Council work session.

We have a couple of very interesting topics.

I'll turn it over to the manager to introduce those topics.

Uh, for your consideration tonight.

The first is an update from the planning department on the Deep Creek area plan.

I think they've done some really amazing work here.

Um, but what they want to do is go over some of that work with their hearing from the community and touch base with council before we go any further in the process.

And then second up, we'll hear from the police department on a fantastic partnership with the state that was made possible through actions by Governor Yunkin and Attorney General Miares to create some partnership opportunities that have really, really borne fruit, especially between some of the work we've done between Chesapeake Police and the Virginia State Police.

So really good stuff tonight, but I'll turn it over now to uh Director McNamara.

So good evening, everyone.

So we are here to talk about the Deep Creek Plan and where we are at to date.

Um this is our first time in front of you regarding uh the small area plan, and we're really excited to to talk about where we're headed.

Uh so the project team for this effort includes Charlie Jones, who will be a project manager on the planning side, also Anna Nagorniak will be uh assisting uh with this project.

Uh from the Kimley Horn side, we have uh Devin Simpson, project manager and Abeli La Cuesta who's here this evening.

Uh so really quick, I do want to talk for those in the chamber and those who are watching, uh, want to take a moment to share uh our effort and strategy today as it is uh regarding uh small area planning.

So, as many of you do know, we have been hard at work updating our comprehensive plan that covers the entire city.

However, the city of Chesapeake is huge and it's made up of many communities.

Uh and these small area uh plans allow us to dive deep into public outreach and the the many details that uh that make these communities unique unto themselves.

So uh once adopted, these plans will be part of the comprehensive plan.

Uh and we think that these will be a great value add uh to the comprehensive plan to give us specific details related to those communities.

So uh to set the table.

We have done these uh for in recent years for Indian River, the industrial waterfront.

We're underway right now with Greenbrier, and now it's Deep Creek's turn.

And uh without further ado, I'm gonna turn things over to uh the project manager, and she can take it from here.

Awesome.

Thank you, Jimmy.

Good evening, everyone.

I am Devin Simpson, consultant project manager with Kimley Horn.

So we'll dive right in.

Um the Deep Creek Area Plan covers both the Deep Creek planning area and the Camelot planning areas.

Uh the map you see here is our core developed study area, but technically it does cover the entire Great Dismal Swamp, and that is an area that we're looking at for additional bike ped connections, but not necessarily looking at as the core study area.

It is a 33 square mile area, so very large, a lot of different development, both retail and very heavy residential in the area.

As Jimmy mentioned, this is a component of the comprehensive plan, but it's an opportunity to dive a little bit deeper, get a little more specific on understanding the community needs and identifying strategic solutions, ideas for implementation to really enhance quality of life, improve connectivity and access, and strengthen the economic vitality of the businesses that exist within this area.

So we kicked off this plan this past July.

Um over the fall and summer time frame, we spent a lot of time collecting data and engaging with the community, performing existing conditions analyses as well.

Um so we've had a few touch points with the community that we'll talk about here in a moment.

Right now, we're in this visioning phase where we've established guiding principles based on that input that we received this fall, and then we'll be moving into the planning and visioning phase, and we've got two more touch points with the community.

The first will be this spring, where we'll have a series of pop-up meetings, meeting the community at different community events to really publicize the plan.

Um then we'll move into actually documenting the plan and the vision and the strategy, and then we'll have a third opportunity to meet with the community again, probably late summer, early fall time frame.

So, as I mentioned, we did a handful of engagement um this past fall, so that included three community meetings in different geographic areas so we can capture residents from the different communities.

Um we had two staff work sessions that included folks from various city departments to weigh in on the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats within the study area.

And then we have three stakeholder workshops too that included representatives throughout the community of different organizations.

Some were residents, some were business owners, um, and some were just represented their um professional organizations.

During this time, we had a community survey that we put out that garnered over 800 responses.

So this was really valuable input.

We learned of challenges in the study area as well as qualities of the study area and what folks really want to see improved.

Um and you should have a handout with you today that summarizes the engagement that we've done to date and just some general themes and input that we've heard from folks, which we'll take a look at here.

So, what we've heard from folks, um, I would be remiss not to mention that traffic is the number one concern that we hear from folks, and and we know that is an issue in the study area.

Um, but we'd like to remind you that we are looking long term.

So the vision that we're setting as part of this plan assumes that the bridge construction is complete, and then on top of that, we are being strategic in the developments that we're looking at in the solutions that we're looking at to make sure we're identifying opportunities to further reduce traffic congestion within the study area.

Some general themes that we heard in terms of those challenges in addition to traffic are the lack of accessibility and sidewalks, so the lack of ability to get around with other modes in addition to vehicle, so whether it be on bike or on foot, and then the lack of retail and restaurant amenities.

Folks really felt that they typically have to go outside the Deep Creek area, even outside the South Military Corridor to get those daily destinations, whether it be medical services, retail restaurants, those sort of things.

As far as challenges, folks, or sorry, qualities, folks really love the parks and open space and the general feel of the Deep Creek area.

They feel like it's family friendly, it's safe, and it's really important to them to preserve that community feel.

But did mention that there is an opportunity to create a sense of identity because they do feel like there's some mit smash in the area, and they would love to have a uniform sense of identity for the Deep Creek area.

So taking all of this input, we've came up with five guiding principles.

These will be used to help us guide us through the rest of the plan based on the community input that we've got to date.

So these are preservation, accessibility, connectivity, community empowerment, and balanced responsible progress.

So preservation, we'd be looking at protecting DC's historic nature that could be a little bit different depending on the area.

It could just be honoring the architectural style of the area.