit. Then what's the lowest rate increase? You can rest assured that when we started to build the model, that was the marching order from your staff. What's the lowest increase we can have and accomplish these other goals? You could in theory have less of a rate increase. You could have 0%, but you wouldn't be able to reinvest in the system. That's the challenge. I know it doesn't put you in an easy spot when you run into constituents. Everybody wants to complain about their rate increases, but that is the answer,That we're trying to keep it as low as possible. You're trending in the absolute right direction. You can look back historically at where you're going. Hope that's helpful. Mike Maker: I ' l l just add, I think you kind of answered your own question by saying everything else is going up. All your vendors that you use for materials and supplies and chemicals, they're all having an increase. Labor only increases. You look at anything, what it cost in 1970 versus today, there's an inflation factor. Everything has gone up. The question is what's the value of safe, reliable drinking water and how much do you value that? That's kind of that at the end of the day. Sometimes we put together a slide showing cost of your cell phone, cost of cable, other things. What do you value most? We look at the price of water and how valuable and how inexpensive that is compared to those things. By turn, all those things off at the end of the day, which one are you going to miss the most? My kids might say the cell phone, [laughter] but you go to take a shower and pour the water. That's important. Courtney Rogers: 1' 11 hit on part of what you were talking about in terms of them being able to pick up and move. They could move over to Fairfax and their bill probably would go lower because they're so big they can spread their expenses out. If they go down to Fauquier, which I just stopped through and saw the Fauquier sewer folks, it's going to be higher because they're a smaller system. That's the one thing that Leesburg has for, is you're a pretty good size. You're a good size system. You're not as big as, obviously, Fairfax, but you're good enough that you can spread that. Look at the average bill and if they want to move down to Richmond where 1 am, it's going to go even higher because you got to pay for the combined sewage overflow rebuild, if you will, of their sewer 111January 8, 2024 system that was built back before the Civil War. That's the other side of it. Walter did a good job talking about the fact that you're running it like a business, and you don't really have any other dollars to put toward any of these increases. Like I said before, chemicals are going up, power's going to keep going up. We're doing our best to basically try to evenly keep the system moving along without pushing it off to somebody else down the road. Which is what Walter was insinuating, that basically, if you go to that zero increase, all those debt items are going to be pushed out at some point rather than pay cash for some of these upgrades, or not upgrades, but rebuilding the system, if you will. The pipes that are failing, things like that You're going to have to go borrow for it and that's going to have interest costs associated with it. That's what were trying to minimize. That's part of what Kyle was talking about, the 16 million that basically we put toward. That 16 million you don't have to borrow for and pay interest on, but we're also not having to use rates to pay for that. That's been built up over time. This is the chart we were looking for, I was talking about in rates. You look at the higher rates, there are generally smaller places. Now, DC Water is higher probably because they have a similar issue as Richmond, which is the combined sewage overflow, which costs a lot of money to basically rebuild the whole system from scratch. Cole Fazenbaker: Very briefly, this is a good plug for the upcoming budget season. This response to the question. On the general fund side, we have taxes that are a percentage of, for example, a meal is taxed three -and -a -half percent of your meal. Your meals are always going up, your assessments are always going up. On utility side, the revenue is fixed, and so your rates are fixed, and no matter how much-- The only variable is the usage. It's different than the general fund side where it can't keep up with inflation except for the rates. Summing up, of how do we get there, eventually, the ideal would be to stay with inflation because that's the only way that the Town's expenses can keep with inflation because the Town's expenses, electricity, chemicals, everything's going up and the rates are the only way to stay in line. Thanks. Unidentified Speaker: [inaudible] Mayor Burk: Is it on? Is it working? Okay. Are our mics not working at all? Is that? Eileen Boeing: Only the podium microphones. Mayor Burk: Vice Mayor. Vice Mayor Steinberg: I think this is a question for Amy. I don't know if this is an existential question or not. Mayor Burk: Put it closer to your mouth. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Thank you. Is it possible-- Is that close enough? Mayor Burk: Yes. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Okay. If we look at this system and we look at the history of how we dealt with these resources over the decades, is it possible that for decades, not just Leesburg, but systems all over the Country, if not the world, have in effect given short shrift to the way we have dealt with the resource of water, both in extracting it and then placing it back into rivers and streams and so on. Now to a certain extent, as we see with PFAS chemistry and so on, we're basically in effect paying the piper because of neglect that simply wasn't dealt with for generations. Now we're realizing how expensive it is and having to pay to maintain these systems to the level they should be maintained. Amy Wyks: Potentially. I think that's where lead and capper changes the rule with the EPA as well as what will come with PFAS are examples of things that have been occurring that we wouldn't have thought of 10, 15 years ago. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Okay. Thank you. 12JJanuary 8, 2024 Mayor Burk: Thank you all very much. I appreciate your information and taking the time to come to us tonight. The staff does need some indication from us. What rate that we are looking at because they need to put a resolution together for tomorrow. So are there four four, let's do a straw poll kind of thing. Four head shakes for the 4.1 rate. All right, so staff, we're looking at a 4.1. Thank you. South King Street and Leesburg Bypass Route 7/15 interchange improvements. Niraja Chandrapu: Good evening, Madam Mayor and Council Members. My name is Niraja Chandrapu and I'm a Transportation Engineer with the Town of Leesburg. Mayor Burk: Pull the mics down closer to you. Thank you. Niraja Chandrapu: We have here with us the representatives from Loudoun County staff, James Zeller, the Assistant Director of Loudoun County Department of Transportation and Capital Infrastructure, and we have the Project Manager Mr. Pazzouli. Today the discussion topics would be talking about how we got here under background, the focus area, crash data, and what does the data reveal, the existing traffic issues, and an overview of the Loudoun County CIP Project - Route 7 improvements and what is staff recommendation. Council requested a work session to discuss the potential improvements to the interchange of Soth King Street and Route 7 and 15 Bypass. Council also requested a representation from the Virginia Department of Transportation, and the inclusion of crash data in the discussion. Today, we do not have anybody from VDOT, but the Loudoun County CIP project is administered by the Loudoun County so we have the representatives from the Loudoun County to answer any questions that you may have on the project. The focus area is South King Street at Route 7 and 15 Bypass. It's a great separated interchange and South King Street is a four -lane divided roadway with turn lanes at major intersection. The posted speed limit is 35 miles per hour, whereas the Leesburg Bypass is a four -lane divided roadway with acceleration and the deceleration lanes at this interchange, and the posted speed limit is 55 miles per hour. The left -turn lanes, as you see in this graphic they are back-to-back. I just wanted to mention because the storage length for vehicles fuming left is not enough at this location. We reviewed the crash data by type and the year, and the data shows that there is a decrease in the number of crashes at this location. I just wanted to mention that this data includes only the crashes along the South King Street. It does not include the crashes at the interchange, like ramps and off ramps, diverging and merging points. The reduction in the crashes from 2020 and 2021 is influenced by COVID-19 pandemic and changes in the travel behavior. However, you see an increase in the crashes in the year 2022. I just wanted to mention that the data from 2023 represents only a partial year and is the reason why you see a very low number of crashes under 2023. This table shows the crash data by severity. The data shows that there are no fatal or severe injury crashes. There is a reduction in the number of visible injury crashes from 2018 to 2023, and the majority of the crashes resulted in property damage only. What are the existing traffic issues? Route 7 and 15 Bypass is heavily congested during commuter peak hours. The condition on Route 7 and 15 Bypass directly impacts the traffic operations of South King Street. In addition to that, at the interchange, there is a heavy congestion during school dismissal and commuter peak hours on South King Street. There are few backups from Route 7/15 bypass and can extend up to Marathon Drive. The insufficient turn lane [inaudible] often causes spill back [inaudible] lanes, and that often obstructs the line of sight for the turning vehicles onto the Bypass. We also have an increase in the number of commuter traffic from Evergreen Mills Road, Sycolin Road, East Market Street, and Dulles Greenway. This is a visual representation of how the traffic looks during the commuter peak hours. As you can see on the right-hand side. during the PMP cover, the traffic congestion spills back from Route 7/15 Bypass all the way, crossing Evergreen Mill Road approximately to the Marathon drive. There is a plan Loudoun County CIP project, which is called as Route 7 improvements from Route 9 to Dulles Greenway. The main purpose of this project is to alleviate congestion by increasing capacity on Route 7 with widening. The widening plan includes an additional eastbound through lane on Route 7, between Route 9 and West Market Street. In the westbound direction, there are already three lanes. This widening plan also includes Route 7 to three lanes in both eastbound and westbound direction between West Market Street and Dulles Greenway. Today, we have only two lanes in each 13IJanuary 8, 2024 direction. However, this current project does not include studying the interchange condition at South King Street. Where is this Loudoun County project right now in the status on this? The request for proposal has not been issued for this project, but it is in the process of being issued soon. The below graphic shows the estimated phase cost and timeline by physical year. The total cost is approximately 44.7 million, but this includes only planning right of the acquisition, utility relocation, and design of bridge expansion only. It does not include the widening of Route 7 itself. The staff recommendation is to formally request Loudoun County to include the study of South King Street and Route 7 and 15 Bypass interchange within the purpose and the need of their scope of services for the Route 7 improvements from Route 9 to Dulles Greenway project. Mayor Burk: Thank you. Is that the end of your report at this point? Niraja Chandrapu: What is it? Mayor Burk: Are you finished with this? Niraja Chandrapu: Yes. I'm finished and the floor is open for questions. Unidentified Speaker: [inaudible] Mayor Burk: Yes, sorry. I forgot. One of the questions I had, in regards to this, I'm actually pretty surprised that the numbers are as low as they are, the accident numbers, because go through that intersection quite often and I see it. It seems like there's a lot of them, but the line up not only goes to Marathon, but also on South King Street it goes a lot of times it will go almost to the Food Lion trying to make a turn onto that. Niraja Chandrapu: Yes, the [inaudible]. Mayor Burk: The Bypass. The thing that really strikes me is that the County is doing this very, I mean a $44 million project and they're not looking at one section. I think maybe it's because there's a bridge there and they don't want to deal with the bridge, but you're not going to make any improvements if you don't get that whole section. Niraja Chandrapu: Yes, so basically if they study the Route 7, if they study also on South King Street, it would help in identifying what additional improvements would be needed and identify the congestion, how we can alleviate congestion. It might help a little bit. We have to study the impacts to understand what will happen with that widening project. Mayor Burk: Right. That could be quite dramatic. It's surprising to see that. The recommendation is that you're asking us to send a letter to the County, asking them to include the study of South King Street and Routes 7 and 15 Bypass within the purpose and need of their scope of services for Route 7 improvements. You're asking them to look at this whole intersection? Niraja Chandrapu: Yes. Whole interchange, yes. Mayor Burk: Well, how very logical of you. Gee. Very interesting. Okay, thank you. Pass it down to Ms. Nacy. Council Member Kari Nacy: I got one. We got one down here. [crosstalk] Mayor Burk: Oh, you got your own. Wow. Niraja Chandrapu: I just wanted to mention that we have staff from Loudoun County staff. If you have any questions on the project itself, they would be able to answer the question. Council Member Nacy: We're going to do some karaoke later. That's why we have our own microphone. [laughter] 14IJanuary 8, 2024 Vice Mayor Steinberg: Well be gone. We'll be leaving. Council Member Nacy: I was just going to add to what Mayor Burk was saying, I live in this section of Town, and I'm pretty sure there's an accident once a week at that intersection. I don't know what constitutes actually logging it, but [laughter] we might not want to send those numbers to the County because it's much higher than that. It really is, a really dangerous intersection that constantly backs up. This just makes complete and total sense, and I think we should let our southwest side of Town know so that they can help us encourage the County to include this. Niraja Chandrapu: Yes, thank you. Mayor Burk: Alright, anyone else have any comments? Vice Mayor? Vice Mayor Steinberg: Thank you. Is this still on? Yes, thank you. From an engineering standpoint, explain to me how you can widen the Bypass to six lanes without actually dealing with the overpass in some form or fashion? Niraja Chandrapu: There are some sections where they are widening inside and there are some sections where they are widening outside to three lanes. They're adding auxiliary lanes also, which is acceleration and deceleration lanes, but they are doing it only on Route 7. Vice Mayor Steinberg: No, I understand that, but eventually, you come to the overpass, and you're now trying to fit six lanes where there currently only four. How do you do that? Kaj Dentler: [inaudible] Mr. Zeller is here from the County. [inaudible] James Zeller: My name is James Zeller. I'm with the Loudoun County Department of Transportation Capital Infrastructure, Assistant Director in charge of the Highway Capital Program. The County's project to widen Route 7 to a uniform six -lane, cross-section from Route 9 to the Dulles Greenway interchange. That's six through lanes. She did mention the auxiliary lanes between the Greenway and South King Street, but six continuous travel lanes within that project limit. Bridges will be widened, as needed, to accommodate the additional travel lanes as well as appropriate shoulders, which is pretty important for safe operation of freeways, like this portion of Route 7 is. In the County's Capital Improvement program, the project has been programmed and funded just for the six -lane widening. To add a-- first off, I presume would be the studies to determine what would be the appropriate improvements to the interchange at South King Street, let alone the land costs and construction costs of whatever that improvement would consist of. That is not just out of the scope of the County's project, but it represents a different, what is known as purpose and need. At this point, I cannot tell you, "Oh yes, we'll just add this interchange to the scope of the County's project." That guidance would have to come from our Board of Supervisors. I would recommend, perhaps, that the Town undergo the formal studies for approval through the Virginia Department of Transportation to determine what precisely should be done with the interchange at South King Street. It's what VDOT calls an Interchange Modification Report. It is a formal process that someone would have to undergo, in order to determine how to improve the interchange. Vice Mayor Steinberg: I appreciate that, but this still doesn't quite answer my question. You said you have to widen the bridge in order to achieve six lanes. You are already, it seems to me, substantially impacting the bridge. How do you do that without also affecting the ingress and the egress to and from? James Zeller: The same ramps would still be accessing the highway. The termini would be adjusted to accommodate the additional through -travel lanes of Route 7, but the cloverleaf ramps would be adjusted to fit the widened highway. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Out of curiosity, why don't we see the cost of the expansion of the highway in the budget as opposed to everything else? Why is that not part of it? Why don't we see in the budget the cost of the additional lanes? 151January 8, 2024 James Zeller: For the six -lane widening? Vice Mayor Steinberg: Yes. James Zeller: It is in the [inaudible] Vice Mayor Steinberg: It wasn't in the slide that we've seen. In fact, the slide specifically didn't mention it. James Zeller: Yes, that was broken up into phases. Thal was the phase for the bridge work. Vice Mayor Steinberg: I see. James Zeller: Yes, but then all total, the project is in the neighborhood of about 100 million. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Okay. You maintain that a certain amount of this falls on-- the responsibility falls on the shoulders of the Town in terms of advocating for a more substantial look at this particular interchange as far as it relates to this project. James Zeller: That would be my recommendation. Vice Mayor Steinberg: In doing that, so then my question would be, I guess back to our Engineer, if we were to consider this, does this mean in some way we have to consider the land that's going to be required to substantially change this intersection? I know currently, there are certain projects that are dreadfully close to this particular intersection. How do we account for that before it's too late, if our intention is to actually substantially increase this? Renee LaFollette: If we were to undertake the Interchange Access Report to study this interchange, part of that would look at the land costs associated. Our thought with this was the portion of the project that the County is getting ready to do includes the planning for everything needed for the widening of the through lanes for the project. It made sense to us to make the request to the County to include this as part of the planning, because the widening of the Bypass will have a direct impact on South King Street and the operations on South King Street. To get an order of magnitude, basically, savings of this because an Interchange Access Report costs roughly $2 million. Looking at the Bypass Battlefield IAR that we will be presenting to you in two weeks, that was a $2 million project. We were hoping to be able to take advantage of the County's planning portion for the widening. Vice Mayor Steinberg: [inaudible] I know we're going to be asked, for example, to look at a potential project on the West Park commercial site. Is that site itself, would it be at jeopardy should we consider to undertake the work that needs to be done at this intersection or any other projects in that vicinity? For example, there's a small shopping center just to the north on the east side of the-- there's all kinds of stuff around it. Renee LaFollette: I can't stand here and give you an answer to that, because looking at that interchange in the way it currently functions, it could completely change how Clubhouse accesses King Street. Vice Mayor Steinberg: I would think so. This is a -- James Zeller: That's the nature of the Interchange Alternatives Report, IAR, is to look at multiple concepts on how to improve the performance of the interchange, and it is a tricky location with Clubhouse rather than -- Vice Mayor Steinberg: Well, exactly. That's my point. This becomes a more complex creation. James Zeller: It has the makings for a fairly complex study. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Okay, thank you. 16lJanuary 8, 2024 Council Member Cummings: Renee, I'm sorry, one quick question. Did I hear you correctly, are we already in the process of talking about an IAR here? Renee LaFollette: Not at this location. Council Member Cummings: Okay. I'm sorry. I heard you say IAR-- Renee LaFollette: In two weeks, we're talking about the Bypass Battlefield, the northernmost. Council Member Cummings: Thank you. Okay. Thanks. Mayor Burk: All right. Thank you very much. Appreciate the information. Is there something we should be doing tonight in-- Kaj Dentler: [inaudible] an your agenda for tomorrow night? Based on what I've heard, it sounds like the Council is probably down to those who are present, still ask the County to include it in the study. If that is correct, I'd recommend we just move to consent agenda tomorrow night. Mayor Burk: Does anybody have any problems moving this to consent? Vice Mayor Steinberg: No. Mayor Burk: Okay. Thank you. All right. The next one is traffic concerns for Fort View Boulevard. Niraja Chandrapu: The second presentation is on the traffic concerns for Fort View Boulevard. We will discuss the background, how the existing conditions are on for Fort View Boulevard. We will provide you what are results we found an on -site assessment, the evaluation of the other concerns, what the action plan is, what the physical impacts are, and what the staff recommendation is. Council requested a work session to discuss improved signage on Fort View Boulevard, potential traffic signal at Fort View Boulevard and Trailview Boulevard, and the potential reduction of speed limit on Fort View Boulevard. Fort View Boulevard is a two-lane roadway with a posted speed limit of 25 miles per hour. I just wanted to mention that this road is not yet accepted by the Town. It is still under the maintenance of the Developer. The Fort View Boulevard functions as a right -in right -out at the Battlefield Parkway, and it functions as a fun access at Trailview Boulevard. With stop controls on Fort View Boulevard. We did an on -site assessment and the on -site assessment reveals that the signage on the roadway aligns with the approved plans. However, we observed a few issues, which are the faded pavement markings and tall grass in the northeast corner of Fort View Boulevard and the Battlefield Parkway intersection, obstructing the line of sight of exiting traffic. This is a graphical representation of showing you the issues. As you see on the left-hand side, you see the circled ones which are the crosswalks and the faded centerline pavement marking. On the right-hand side, you'll see the picture showing the tall grass, which is obstructing the line of sight of exiting traffic. We have done the other concerns that were raised, which is the speeding. We have collected the speed data on Fort View Boulevard, and the data indicates that the average speed is 1174 miles per hour, whereas the 85th percentile is 19.13 miles per hour, and the posted speed limit is 25 miles per hour, so speeding is not an issue, at this time. The intersection of Fort View Boulevard and the Trailview Boulevard currently does not meet the criteria for a traffic signal. However, it is proffered for a traffic signal with additional commercial development along the Trailview Boulevard. That is upon meeting the criteria for signal. Our action plan is to coordinate with the Developer for a regular maintenance action such as repaint the faded pavement markings and trim tall grass in the northeast corner. Not just today, but also in future to make sure that there is no obstruction of line of sight. Since this is still under maintenance of the Developer, there is no physical impact on the Town, at this time. The staff recommendation is to coordinate with the developer for the routine maintenance 17panuary 8, 2024 actions, such as repainting the faded pavement markings and trimming the tall grass to enhance the line of sight. We would not recommend a signal at the intersection of Fort View Boulevard and Trailview Boulevard as it is not justified. Then the reduction in the speed limit on the Fort View Boulevard is also not recommended, at this time. Now I open the floor for questions. Mayor Burk: Okay. Council Member Cimino -Johnson. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you for your presentation as well. A couple questions. The first one that comes to mind is when did you collect the data on the speeds? Niraja Chandrapu: On December 29th to January 1st. Very recently. Very recently we collected because this is collected by the Police Department. If I remember it right, they left it for a few additional days to see if there is any change, and based on that, there was no change in the speed data. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: This was the Police Department running radar on the vehicles? Niraja Chandrapu: Yes, our Town of Leesburg Police Department collected using the radar speed signs. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Oh, the speed signs? Niraja Chandrapu: Yes. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Those little black boxes? Niraja Chandrapu: I think so. It is called the radar signs, like a shield sign, that captures the speed. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Okay, okay well that time period, a lot of people aren't home, so I would expect that you would get that data. If you go there and run it now for the next couple weeks, you're going to see very different numbers. I live right there along that road, and people just speed through there constantly. I'm very surprised at the numbers that I saw. Oh, the grass, whose responsibility is that? Niraja Chandrapu: Developer's responsibility, Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Because that's not their land, is it? Niraja Chandrapu: It's a Developer's land, so it is their responsibility to make sure that the line of site is not obstructed. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Because I was told a couple weeks ago, it transferred hands. It was sold, the land was sold. Niraja Chandrapu: The land was -- Council Member Cimino -Johnson: To a Developer, Lidl. Niraja Chandrapu: The land was sold? Renee LaFollette: Whoever that property was sold to is the one that is responsible. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: You are not saying Stanley Martin. You are saying whoever owns it currently. Renee LaFollette: Whoever owns that we are referring to as the Developer. If that is Lidl now, then that is who is responsible for maintaining that. 18Danuary 8, 2024 Council Member Cimino -Johnson: What is the steps that are going to be taken? Niraja Chandrapu: Steps have already been taken. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Oh, okay. Niraja Chandrapu: We have already contacted them clear the grass --to trim the grass. We already sent out an email to repaint the faded pavement mark. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Oh, I can't hear you. Niraja Chandrapu: We already sent out an email asking them to repaint the faded pavement markings. The temperature should support in order to do that We haven't heard back from them, yet. It was sent out last week. I'm hoping to hear soon. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: WII you update? Niraja Chandrapu: Yes, I will update on where we are with the status on that. Council Member Cimino -Johnson: Thank you so much. Niraja Chandrapu: Thank you. Mayor Burk: Anyone else? You all with your own mic down there, no. All right Thank you for the information and for being responsive to this. We need to get those faded paintings backup to make it safer for everybody out there. I didn't even know that was the name of that road, so I learned something today. Niraja Chandrapu: Thank you. Mayor Burk: Thank you very much. Niraja Chandrapu: Thanks. Mayor Burk: At this point, is there any future Council meeting topics? Mr. Cummings? Council Member Cummings: I just wanted to let everybody know there's some extra Town calendars in the hall. This is my final announcement as the calendar guy. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Calendar guy. Mayor Burk: Is that a song? The calendar guy? Anyone else? Yes. [laughter] Vice Mayor Steinberg: Actually, this may be a question for the Town Manager. Do we need a future discussion about how we deal with potential development in the area we discussed on South King Street with it's intersection at the Bypass? Because that could easily affect decisions that we're going to make there. Is this too long term or do we need to seriously consider what happens at this intersection at this point? Kaj Dentler: It doesn't hurt to get a blank [inaudible] Mayor Burk: [inaudible] Great. Sorry. Kaj Dentler: 1'11 just talk loudly. It doesn't hurt to have a deeper conversation on the interchange if you wish to do that. It's your decision. 1 think right now what we want to do from our perspective is get the County to go ahead and include that interchange. The complexity of the project as the County acknowledged here, if there are two entities trying to coordinate and match up at the right point of time, that seems to be complex. Should the Town contribute funds in part of that project? I don't know that answer, but that's easier than trying to have two different parties match up in a certain point. 19lJanuary 8, 2024 Vice Mayor Steinberg: Appreciate that. Well, then I would offer this as a discussion topic for future discussion. Mayor Burk: Are there four people that would like to-- I'm trying to yell very loudly. Are there four people that-- I will do that. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Stereo. [laughs] Mayor Burk: Are there four people that would like to have that discussion at a future time? All right, that's everyone. Is that it? Do I have a motion to adjourn? Vice Mayor Steinberg: So moved. Mayor Burk: Second? Council Member Nacy: Second. Council Member Bagdasarian: Closed Session? Mayor Burk: No, we were able to - Council Member Nacy: Sweet. Mayor Burk: -cancel it.[laughter][crosstalk] Council Member Bagdasarian: Motion to adjourn. Mayor Burk: Second? I need a second. Vice Mayor Steinberg: Second. Second. Mayor Burk: All in favor? Members: Aye. Mayor Burk: Opposed? All right. Good night, everyone. 20IJanuary 8, 2024