Good afternoon and welcome to Hampton City Council work session.

I want to ask the clerk to call the role, please.

Councilman Bowman.

Present.

Vice Mayor Brown.

Here.

Councilwoman Campbell.

Present.

Councilwoman Bay RB.

Present.

Councilwoman Harper.

Present.

Councilwoman Muggler.

President Mayor Gray.

Present.

And we have several presentations this afternoon.

So I'm going to get started.

Ask the city manager to uh introduce the first one.

Yes, thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

We have with us this afternoon to give an update on the proposed uh General Assembly legislative priority document that's on your agenda for adoption this evening.

Mr.

Ed Reed, Vice President of Two Capital Consulting.

You all received a report last month.

There were some changes recommended at the time to delete one item, and since that time, based upon the VML meeting and other uh legislative conversations at the regional level, there have been a few items that we have also added by you know checking in with each of you.

But we wanted the public to see the changes and to know the changes that have been made.

So Mr.

Reid is just going to go briefly over both the deletion as well as the additions that are uh showing up in your final package for adoption this evening.

All right, good afternoon.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, members of council, uh city manager, city attorney, and city clerk.

I appreciate the opportunity to uh brief you today on uh those additions and deletions to the uh the presentation that I gave on back in October.

And so I'll try to be pretty brief today and not to bore you with some of the information that you've you've already heard uh last month.

And so we'll jump right in.

The first thing that I wanted to tackle is um we've had some changes uh since the last time I've uh presented to you all, and so I wanted to give you a bit of a election recap and talk about the implications for that for the upcoming uh general assembly session.

So the the Democrats swept all three uh statewide offices that you'll see there in the presentation.

So we'll have a new uh new governor, Lieutenant Governor, and attorney general coming in in those offices.

Those transitions are underway.

Um our team's been uh communicating with the respective uh transition teams to to find out how we can be be helpful as that transition takes place.

Uh we have um in House District 87, delegate Jawan Ward was re-elected and and she'll be serving in in that capacity, and then in House District 86, uh delegate elect Virgil Thornton will be representing uh the district there.

And so uh likewise we've been in communication with the members of the delegation as well to give them a little bit of a heads up on what's in the legislative package before uh council formally adopts that um this afternoon.

Um to the right there you'll see just some of the implications with the pickup of of 13 additional seats on the Democratic side and the House of Delegates, um, it will create um a ripple effect in terms of the way the committees are made up.

And so um that is something we we likely won't know the extent of until the beginning of session in January, but we'll keep a close eye on how that impacts the work that we're doing here on behalf of the city.

Um but we do expect some of the the makeups um in terms of committees to change.

Um we also have a special election that will take place as a result of uh Lieutenant Governor elect Hashmi being elected, and now her um Senate seat will need to be filled in there at this point.

There are two House members that have announced that they're running for that seat in the central uh Richmond area.

And so if one of them is victorious, we'll have another special election for that house seat as well.

So again, some ripple effects in terms of that, um, but work is well on the way to to ensure that we're off to a great session.

Some important dates here to keep in mind, and there's one slight correction here on November the November 17th date is actually the beginning of the pre-filing uh period.

Uh the uh it ends on December 1st, and so um usually a little bit later in the process with the beginning of that deadline um after the election in the House, and so we we saw the election uh last week, and so we have a little bit more time in terms of the pre-filing uh deadline there.

Two important dates are coming up next week, and that's the 18th and the 20th through the 21st.

That's the House appropriations and the Senate finance retreats respectively.

House appropriations will meet in Prince William and the Senate Finance will meet in uh Radford.

So our team will be actively participating in both of those meetings.

Um it is we're hoping to glean a better understanding of the fiscal uh outlook for the Commonwealth going into the session.

Um you might recall back in October I said the mandated unmet needs for the commonwealth based on some of the federal impacts and just some things that we have in terms of obligations as a commonwealth.

We're in the couple billion dollar range.

Um we've heard some estimates now that get that up to four billion dollars over the two-year period.

So a lot of challenges, I think, ahead in terms of the fiscal environment, and we'll hope to get a better understanding of that next next week.

Governor Yuncan is still slated to present his outgoing budget on December 17th.

Um, at that point, we'll um know what his proposals are on the outgoing budget, and the General Assembly will have their way in that during the session, and you'll see there that the budget amendments uh are due as a result of that on January 16th.

Um we do have you know new administration coming in, so we do have an inauguration that will take place um shortly after the the beginning of session.

Um, and then there you'll see that um we're scheduled to and um hopefully that stays true.

Uh March 14th would be the day that we would adjourn the 60-day budget session.

So I'll jump into some of the policy position updates, and again, I will not go through all the bullet points because you've heard this already and have seen this information, but just highlighting the the updates.

Um, based on feedback in our conversation in the October meeting, uh, the item related to uh TNR trap neuter and release was removed for the 2026 General Assembly session, so that you do not see in the resiliency environment and natural resources um section.

That deletion was the only change in terms of resiliency.

Um on community development and economic development, we did not have any additional updates as it relates to um changes.

Um, so that information you'll be very familiar with is what you saw at the October meeting.

Public education, sort of the the same.

Uh we didn't have any additions or deletions there.

Um in October, I I told you about the last bullet point there, which was uh supporting um solutions on school construction, which we continue to hear as a priority for for the incoming administration and this general assembly.

So uh no known uh changes there from our October meeting.

Fiscal responsibility and revenue generation.

We did have a couple of um additions here, um, and as I think the the city manager alluded to, and I think that the mayor and his role as chair of the uh Virginia Municipal League Legislative Committee helped to get um a priority position for the uh tax exemption for disabled veterans program.

And so VML is going to be prioritizing a study of that program and in the upcoming session.

Um, and so we've added some support language around the study of that.

You'll see there on the third bullet for statewide study on those local impacts.

Additionally, in the the second column there at the at the very bottom, um, you'll see a statement that was added around opposing any further local mandates as it relates to collective bargaining.

Um, right now there's a local option.

Um, you know, there's been some rumors and talks about uh legislation introduced that would further that to mandate that that local governments have to participate in collective bargaining.

So that's why you see that opposition statement there.

And I think um some of our regional uh partners uh will also have that same uh opposition statement in their packages as well.

Lastly, on the fiscal responsibility and revenue generation is a new um bullet point that was also added.

This is related to the compensation for a wrongful incarceration, and so um some of you might um have heard about this a little bit in the news over the last few months uh in a locality that that that dealt with this issue.

There was a bill that passed last session that would shift or add some additional compensation on these cases uh to local governments, and so this is uh basically requesting the removal of that language that would also state that you know uh the state could withhold state funding from a locality who did not follow through with with that uh compensation.

So again, I think we have several other localities across the region and across the state that are going to be working on that issue as well.

Public safety, um, no changes on this slide.

On the next slide, um, we did add two two issues here.

Um, one is related to these um what we we call and identify here as pop-up zones.

Um, the city of Virginia Beach is actually going to be taking the lead on this legislation, but again, uh as is the case here in the region, multiple localities will support this effort.

Um, this is um an effort to crack down on some of the um large-scale gatherings that typically are planned or just happen to take place at some of our public spaces.

Um this would give additional authority to local governments for increased enforcement and uh penalties around those violations.

And then secondly, there um is support for the continued uh uh use of uh license plate readers.

Um we heard that feedback at our October meeting, so we added a um a statement there.

We do expect some legislation around uh license plate readers to to come back in the upcoming General Assembly session.

No changes to the one uh FOIA statement that we have uh in the package.

And then on transportation and transit, there was one addition there to the bottom based on feedback at our October meeting that's as a um support statement for a regional secondary road fund and the creation of that, which is you know, again being spearheaded by the Hampton Roads uh Transportation Accountability Commission and the Hampton Roads Planning District Commission and the creation of that.

As it relates to our direct um legislative requests and budget requests, um there were no uh known changes, uh additions, deletions to those.

So you you might um remember that those are requesting that we be added to the list of localities in terms of more flexibility on taxation for for commercial or vacant properties, and then secondly, uh requesting additional legislative uh amendments related to um allowing Hampton and other localities to receive those state recycling credits for for what you're doing here locally in terms of the residential uh household trash.

On the budget side, we remain three budget requests here, um, 2.5 for the safer communities program, um, the estimated 770,000 for the creation of the Hampton or re-establishment of the Hampton Health District, uh, and then the the uh four roughly 4.4 million for the the um supporting the coalition for Fort Wool's efforts and and funding at uh Fort Wool.

And again, we hope to know more about the budget outlook for the state um next week.

Um, but but those three budget amendments are are what we have uh at this point.

And so with that, I will turn back to you, Mr.

Mayor, for uh feedback, questions, or comments questions from uh council members spice member.

Yeah, thank you, Ed uh for your uh report.

Uh on collective bargaining, uh that statement in terms of mandating collective bargaining for the for the uh locality.

Is that a regional position or is that specific to Hampton?

Uh I don't think that's a regional position per se.

I know other localities across the region that will have that in their individual package.

So is that Hampton specific position?

That is the recommendation at this time, yes.

Um I if I might add, I know I need some clarity on that one.

Yeah.

The many of the localities, although not all, are taking the position that they want to maintain local choice as opposed to mandate.

They are doing it in different ways.

Some are calling it out specifically as we had, others are lumping it in the don't put any unfunded mandates on us.

Because if there is a mandate to do collective bargaining, that takes away the local decision about whether you want to do it or not.

It's not a decision that you don't want to do it or that you do want to do it, it's just maintaining the choice that you have versus having the General Assembly dictate to you that you must do collective bargaining.

And the reason why many localities are taking that position is that there is a very large administrative cost that comes along, and they think it should be a local conversation.

Some localities haven't even had a movement of the workforce to request the collective bargaining.

So why mandate that and mandate the extra cost if because the locality is properly taking care of its workforce, there isn't a groundswell movement to even request it.

That's the basic gist of what this means.

And I believe you will find again in almost all, maybe not all, but many uh the majority either it's expressed this way or expressed as the don't put unfunded mandates on us.

That answer to the clarifies the question.

Did you need additional information on that?

I I think uh this was passed uh by the House and the Senate last year and went to the governor, he vetoed it.

Is that correct?

That's that's the expectation is that it's going to come back again this year uh as a mandate for public employees.

That's correct.

So I guess that's you know that's the reason we still have this uh statement in our in our positions.

All right.

Other questions.

I got I guess more of a comment, but um, you know, we have in under public safety, you know, requests from the state to honor their commitment and local governments about House Bill 599, and it's in there every year, it's in everybody else's package.

So it's almost like this is just a reminder that you owe us for you're not funding it like you should, but it it you know, I mean does this require or has there been uh a more of a full court press by the different organizations or localities to bring this to the attention and identify you know what the shortfall is.

Um I just just curious to know if you've been a part uh part of any discussions on on this, other than just everybody just has it in there just to remind the General Assembly, and then they ignore it every year and we move on.

So yeah, it's a great comment.

Um I think in the last two years there's been no movement uh to increase the 599 fund.

Uh previous to that, we've saw some incremental increases to the program.

I think some of the the you know budgetary uh constraints have have not allowed for that increase.

And so I know for instance, in uh in Hampton, Senator Locke has been a very good um supporter of that and introducing budget amendments to increase that Virginia First Cities, for instance, is a big priority for them in the work that they do, um, particularly for for those cities that are um that need that additional funding.

So I'd say that there's a pretty good full court press in Richmond around that issue.

Um it's uh it becomes a priority uh situation for the General Assembly in terms of money committees and where they allocate some, maybe not to the 599 fund for public safety, but to other areas um as well.

Um I do think in the upcoming budget cycle we'll see a lot more emphasis on that, um, just given some of the the drivers locally that we're seeing and and the needs and funding requests that we get.

Um so I think it'll be a priority for the upcoming budget cycle.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions, comments?

Okay, thank you.

And uh this will be on uh uh consent agenda this evening, so and I understand Mr.

Reed won't be here, but there's no need for you to be here for that because you know any questions we have, we're trying to get those on the floor now.

All right, thank you.

Thank you.

Ms.

Mayor, the next presentation this afternoon is one we're very, very excited about.

I know all of you as council members, as well as myself and and our team have heard complaints over time about our community development department's uh responsiveness or and and and people's minds lack of responsiveness, some of the, if you will, bureaucratic red tape or length of time it takes to get things done.

I do want to be fair to the staff and say all along some of the things that people complain about are code driven, and many of them uh the ones that are most frustrating to them uh that distinguish our city and some cities in our region from others have to do with state mandates around the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act and or federal regulations around wetlands, because we are a coastal community, and not every locality in the Commonwealth has to deal with some of those kinds of constraints.

Um so but that said, we took the challenge that we wanted to be even better and stronger and more responsive.

And uh today we're going to unveil the strategic shift that our community development department has made.

Uh this started um uh under Bonnie Brown before she left and Kim Michael and Jason Mitchell, um, who was both the interim CDD director and also assistant city manager, have been working together to chart this new course, and today we're glad to unveil it for you.

You're gonna see uh several changes that we've made.

Um many of these came from the employees themselves wanting and appreciating uh saying we we wanted to be and needed to be more customer service focused, but we also employed a consulting firm uh clarion to also help guide us with an independent perspective.

And so this presentation blends both the clarion recommendations, many of those have already been accomplished, some are yet to come, as well as the employee recommendations.

And I want to commend Kim Michael, our interim director, for the great job she's done in picking up the reins and and making sure we got to today where we could share this exciting unveiling with you.

Our hope is that in the new year after we get past the holidays as we're entering the holiday season that we'll also do some more of this kind of thing and invite our private sector partners in so that they can actually hear some of this and visit in an open house type of format.

But you all get the first preview today.

All right.

Welcome before you started I know you won't revisit this slide again but I did I miss a celebration or was this done for the benefit of the presentation.

That was a very nice photo this was their retreat.

Oh okay Kim had a retreat and Brian and I uh were and Jason were invited I think Quasi was too maybe he couldn't come to visit with them during part of the retreat day and they were having a lot of fun you can see the enthusiasm expressed in the picture they were taking great pride in each of their division's work and their new vision and they wanted a selfie so this is our selfie all right great all right Kim take it away all right thank you so much so good afternoon members of council we do really appreciate the opportunity today to brief you on the state of our department our share some of our recent recent accomplishments and our strategic shift in vision and operation so we'll discuss today how the department is evolving why we're shifting our focus and our vision and and other things and explore why and how each division's impact and preview next steps on our journey this journey began with the realization that perceptions of our department have not always been positive.

We've heard the feedback and we're committed to making meaningful change by streamlining some of our processes strengthening partnerships and prioritizing a truly customer focused approach we're working to build trust and deliver outcomes for everyone we serve we understand that our community seeks solutions not just oversight and we're building partnerships and putting people at the heart of development we plotted the course together Mary mentioned some of this through open feedback sessions consultant insights oversight committee guidance and surveys capturing both staff and community voices because listening to everyone is vital to driving impactful change we discovered several key challenges some of which were historical and have already seen improvements including staffing and retention challenges outdated planning tools workflow and system gaps zoning ordinance concerns inconsistent procedures and development process delays so here's what we're doing about it and here's what we've done so we're already strengthening our team by enhancing career development pathways and proving improving onboarding fostering a positive workplace culture addressing vacancies and staff capacity challenges and addressing key positions within the department importantly we're not just focusing on recruitment but also on retention ensuring that we attract the most qualified staff while creating an environment where they want to stay in fact we now have 28 more positions filled than just two years ago and turnover has drastically decreased reflecting the progress of these efforts modernizing our workflows is a top council and customer priority so staff is working diligently to present a new software proposal soon and it will be designed to be customer focused that we've heard a lot about that feedback from our community and customers so we want it to be very customer focused intuitive and to provide seamless permitting and project tracking for our customers we're improving procedural accountability by updating our SOPs conducting regular internal audits and training refreshers and establishing accountability measures to ensure consistent procedural compliance we're preparing to update long range plans and design guidelines to guide future growth at the same time we're laying the groundwork to simplify and modernize our zoning ordinance which we know is much needed creating clearer and more effective regulations we're accelerating impact by strengthening pre-application and early coordination processes and fostering seamless collaboration across divisions and departments to eliminate bottlenecks and to maximize the greatest impact we must first reimagine our vision one that aligns with our goals our community and our future and so like Mary said as part of our retreat we spend a lot of work thinking about and updating our vision for our department so this is our new department vision statement again it's something that we worked on as a team it really reflects where we see ourselves going as a result of our passion and dedication today and so through the community development department we strive to be a connection point for people ideas and opportunities where everyone thrives in a healthy inclusive and future ready community to further clarify our purpose and values we created a department motto this was actually a really cool exercise we had staff work together in groups to come up with some ideas they came up with some really great ideas this is what we ended up voting on over

And so through the community development department, we strive to be a connection point for people, ideas, and opportunities where everyone thrives in a healthy, inclusive, and future ready community.

To further clarify our purpose and values, we created a department motto.

This was actually a really cool exercise.

We had staff work together in groups to come up with some ideas.

They came up with some really great ideas.

This is what we ended up voting on overall.

And so the goal is not just to energize staff and stakeholders, but it's also a reminder of the bigger purpose behind our work.

So you'll start to see this in our email signatures, and you'll start to see this around the department.

We thought that was a very cool exercise.

So just to further emphasize our focus on customer service, we're aiming to ensure processes and expectations are clear and reliable for all stakeholders, from residents and businesses to staff and partners.

We are introducing more flexible approaches to accommodate a range of project types and development goals, eliminating unnecessary steps and bottlenecks to make the development review process faster and more efficient.

As we explore each division now, we'll highlight their vital role in serving the community, showcase standout recent achievements, and demonstrate how they are advancing our new vision and priorities.

So our divisions of work at a glance, so we have everything from code enforcement, new construction, community engagement, our customer service team, development services center, housing and neighborhoods, planning division, support services, resilient Hampton, and lastly, zoning.

So we'll begin with the development services center.

They serve the city and its applicants, contractors, property owners, and the public by providing coordinated customer focused permitting services, guidance, process coordination, information, and compliance support.

Here you see a snapshot of the previous year performance metrics.

While the total construction value tends to fluctuate from year to year, this year being down slightly from last year, you'll see the total permit revenue and permit application numbers.

It's an extremely high number, and it is up significantly from last year.

But for the last decade, we have surveyed customers that we serve in the development services center.

And so whether they're served in person or online, this graph represents customer satisfaction in the areas of efficiency, consistency, and our online portal functionality.

As you can see, up until 2024, there was a steady drop in satisfaction.

Since then, it's drastically and significantly improved under new leadership and direction.

Alright.

Again, you can see the same trend this time in regard to customer satisfaction and courtesy, knowledge and promptness or responsiveness.

And so, as a part of this presentation, we want to highlight staff achievements in the way of promotions and certifications, as this is a significant contributing factor in the ability to provide outstanding service in terms of knowledge and expertise.

So first we have Latoya Forbes, she was promoted to our development services center management manager.

We have Sue Hair promoted to chief site plan agent.

Chris Free promoted to site plan agent too.

Yolanda Price promoted from permit tech to site plan agent.

Candice Bass promoted to Permittech 2.

Olivia Harris promoted to Permit Tech from Administrative Assistant.

Both Candace and Molly have now passed their required permit tech certifications.

And we've actually added a new permit tech position.

That we did fill that position.

She actually started this week, so we're excited to see what kind of a difference it's going to make in terms of having a fourth permit tech.

But we believe that this addition will help us to process permits with greater efficiency as well as providing a greater level of customer service.

How the work aligns with our vision.

So having certified permit techs who are discipline focused, the extension of the DSC hours to better accommodate contractors, and streamline comment letters to expedite review times and provide improved clarity and customer service.

Next, new construction division oversees plan reviews, inspections of new development, and compliance with construction standards and regulations.

So last performance year, they performed a total of over 11,000 total inspections, issued over 300 certificates of occupancy, and reviewed over 2400 plans.

We'll talk a little bit about how we're doing in terms of time frames on our plan review side, but first I'm going to show you what those standard time frames are.

And these standard time frames are across the region, so we're not different than other localities in terms of how we how we use these standards.

So if you see zoning generally zoning reviews would be two days, other anything other than a zoning site plan review, which would be a 30-day time frame.

Terms of site plan reviews, the initial submission would be 30 days.

Any resubmissions will be 21 days or less.

Anything trade related plumbing mechanical electrical on the initial initial submission is 21 days.

And then resubmissions, we try to get those done in three to seven days.

We try to expedite those as quickly as possible.

Residential building plan review, the initial submission, we try to get those done in seven days or less.

Resubmissions, three days or less.

And then on the commercial side, initial submission, we're at 21 days, and again on the resubmission, we try to get those out the door as quickly as possible with seven days or less.

Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

Question for you.

This is actually I think the previous slide on development services center.

And though you said that you extended the uh hours to accommodate contractor schedules and all that.

Is that has that change uh in terms of your extended hours or is that still the same?

Yeah, that's a good question.

So I think when we reduce the time frame previously, we were in a very unusual and unique situation.

Um first we had very low staffing, and so the ability to serve the customers as they come in and in person all day long, as well as try to keep up with the emails and you know, processing our online permits, it was just it just wasn't working.

So at that time we thought it was best that we close the DSC first thing in the morning for a few hours so that the staff would have the opportunity to um address online customers as they do the the ones in person.

But since we've uh gone back to the initial time frame, I believe it's been probably almost a year now that we've gone back to being open all day.

So essentially we open at 8 30, that gives 30 minutes for the permit text to kind of get in and get everything set up, and then we close down at four o'clock.

The permit text leave at 4 30 for the day, so that gives them 30 minutes to kind of do the reporting and and all that kind of thing.

So that's been very successful for us.

Okay.

All right.

Um thank you, Ms.

Mayor.

Thank you, Kim.

Um, I just had a I know I did a little bit of math, and it looks like this is about a five-month process from end to end if everything goes smoothly.

Um is this more um because you have the your time ranges, so is this an average or um is this kind of like the maximum time that it would typically take, except for some outliers?

Yeah, that's a good question.

So this is generally our standard, and I'll say I'll show you some graphs here in just a moment that'll show that you know if you looked at us two years ago, we would have been behind the standard, right?

Or slower than the standard.

Whereas now we are way ahead of the standard.

We've got new staff, we've changed our processes, and so we're faster than ever now.

But I think depending on the project, it may not necessarily go through all of these reviews each time.

So some of these may just go through zoning reviews, some of these may go through zoning and plan uh and site plan review.

So not every project necessarily goes through all of these steps.

So the time frames will differ depending on the project.

Thank you to answer your question.

That does, thank you.

And Kim, can't some of them be done concurrently as well in parallel path as opposed to sequentially?

Yes, ma'am.

So as much as possible, thank you for bringing that up, Mary.

As much as possible, we try to do concurrent reviews.

So, like I said, if a specific project needs zoning, site plan and building to the greatest extent possible, we've got all those different uh bodies of staff looking at those plans so that we can try to expedite those projects as quickly as possible.

Okay.

All right, so here you see.

So we kind of we saw the standards of time.

So here you'll see so uh fiscal year 25 is in blue, fiscal year 26 is in green.

So you can see how much quicker and more efficient we've already become.

Um we are now fully staffed in plan review, but across the board, like I said, in terms of staffing, but also looking at our processes and SOPs, reducing unnecessary steps, eliminating bottlenecks.

We have come become significantly faster in our time review or plan review time frames across the board, other than zoning, which we'll talk about zoning a little bit later in the presentation.

So again, we've had many new additions in our um in our uh plan review section, and so as you can see, if we would have looked at this two years ago, um we were way on to the right.

So the negatives show how many days ahead of our plan review standard that we are.

If again, if you'd have looked at us two, three years ago, we would have been way to the right.

Um, a lot of our significant amount of our plan reviews were not on time.

They were one, two, three, and more days over the time frame.

So this is a huge improvement.

Um thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Uh I want to make sure I understand how to read this char.

So are you saying that if if your if your goal was two days for zoning reviews, they're saying that it took four or night?

Yes, ma'am, yeah.

And like I said, zoning we'll talk about in a little bit, but if you look at the zero line, that would be the standard line, and so anything to the negative would be faster than the standard, anything to the right would be slower than our standard.

Thank you.

And that's not terrible.

Four days versus two.

Okay, thank you.

Yes, ma'am.

All right, so we've had many new additions in our new construction division, including Eldridge Reynard, our new building official, John Price, Ira Gary, John Card, and Justin Torres in our plan review section, and like I said, we are now actually fully staffed and plan reviewed and made such a significant difference.

We've also brought on a new building inspector, Vincent Moore, and I'm happy to say that Trevor and Ira both passed their required certifications, which is no small feat.

Through their work, uh their work aligns with our new vision through updated and clear submission checklists, improved comment letters that provide more helpful and solution-oriented feedback, accelerated review and resolution, and enhanced field issue resolution provided by inspection staff.

Next, we'll jump to property maintenance and zoning enforcement.

So, this division is charged with safeguarding Hampton's neighborhoods by enforcing codes and ordinances to maintain public safety, property values, and quality of life.

This data reflects numbers from fiscal year 2025.

We've seen an increase in violations and inspections since the allocation by council for new positions.

This has allowed us to narrow our focus in terms of geographic area while also ensuring seamless implementation and enforcement of new codes and ordinances that have been recently adopted.

We have several accomplishments here to celebrate, including Austin Davis being promoted to a codes inspector too, new additions in staffing with Frank, Michael, Ashley, and Forrest, and both Megan and Chase have recently passed required certifications, which is amazing.

We're further aligning our efforts in code enforcement by planning a code show initiative.

This aims to enhance the education of our neighborhood groups and community members.

We're also more strategically focusing on commercial corridors, understanding that we want our current businesses to thrive, while also trying to attract new businesses to the area.

With the addition of new staff, we've been able to enhance proactive inspections overall.

Next, housing and neighborhoods.

So this division oversees and administers HUD entitlement grants and other housing resources.

They support our neighborhood commission and pride itself on neighborhood capacity building through a civic leadership development focus.

And you can see here in fiscal year 2025, they helped to administer over two million in grant activities, including CDBG, home and city grant funds.

There was also about 80,000 allocated to neighborhood and pool grants, four new neighborhood organizations were registered, three new district representatives onboarded to the neighborhood commission, and about 43 new graduates of our neighborhood leadership programs.

We had two recent additions to our housing and neighborhoods division, and Travis Rash, he's our new chief neighborhood specialist.

Raquel McMillan, she came over from being a permit tech.

She is now our new neighborhood associate.

And we recently gave an update on some of our housing achievements with the CAPER presentation that Monica did.

But our staff also celebrated success in some of our programs to include our leadership academy, work and support with the Hampton community policing effort, and work on the neighborhood grant programs.

Next, we have community engagement, it's a fairly new division.

Their focus is on effective engagement that elicits public input on a variety of topics, education, work with our youth commission and serves as a connection point for information to flow to and from the community.

These metrics outline some of the incredible work that our community engagement team has accomplished last year, including over 3,000 notices to the public, over 800 households were engaged with, and successful steering group facilitation, lots of youth engagement, mainly through our work with our youth commission and their youth-based events.

Their work helps us to further align with our vision through meaningful and thoughtful engagement with the community.

Our community engagement team includes the division manager, most of you know Monica Maharag.

We also have Carol Wilson and Mari Jones, who are the community engagement specialists and associate, and they celebrated accomplishments and things like Braille History Panel, also our neighborhood block party kits that was launched with libraries and HS earlier this year.

Next, we'll talk about support services division.

So these staff are truly the powerhouse behind the work that serves Hampton.

Through administrative support, personnel management, finance, procurement, and records management, they keep our department and staff operating at a high level and ensure that staff has the resources they need to be successful in their work.

A highlight of just a few of their accomplishments last year.

They worked to streamline procurement processes, introduce enhanced financial tracking, and coordinated a comprehensive records management overhaul.

We recently changed how our administrative staff are organized, where they used to function as a standalone division.

We have now deployed those staff directly into our divisions.

This has proved successful as each admin has a much clearer and specific focus in terms of their job duties.

Supports some of our department's boards and commissions, and helps to shape development in Hampton.

We've hired a new planning manager, Melissa Story, and three planners have celebrated their one-year anniversary, Han, Quinn, and Valerie.

They've celebrated recent work on many new codes and ordinance policies and amendments, including ADUs, Infill Housing Plans Book, and STRs, just to name a few.

Next, our zoning team administers enforces Hampton's zoning ordinance to ensure land use and development are consistent with adopted plans and policies.

They focus on application processing, interpretation and guidance on the ordinance, compliance checks, and property research.

These numbers reflect work from fiscal year 2025 with over 3,600 total zoning reviews completed, 235 zoning inquiries researched and responded to, and over 415 zoning walk-ins were served at the Development Services Center.

Our zoning division has experienced many challenges and significant turnover in the last two years, which was reflected in some of the timeliness metrics earlier in the presentation.

We are very excited to announce that we are now almost fully staffed and seem to be stabilizing as we continue to work to get new staff trained and up to speed.

We now have a new zoning administrator, Milview Knight, as well as a deputy zoning administrator, Chris Langester, and several new zoning officials, Summer Raven, WandaWyn, and Rachel Dickens.

In addition to staffing, this team celebrates successful work on a new training program, update the SOPs, and a new inquiry tracking system.

This work helps us to grow by protecting community character, supporting economic investment, and building public trust.

Our resilience team allows us to envision empower and create through adaptation planning and policy, project management, and strategic focus on living with water.

They truly are a small but mighty team.

They focus on grant writing and administration, project planning and management, and support in the development review process, which helps us to ensure that resilient policies are considered to support healthy growth here in Hampton.

Their team includes a resiliency officer, Olivia Askew, as well as Scott Smith, our resiliency engineer, and Anna Hammond, a resiliency specialist.

While they may be new to these positions, they've all served in the city of Hampton in different capacities and work for the city of Hampton for many years.

They bring a wealth of experience, knowledge, and skill to this division.

They've had many recent achievements.

I think we did a recent presentation.

Scott did a living with water presentation.

It highlighted some of their achievements over the last year or so, so we can just highlight some of those here again.

Their work helps us to align with our vision through collaborative partnerships, value-focused solutions, and innovation.

Next small business, we've had great success in the addition of our small business coordinator.

This position provides assistance and guidance to small businesses in Hampton through project navigation, process coordination, and clear communication and advocacy.

In the last fiscal year, over 100 businesses were supported with over 49 opening in that time frame, over 2 million in small business construction value, and approximately 450 new jobs created.

The addition of this position has allowed us to better link planning to business growth, zoning to real outcomes, turn permits into open doors, and helping to expedite processes by bridging the gap between organizations and clearly outlining steps for each unique business type.

In addition to our small business coordinator, we were allocated two other customer service positions within the last year or so.

We have a customer service manager and an executive project manager.

So while Skylar mainly focuses on the small business customer, lease of our networks to help and support customers who may feel frustrated or stuck in our processes.

Joshua George focuses on customer service and efficiency as it relates to larger development projects.

And so the establishment of this team has already proven to be integral to our success and providing exceptional and reliable customer service.

I don't want to fail to mention the creation of our CDD fund crew.

This has made a tremendous impact on our culture and environment through informed feedback, meaningful activities, and a focus on collaboration of divisions within our very large department, which can be otherwise challenging.

And I do want to just take a second to highlight our leadership team.

So one of the key pillars of a high performing organization is having the right people in the right places.

And I can say right now with great confidence that we have that in this team.

This team has worked extremely hard and made it possible to make all the changes that I highlighted earlier.

Their passion, dedication, and strong leadership has allowed us to make a significant impact in changing focus and creating positive perceptions of not just our department but our city as a whole.

So we're all committed to continued growth, strong leadership, creating positive work cultures for staff, development of staff, and having a customer focused and solution-oriented way of thinking.

Next step, so our progress is only the beginning.

And lastly, I just we just want to acknowledge and thank council and city leadership for allocating funds and resources towards this effort by making our department development a priority.

We've been able to make so many positive changes already with so many more to come.

Thank you.

And I'm here for questions if you have any.

Questions?

Councilwoman Hawker.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Thank you, Kim, for your presentation.

I know that was a lot.

You went through quite a few slides, and you did a very good job.

Thank you so much.

I am proud of the progress that you all are doing and taking the feedback and really acting upon it.

I do got one question.

With some of the zoning, particularly like the zoning ordinances, some of them are very old, and I know it's a wide range that we have.

Do you all take a look at those pertaining like with the accessory dwelling units?

Because I know some of them are we have zoning ordinances pertaining to those, but it's very outdated compared to you know what we are doing now.

So do you all take a look at these zoning ordinances?

And the reason why I'm asking is because I was working with the citizen on specifically that the accessory dwelling unit that they were trying to do, they could not under the old zoning because the we were still, of course, bound by that, even though it was very, very old ordinance.

But um was one of the reasons why we're having these changes right now to bring us up to date with you know with the times.

So do we take the time sometimes just to see hey, uh these zoning ordinances are kind of old.

Maybe we need to kind of take a look and see if we need to kind of bring them back up to speed.

Yeah, that's a good question.

I think over time we do that uh incrementally, and and as things come up and we realize that you know, hey, this really needs to be updated, or other localities are doing these things, or otherwise, if the state code or um state law changes, and we feel like we that's something that we want to get adopted.

But I do know moving forward, we do understand that right now there's a couple of issues with our zoning ordinance.

One, the complexity of it, just because, like you said, over time it's just become so complex.

Um, and then the other thing is maybe looking at you know, modernizing it, but that comes with you know, that typically would come after we do a comp plan amendment.

So, what we're gonna be looking at is doing a phase approach.

Step one will be something along the lines of cleaning it up, reorganizing our zoning ordinance, step one, and then after the comprehensive plan amendment, we would look at doing updates and modernizing at that point, but at least our zoning ordinance would be clean and ready to go for those new updates.

So that's a really good question.

Okay, thank you.

You might also recall that when we did the Mitchell Silver retreat, we asked people, not only you but your boards and commission members if they were supportive of the more incremental way or a total rewrite.

Okay, and overwhelmingly consensus was a total rewrite, but that does take time, as Kim mentioned.

So in the meantime, for instance, tonight the accessory dwelling units coming as a change to the zoning ordinance precisely because of the issue you brought up and others were bringing up.

So we'll continue doing incremental while we're working on the overhaul.

But we did acknowledge, and I think the the boards and commissions you all brought in to that retreat with Mitchell Silver, everyone you know sort of concurred it's time to update and modernize the code.

Yes, thank you.

Councilman Faraby.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Again, uh I want to just applaud the work that you um that went into your uh this process and how you plotted your course, and I'm very excited and um grateful that that you all have taken this on and and um and I can't say enough positive about um what I've heard today.

Um I do have a kind of a question, and and Kim, you just mentioned other surrounding localities when you were answering uh council um woman uh harper's question, but I already have written down the question around um I have you have you actually benchmarked um other low our neighbors, uh our local our other localities, and how you know in coordination with the consultant, did you look at the industry standards and the best practices to kind of get you there because the way you plotted your course it seems to be more internally focused just as a casual observer.

No, that's a great question.

Yeah, as part of the um, like Mary said, we had Clarion or a consultant come in, and as part of what they did, they not only broke down and looked at every one of our development processes, how we do things, um, essentially from the time it hits planning, if if it needs a rezoning use permit, all the way down to our development services center in terms of plan review permitting, they looked at every part of those processes, and then what they did as a step two is they compared us to other localities.

So they looked at other localities that have similar processes.

If there were other localities that were doing it maybe a little bit different, or they tweaked it a little bit, or they had less steps, they were pulling that in and giving us that information so that we could bring that into us so that we can make sure that Hampton are doing is doing things as efficiently as possible and that our processes are easy and clear for our customers.

Thank you.

Yes, exactly what I wanted to hear.

Sorry, Councilwoman Mugler.

Thank thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Sorry, suddenly lost my voice.

Um thank you for the presentation.

I I love the the nature and the tone of this presentation and and the direction that you all are going in.

I think it's something since my tenure on council began that we have talked about as a council.

Um it's really going in a direction that I think we had a vision that you could take it.

So thank you for the work that you all have done.

And um and um the retreat that you did, all those things really um great practices to to engage in.

I had a question about um early in the presentation, you were talking about modernizing your workflows and um implementing modern technology and building a one-stop portal.

Um my question is, and I'm sure that you will have given some thought to this, you'll be working with IT on this, obviously.

Yes, um, but what I have experienced in my own um personal um professional journey is that many times we pick out this incredible software that we think is just terrific.

But you want to um make sure, and maybe this isn't a question but a suggestion, but I'd like to see that we make sure that all these um softwares will integrate with one another and talk to each other so that uh because um you have all this data in in you know on this platform, and then you want to make sure that uh you'll be able to pull a report out that that's going to be helpful to you.

And so as you do this work, uh you know, hope that you'll think about the kinds of reports and the kind of information that you are gonna want to be able to pull out of this portal or out of this technology so that you get you get the maximum use out of it.

Um I've been in you know engaged in banking for a long time.

We um oftentimes have this really great platform, and then we realize that we can't pull any reports from it because the data we want to attach it to is over here and this software.

So um just work really closely with IT and uh in that work and ensure that all those platforms are going to talk to each other and you'll be able to get so it's probably some preliminary work that you'll want to do to make sure you think about all the things you want to be able to get out of it before you know before you find on a dotted line.

But I like I love the idea of a one-stop portal, and I think that you know the people that we're serving are gonna really um find that to be helpful resource.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you again for the presentation and look forward to great outcomes.

Thank you.

Uh Councilwoman Campbell.

Good morning, ma'am.

Um, I just want to give you some feedback.

Um, you know, as I'm out and about um with the citizens, and I talked to them about how their interaction is with the staff.

Um here's just a couple examples that have already started to make a difference.

So I asked the first gentleman, you know, how's it going?

And he said, Oh, it really is horrible.

So he said, wait, he said, I can say, he said, I I've put it in the new tool, and it it seems much better.

So I'm I'm gonna wait and see.

So that was positive.

And then I had another gentleman say, you know, I had a particular project that I wanted to do, and they told me that I couldn't do it that way, but I could do it this way.

So he was able to complete his project with the rules that are set out.

So the tone is already coming back, more of a let's get there from here.

Um, so that's really really good.

I can tell you too, your customer service, be prepared to expand that department because once people find out that it's there, um, those people are going to get quickly overwhelmed, and you're gonna need more of them.

So um as far as the information that you provide today, it was awesome.

Um, I would like to see um staffing levels of what you would like to see versus what you have.

You had the metric in there for your performance and your turnaround, but I'd be curious to see you know where you need more people.

So, but great job.

Glad to see the change coming.

It makes my job easier.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any other questions, uh, council members?

Okay.

All right.

So you know, I think uh this has been a long time coming, and I noted a process of going through this review and you know, working with the consultants uh I think is going to produce some good results for us.

So, you know, as councilwoman Campbell said, I think we look forward to you know making our job easier and getting a lot more positive comments, but we'll certainly share those with you as well.

Because I think you know, hopefully you'll you all will be kind of looking and reviewing it, you know, the changes you make to see you know if they're if they're working for the customer, and that's really what's most important in the end.

But good job with um getting all your positions filled, and uh, I guess if there's any more investments that we need to make uh you know, this budget year, we're certainly willing to look at those as well in terms of uh you know showing up your customer service because uh you know that's that's pretty big for the customers, and we want the developers and those of building houses and you know want them to invest in our community, and I think uh you know the experience with that whole process is is critical for you know our long-term success.

So thank you.

Thank you.

C managers uh next presentation.

Yes, um, the next one also comes from community development, as you know on your agenda tonight has already alluded to when we were talking about the issue Councilwoman Harper brought up about the zoning code not really permitting accessory dwelling units.

Council initiated action for us to have community conversations and a stakeholder group about how we might update our zoning ordinance to permit these.

Uh council's had quite a few briefings on this, and your actions are tonight with the public hearing.

However, we did want to alert you to some uh conversations and one specific change the planning commission had recommended at its meeting last month so that you have that in advance to think about before you um actually have the full presentation hearing and vote tonight.

And so it's my pleasure to um I had that Kim Michael was going to do this one.

I'm sorry.

Quinn, this is your first presentation before council, is it right?

I did one other one about the use permit.

Okay, I may not have been here when you did that one.

So Mike forgive me for not realizing you were gonna be doing this today.

Yes.

Uh well, good afternoon, council.

Um, yeah, as um city manager said, I will be presenting zoning ordinance amendments number 25-0018, 25-0019, 25-0268, and 25-0269 relating to defining and permitting accessory dwelling units.

Um, just an overview of what an accessory dwelling unit is.

Um it is a smaller secondary housing unit on a one-family residential lot.

That could either be a detached ADU, which would be an ADU that is separate from the principal dwelling but on the same lot as part of an accessory structure, or it could be an attached ADU, which would be connected to the main building either as an addition or within the existing building footprint.

Um City of Hampton is um recommended or is considering adding these as a housing option in order to increase housing opportunities within Hampton's existing neighborhoods.

Um based on the community input and steering group decisions that we had, um staff is recommending a phase data informed approach to ADU implementation that emphasizes safety and family unity.

Um so once again, this amendment will these amendments will impact chapters one, two, four, and eleven of the city zoning ordinance.

Um in chapter one, we will be creating additional standards and regulations for accessory dwelling units in a new section, which I believe is section one-three seven.

Uh the standards will aim to minimize the impact of additional housing units within one family neighborhoods and on the city as a whole.

They will ensure that ADUs remain accessory to the principal dwellings on the lots that they're located on, and they'll prohibit specific uses within ADUs.

It is staff's recommendation that only one ADU be permitted on any one lot.

Uh, that is consistent with every other city in the region, and we believe it would be also keep the neighborhood or maintain help maintain neighborhood character.

Um there will be no minimum lot requirements for ADUs, so technically any lot in the city um that has a principal dwelling on it already could support an ADU provided it meets the other standards in this section.

So the ADUs will have setback requirements.

Uh attached ADUs will need to meet the setbacks of the base zoning district for principal dwellings, the same way an addition would.

Detached ADUs will need to meet setback requirements for accessory structures.

Uh the one exception to that, um planning commission added a recommendation at the last public hearing to increase the required side setback from three feet to five feet.

Um, and that is acknowledging that accessory dwelling or detached ADUs will be a more intensive use than most other accessory structures, and also for purposes of maintaining privacy with neighboring properties and also fire safety and other forms of safety.

And ADUs will also need to meet the 20% detached ADUs will need to meet the 20% rear lot coverage requirement that accessory structures currently have.

So no more than 20% of the rear yard can be accessory structures, and that would include ADUs.

ADUs will not be allowed to exceed 50% of the area of the principal dwelling and with a cap at 800 square feet, even if the dwelling, even if that's less than 50 percent of the dwelling.

We settled on 800 square feet because 1600 square feet or twice that is the median around the median dwelling size for the city of Hampton.

So we thought 800 was a pretty good benchmark.

Um other recommendation recommended change from the planning commission that the planning commission made is that um initially we had stated in that ordinance section that this would be minimum dwelling area.

That was an error on our part.

Planning commission recommends changing that to maximum dwelling area because that would be is the correct word that was intended to be there.

ADUs will not be allowed to exceed 16 feet in height or approximately one and a half stories.

They will not be allowed to exceed the height of the principal dwelling.

However, in the case where an ADU is built in a special flood hazard area as designated by FEMA, their elevation, 16-foot elevation would be based on the design flood elevation rather than grade.

And in that case, if the existing dwelling was built before those requirements were in place, the ADU would be allowed to project higher than the existing than the principal dwelling.

ADUs will not be allowed to be used as short-term rentals.

Um that is partly informed by our survey respondents, where a plurality of them of the survey respondents said that they didn't want ADUs to be also used as short-term rentals.

But additionally, ADUs and STRs are both uses that the city or that city staff wants to see, um, but they are serve different purposes, and we don't want them to be in competition with each other.

And this requirement does not affect existing STRs that would be located in nonconforming ADUs, but it would affect any STRs that are built in the future.

In the interest of safety, all ADUs will be required to have a path of ingress and egress that connects to and from the right-of-way.

That's for so that first respondents or first responders can access the property in an emergency.

To that end also for attached ADUs, there should be a separate principal access, and it will be need to be located in the side and rear yard.

That's also partly for neighborhood character purposes.

And we're also going to require that ADUs are owner occupied.

That means the property owner will need to reside on the premises, either in the principal dwelling or in the ADU.

They would not be allowed to rent both properties or both the ADU and the principal dwelling out simultaneously.

All of those standards concern existing or new and conforming structures for non-conforming structures as defined on this slide.

Staff has recommends additional provisions.

Attached ADUs may be located within or structurally connected to a legally nonconforming principal dwelling, provided that the ADU does not create any new nonconformity or increase the degree of an existing nonconformity.

And similarly, a detached accessory structure that was legally established may be converted to a detached ADU again, even if it doesn't meet the current setback and height requirements.

Again, provided it does not create or increase any nonconformities, and it would still be required to be capped at 800 square feet.

One other change that the planning commission recommended, there are existing standards for ADUs that concern the Buckrow Bayfront districts only, BB1, BB2, and BB3.

They're found at Chapter 8 of the zoning ordinance.

This was not included in our initial briefing to the council.

And the so the planning commission has added language codifying this recommendation and recommending that adopting language or recommending adopting language that clarifies that the standards in chapter one would supersede our existing standards for the Buckrow Bay front.

And again, that will apply to new ADUs but not to existing ADUs that have been constructed there.

So that concludes the additional standards outlined in Chapter 1.

In Chapter 2, we have added a definition for accessory dwelling unit, which reads as a secondary dwelling unit established in conjunction with and clearly subordinate to a principal dwelling unit.

Whether part of the same structure is the principal dwelling unit, which would be an attached ADU, or as a detached structure on the same lot with a separate kitchen, bathroom, and sleeping area, which would be a detached ADU.

We've also amended our definition of dwelling area to better reflect ADUs as a separate use.

In chapter four, um we added language because we needed to clarify that the requirements for dwelling area concerned principal dwellings rather than ADUs.

So we added the word principal in front of every use of the word dwelling in the sections listed on this slide.

For the rural residential district or section 4-21, we decided or we strike or recommending striking language that related to guest houses and servant quarters.

We consider that language outdated, and it was redundant with new ADUs being constructed or with our new ordinance for ADUs.

Lastly, staff is remant recommending amendments to our chapter 11 on parking requirements.

Staff's recommendation is that most new ADUs do not will not require additional parking or off-strike or on-site parking.

They will require off-street or on-site parking for lots that prohibit parking on either side of the or prohibit on-street parking on either side of the block.

In that case, one additional off-street parking or one off-street parking space would need to be identified on the premises where of the lot where the ADU is.

The reason that the reasons we settle on this amendment.

First, it um aims to preserve and protect neighborhood character by reducing any potential changes to the way parking is done.

It acknowledges that a majority of single-family homes have sufficient on-site or on-street parking to accommodate new ADUs.

And lastly, additional surface parking requirements will negatively impact the city of Hampton's resiliency objectives because they create more impervious area, and we don't want to do that unnecessarily.

So to summarize, the amendments to the zoning ordinance that will be presented tonight will permit accessory dwelling units in all one-family residential properties with additional standards outlined in chapter one.

The definition of accessory dwelling unit will be found in chapter two.

The amendments will refine language that relates to principal dwellings in chapter 4, and they will amend parking requirements in chapter 11.

Um so staff recommends approval of all four of these zoning ordinance amendments.

Planning commission recommends approval with the revisions shown in this slide and also the changing of the word minimum to maximum in relation to dwelling area that I outlined before.

Staff recommends approval with the or staff also recommends approval of these amendments.

Um and additionally, uh this didn't make it to this slide either, but uh staff would like to recommend that this ordinance be adopted on December 31st rather than immediately.

Um that was not something that was included in the planning commission, but it was intended to be uh uh yeah, it was intended to be part of the planning commission at that point.

Um thank you, and we're available for any questions you may have.

Mr.

Mayor, can I just clarify that?

So I think um you can adopt it today if that's your desire, but to specify an effective date of January 1, 2026, I think is it.

December 31st, but yes.

Okay.

Okay.

So but you can normally an ordinance is effective immediately unless you specify an effective date and for staff's ability to be able to administer it, they're just asking that you specify that delayed effective date.

Okay.

All right.

Questions, uh comments?

I I I do have one question, and I think this may have been addressed in one of the earlier presentations, but I'm not sure.

So if you have a detached uh structure, garage, it can be converted to a ADU.

If you have a detached garage and you have adequate property, can you also still add a ADU to the property?

You could add an ADU with an attached garage provided.

With a detached garage.

Yeah.

Well, so you're saying that if there's a detached garage, you could add a separate structure that would be a detached ADU?

Yeah, because you mentioned you know your presentation said you can convert a detached structure to an ADU.

But if if you have a detached garage on the property, can you still add an ADU?

Does that count?

Does the detached garage count as ADU property?

So you're asking, can you not use your detached garage as you want to keep your garage as a garage?

And you want to build a new accessory structure on the property that would be a detached ADU.

Yes, yes, I believe the answer is yes, as long as it meets all of the requirements of the ordinance.

Right.

Okay.

Yes, that's correct.

Uh Vice Mayor Brown.

Yeah.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh question regarding I know ADUs you can have one on your property.

So if you had a large swatch of property and you subdivided it, can you have one ADU there?

So if you if you subdivided the property, then if the sub if the um if you had two single family lots that were subdivided and they were subdivided into separate lots, then yes, you could.

But what you wouldn't you wouldn't be able to do to subdivide it and then just have an ADU on there.

There would have to be a principal dwelling as part of it.

So if you subdivide, you build a house on it and have enough property to do the ADU, you could do it.

Yes, provided it meets all of the other requirements.

Yeah.

Thanks.

Councilman Bowman.

Thank you.

Um, Mayor, and um thank you for the presentation.

So I had several um citizens call me, and the ordinance is not clear, or either um people don't understand it, but can you use a camper?

Because a camper will have a living room, a bathroom, a kitchen, and you will have power to it.

So is that gonna be permitted?

I I don't remember what we did discussed on that actually.

I believe and and Kim's stepping up to talk about it.

We have a current ordinance that prohibits living in trailers on your home property.

So I think the answer is no.

Correct.

Yes, that's right.

Okay, thank you.

Councilwoman Campbell.

Hi, thanks.

One of the comments that you made was um about the ADU having to be allowed to be higher than the primary.

Umright that was no.

Is there a limit on how high that ADU can be above the primary?

It would still well, the the limit is it would still have to be 16 feet above the design flood elevation is the maximum.

But that would be the maximum height for the ADU.

So however much higher that is than the principal dwelling would be how high.

Okay.

Thank you.

Any other questions, comments?

Okay.

All right, thank you.

If there are no other questions, that concludes our open session items for you today.

All right.

Okay, so are there uh any regional issues?

Uh any items for new business.

All right, if not, I'll ask the clerk to read the uh motion for required for closed session.

The motion required today for your closed session is to continue to closed session pursuant to Virginia Code Section 2.2-3711A point one to discuss the performance of appointees to a local border commission, point five and point eight to discuss a prospective industry in the Hampton Road Center area where no previous announcement has been made about the industry's interest locating in Hampton, and to consult with legal counsel regarding specific legal issues related to such industry, and pursuant to point seven for a consultation with legal counsel regarding potential settlement of a pending legal case.

So moved, Mr.

Mayor.

Second Councilman Bowman.

Vice Mayor Brown.

Aye.

Councilwoman Campbell.

Aye.

Councilwoman Fairby.

Aye.

Councilwoman Harper.

Aye.

Councilwoman Mugler.

Aye.

Mayor Gray.

Aye.

Okay, so we will convene for closed session in the Lawson conference room.

And um uh at the closed session, council will reconvene in the open meeting at the same location in order to certify the closed session.

So we'll convene in a laws and conference room at uh 2 30.