Good afternoon, everyone.

The code refresh work session for the Richmond City Council will now come to order.

And if we can have the chamber emergency evacuation plan announcement, followed by the provision of the general procedures for today's work session will get underway, Ms.

Reed.

Upon activation of the emergency alarm signal, all persons should immediately exit the building.

Please use the exits to the left or right front of the council chamber or the north or south stairwells outside the rear doors of the chamber.

Do not use elevators or escalators after exiting the building.

Security will direct everyone down 9th Street to the fenced area located between Clay and Lee Streets.

Able persons should assist visually and hearing impaired visitors with exiting the building.

And Madam President, for the record, all members of council are present this afternoon with the exception of counselors Breton and Abu Bakr.

You do have a quorum.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Clore.

Council Chief of Staff RJ Warren, if you would come forward to provide general info regarding procedures for today's work session.

Yes, may it please the council, uh, city administration and the mayor's office have requested this work session to present you all information on code refresh and the update and the work being done to update the city's zoning ordinance.

Uh we will start off with the administration uh presenting in full, followed by which we will have two rounds of remarks, five minutes per council member per round.

So you'll have similar as we did the budget work sessions.

So you'll have a total of 10 minutes.

Uh use that time as you see fit for questions, perspectives, or you may reserve your remarks.

We will adjourn after the second round, and there is no public comment at this meeting today.

This is a work session between council and city administration.

Any follow-up questions, including those you didn't have time to raise during the first two rounds, may be directed at me.

I'll forward them to city administration.

Council staff will compile all questions and responses from today and any follow-up after this meeting, and we will provide those to members and the public, and I will work to get those posted online for everyone to see.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Mr.

Warren.

At this time, I'll invite Dr.

Vonk up to begin in terms of the presentation.

Thank you.

Kevin J.

Bonk, Director of Planning and Development and Review.

Um, here to work with you this afternoon, and appreciate uh covering out some time to be able to do this.

So, purpose and objectives.

Uh, we've been at this two years working on an update of our zoning ordinance.

Uh what we'd like to do, uh we are uh in the process of moving from draft two to draft three of the code.

Uh, we've done a lot of engagement, and we thought it would be appropriate to engage uh with the elected and appointed bodies.

So today uh working with city council, tomorrow working with Planning Commission, and on Wednesday, working with the zoning advisory committee to really get in uh to some specific questions uh that we'll talk about today, uh, and really get an understanding of what is needed in terms of additional information uh to help you as a body make good decisions as we move forward on this process.

Uh I want to to frame today's discussion and all right.

All right, we exited the matrix.

All right, uh, and and framing some discussion to uh provide some feedback to us uh so that we can work on incorporating uh additional changes into draft three or providing information that would be helpful in terms of making decision uh on on draft three.

And again, I wanted to frame uh today's discussion, and I've said before, there's no right answers, there's no wrong answers.

We're looking to get towards some answers of what we'll be putting together in our final code.

Um, I have lost the ability to navigate on this.

Alright, great.

So, why code refresh?

Our 50-year old zoning code does not align with our master plan.

Uh Richmond 300, a document many of you and the community is very familiar with.

It does not align with our goals for housing choice, neighborhood walkability, economic vitality, and climate resilience.

So we need a new zoning code that helps us or allows us more residents to build the type of housing units that fits their needs.

It allows for greater mixing of uses at the proper scale and in the proper places.

It facilitates new development that complements our most significant cultural, historic, and natural assets, and it simplifies standards and procedures.

How does code refresh align with Richmond 300?

This is a super important question because I think ultimately, right, Richmond 300 says who we want to be as a city, and it told us to make some big moves in it.

And the first one is to rewrite the zoning code.

And so it's very important and actually legally required that the zoning ordinance help implement that master plan.

And so when it comes to the zoning code, in particular, it talks about three things.

One, equity, expanding opportunities for all Richmonders.

Talks about sustainability, and so whether that be transportation or energy production or protection of the environment, and it talks about beauty.

Richmond is a very special place, it's very unique, and the goal is to be able to again conserve, maintain, preserve what we have moving forward.

And so, how do we craft a draft code?

So again, we start with that framework of Richmond 300, and how do we work that into a zoning ordinance?

How do we work that into code refresh?

And so taking that as the framework, the planning commission, again, per our city charter is uh charged with working on a comp plan, it's charged with working on a zoning ordinance to implement that.

Um, and they have tasked our department of planning and development review to come to them with a new code.

And so through that process, we have engaged lots of people.

We have turned to lots of sources of information to basically get to the point that we're at today.

So we can start with things like Code of Virginia.

There's certain things, right?

Being a deal in rural state, we'd love to do, but we can't do because we have not been enabled to do those things.

Uh, we started early on with like, all right, we're not starting at zero, we're built environment.

So we had one of our subconsultants work on a pattern book looking at all right, what's on the ground here today?

Uh we had an economic consultant run different development scenarios in terms of all right, if we do this zoning, what are some things that may happen?

We've had a zoning advisory committee that's looked at things from a very technical aspect in terms of, right, what does this actually mean when it comes to implementing the rules?

That committee has created a number of working groups, again, framed in Richmond 300, and looking at the changes proposed through different lenses.

There's been public comment, and then you know, internally, we've looked at other city departments for advice, other cities to see what they're doing.

Um, being out in the public from uh working in many of you who've come to your district meetings, we've come to your civic association meetings, um, we've done the traditional open houses, we've done pop-ups surprising in places, and then open things up online through text comments or map comments, all of those things, right?

Thousands of data points we've been taking into this process.

And I think we have substantial agreement on a number of things.

And I put that in the context of again, it's not perfect, but generally we've been able to work towards a greater understanding, and again, some of these may have some tweaks as we move into the third draft, but there's some things that people have really, you know, I'll say coalesced around and are getting excited about.

So, in general, we haven't had a whole lot of shifting in terms of like the number of zoning districts.

I think trying to write provide enough uh districts so there's enough separation between them, uh, but also understanding like right, we don't have hundreds of districts.

I think things that we've talked about here, the ability to do more conditional uses, right, instead of a special use permit, a conditional use permit where you could look at a particular use and say, all right, maybe we put a timestamp on it or a deadline on it, that gives us a lot of more say in making sure we're working with good actors.

Things like open space.

Uh, for the first time, we're we're actually zoning and creating an open space district to be able to map that.

Um, really working on getting into some of the nuances of a mapping, and again, we'll continue to work on that to make sure those districts are hitting on the ground appropriately.

Uh, and as we talk about right fitting into the existing environment, we've made changes and we'll continue to make changes to things like how do buildings sit on the lot and how much can they cover?

But also thinking about important things like tree canopy and minimum tree canopy that we're enabled to do to protect, preserve the environment, and then things when it comes to, you know, again, mobility, things that help for pedestrians.

There's a lot of things that are coming together that I think are really beneficial as part of this code.

Where are we still evaluating options?

Three big questions that we really want to get some feedback on today.

How many people in a household?

How do we zone places of worship?

And how many dwelling units on a lot?

These are the areas where we've had, I'll say, probably the most wide spectrum of feedback in terms of where we should land.

Of some who say like we've gone way too far, and others who are saying, like, we're not going far enough.

And so we're looking for you for some feedback to discuss these items and really kind of I'll say eyes wide open, work into what do we think is uh feasible, workable, um, uh, in the best public interest, and in the spirit of Richmond 300, as we go to draft three.

So, the three questions, and I want to go through these in in terms of uh a few things.

One to ask the question, to second, I'll say, how does Richmond 300 maybe refer to some of these things?

There's a lot of goals, objectives within Richmond 300.

What are some things that we're thinking about when we think about this question?

And then talk about all right, where are we today?

How is this evolved through the drafts, and what are we thinking about proposing and draft three?

And again, this is me coming to you today where we're at in the midst of a draft, like literally like right wet ink, trying to figure out what should go into draft three.

So, how does code refresh align with Richmond 300?

We talk about how many people in a household, um, some objectives in there, ensure that homelessness is rare, brief, and one time.

Why does this come up?

Because we talk about when we talk our uh to our housing providers, you know, options for congregate living, it's it's a way to write transition out of homelessness, and so are there options for uh that in our community.

We talk about inclusionary and equitable housing options for gentrifying neighborhoods to prevent involuntary displacement, right?

So as people are moving in or there's pressures coming into neighborhoods, how do we provide other options for living?

Uh, but then also assisting households that desire to age in place in the neighborhood.

I want to stay in my neighborhood.

There's no housing products for me.

So, like thinking about these things as we think particularly about this question, but other questions is how we're framing it in terms of the Richmond 300 uh focus.

So, how many people in a household?

Our current code says not more than three unrelated persons or a combination of related and unrelated persons.

Draft one, we actually didn't define it.

It's not in there.

Draft two, we moved and put in eight or fewer unrelated individuals.

Uh, that was based on some code of Virginia provisions that we have in our code right now that talk about certain situations for individuals that are living together with disabilities that the code of Virginia provides opportunities for.

And so we felt that was a bar to look at uh in terms of expanding that to other parts of the code.

Um, and in draft three, what we're looking at is maybe a little bit uh in terms of um moving it outside of zoning and looking at it from a building code perspective.

And that is the building code uh really is I'll say the arbiter of health and safety when it comes to structures, and so looking at all right, the building code says how many people can safely live in a structure.

So referring to that in terms of based on the bedrooms in there and how many people are living in there, um, those are going to uh set the occupancy limits for what is um when it comes to how many people in a household.

Second question How do we zone places of worship?

So thinking about zoning places of worship and thinking about places of worship and in terms of you know, places of assembly, but also places that are generally some of the larger landholders in in some of our neighborhoods.

And so you look at Richmond 300, and you look at all right, we need to rezone the city in accordance with the future land use plan, and it's a map we've referred to a lot, and you'll hear it in planning commission, you'll hear it here when you talk about rezonings or special use permits.

Talking about reducing the demolition of historic buildings.

And if you go into Richmond 300, there's actually a little call-out that talks about churches and places of worship and thinking about, all right, as congregations, maybe like move to other places or fold up, what happens to those buildings, often great buildings, beautiful buildings that they leave behind.

And then also increasing and supporting small businesses.

One of the points of conversation that has come up in terms of, you know, as these entities look at again, small scale commercial or opportunities to bring different activities into residential neighborhoods.

They're already having activity in residential neighborhoods.

Are these places for again, you know, congregations or smaller businesses to be able to, again, at the right scale do something that serves the community?

And so current code, it's a wide mix.

And generally it's it's close to what the neighborhood is around it is zoned.

So that can be everything from R1, which is our least intense district, to B4, which is like what we have downtown.

Draft one, we did primarily uh most of them institutional, which is what we have zoned larger scale uses.

So our government complexes, VCU, VUU, University of Richmond, uh some of the schools are zones institutional, so we zoned them that.

Draft two, we made a switch based to thinking about MX3.

And that was okay, again, still allowing for churches, places of worship, but is this a way for those places to be able to bring in housing or to be able to bring in smaller commercial incremental?

And look, we had a lot of feedback on this one and realized sure there's probably some loopholes that would allow for things that were beyond, I'll say the scope and intent, where you could have, you know, the intent is they'll say small-scale commercial, but the way the rules were written, you could have had a strip mall.

And I don't think that was what intended.

And so in draft three, we're looking at a more nuanced approach of some of the small multifamily districts.

And so RMA, B, C, and then residential cottage.

And what those are is again, they still allow churches, places of worship, synagogue's mosques, any place of worship, those assembly uses still allow them to continue, but it also allows on that land, housing to be introduced.

So it can be detached, it can be attached, or in the case of RMA, up to six units, so small multifamily buildings.

Um RMB allows up to 12 RMC is unlimited, and that may be appropriate in some of the transit corridors or growth nodes, and also RC.

We haven't, I'll say forwardly proactively done RC, but our residential cottage, it's basically, you know, cottage living, so it allows small homes up to 1200 square feet to be arranged around some type of a courtyard or feature, and again, writing that that starter home or an entry level product that provides again a different housing choice in the neighborhood that may not have those.

And so uh what we're looking at on and reflecting these in the map is you know, in the more uh, you know, suburban areas and deep in the neighborhoods and RMA, maybe on streets and transit corridors, RMB, and again corridors and growth nodes, uh RMC, and then RC as is requested.

So that is what we were proposing at this point.

And then the third question: how many dwelling units on a lot?

So again, how many dwelling it's on a lot?

What does Richmond 300 have to say about this?

Well, first it says create and then preserve high quality, distinctive, well-designed neighborhoods throughout the city, right?

And so it talks about the preservation of like some of our distinctive neighborhoods.

It also says increasing citywide about the importance of integrating housing at all income levels into every residential neighborhood so that there's housing choice throughout the city, right?

So if I'm a household of a certain income, my choices aren't limited to one area of the city.

I've got choices in other places in the city.

Now it may not be every single place in the city, but at least right, north of the river, south of the river, east end, west end, there's some choices for me and and my household.

Uh, and it also talks about you know encouraging more housing types throughout the city.

Again, focus on transit corridors and nodes, but it talks about choice throughout the city.

And so again, how are we balancing these tensions that are together?

So we started, well, today with our current code and a few years ago, we amended that allows you, right?

Your principal dwelling unit allows you to add an accessory dwelling unit.

That's up to a third of the size of your dwelling unit or 500 square feet, whichever is greater.

And so, in the case of like a small home, like a thousand square feet instead of 333 square feet in your ADU, you could do 500 square feet.

Draft one looked at, all right, you could have up to two principal dwelling units plus an ADU less than a thousand square feet on your lot.

Got a lot of feedback on that.

And one of the things we heard about was hey, there's some concern that this would potentially cause displacement by somebody going in, purchasing a property where the I'll say land value may be high, but the improvement value may be low, tipping that over in order to put two dwelling units and an ADU on it.

And so we entered a term we call the preservation bonus and said, look, you can have two principal dwelling units and an ADU, but you have to keep the existing unit that's there.

That's the only way you get it.

So if you demolish the existing building there, you get what you get today, which is a dwelling unit plus an ADU.

What we're looking at in draft three is modifying this slightly based on some of the concerns we had about, right?

Just more buildings going up in more neighborhoods.

And so it's still says, hey, if you preserve that existing unit, that existing unit you have, one or two units in there.

If you want to keep it as a single family, if you want to split it in two, if you don't split it evenly, right, it's an ADU.

If you split it evenly, it's two dwelling units, but you have to keep that existing building.

And you could add an ADU under 1200 square feet, but you only get two buildings on your property.

So there's no principal dwelling unit ADU, ADU, or dwelling unit, dwelling unit ADU, you only get two buildings on your property.

And again, if you demolish what is there today, you basically go back to what you get today, and that is a principal dwelling unit plus an accessory dwelling unit.

And so just an example of, again, this is not exhaustive of all the possibilities that are out there.

It's meant to be illustrative of just showing like what may be some potential.

So current code allows these things.

Uh P is for principal, A is for accessory.

If it's blue, it means it's there today.

If it's light blue, it means you carved it out of what's there today.

And if it's red, it's new construction.

And so these are all the things you can do today.

So, right, talk about a principal dwelling unit and then an A to U up to a third of the size.

And that can be inside, can be attached, it can be out in the yard.

These are the options you have today.

So, what we're proposing in draft three would add these options.

It will allow what you have today, but would allow these options and in essence, one of the things with the principal dwelling unit, instead of just dividing it to carve out an accessory, you could split it in half.

So you could have a duplex within it.

Um, and then your accessory dwelling unit, again, that's all you get.

You only get one additional unit.

And as for new construction, you have to, you can only do that, you'd only get the full if that lot has been vacant for five years.

And the intent, again, is to say, hey, I'm not gonna go in, tip something over and get all these, you know, extra dwelling units there.

It has that third unit only comes when you preserve the existing unit.

Um, and also I'll say looking at re-entering some additional provisions to make sure that the accessory dwelling unit is smaller than what's there today, so that anything new coming in will be smaller than what's there.

So we've talked a lot about height, I think that's a big thing, and there's could be some further discussion about like structures, right?

Can you put the ADU on top of a garage, or can you combine it?

Or are we just talking about the structure in whole?

Because I think that's a concern, again, about the proliferation of buildings and the coverage of buildings, and so how do we make that balance?

So these are the three big questions for for discussion, uh, just in terms of next steps.

I think um, you know, Chief of Staff Warren talked a little bit about going through having some hopefully robust discussion today.

If there's other things that come up to let him know, and he'll let our team know, with then the goal of taking this feedback from this session and our sessions this week into a full draft three that we hope to come up with sometime in July.

And that draft again will be a draft.

Ultimately, anything we'll have to go through the process of staff making a recommendation to our city planning commission and city planning commission making a recommendation to this body who has the ultimate final say on what goes into a new code and when it happens.

So, the next steps, and that's my presentation, and I guess away we go.

Thank you, Mr.

Thonk.

Um, we'll get underway with questions and discussions.

Councilmember Gibson.

Thank you, Madam President, and and thank you, Mr.

Vonk.

Um I appreciate this opportunity to essentially get like a vibe check from council as you're looking at the code refresh.

Um I do want to express that this meeting is unusual to get a vibe check.

Um, because this body makes takes action and makes decisions and and is guided by definition through public comment.

And so I I have some hesitation in sharing vibes, you know, absent that important part of how we govern.

Um I also um always emphasize the the importance of having data to inform the decisions.

Um I think that as a city we do our residents a disservice when we're guided by vibes and not data.

So the first um question I want to ask, as you know, I think it's important that we continually go back to the master plan, and I appreciate the points that the presentation included.

So the master plan has many metrics and and goals jobs, poverty, education.

I mean, we developed the master plan with those objectives of making the city better in mind, and so the master plan mandates that there is an annual report that shows our progress on those.

And I really think that would be really helpful, you know, to have as an attachment in conversations like this.

I'm wondering where the administration is on these annual plans.

I have not seen one, and um, and I do think that would be helpful.

Sure.

Um we are due for one this year, our our last one in 2025.

We have been doing it at Planning Commission, uh, but to your point, I think it would be good, and I'll just make sure that those materials are also shared with council members as well.

Um, but we have been usually doing it sometime in the summer months with our city planning commission.

Um, and so like I said, we're do we're due for our 2026 update, which is a reflection, I'll say in 2025 activities.

Um, but I can share the one from last year, and then um yeah, make sure that this year council is also included.

So I I mean I believe that it was required to be shared in OD with council, and it you're saying it's never been shared with council.

To my knowledge, and I'm gonna look at Deputy Director Pitts.

I don't know if we've made a presentation.

I do not believe we made a presentation to council uh on that update, it's just been to the city planning commission.

Okay.

Um, the other piece going back to the master plan, is that um the master plan is very specific in what its objective is, which is you know, growth is inevitable.

We are experiencing growth in the city.

Um, and what the master plan does is ensure that we are putting growth where we want it, and um, and to that end, um, page 289 uh specifies that yes, we do need to rewrite the zoning ordinance, and it says that we will rewrite the zoning ordinance to direct growth to appropriate areas while maintaining existing neighborhoods, as well as creating new authentic neighborhoods adjacent to enhanced transit, and so I think it's important to continually go back to that.

Um, the master plan also specifies very specifically to amend the B3 zoning district and to rezone areas at the Pulse Corridor, it's very much focused on these key corridors in the city, and so I want to ensure that the work that we are doing is is keeps that effort and at the forefront because ultimately we're legally required to do that.

Um in addition to that, we talk a lot about affordable housing as a as an objective here for good reason.

Um I think it's important that as we're doing this, we we keep at the forefront the impact of the 1960s urban renewal and ensure we are not making those same mistakes again.

So the reports that I've seen from was it RMK?

RKG.

RKG, that's the acronym, uh, was disappointing to that end.

It's it shows that essentially the the housing that will likely be largely be uh created as a result of this work, um, is developer-driven in the most affordable, I mean the most affluent areas of the city, um, because in order for their numbers to work, they have to they have to get the rents that they have to get.

So, I am it's discouraging, I don't know if that's the right word, but that but that much of what we're doing, we've we've talked about it from the perspective of affordable housing, and I don't know that we've received any research that that's there.

Councilmember Gibson, we've approached your time, you'll have another iteration, but go on to Stevon.

Sure.

Um, let me respond to a few of those things, and I think maybe some information both today and then in the future.

So, in terms of focus on nodes and corridors, uh, I think the information that the analysis that RKG did, and I do want to be specific that the RKG analysis is a market analysis.

So it is it is only going to show what the market will provide.

And so I think there's um additional work that needs to be done.

I mean, we have been doing and will continue to be done with my colleague, you know, Director Malone, and in terms of like how we talk about also adding in, I'll say capital A affordable housing.

I think, in terms of one of the ways, and again, from a supply-based approach of showing through the market where those units are going to come, like you said, they're going to go to the places that have I'll say the hottest markets, and primarily that's in areas of you know, I'll say the central core to the west end of the city.

Um, one of the things I think the analysis shows that probably about two-thirds of the new units will be on nodes and corridors.

So to me, that is saying, okay, and again, it's an analysis, it's not precise, but at least like to me, then we're heading on the right direction.

That's where we want the growth to be, right?

We don't want it in deep in pockets and neighborhoods.

Um, I think the other thing that it showed is like right in parts of Southside, there's not a lot of market growth.

So that brings it back to us in the administration and saying, okay, well, what are some things that we can do to incentivize or catalyze some of that growth again in the nodes and corridors in that area?

As far as, you know, so again, I think the one approach that this this code looks at is look, what can it do to provide supply and supply of different types of housing units, and where are those happening?

Um, the second is, you know, making sure that I'll say like we don't give it all away through the code so that we still have the opportunity to incentivize things like affordable housing.

So the General Assembly gave us a whole bunch of tools this past session.

Uh, and some of it says, right, either there's a provision for like administrative rezonings.

There's also talk about, you know, incentivizing inclusionary zoning.

And so one of the things that, you know, I would posit is that look, we need to get a good framework in place and show that look, we are we're trying to get the city right and legal and and to a place where it needs to be.

But then there are still opportunities for incentivizing additional development if it's affordable.

And where I'm saying this is the master land use plan in Richmond 300 talks about generally intensity and density and height of certain land use districts.

And I'm working on providing some maps to show that like what that maximum height is and what we're zoning it, we do not go all the way in all the districts.

And so to me, there is room left for us to give to negotiate in terms of like, hey, the land use would support something bigger or something taller, but like if you're gonna do that, we need something for you when it comes to maybe affordability.

That's just one option, but but I I just want to to frame the affordability that we're talking about in the code, is thinking about from a supply perspective, there's still other work to do to actually build like um affordable prices, affordable rents.

Thank you, Mr.

Bonk.

I uh in follow-up to Councilmember Gibson's um inquiry, I'd like to make sure that we the council will get a presentation in terms of the annual report um at OD, as well as an overview of the market analysis.

Sure.

Thank you.

Councilmember Jones.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you, Mr.

Bonk, for this presentation.

I want to reserve my responses to your questions for the second go-round.

And I want to piggyback a little bit off of what my colleague, Ms.

Gibson was just sharing relative to the 300, and basically directing growth to appropriate areas.

So my question is when we look at the master plan and we are thinking about growth, and you mentioned the south side, you said there was not a lot of growth specifically on the corridors.

Um are we also measuring um the growth?

And we've talked about this that when the master plan was done, Richmond Public Schools was not a part of that master plan, and we know that all of the schools are overcrowded at this moment.

So if we are directing growth to areas based on um, you know, the appropriate areas, how are we, how are we including Southside when we know that the growth is there, right?

And so I think there's a misconception when we speak about directing growth within the city that is not comparable to what really exists, and so I just want to get a clear sense of when you speak about, you know, we see that there's not been a lot of growth in Southside, you know, development wise, absolutely, but then how are we comparing that to the development and the people that already exist there so that we're not when we talk about displacement or overcrowding?

How are we maintaining that?

That's my first question.

Sure.

Um, thank you.

I was not here putting together Richmond 300, and I will just attest that over the last few years, and especially over the last year, uh, our department has had a lot more active and engaged relationship with RPS.

Um, and I think and in terms of at a transactional level, talking through and giving their staff data to understand right where new projects are coming on so that they can help calculate right what might be the impact on the schools in this area.

Um, something I'll say beyond that is has been happening is right, where are families moving, families with school age children moving in the city?

So it's not just new development, but it could be just families moving around in the city.

I'll defer a little bit to RPS in terms of like where they're seeing some of that come from.

And again, they're working on getting better data of like, is this a family that was somewhere else in the city of Richmond?

Were they in the metro area, or were they like brand new coming from like the outside of of this market?

Um, and so I think what we're looking at is um, you know, one as these projects come in, understanding like what what is the impact on our schools, and then thinking about all right, what does that mean in terms of like where those schools are at right now for capacity?

I think from one of the things that we're trying to wrestle with from a larger perspective, and I've been working on putting together um some data of where were we at in 1970, right?

When we did this code, and where are we at?

I'll say now, but like in 2020, right?

With census data and things like that.

So one of the things that came out in in 1970, um, we had just under 60,000 students enrolled in public schools.

Um today, we're under 30,000.

That includes nursery kindergarten, elementary, and um high school, and and a fraction of that is in private school.

I'm saying that's all students, but like we are a city with fewer children by far.

Um, and so we look at that with also the challenge of like right our facilities and buildings.

We also have in the portfolio like 10 new, 10 net schools new.

Um, and so I think that that that's a challenge that we need to continue to work with in terms of like how we have our growth and how RPS looks at their facilities, because also, like some city facilities, like we need upgrades and we need maintenance.

I mean, there's deferred maintenance, and so how do we look at managing some of those things?

Um, so I think you know, it's really important and and um I'll continue on the questions.

Most of the households also that are moving here don't have kids, and so it's important to think about and be specific of like as projects come in, where are the housing units with multiple bedrooms that are more likely to have kids within it?

So that's one of the things we continue to talk about, but I will just say um it's a much more eyes-wide open approach than it's been in the past.

So will you have that data in that presentation at OD as well, the data that you just reflected?

Yeah, and I think part of um, you know, the focus today was trying to, you know, think about like some of these three questions, but I'm also, you know, I hear a lot from you, and I hear a lot of things in the community and uh hear a lot of things that just aren't true.

Um they're important questions to ask, but it's really important, I think, and then as Counselor Gibson said, like, to have the data to like decide like how do we solve them?

So I think the things that we're hearing about, you know, schools, infrastructure, those things to bring you some data to be able to make decisions on those to show that.

So, yes, um, whether part of the Richmond 300 presentation or another presentation on on the code, um, I think it's important to have um for you.

Yeah, and I think that's my reason by asking because it makes it challenging, right?

To literally when you give us a presentation and you say, hey, we're working towards a third draft, you know, and it's adding, you know, more units, or you know, not necessarily focusing on a specific area that was originally, I guess, designed to build up the corridors and the transit nodes.

And so I think it is important to really set the table because I think when we are hearing the the different messaging, right, about what code refresh looks like.

I also want to, and you you mentioned it when you first started about equity.

So I want to make sure that it is clear that we're not starting at the same point.

When we first even got in a room and said, hey, let's put this code together because of those nuances, right?

That to your point you weren't here, so you're still writing based off of what you know now and having to play catch-up, but that catch up could also ultimately create a very you know ripple effect if we are not actually looking at what's already there, because the growth may have not been in development per se, but it is in people, and so I think we have to really you know acknowledge that, and I think that is important to be able to answer where I would want to even see more housing in an area when I know that we're already overcrowded, and you're not gonna you know, you understand.

So I just want to make sure that that is something because we again, this is our first time having this conversation.

You and I have had it.

This is our first time, and I just always want to make sure that that is part of the continuum that we are discussing it.

Great.

Vice President Jordan.

Thank you so much, President Newbell, and thank you, Director Bach.

Um, also just want to say thank you to everyone who came out today and who is watching online or who will watch this later.

I think we've had a remarkable amount of public engagement over these last two years, and then obviously going back even further to code refresh.

And I appreciated the summary that you provided, which I believe was in the board docs of that public engagement, and you know, it was 5,000 individual Richmonders, took time out of their days to interact with this process, and it's gonna be an iterative process and it's not gonna be a perfect process, but I just want to commend you and your staff and everyone from from the city, our residents who have engaged in this process.

Um, one of the things that you said early on that really resonated with me was let's make it difficult to build the things we don't want to see and easy to build the things we want.

That to me was a very clear statement where it got tricky as we proceeded through the public engagement meetings, uh, we all had our own town halls, et cetera, was we have folks who don't agree on what it is they want to see, and they don't agree on what they don't want to see.

So I appreciate you bringing um these materials to us today so we could try to dig into some of these thornier points.

Uh and I also just want to acknowledge while there are things that I believe people have started to move into consensus territory on.

There are obviously topics outside of these three that I think every one of us on council would like to engage on with your office and with our residents.

So looking forward to seeing what that looks like in draft three, and just you know, to name some of them from the second district, it would be uh more information on what where MX3 versus four is going to go, uh, what contextual you know setbacks or setbacks look like, trade canopy, etc.

So, but I just want to start off by saying thank you for all your hard work and thank you to everyone here who has participated in the process.

Um, I did have some specific questions to the to the points that you were looking for feedback on that I've heard from my residents.

Um, and then it's not necessarily in the order that you're presented, but we had a question about the places of worship and how potential subdividing would affect what happens in those parcels.

I have a few more, but I'll let you respond.

Sure.

Um, so looking at um, yeah, as I mentioned, one of the reasons that we're looking at them, and Richmond 300 brought them up is because they're more often the not larger landholders in the neighborhood, right?

They have got like some of the biggest parcels.

Um, those entities would be able to, and then and they can today subdivide their property if they choose, subject to what the zoning regulations are in place.

And so for a place of worship that's in an R1 district, they could subdivide it so long as every lot met an R1 standard.

Um, what would happen or be proposed is um if uh rezone those places of worship would be able to subdivide their lots into whatever zone uh was applied to them in the future, um, and so when you look at uh what's proposed here, they could all stay as one lot, or they could be subdivided in the future, but that entity would still retain the ability to subdivide their property subject to the rules of what we zoned it.

Okay, thank you.

I'd be curious to understand the feedback you've gotten so far from our affordable housing community on the different two plus one options for the parcels.

Sure.

Um, and if I'm allowed, I may call on a colleague to get some some feedback.

Um I I will say, you know, in terms of the options that are available, I think the ability to look at a I'll say buy right duplex instead of an ADU, especially with like new construction, could allow for something to be built more efficiently.

Again, it may not be Capital A affordable, but could be small A affordable in terms of being able to get, you know, two units instead of one on a lot, or with the accessory dwelling unit.

I think right now there are still some barriers in terms of cost, and in terms of right construction cost and labor and those things.

We've also just had a discussion today about what are the fees or things that the city imposes in terms of making development happen.

I don't know.

Is there anything Mr.

Malone wants to add?

Okay.

So I think in terms of I think what what they are looking at is in terms of yeah, just the ability to have options.

Thank you.

And then, you know, sort of uh to speak to those options outside of what is going to be in this, like you've got the state building code, this is our you know, zoning code, but then we also have a lot of policies and other options outside of these two you know documents to try and make building easier or more efficient or more reflective of the goals within version 300.

So I guess I would love to hear you speak a little bit of what parallel initiatives the city is doing.

Like, are we close to having the cultural cultural heritage stewardship plan presented for those communities?

And obviously, the second district has a lot of historic neighborhoods from Carver, Storage Jackson Ward, the FAN, etc.

Um, what are some parallel options that we can pursue to help the community uh drive a process for historic preservation initiatives like historic districts or district overlays?

Thanks.

Sure.

Um I'll answer them backwards.

So in terms of, yes, we are working on uh cultural heritage plan, which planning commission did recommend adoption as part of the master plan.

Uh so we're working on getting an intro for that for council so council can consider that ahead of the zoning ordinance.

I think that's really important for us and a number of residents to say, hey, we're doing these things in the framework again.

Um, Master Plan talks a lot about right, maintaining the beauty of the city and the cultural assets that we have.

Um, how do we write the growth that's coming here, do it in a way that doesn't destroy what's on the ground?

And and so um, you know, I'll just say in terms of a few things.

One, all the city old and historic districts that exist now, which are regulating, right, in terms of needing a certificate of appropriateness of your development, all those that exist now are all coming over to the new zoning ordinance.

Like none of those will be changed.

Uh the new code proposes establishment, I'll say of two lighter levels of regulation, where maybe um uh neighborhood does not want to do a full city old and historic district, but they're just concerned about new construction.

And so setting the framework for design overlays that would all right basically regulate any range of things from just a little thing like maybe a porch to a lot of things like materials and windows.

Um, the framework will be there for neighborhoods, I'll say a bottom-up approach to say, all right, we think this is important in our neighborhood and any new building that comes in, we want it to be subject to these regulations.

And so, based on that neighborhood and consent of the majority of property owners, we could work on, and again, we would help support establish those districts.

Um, one level below that would be just a district that um curtails or discourages demolitions.

And so saying, all right, if you're gonna demolish a building in this area, you got to go through the same process like you would have said the own historic district, which says timeout, we're gonna look and see if there's any viable alternatives for this structure before you move forward with demolition.

So those frameworks will be established within the new code.

Um, and then just one last thing in terms of implementation.

You know, we've talked about when it comes to accessory dwelling units, um, once we land on, you know, a code to work with, you know, a great architectural community that's out there and get some like pre-designed ADUs that we can, you know, help homeowners like figure out right, right?

Save on some design costs of competition.

Can we have a handful of like, hey, these three designs, they're good in this neighborhood, these three designs are good in this neighborhood to again kind of like win-win of like facilitate like really nice structures, but also save on costs to reduce the cost of constructing those accessory dwelling units.

Um, as far as churches and places of worship, one of the things, and and I don't know if Miss Morrison is here, I don't know the exact bill.

Um, but one of the tools that's coming from this state involves um places of worship and actually is expanded to any nonprofit entity that has owned their land for five or more years.

And and a short way of summarizing is um if they are proposing to do affordable housing, um, this would allow them to basically, I'll say uh as a comparison on the choices that are up there, basically go to RMC, like do like pretty substantial multifamily, like buy right.

And so I think that's one of the things that we're looking at in terms of like that is coming down the pipeline.

And so are there other things that we can do to incentivize things or shape things that like RMC may be good in some parcels, but that may be right for every single parcel in the city.

So, in what ways could we maybe get in front of that to encourage the type of development that would still allow affordable housing, allow a number of units, but do it in a scale in a context that like fits the neighborhood better than kind of the top-down state approach.

Um, and so I think those are some things that we've we've talked about, um, and they're having ongoing conversations about that.

And then, as I mentioned before, um, the inclusionary zoning incentives that will be coming as well.

Thank you so much.

Councilman Brighton.

So I also want to echo um Vice President Jordan's um gratitude for all the engagement that the planning department has done for many years through Richmond 300 as well as the code refresh.

Um it was really, yeah, remarkable to see on the slide there, like all the different sources that have been going into this process all the way through Richmond 300 into the code refresh.

And I have been saying, you know, people can read my newsletter.

I've been saying that the broad strokes of what I've been seeing are consistent with what I would expect from the Richmond 300 plan.

I'm seeing we are legalizing growth in our dedicated nodes, we are legalizing more housing types in all the neighborhoods, which was also something that the code that the plan called for.

And so those were um, you know, exactly what I would have expected to see.

And I think now we are getting into the details, and that's where you know the real work begins.

And so I have asked a number of questions that are the questions that I get from my residents about our readiness for utilities or our readiness for the possibility of handling traffic safety or our readiness for schools.

I mean, these are these are very important questions.

So I've echoed these questions on the administration, and I um have gotten a word back that they will be answering them.

And so I'm looking forward to that because that's what the people need to understand that we are doing our homework as we go through this process.

Um similarly, you know, the our housing targets of evidence from other cities, these are the questions that I've asked because of the questions that I've received.

So I want to make sure that as we're going through this, that I am um yeah, doing all the diligence that my residents ask.

Um, and still I also am very excited for the prospect of legalizing more homes in the city.

So I want to make sure that we're doing it right.

And in fact, and the two plus one question is a really important one that I know that you brought up and you wanted our feedback on.

And um, one of the things that I've been very concerned about is whether anything we're doing might be encouraging demolitions, which was why um when people were concerned that allowing too many units on a property might be incentivizing people with dollar signs in their eyes to eliminate affordable homes in order to build, you know, max out a property, um, that raised a concern.

When we created the preservation bonus, that I got a lot of positive feedback from um, you know, residents uh about how that eased our concerns about how we might be unintentionally encouraging demolitions.

At the same time, though, it also created concerns that we were going to make it harder for developers to build starter homes.

And I think starter homes is something that is very important in this city.

People are looking for a way to get their leg into the housing market.

And anything we can do to make it easier for people to find those starter homes is something I want to encourage.

And so when it comes to the two plus one question, um, whether ADUs are also an excellent way to create those small homes or um or whether size limits on homes are a way to solve that as well.

It's a great way to encourage those that starter home size that I would love to see.

So my feedback on the two plus one is to think about, you know, small is beautiful when it comes to creating those starter home opportunities for people to get into the housing market.

Um there are another number of other specific questions that I would like to go over with you.

They relate to the some of the more specific map center questions like are there um enough transition treatments when a residential comes up against a growth node?

You know, um, you know, when a three-story zone comes up against a six-story node, like how do we are the transitions gentle enough?

Other questions of those, I want to make sure that our tree canopy requirements are basically as strong as we can get them.

Um I also have some um questions around whether or not state agencies are able to take over a zone and maybe bypass our zoning restrictions and do whatever they want.

So I'd also want to make sure that we that we're being careful about things like that.

So a lot of specific details to get through left.

Um, so um, I want to make sure the people know the types of questions that I'm asking, and I'm looking forward to working with you to get get those answers to get these details right.

Um thank you.

I'll try and answer uh a few pieces in terms of the infrastructure question.

Yes, I think you know, working on providing some of that information, um, in terms of, you know, working with DPU and DPW and Department of Transportation to make sure that we have sufficient capacity.

Um, you know, I just I always say, like many other old cities, right?

We've got old infrastructure that's in need of improvement.

Um, we also understand that this infrastructure has at one time been able to support um a much larger population.

Uh, and so we also think about, you know, what does that mean for the future?

And you know, I think on a on two levels, one from a system-wide um piece.

I mean, you see and approve a capital improvement plan every year that works on right making improvements to the whole system uh as a whole, and we on a project by project basis also look as you know individual projects come in, how do they improve, I'll say, like the local system uh around them.

One of the things that I also look at is like, right, there is a cost um to this infrastructure, and um, if we that infrastructure is going to get old no matter if we build another unit of housing or not.

And so, in terms of, I think one of the questions that comes up in terms of like expenses and affordability, the more that we're able to spread the burden of that cost among more property owners, the less every individual property owner will have to pay in terms of rates and taxes to help that uh to help fix it.

And so thinking about right, making efficient use of our land, making efficient use of our infrastructure is one of the things that's in there, but in terms of I think being able to provide you some data of like where we're at, where we think we're going.

Um, the demolition piece, um, I know that's a big one that came out, and and we have had a lot of discussion about in terms of also why I think the preservation bonus was in there.

I think concerns about, especially in areas where land value may be high and the improvement value may be low, and concerns about causing displacement, right?

Somebody could come in and say, Wow, I'm gonna buy this small house because I can build like two houses, I can build you know, two plus one, right?

And so I might be incentivized to do that.

The we actually had it.

If you look at the early RKG analysis, um, we had them run, which I'll call like draft one, in terms of like what would that actually do?

Um we found that on average per year in like the detached districts, it would probably lead to about 20 or so demolitions a year.

Um, however, most of those were in the central city and the west end.

And so for you, I think that there's a concern in terms of like, right?

That's and you do see it happening in your district, where somebody's coming in and taking down a home and putting in a bigger home in its place.

Um, since that two plus one by right has been moved on from in terms of right the preservation bonus, I would say like that's the highest it would be.

It's much lower now because now you can't get those three units if you take it down.

Overall, and if you look at the other districts, we talk about the MX districts, the RM districts, the RA districts, it's projecting in the range of maybe around 30 to 40 demolitions per year.

Um it's it's not specific to where those uh are, but again, it's mostly in the central city to the west end.

In terms of that is where the market is most active, and that is where things are are happening.

Just for context, um, we did 80 demolitions in the city last year.

So that includes both residential and commercial properties, but just from a scale context, um I'll just say the numbers aren't showing like a rapid increase in demolitions from like what we're experiencing today.

Um then one last question, perhaps that I might have lost my train of thought of, but but just in terms of um, I think, oh, smaller units.

So we proposed, you know, a starter home, and I think this is another conversation in talking with um affordable housing partners of like what's the square footage you need to be able to again max build up to like a small starter home for a family.

And we kind of came to the number of 1,200 square feet.

So 1200 square feet, that's the max size in the residential cottage zoning district.

So you can build you know cottages, but none can be larger than 1200 square feet.

It is the max size for an accessory dwelling unit.

Um, and so that's a proposal that, again, you don't have to build that large, but that's a way to look at providing a home that could provide a home for you know a family of two, three, four people, um, and and then provide that starter home opportunity.

I think something that's um I think gonna be helpful for us as we go through this conversation is also to clarify what the zoning code I guess can be expected to do and what it can't do, because I know that actually my colleague um council member Jones was asking about you know how are we going to make sure that we're getting the building that we want, you know, in her district.

And I think it's important that we just acknowledge and clarify that this that what we're passing here, you know, makes certain things no longer illegal to build, right?

But in terms of getting to where we want to go, what else are we doing to get there?

Whether that's helping design ADUs, whether that's making investments in the south side, um, you know, whether that's improving the affordable housing trust fund, whether that's getting our um performance grants programs in line.

So there's all that we need to do, and so I think as we do this, I'm gonna ask that we that your department help to frame the conversation and and to show the other work we're doing to reach those goals outside of only here in the code refresh.

Thank you.

Sure.

Um yeah, I think you know it's really important to approach this.

Um zoning ordinance is not a silver bullet, but it's like definitely a necessary bullet to attack some of the things that we're we're looking at in terms of um, you know, what zoning can do again, right?

It's shaping what you can do on the property, it's setting the allowances, and as um Vice President Jordan said, right, we're trying to shape it in a way that Richmond 300 says we want to do those things, so how do the rules make it easy to do those things and harder to do other things?

Um, you know, it's very important in terms of right zoning, you know, how tall, how big, how you can use it, things like that.

Um, what zoning can't do?

Like zoning can never force anybody to do anything, right?

It allows you to do it, but like you don't have to do it.

Like, and we've said many times, if you're good just the way you are, you can stay just the way you are.

Um, and so there's there's no forced changes of anything.

Um zoning can't set tenure, whether it's rental or ownership.

Um, you know, zoning um, you know, can't uh do a lot of things.

And so I think it's just important to like, as we talk through, um, you know, just acknowledge what those are and and what those aren't.

Because there might be other tools that can, right?

Like if we're providing, you know, incentives or money or land or other things, like those are things that could be negotiated outside of a zoning ordinance.

But I think it's important, and I think as we've talked, the zoning ordinance is a key critical point to like get where we need to go as a city, but it's like not the only thing in terms of like getting development and getting affordability where where we need it.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Trammell.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um, Kevin, I just want to say thank you, you know, for you know, bringing all this information to us.

And I know that one of my colleagues said that you've had meetings with about 5,000 people.

I know that I attended meetings just recently where there's over 200 at every meeting that I've attended.

That's not counting our eighth district meeting since last December, which I'm quite sure that would probably add up over about 3,000.

And when special, we got about 232,000 citizens in the city that still do not know exactly what code fresh is.

But I want to um just read a little bit, I want to read something.

Code refresh is not affordable housing.

There is no grant money with code refresh.

Without grant money, you cannot have affordable housing.

These two go together.

Everything in code refresh will be full market rate price.

We the citizens were sold by the mayor a box of candy, but all we're really getting is a box of rocks.

This is not, I mean, this right here is just it breaks my heart when every seven days a week I get all these calls, and I just showed you some pictures in my neighborhood that I got a car lot, did not know about it.

It's really gonna be a junkyard.

And I appreciate you saying you're gonna look at it again.

I really appreciate that because I hate going out my front door and I'm looking at all this stuff and and everything else that's going up Castlewood Road.

We've lost more businesses on Richmond Highway in the past month than I've ever seen.

Captain D's is closed up.

Um Kentucky Fried Chicken that's been there forever and ever with Taco Bell is gone.

And I'm hearing today more businesses are leaving.

Call Federal Credit Union right there, Commerce Road, where we're gonna have the casino that we lost.

That's leaving the end of this month and going to be torn down.

I've been a member since 1979 there, along with so many other people.

Breaks my heart.

And then we talk about it's gonna be affordable.

No, it's not because we know that.

I mean, Richie's come before all of us over and over and over and told us any time you build something, it don't go down, it goes up.

I've had my neighbors tell me for years we're not fixing up our houses, we're not doing this, we're not doing that.

We don't want our we don't want our assessments to go up.

Well, those days are dead and gone because it doesn't matter if you fix up your house or not, your assessments are going to go up because of all this building.

I got 12 developers building in our 8th district right now.

And I keep asking, what about our schools?

I mean, you just saw where the schools just did the cut.

Richmond Virtual Academy got cut with all those little students and so many other things.

Um we see our seniors calling us every day begging us for tax relief.

How do they fill out the forms?

How you know they can't come down here, no place to park.

Then we tell them catch the bus.

70, 80 years old on wheelchairs, walkers catch the bus when it's 105 degrees outside.

We just had a medical emergency at my meeting last Thursday night.

Thank God to firefighters and the police chief and the police officers and Chip Decker was there.

She did end up going to the hospital.

And that last month, well, couple months ago, we had one that got to the hospital.

Thank God for chip, but she had another medical emergency, did not come out the hospital.

What do we do about our streets that we keep screaming and hollering about?

Look at the look at the storms last night.

Look at all the damages.

You know, we don't have enough, we don't have enough police officers.

The poor chief is getting all these calls, and I mean the people are lined up at my meeting last Thursday night to talk to him and his lieutenants and his officers about this and that going on in their neighborhoods.

And they're like, nobody's addressing these issues.

We call 311.

Don't get the replies until weeks, months later.

How can we do this to the citizen?

And then we're gonna tell people that you can have how many people in a rental property right now.

We have we have something that that says this is what this is the code.

Now we're gonna say up to eight people.

Can you imagine what about all the cars?

What about the calls that I'm getting about roosters and roosters in our neighborhoods?

It's not supposed to have a rooster, thank God for Christy, because she dresses it right away.

Chickens, more than five chickens, they got more than that going on right now.

The loud music, the cars with all the mufflers, or no mufflers on them, no place to park.

And we're going to tell them, ride your bicycle.

Hell, I can't ride a bicycle.

I mean, I think I've been on a bicycle since I was like 10 years old.

Now go catch me on no bike.

Ride a scooter.

Ride a motorcycle.

No.

You know, and then we tell these people, oh, you can find a place to park.

Where?

How?

We got 232,000 right now.

And the mayor wants to put another 50,000 in 8th and 9th district that we know that this is not right.

How do you know it's a new line?

How do you answer those questions, Kevin?

I mean, this is a lot.

You don't have to answer right now.

We got another round that we're gonna do.

Yes, thank you.

You do.

Well, keep that in your mind.

Thank you.

Sure.

No, thank you.

And I appreciate your comments and appreciate, you know, the opportunity to speak at your district meetings.

I think it's been a good opportunity to, again, another form of engagement and not only like the formal presentation, but right working around the room, hearing a lot from your constituents.

I think in terms of let me just talk about, and I think to frame like what code refresh is and what code refresh isn't, and then how it works on affordability and what it is and what it isn't when it comes to affordability.

Um I do not envy the assessor.

He has got an extremely tough job.

And he's also right pinned into some rules in terms of like it's his job to basically assess for like the property for what it's worth and what it's worth is basically like what did something like it sell for nearby in a recent history, right?

So, in terms of like right, how much what are the sales of comparable units like in the neighborhood in the last few months?

What is selling?

And we have seen, all of us have seen, right?

I've seen since I came here in 2020, how rapidly those prices have increased, right?

What something sold for five years ago, it's 20, 30, 50, some cases like right, 80, 90% more, just a few years.

Like that's tremendous.

And so, in terms of like affordability, right?

The assessments are going up because things are selling for much higher prices, because we have a very tight market.

And what I see happening is we have, and again, this is something that you talk about things zoning can and can't do.

Like Richmond is an awesome city that has attracted a lot of people, and it's attracted a lot of people and a lot of households, and generally I'll say one and two-person households that generally have higher income household income than residents who are here, and so as they come from Northern Virginia or the East Coast, or sometimes even like Texas or California, all over, like we're we're we're a magnet.

As they come with higher incomes, they are able to outbid and outprice our residents that are here for the limited homes that are available.

And so I say this in terms of I understand that like what may come onto the market because of this might be luxury homes, might be high-end homes, might be homes with like high rent, but what it's doing and what it's hoping to do is absorb some of that demand that is coming here because right now there are very few options, and so they're going into places and going into neighborhoods and outbidding right for the scarce resources that are there, and that is driving up our prices.

So when I say talking about from a supply side, code refresh is meant to like try and supply some additional housing units to help absorb some of that growth.

The other thing in terms of I think where it comes to talking about affordability is, and and and my colleague Mr.

Malone can talk about this, right?

To do something affordably, right?

There's hard costs and soft costs and hard costs, like again, it it's really tough these days because construction prices are up and and labor is up and then it's it's expensive to build.

Um, but one of the things that we can work on is I'll say the soft cost, right?

Holding it, right?

What I have to pay for the land while I'm waiting to build, while I'm going through the process of getting building permits, and we're gonna talk to land use tomorrow about right, our permitting process and how long it takes to do things.

And one of the things that comes out of it is, yep, it takes a few weeks to get a building permit or a few weeks and a few months to get a building permit and a site plan, but it takes months to get something rezoned and months to get something into a special use permit.

And so we've had a number, and I think they've come here of affordable housing projects that like those costs are going up because they they can't even build what's there today.

And and I think one of the things that's um, you know, what I when I talk about silly SUPs, um, over our over the last few years, over a third, a third of our special use permits have been just to build a single family dwelling unit.

So we are making somebody who wants to provide just a house, right, go through this whole long process.

So by trying to move towards something by right, I think we're trying to help that builder do something more quickly, and then the last will just echo in terms of like it's going to come and it's gonna require like a whole lot of other tools to get those prices down.

And so things that we've been able to do, you know, through our performance grants and partnering with the state to get things financed, there's I'll say like a yes and so that's why I'm bringing this approach.

Like it it's not going to yes directly lower the cost of housing, but overall combined with other things, that's going to provide more affordable options.

So we can talk about it more, but I think just I wanted to put that into some context.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Lynch.

Um, thank you.

Lots of thoughts here, just in general, kind of top line, um, just to echo some of my my colleagues' top line um items that I think are noteworthy in context of you know, as we look at this plan.

Um, so one, I think someone um mentioned the um historical uh the stewardship plan that we have not we have not passed that um as of yet, but there are some excellent um protections, um kind of policies that are recommended in that um larger plan that I think go hand in hand are a wonderful complement um to code refresh.

So I would I would highly encourage, or I guess on the wish list is to bring that forward alongside our uh maybe maybe we discuss that you know during our OD meeting.

Are we having the, you know, um I think having that in tow with us when we when we talk about um code refresh and how important some of those placemaking opportunities, the design overlay, the um, you know, the pieces in that plan are to and and really do harmonize with um code refresh.

I think that that would be helpful to bring that forward.

Um, the other thing, you know, we've talked about schools and um the impact of of schools, um, I'm I'm sorry, the impact of the potential um population growth um on schools uh on our infrastructure um and on our public safety departments.

Um, you know, schools will be, you know, we can address that, I think, with the facilities master plan that is coming up hopefully in September.

Um they are supposed to be doing a deep dive in kind of a second iteration of the Kruper um enrollment study.

Um, and I think that'll really help us kind of get a better handle on where some of that growth but get really surgical about where some of that growth may occur by running the analysis on you know if we were to pass code refresh with a two plus one in ADU, wherever that goes you know how how would that how would that look for some of our um potential uh schools, particularly on the south side.

So I think having that plan, and that's again supposed to be here in September.

I think having that plan would be really helpful.

Um and then, you know, I think Rebe you did a great job in our public safety meeting the other day.

We had a great in-depth report from um police and fire, and they gave us kind of an analysis on what the increased um density might do for police and fire.

I don't think that we've gotten a comprehensive um report from DPU yet, but I think any type of you know, more information that we could have on that.

Um my guess is it's probably not a lot, to be honest.

I mean, you know, 50,000 people over 20 years or so is a pretty standard population growth for an urban side for an urban mid-sized city like ours.

Um I've heard uh various um numbers being thrown about about what the you know some of this proposed increased density and some of these zoning changes would precipitate as far as actual population growth.

I would love to see more um data on that, if you could, you know, run some scenarios and kind of really give us the the real the real deal on you know what what could we expect to see as kind of a normal pattern of growth for a mid-sized city versus um what the zoning code changes um kind of as proposed would precipitate.

So I think that would be very helpful.

Um as far as the um the student, you know, the student housing, or I'll affectionately call that the how many people in one household.

I'm I'm we need to.

I mean, personally, I feel like we need to keep that at three um as the current Virginia code allows.

I'm not really sure why we're changing it because we can't really enforce it today.

I don't know that we'd be able to enforce it anymore tomorrow if we change it to eight, ten people.

I mean, you know, it if it's not really that enforceable, um, you know, leaving it at three, um, for me at least for our for our, you know, particularly for you know our we've got Maymont, Oregon Hill and Randolph that where it bears the brunt of an uptown that bears the brunt of student housing um and lots of these kind of you know houses that have um much more than three individuals living at residence.

I mean, I think that would be helpful to just leave it where it is, but you know, if there's appetite to take it to a higher number, I mean I guess that's part of the negotiations, but personally I would like to leave it at three.

Um, you know, the the um the um God in my backyard legislation that we referred to goes really really far in the state code.

Um so if we were somebody were to write an ordinance to allow that legislation to you know, because we'd have to draft a bill to put it in and allow it here in Richmond, um, it would go very it would go to your point a lot further than what you're proposing here.

Um I personally would would like us to be a little bit more conservative about the density that we um would enable in in those council member Lynch, yep.

Um that would be the time.

All right.

Well, just trying to put my stuff on the table, but right, sure.

Um, address maybe kind of in reverse order, yes.

For the for the last one, I think the um opportunities again we have now to talk about like how we zone places of worship uh is an important discussion.

I think there's also been some discussion uh in terms of there is a clause I'm just gonna look that allows us to do our own.

Got it.

So so there's some opportunity for us to all say get in front of it before it's a top-down mandate from the state.

So so long as we can meet the intent, I think there's some things again, we're talking about we still have to pass it.

We would have to pass an ordinance and we would before the first of the year.

We still have to pass it.

It allows, it's an it's a permissible piece of legislation, so it allows for a locality to put in.

So that's that's something that still could come on the table in terms of like I would say what the proposal today is not qualifying for that.

There would have to be a separate proposal that would allow for um those types of things.

I think Director Morrison would like to speak to that because it's important, I think, to get this one right.

Welcome, Ms.

Morrison.

Hi, Council President, members of council Ruth Morrison, intergovernmental affairs, um, clarification on HP 1279, which is the yes and God's backyard legislation colloquially speaking.

It is a mandate.

It takes effect January 1 and is a five-year sunset.

So the other thing that's important here is our underlying code today, as Director Vonk was speaking about, like does not allow any of the options that he put on the slide.

So when the state code takes effect on January 1, we can pass an administrative ordinance creating some procedures around this to support these uh property tax exempt nonprofits, including faith-based organizations, but we do have to substantially comply with the new state code and any local ordinance consistent with January 1.

I hope that clarifies.

That was not my read of the bill, but okay, go ahead.

Thank you.

Um, as far as you know, number of uh people in a household.

Uh, I think, and as Councilmember Breton, you know, asks things you can zone for and cannot, um, you cannot zone for good management.

You cannot zone for a good landlord.

And we've had cases where right, we've had group homes that are well managed with eight people in, and we don't hear about them one bit.

We've also had group living situations with three individuals in that we hear about a lot because they're not well managed.

And so I think in terms of just talking through and understanding what that means, and then and we've talked about right some of the difficulties of enforcement.

Um, I think for for us, you know, if if um, you know, this body desires a number and we want to stick with three, um, you know, again, we're trying to balance like other living situations and and opportunities that we've heard a lot from our housing providers saying, hey, in terms of like the continuum of care, sometimes group living, like is a way to like make it work.

And and we've had and and talking with school sometimes, right?

You have families that are like, hey, my family's living with this family because like we just can't afford housing.

And so just thinking through like how that ultimately works, I think is definitely something why we keep talking about and bringing that up.

Um, I think in terms of, you know, when we talk about you know the the second relation to schools, and then we talk about like households and who's moving here, and this is part of I think you know, bringing together some data, like again, comparing 1970 when the code was done to today, most people moving here today, or most households moving here today are households of one or two, and so sometimes that can mean a student, but it's mostly households of one or two.

And if you look at our um, you know, uh, I'll just say part of the challenge we have is even though we're not back up to our peak population, we have way more households and housing units.

So, like we need more housing units to provide shelter for the same amount of population.

If you look at today's numbers, households that are only one or two people basically equal households of one, two, three, four, and five people back in 1970.

So it's like a dramatically different shift in terms of like what our demographics are today.

So that's one of the things that I think you know, our code is rubbing up against in terms of like what type of housing products are you allowed to build, um, is why we have this important conversation about starter homes or about multiple units.

Like, how do we figure out ways to house those households that are very different uh today than they were in 1970?

Thank you.

Councilwoman Robertson.

Thank you, Dr.

Newbill, and thank you, uh, thank you for all the work that you and many others have been doing for a couple years now.

Uh I've had the opportunity to serve on the advisory board.

And so I've waited because I think it's important for me as well, as well as serving on that board, to really hear some of the questions and concerns that this body has.

I do think that the missed opportunity that we are trying to uh recover from is that this is a big policy, and to have one work session at this stage of the game, is probably a lesson learned that uh we will take seriously with any policies of this magnitude, or even anywhere near this magnitude coming forward, and especially when it has been you know, from 70 to today, you know, is just unrealistic to regard as how many meetings we have, how much feedback we get, how many presentations like the presentation that you've done today to try to capture work that has been doing, been done for two years, and to drill down to three questions, it's it sends a message that we got most of the stuff right, except these three, and that is not the message that people want to hear.

It's not the message that I want to hear, it's not the message that I've heard sitting on the bullet, uh the advisory board as to where we are.

I think there still remains a significant level of lack of understanding, lack of information being clear, um, for many reasons, but I do think this kind of work session.

Uh, and I'd say this back to Al to us, first of all, and our role that we play in this process of how many work sessions, how many hearings we want, and then also how many opportunities council wants to give people to speak back to us to respond to what they are hearing or not hearing.

Uh, so that when we talk about the three areas or the 20 areas that we still need to drill down, we know that's coming from concerns that people have.

I believe that the work that has been done can answer people's concerns, and I think it can get people where we want them to be, but I don't think that um I think the issue is still the frequency, the volume of exchange of information at any one given time.

So let me ask a couple questions.

One, I'm hearing 50,000 people is the growth that we want to achieve over a period of time.

My question is, if that is true, well, you tell me what is what level of units, number of units of housing we would need this zoning to have the potential of bringing on.

Sure.

Uh I think to answer the question in terms of how much we want to grow, I'll say that's a little bit beyond zoning in terms of market forces of like why people are moving to Richmond.

Um, the zoning is going to have a marginal effect in terms of things like people moving here because it's awesome, but usually right because I can get a job, I can find somewhere to live, and there's again amenities or other things to do.

And so the way I think Richmond 300, right?

It looks at a few different growth scenarios, like we grow very rapidly, we could grow very slowly or somewhere in between, and we're probably on that, like somewhere in between track, maybe rapidly, but like we're not growing super rapidly, but like we're up there, we're not growing at the low growth rate.

And so what we look at in terms of, I think from a zoning code perspective, is can we have a code that allows enough housing units to be built to potentially house that population that is coming here?

There's still a whole lot at play in terms of like the market and builders and the economy of like actually building housing units, but I feel like our goal in terms of the code is like we have to set the table like to actually allow those to even be built in the first place.

Because if you can't, if you don't allow for those housing units to be built, doesn't matter how many people are in the construction industry or available to build things.

If they can't build it, they won't be built.

So what we looked at is all right, does this allow units to be built?

And going back to the RKG study, again, this was just looking at market rate units, depending, and again, if you looked at they had some projections of low, medium, and high, and they would say, all right, on kind of the low end, like we would expect to see with a code in place, somewhere around the range of like 18, 1900 units a year, in a medium range, around 2400 units a year, and if you looked at a high range, it could potentially facilitate 3,000 plus units a year.

I feel like if you look at the last few years, we have been growing at a rate somewhere around, I think I talked about this at zoning advisory council, right around 2,500 units per year.

And so, in terms of like having a code that facilitates that growth, and I think additional growth, because when I say like we've been growing at 2500 units a year, that is market rate units, and it's capital A affordable housing units in there as well.

Those are projects that are coming through, you know, with our partners at HCD or Light Tech projects.

Um, and so when we say that the code could produce or allow for, again, in that middle number, around 2500, just market rate units, that is not counting over and above affordable units that will be on top of that.

And so I think this is a way of saying that the code that is proposed based on some of these market studies will be able to facilitate future growth, even if it upticks a little bit.

If something happens and people stop moving to Richmond and people stop building, we'll have a code in place that will just still be in place, but it will allow for like the growth we expect, and I'll say it'll allow for that medium growth, but it also has the capacity if again something happens and more people start moving here to kind of keep pace to be able to build for those housing units that are needed.

Okay, so my thank you.

My question is ask with the master plan.

Richmond should have some expectation of the percentage of growth that we would want to experience just to remain competitive in a decent place to live, right?

So if I'm hearing you correctly, this zoning initiative that we are putting out, the audience would sustain growth at the current rate that we experience with some opportunity for growth, correct?

Not a lot, correct.

I would say yes, that what we are proposing provides an environment to build enough housing for the people that are moving here and could allow for housing to be produced if more people started moving here more quickly.

Okay.

So the question people ask a lot of questions about what's in this uh proposed zoning that allows for affordability, and how do you define affordability?

Yeah, um, so I think in terms of as I talked about with Ms.

Trammell, I think uh, in terms of providing affordability, in one aspect, it's being able to provide supply, but it's also being able to provide housing products that don't exist today in terms of being able to facilitate smaller developments, and so I've talked about residential cottage, um the RC district, it's not a district we've applied liberally, but we have it available so that if we have parcels where landowner would like to say, hey, I want to build some tiny homes or some smaller homes of some starter homes, they now have the ability, and again, we can still work on mapping through this process to provide that entry-level housing product.

I think in terms of you know, moving through with accessory dwelling units, whether that's interior or being able to add in the yard, being able to add smaller housing units as a way to again not being able to, you know, because there's a certain cost to land, that if I'm paying a lot for the land and all I can do with it is build one single housing unit, most likely I'm going to build a large expensive housing unit.

But if I have other options that I could potentially do some more things with, all right, I might be able to build smaller, maybe more affordable.

And again, I think we can talk about there's the the HUD definitions of affordability and and I'll say a larger market definitions of affordability, talking about um, you know, what households we're looking at, but just expanding the options that are available out there, I think is is an important thing that this code does in terms of facilitating that.

And then the last thing I think, in terms of just part of this process, and then you know, with you being on planning commission, like you see how many, even I'll say capital A affordable housing projects have to go through a special use permit process.

That adds significant amount of time, it adds you know, a significant amount of uncertainty.

And so what happens, like an affordable housing developer has to hedge their bet, and so like it's more expensive to do it because they're not certain at the end of the day, will this work out?

And so, if we can find more by-right pathways to figure out how to get housing done, whether that's, you know, a market rate project or an affordable project, that can be a big savings towards that developer.

The last thing I'll say, I think, in terms of, you know, to me, setting the base level of like what are the expectations for the zoning districts that we have, because a lot of the state legislation talks about rezoning.

It talks not about special use permits, but it talks about opportunities to administratively rezone based on doing some affordability.

So I'm going to go from district A to district B.

Well, right now, like we don't have a lot of great choices.

And I think if I didn't already, you'll see tomorrow, like we did last year, we did a hundred plus special use permits, we did three rezonings.

Why?

Because like my choices are really crummy, right?

I don't want to rezone to this because like I can't do what I need to do.

And so where I'm going with this is in terms of I think setting a framework of hey, if it's zoned by right, I'll just say like RMA.

And if I'm going to do affordability, there's an administrative way to go to RMB.

Like that's a pretty straightforward pathway in terms of I'll say certainty for that developer, but also like certainty for like us in the neighborhood of like, hey, what might be the potential of something happening here with a special use permit?

It's maybe a little more varied in terms of what the ultimate outcome is.

One of the things we're hoping this rezoning is going to do is reduce the number of SUPs based on what you're doing, what we are proposing.

What are we expecting?

Yes.

So, you know, and I will we've done some analysis.

I will think the Richmonder for doing some analysis on SUPs, as I mentioned, a third were for single family units.

Almost another third were for like very small residential projects.

And so most of those, as you dig into them, were there because they don't meet minimum lot width.

Well, nobody in the neighborhood does, right?

It needs 50 foot wide minimum lot, it's 40 feet wide.

Well, everyone in the neighborhood is 40 feet wide.

It looks just like everything else, but because they don't meet the zoning, they're here for a special use permit.

Um, and so that's primarily like the biggest one that's there.

And so to look at being able to, you know, I'll say eliminate dozens of small projects.

And I think that is one of the things, again, the zoning is focused on adding units and nodes and corridors.

That's what Richard 300 says, and that's what like the analysis will say, right?

The vast majority, two-thirds of those units are gonna come, nodes and corridors.

But I think when we talk about equity, what's what's happening is you're keeping a lot of, and and I'll use this term, like small-scale developers, like somebody who just wants to build a house or a duplex like on the sidelines because they don't have time or resources to go through this special use permit process.

And so when you have a vacant lot in your neighborhood, and like the only way I can build a house on it is to go through a special use permit process, how many people are you scaring off?

Because it's like I I just I don't have the resources to go through that.

But if I know, like, hey, if I plan to build something that looks like everything else in the neighborhood, and there's a straightforward path to do that.

Um, I think that can unlock some potential for some of these smaller projects and people who want to do good things in the neighborhood to be able to do that.

The question question um growth that you've seen happen, it seems to us like there's been a lot of multifamily, very large, very high development that have taken place.

Is that true and where?

And what would be different with the zoning?

Sure.

Um, and I can provide some of this information in terms of um where we've seen some of the development in the in the past few years.

I think um on a positive standpoint, we have seen a lot of development along the pulse corridor.

If we look at um since the pulse, you know, and the TOD zoning that was created, um, you know, in the I'll say around right 2015, 16, 17, you know, they're kind of hand in hand in terms of saying, all right, we're going to put this infrastructure improvement in to improve transportation.

At the same time, we're gonna layer that with land use and say, hey, this would be good to have like density and intensity along this route, right?

And and so we've seen um, you know, really in the since that time, I'll probably have to update the numbers, but like over a billion dollars of investment and thousands of units happening along the pulse corridor.

So I think that's important in terms of that relationship happening, symbiotic, and we want to be able to see that in more places and then more corridors.

But if we don't have the zoning in place, it's it's much tougher to do.

We've had a handful of I'll say outlier projects, and some of those have been special use permits and probably still would be a special use permit in the future.

Um, and this is a challenge, right?

With affordable housing projects that go to where land is inexpensive.

And sometimes that inexpensive land is inexpensive for a reason because it's not well served by transportation, it's not having a lot of amenities, and so we get into this challenge of all right.

Well, we can build affordably, but now like where's that transportation connection?

And so I think what this is trying to do through the code is help us implement that Richmond 300 plan of saying, look, if we want to intensify in these nodes in the corridors, we've got to get the zoning right to get there.

And when it comes to the neighborhoods, which we talk about a lot, it's it's talking about again this balance of like right, preserving the neighborhood, but also allowing for different housing products.

So, how are we trying to thread that needle?

But the main point is to say, hey, how do we really facilitate that growth in the places where we said we wanted that growth?

And I think that's what this code is is framing us up to do by pulling out or changing some of the zoning that does not allow that right now along those corridors.

So there's fear that Scott's edition in Manchester can happen anywhere.

How does this prevent that?

Sure.

Um it can't because we are not zoning it the same way.

Um, and so I will just say flat out, right?

Like I spend probably too much time like reading things that I shouldn't, but like the fan, museum district, like South, like they will not become the FAN, they will not, they will not become Scott's edition, they will not become Manchester.

And then part of that is you know, looking at the zoning and what is allowed.

And so if you look at those two areas, right, Manchester and Scott's Edition are areas that in the master plan, we said, hey, we want growth there, we want intensity, we want intensity there.

And and you look at the zoning categories.

There's a lot of MX, a lot of MX7, right, which allows up to seven stories.

In some cases along Arthur Ash or along Hall, there's maybe even MX 13 that allows for taller buildings or MXU for some of the tall buildings that exist there already.

Like you don't find MX 7 in the neighborhoods.

Like it's not there, it's along a few corridors, but you don't find those zoning categories.

Most zoning categories, the R categories, the residential categories are three stories in height, the RM categories B and C go up to four stories in height, but they also have contextual standards, right?

So you have to like look at what's adjacent to your property, and you can only go a story above those.

And so, just in terms of like the framework that we are putting out, does not allow that type of large-scale development to happen by right in those neighborhoods.

Thank you.

Um Mr.

Bonk, I want to say thank you for the incredible amount of work that's been done.

Um, but we still have more yet to do.

Um, I'm wanting to make sure that you mentioned uh the cultural heritage and historic district plans.

We're gonna get those with some time before we get the third iteration of code refresh, is that correct?

Um, yes, so working to get those um introduced by council so that council can hear them.

As I said, planning commission went through.

My hope would be that council would be able to consider those resolutions before they considered the final draft of this plan.

Okay, so you anticipate it prior to the draft three.

Just a few things and um that have come back to me in terms of feedback, some of which you've heard already.

And uh would like to make sure we're going to be addressing them.

Affordable housing, you've heard that already, and incentives uh for that.

I ask constantly, if we're wanting to make housing more deeply affordable, that we look at the AMI for Richmond versus the MSA.

I know that that is, you know, what HUD requires, et cetera, but if we're talking deeper affordability, that's something that I think we need to look at.

That's on the list.

Strategies to minimize displacement continues to come back as major concerns.

And so I know we're looking at those uh components.

Um, where do we have substantial agreement?

Um minimum tree canopy.

That's not a nicety in terms of tree canopy.

Right.

Tree canopy.

We're talking about health and wellness.

They're heat islands uh throughout the city, and so knowing uh and being vigilant about that and how we're positioning so minimum may or may not be the case for some areas, the green space continually comes back to me.

We're looking at having the standard of you know, minimal walking to everyone about health and well-being.

The commercial corridors and whether or not there's a focus there in terms of addressing uh commercial corridors.

I mean, we have them throughout the city, and how do we look and focus there to increase um development?

Have it be catalytic for some of the development in the surrounding areas.

Um that's something that continues to come back, uh to me as well as the number of persons in households.

I have a laundry list really of things prior to, and I'll look to have discussion or and or get the questions to RJ, so that as we're looking and moving towards that draft three, some of the things that have come back, I can make sure you have benefit of the affordable housing, in addition to looking at which AMI numbers we're looking at, uh, have been mentioned already in terms of what are the incentives, uh, the performance grants, if the affordable housing trust fund, those kinds of things, parking continues to come back to the infrastructure issues, and how we mitigate that given what we're dealing with.

You know, the great thing about Richmond, it is a wonderful old and historic city.

Therein lies some of the challenge, an old and historic city that has infrastructure that needs to be revisited and anticipating those.

So I have several um items pertaining to the questions and other items that I see that references that we have substantial agreement on.

Really, we'll need to revisit some of those.

Um I'll just get the list uh to RJ and get back with you.

I think I see councilwoman, I'm not in my five minutes.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Um, you trying to cut us off.

We council.

Just before just to so I don't forget, just again working on those things.

Um, you know, tree canopy, amenity space.

I think those are things that, yes, right, eyes wide open.

Um a developer may not love because they're gonna take away developable space and they may cost more, but I think in terms of the conversations we had, these are vitally important to the community in terms of like long-term sustainability and resiliency.

Um, when you talk about displacement, uh, I think one of the things that we are are also working on in terms of why we ran a test for like demolitions is um you know, trying to be very cognizant of right, not significantly upzoning an area that would cause that.

So, right, trying to get it right in terms of legalizing what is there on the ground without having a lot of like ability to do a lot more than what is there, especially in our residential neighborhoods to continue what's there to incrementally grow, but not like substantially change the grow or like right flipping to Scott's edition overnight.

And so I think that is one thing that we've we've done very carefully again, especially in the residential districts to test like did we get the zoning right?

Did we have the dimensions right?

And we'll continue to look at that.

I'll say with that when you talk about nodes and corridors, you know, very um cognizantly and most high frequent return 300 identifies a number of high frequency transit corridors that whether today or in the future, we have said, hey, this is where we want to have enhanced transit, and we have generally upzoned those areas, saying kind of like not all to TOD, but like to maybe MX3, MX4, MX5, MX7, to say, look, in these areas, again, depending on context, this is where we want the intensity and density along the transit corridors.

Where we broke that rule is North Chamberlain, North or Bilken Park Boulevard, because we know there's a significant amount of affordable housing, actually occurring affordable housing there, and in terms of displacement, while we're in other areas, and I'll just say like other parts of the new BRT like Midlothian that are um, you know, single story commercial uses, like there's no people there.

There's people on North Chamberlain.

And so I think being very cognizant about like just zoning for what is there to keep what is there, and having a separate discussion about like what should that appropriate zoning be in that area, and then just last thing, I don't know if Director Malone or if DCO Ebert is on the other side.

Sorry, I don't have eyes in the back of my head.

If anyone, if either of you want to say something quickly just about like the laundry list of like things we're doing in terms of affordability right now, because I just feel it's really important to just kind of get on the record um just the wide variety that it's not just like zoning as part of this, but just all of the other things the administration is working on.

I feel it's just really important to hear it here as long as we're here today.

I would like to answer my question.

I think that that Kevin, my colleague expressed it correctly.

Can you state your name and title, please?

Sorry, my name is Merrick Malone.

I'm the director of housing and community development basically at Richmond.

Um zoning refresh, code refresh, is a tool, it's a very, very important tool.

But as he said, this sets the framework.

We have a number of tools that we use to actually help get to kind of the desired response that we want to see in these various neighborhoods.

I know we talk about the ADU sometime, and when you look at ADUs, that's an opportunity for intergenerational housing.

I mean, if I had you know my you know parents, I mean, they I wouldn't want to move to me, but they could have their own space.

Our children who come back from college who can't find a place to live, the starter, ADU could work.

So the what Kevin says is important.

I mean, we between our performance grant, the affordable housing trust fund, how we're just using our land surplus land to be able to um, you know, create additional housing, affordable housing.

We're looking at the tools that we're getting now from the GASM from the GA, looking at how did we use strategically use inclusionary zoning so that it is an incentive to create more affordability.

I mean, I know I hear people say that you know, some suggest that well, it's you're just gonna build as high as you can.

Well, the market says if you go from like stink bill to another type of housing, that becomes very expensive.

And so you might not want to do that.

So I'm just saying that.

Yeah, you were giving us some sense of the tools that we will have in terms of affordable housing.

You're gonna look at the AMI at City of Richmond as well, right, Mr.

Malone.

Thank you.

Okay, okay, Mr.

Bronk, if you were coming back.

Um I'm going to try to quickly because we are approaching the time that we allowed ourselves, but we have some additional questions that I'd like to think.

Thank you.

So, councilwoman Gibson.

Um, thank you, madam president.

Um, I want to highlight what we heard today.

Um, you know, we were told that through additional supply, we would be getting affordable housing.

And based on what we've seen, based on the market rate studies, that doesn't appear to be the case.

And that that matters a lot because essentially we're here because we're in an affordable housing crisis.

And the reality is that at this point, we don't know what the the true look of what the affordable housing is that's going to come of it, and the cost of existing affordable housing on creating it.

So if we have studies that are showing where the market-based building is going, we need to see where the teardowns are happening.

When we're talking about single family homes, I think that's our starter homes, that's important.

So I pulled the 2025 and 2026 land books, and I looked at all of the properties that are owned by LLCs.

In the 6th district, right?

Uh an affordable historically black community, almost 25% of the homes are owned by LLCs.

So when we're talking about development, we're not talking about, you know, folks that just are building a few things here and there.

Essentially the affordable housing crisis that we're in today is largely fueled by pub by private equity.

That's the reality.

And we would be delusional to believe, I'm still speaking.

Ms.

Gibson, one second.

I am going to ask that you not applaud.

I don't mind the applause, but I understand you don't, but others may.

I would like to finish you.

So what I was saying is the affordable housing crisis has been fueled by private equity.

And we would be delusional to believe that private equity will get us out.

That's the reality.

And so we need to be looking at the displacement data with haste.

And to appreciate and ensure that the decisions made by the zoning advisory committee truly align with the master plan.

And we need an independent body to do that.

We need to understand the impact of homeownership, impacts on safety and pedestrian safety, and fire safety.

Because if, according to the research we've seen, much of the construction is going to be stick built five to seven stories.

How does our fire department feel about this?

There are implications that are there.

And so I hope that this body considers how we can ensure that that alignment is there.

We are legally bound to do it, and we owe it to our residents to ensure that that with what we're want to be able to allow people to do that it's going to benefit the people, the residents of the city today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So just and I'll be brief.

I think just to take a look at that.

Yeah, because I have other members who are trying to make around to Yeah, I think to just acknowledge the question, I think again, going in eyes wide open and acknowledging what zoning can and can't do.

Like zoning is not going to change like the fact that housing has morphed over time from a utilitarian product to financial product.

And so like that's a reality we're dealing with.

And so just trying to acknowledge that in our rules of like, all right, how are these, I'll say, players playing the game.

And so I think that's one of the things in terms of one, when you do look at other communities, there has been some relationship between delivering supply and cooling prices in other cities.

I will say we have not hit that point in Richmond yet.

The other part, in terms of like, I'll say playing the game, one of the things as I mentioned earlier is providing opportunities for like other people to get involved in the housing market.

And right now, right, it's a very high bar.

Like you see what comes to planning commission, like it's usually with either an expeditor, a consultant, or land use attorney, or sometimes all three.

Like it's really hard to like do development, it's really hard to build housing in the city.

So I think part of like this discussion, and again, trying to be eyes wide open about it is what are the opportunities are there for other entities to enter this housing market that maybe we don't have today.

It's not going to be a hundred percent panacea, but I think it's just looking at reality in terms of are there ways that we can allow others to be part of this process.

All right, thank you.

I have one final point.

Um, I I don't know if we have the ability to limit the impact of private equity on the housing market, that we have that tool at our ready here in Richmond.

I don't believe that we do, obviously, if we did, you know, sign me up.

Um but the the issue of being able to allow other people in.

I mean, that it's it's not a problem we can easily solve.

And the reality is is that, you know, these developers, they use these, you know, algorithms essentially to set the rates to set rental prices, right?

So um, so this is essentially like legal collusion by which the rents are set, and so um, and they're not reducing the rent, they might give a free month, right?

They do that to ensure that the rents maintain are still high, and they can keep the value of their pro of their property high.

We need to ensure we've done our work to ensure that whatever decisions we make don't make this worse.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Jones.

Thank you, madam president.

Um, and again, thank you, Director Bonk.

Um, my colleagues said a lot of what I wanted to share.

I have two things.

Um, one in talking about the amount of folks that can actually unrelated folks that can occupy a home.

Um, I guess are we factoring in or have we factored in partners who um have housing for like incarcerated recovery, like have we factored that in when we're planning for the unrelated um amount of people that can live in a home?

Um, and then the other piece with this um added position um with the ADUs and the principal dwellings and all that, um, if possible, I would really love to see us get a little bit more feedback from the south side communities, particularly because we're talking about a lot of growth that is over there, and I think it's only feasible and only fair that we make a conscious attempt to try and pull in a little bit more voices.

Um, I know what I'm from what I'm getting and hearing thus far, it is a lot of opposition, but it's also a lot of people who are not even at the table who don't even understand and who are just hearing, you know, in whatever way that this is what's happening, and I don't want to be responsible for when it comes down to a vote that they have not been engaged, and I you know feel like we can do a better job.

Um, and we need to figure out what that looks like, some sort of blitz, whatever it needs to be.

But I think every home in the South Side, particularly probably eighth and ninth, needs to have a direct contact to at least at a minimum know what this is, know what is coming, because I think a lot of times when we talk about you can add an ADU and you could your child could live back there, or you could do that that's wonderful.

I love all of that, but then we also have residents that cannot do that and cannot and will not be able to do that.

I don't think we should be making decisions for them.

So I would just love to see if there's any way possible, and I'm willing to help in whatever capacity that I can.

I think we need more voices before we get to a draft three and as close as we get in.

Um I would love to see just a little bit more engagement on the South Side.

We said 5,000 residents.

I would like to know how many of those come from the 8th and 9th district.

And I know I've held I've I was telling uh a constituent yesterday, we've been talking about this since 2025, but back when I was over at Pops Barn Grew, but it still somehow has not matriculated through and the voices that I'm hearing is solely against, and I want to make sure that everybody at least has an opportunity to decide because this is a lot of you know uh it's a lot, and it's a lot of coming out your house, and now you see three units on the back of like that's a lot.

So I just want to know that, and then I want to know about what are we making provisions for um relativity of two um recovery houses, um transition houses, because we have a lot of those in our community as well.

Thank you.

Um yes, I mean, Code of Virginia does have some provisions that do allow and I'll say supersede us in terms of allowing for up to eight and and some certain situations, so we are thinking about that when we're talking about what is that proper number.

Thank you.

Vice President Jordan.

Thank you so much, President Nivelle.

Um I guess I would just like to revisit the topic of housing products we don't have today.

And I think the reality is when we talk about affordability, and everyone, I think too often it is putting a weight on this process that is unrealistic.

Um updating our zoning code is not going to fix the affordability crisis, period.

It never was going to.

We have inflation out of control, salary stagnation.

There are all these other factors that are contributing to folks being pressed in their ability to afford their rent or to save up for a new home or that first home.

And to anyone who did not see the presentation on filtering that the planning commission, sorry, sorry, the planning apartment provided, it was really useful.

More housing, more housing types allows the filtering down of the most expensive to more affordable, etc.

Um, and when the presenter was was pushed on, well, how do why can't we focus on more starter homes?

We want more starter homes.

We want more homeowners in our neighborhood and our district and our city.

The reality was renters aren't able to save up the money to do that because they're so cost burdened by their rent.

So I really do feel like tackling the capacity of our our rentals is beneficial and I appreciate it.

Um I also want to, you know, to the types of housing products.

Not in this, I don't need an answer right here.

Um, but in the in the cluster of things we're working on outside of code refresh, how do we get conduizing buildings easier?

Because I do think that is around the ladder that we don't have enough of across the city.

There are a lot in the fan, and they're extremely popular.

Um, but they were created a long time ago, and I hear from developers in my community that struggled to create that now.

Again, not for a comment now, but I do think that's something that we need to focus on.

Would appreciate a response of how to facilitate that.

I know you were looking for feedback on these three items, and we're starting to run down run out of time here.

Um quickly for myself for my district.

I think we have seen um people completely against moving off the three unrelated to 100% support for just following Virginia code.

I would like it to see something in draft three that maybe is a little bit more representative of the fact that folks are living in different arrangements now.

That's just up to this little necessity.

Um, and we do have situations where that makes sense.

Um, I think eight is too much.

I think three is a little bit too conservative.

Four or five, seems like maybe five, we're moving forward and being more um realistic.

Um, and then when it comes to the houses of worship, I think you're zooming in here.

I think on on a good spot.

Uh, like that you are providing options that would be uh contextual to the surrounding neighborhoods.

And then when it comes to the two plus one, I think that is something that you know on my block, I feel like I have everything, and I love it.

I love having renters on my block across the street, different size buildings, different types of buildings.

That is not something that across my district, and certainly I know across the city that people seem comfortable with at this point.

Um, so appreciate you bringing these to us, and that would be my feed frack at this moment.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Councilman Burton, I'm trying to go in the order that you spoke.

You don't have if you don't have anything additional fine.

Um, I just want to make sure that um we get a good understanding of the um type of overlays that the um neighborhoods will be able to benefit from.

You know, I've preside over a lot of historic districts, you know, that are um, and I I also value the the history that this city brings and the type of architecture and you know charm that it has, and so as we're inviting new families in, I want to make sure that we're doing things that we can to preserve our tree canopy and also preserve, you know, style and architectural overlays.

So make sure that's clear so when we are voting on our zones, that we will know that we how we can also be protecting um design overlays and how that's gonna work and how feasible and easy it's gonna be.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Trammel.

Kevin, I want to ask you something.

Um everybody knows that code refresh goes way beyond our master plan.

We've talked about that over and over and over.

It's not with the master plan.

If state law requires the rezoning must follow our master plan, why have you ignored our master plan with code refresh?

So correct the zoning code, right?

Has to be in line with the master plan.

And I think if you look at what our master plan says in terms of we want to grow and where we want to grow, and you look at what the zoning allows in those areas, it fulfills that.

And in many cases, it's under it.

And I think that's one of the things we've talked about in terms of affordable housing, that it's not giving it all away, that there's still room to incentivize particular things, whether that be affordable housing, whether that be sustainability features, there's there's still room to grow in the future.

Um, and we're actually doing some analysis right now, and we can can share that in terms of you know what the master plan says in terms of right max intensity, density, height, and where we're zoning it to make sure that we're underneath that, and in all the cases.

Okay, all right, comparing the um current map of the master plan and the code refresh map, the code refresh has maybe ten times as much development in that area.

How is that legal?

In what particular area?

Yeah.

No, I'm asking in what in what particular area is it 10x.

Well, it's like what's being built in different parts like my eighth district, I'll just say because I know the citizens are are definitely going against some of the development that has to come before here, but I keep telling them they need to work with the developer because once this buy right gets passed, you know, these apartments and townhouses and things like that, it'll be declared as by right.

So it'll be it'll pass.

So they don't fully understand that.

And I know because they're asking me now.

Um answer that because I have another question I meant to ask you earlier.

And I think, you know, and I'm I'm glad to talk through with you or your constituents, um, in terms of you know where we're looking again to incentivize types of dense development, looking at how we're zoning Richmond Highway in particular, right?

There's there's higher density zoning on Richmond Highway because we said that's where we want some of the intensity and density.

We're not doing that in the neighborhoods.

It's it's mostly a mix of some type of like our district.

And so the point is to say, look, in terms of by right, yes, there may not be a legislative process in terms of like what's happening on Richmond Highway, but the master plan said we want development on Richmond Highway.

And so we're trying to facilitate development on Richmond Highway, and we're trying to, again, legalize what's happening in the neighborhoods, but you will not see um if you look at the code, you will not see apartments all throughout the neighborhoods.

All right, I'm glad you just brought um Richmond Highway up because I know that I shared it on my Facebook page.

The mayor didn't even mention Richmond Highway.

He mentioned Midlothian, Brooklyn Park Boulevard, but never mentioned Richmond Highway, and that is a disaster.

And also I want to know what is in the plans for Richmond Highway before I lose every business over there.

And I want to thank all these citizens that took their time, so many of them have left because here we're going on two hours and we're still talking, and I've always been told anything after an hour and a half, people get bored and they want to leave.

But um we got we got a hell of a lot of work to do before we even think about voting on this.

This is going to be a disaster.

And let me just say this and then I'll shut up.

This code refresh passes, all of you better remember this.

Your American dream is going to be gone.

The American, the American, the dream that we've all had, including myself, was always to live in a nice, quiet, peaceful neighborhood and be able to afford my home.

Landlords are being pushed to the point right now that they've got to sell their properties because they can't keep up with all the with all the destruction that goes on in their apartments or their homes or single-family home with the police calls that they that the citizens, the neighbors are calling on renters, and then nothing gets done.

So there goes your American dream in your home that you saved your money to put that roof over top of your head, and not only that would taxes gone up, utilities gone up, everything else gone up.

So that's all I gotta say.

Thank you, and Councilmember Trammell.

If you have additional questions, please RJ wouldn't get them to him.

And to Mr.

Bond, because we're not gonna have enough time to get.

I know I'll do that.

I can thank you.

Um Councilmember Lynch.

Thank you.

Um so just just a couple, a couple of things, and and Riva Riva is right.

The American dream is gone, right?

But that's because we have extreme, extreme wealth disparities in this country, and we live in an unregulated market, we don't have price controls over housing.

And so to uh council member Gibson's point, um, investors, uh developers, real estate agents will charge whatever we'll list that house at whatever the price, but whatever the market will bear, right?

So I think just to back up a second, and one thing that has you know, I just want to make one observation because it has been really, you know, living in my heart since this whole time we've been going down this train track, is that because this is such a deeply emotional topic um for people because it touches on the things that have slipped away from us in our society, it it is rubbed in our face every day.

Um, and we see the invisible and very and visible signs of wealth disparity in our country that manifests itself in our cost of living and our housing.

It it has caused a lot of feelings about this code refresh, right?

And so one of the things that always disturbs me, though, is when you when you have any type of effort or initiative or going you know through a change, is that um there is disinformation on both sides.

Code refresh is not going to be the solvent to our affordable housing crisis.

It's just it's just not.

Code refresh is not going to poison people in the James and cause boils on people's skin, is not going to, it is it is it is not gonna re-redline Richmond.

It is not going to overnight explode a million people into the city, and it also is not gonna do really anything demonstrative for people that are truly struggling in poverty in this city that have already been pushed out.

So I I would like for us to approach the code refresh, make fact fact basis, and the three things are really this, it's really this simple.

And then there's a couple changes that we need to make, you know, for our own districts to reflect the feedback that we've heard.

But we we've we I want to get back to these three quite like I've I love that you we did this, it's like cut right through the note fence like the BS.

Because this is what it's about.

And if we can come to consensus on that and engage our neighborhoods and engage uh the communities that have not been engaged.

I think Council Member Jones has an excellent point because you know, we largely the people that are really paying attention to this are, you know, there's two different groups of stakeholders, right?

But none of them are the people that really truly are impacted by the issues that I just talked about, the challenges in our society, right?

Um, if we can just get to consensus, though, and engage and get to consensus on those three things.

Have our have our historical cultural preservation plan, because yes, absolutely 1,000 percent.

We need that.

We need the facilities master plan for the schools.

Um, I think we can do it.

I just want to make one last note.

Hemraiko passed their code refresh, which was much more aggressive than ours in 2021.

Chesterfield, they just passed theirs.

It took it took place, uh, takes effect, uh, took effect in January 1 of this year.

Richmond, we're behind.

Let's just, you know, we'll get it together.

And I think we will make very common sense, common sense decisions that reflect the needs of our communities because that's what we're here to do.

Um, and with that said, yes, three people, you know where I'm standing on that, three people to it to a dwelling.

Um, I take a little bit more of a conservative approach to the God in my backyard, um, and then, you know, I think we're gonna, I think for some of our neighborhoods, the principal dwelling, one principal dwelling unit in the ADU is is probably where we're gonna land just because I am worried about the demolition that happened that occurs in our in the primarily in Randolph neighborhood um Maymont and um and potentially in bird park.

So I mean I think that that is worthy of conversation.

That's where I stand on those three things.

I hope we can cut right to the keep it just the facts and engage the people that that aren't sitting here with us today and that need to be engaged.

Thank you.

Councilmember Robertson.

Wow, okay.

Uh thank you again.

I appreciate the three questions.

Um, and that would be great if that's all we need to come to consensus on and we could get there.

Um, but I do think that the challenge, there are a lot of things, questions that are being raised that want to be addressed, that code is not going to address.

And I think it's very important that we just make some of that stuff clear because we do need those things addressed, but they're not going to be addressed by codes.

And I think that recognizing growth requires us to at least add 2,005, 3,000 units of housing on an annual basis, multiple choices of houses, and also inclusionary housing opportunities in quarters in the city of Richmond that in our opinion is designed for that.

The threat of single family community areas that have been single family forever needs to be said clearly.

No, there is not a rezoning that's gonna put multifamily, 10-story buildings in your single on your block next to your single family homes.

There are a lot of folk that still believe that's true.

Um, some of the myths that are out there just need to be set up front and whether it's true, not true, and how we are not going to be doing those kinds of things as far as the zoning is concerned.

I think it's important that we define what affordable housing is.

There are a lot of folk that still believe public housing is what affordable housing is only.

They don't know any different, they really believe that's what it is, and it's not based on all income levels.

I mean, we talk about homelessness, except for just a few years ago.

There was nowhere you could do housing for uh homeless families, shelters in the city of Richmond by right.

So we have to be sure that we categorize the type of housing.

People need to know what these big business quarters that we are talking about are because some people still think it's my little two blocks in my center neighborhood.

We talk languages that is not common language to the average person, and it's so easy to be misled and confused or believe anything that someone tell you because we are not painting this picture.

I mean, we need to paint this picture of where are these big quarters and what are we talking about?

Are we talking 13 stories?

We talk in seven stories, we're talking 10 stories.

We need to be clear on that.

One of the questions, one of the statements that my colleague made that um affordable housing is being funded by private equity.

She mentioned specifically the sixth district, which raises a lot of concern for me.

Everybody in the city knows that Ellen Robinson is advocated for affordable housing.

That statement in itself suggests that in reality, affordable housing is building wealth by private equity.

And in her statement, I need to I need facts to verify that.

I need facts to say where the LLCs, how much is the affordable housing based on private equity?

Because I can't sit here and let the 6th district be the only district that is named as it relates to private equity and what private equity means.

Yes, you know, low income tax credit is equity, and we need it in order to make affordable housing a reality.

So I want to challenge us before we do anything to adopt anything.

We need to define what is affordable housing, what has to be going in, what is private equity, and we need to make sure that I know that we're not going to advocate one district just doing private equity for housing affordable housing in the city of Richmond.

And I want Raj to add that to your list.

Uh entities, the churches, we have state guidelines that have come down now and understanding the implications there.

Inclusionary zoning, that what will be implications around affordable housing.

So there's more information I want to get prior to saying, yes, let's just do that.

I have a good news.

A lot of uh faith-based organizations in my district want to make sure that what we are proposing is what the community uh sees as valuable.

So I'm looking forward to more communication and community engagement in my district around the draft number three, but I will get the questions to you relative to these three items so that I can be more responsive.

With that, members, I'd like to thank you for the time.

I know we went over time.

Mr.

Bonk, I really want to thank you for all that uh you've already done and the work you'll continue to do.

With that, members, this work session now stands adjourned.