After hour delay to achieve a quorum, council quickly approves three CUP requests, two for Short-Term Rentals, before convening to work session

The Monday, September 12, Special Meeting of the Front Royal Town Council began with an hour’s delay with only two council members present (Thompson, Gillispie), along with Mayor Holloway at the called 6 p.m. starting time. The Special Meeting was scheduled to accommodate three public hearings originally scheduled for the August 22nd meeting, a meeting canceled for lack of a physical quorum.

At 7 p.m., the September 12 meeting convened with four of its current five members present in the Town Hall main meeting room. Vice-Mayor Lori Cockrell and Amber Morris joined Letasha Thompson, Gary Gillispie, and Mayor Chris Holloway, with Zach Jackson absent. Controversially resigned/un-resigned member Joe McFadden was also present, maintaining his string of appearances despite council’s late (Aug. 29) acknowledgment of his August 8 verbal resignation rescinded in writing four days later.

At 6 p.m., it was pretty lonely in the Town Hall second floor meeting room, with only two of five current council members present, along with staff. Below, an hour later, the quorum was achieved, and the already once-canceled public hearings commenced. Photos Royal Examiner

With its quorum achieved with the necessary four active members physically present council got down to its meeting business prior to convening to a work session to discuss coming meeting topics and ongoing projects. First up of three Special Use Permit (SUP) requests was Ramzi Beidas’ for two residential “dwelling” units on the ground floor of his property at 650 West 11th Street. According to the agenda packet staff summary, there are currently two dwelling units on the second floor of the two-story building in the Commercial-1 (C-1) District. The first-floor spaces had previously been used as a brewery and laundromat.

With a Town Planning Commission recommendation of approval and no speakers at the public hearing, Councilwoman Thompson read a motion to approve as presented by staff in the agenda packet with recommended conditions, including resurfacing of the existing parking lot and inspections by council members or designated representatives at “reasonable” times to see that enabling conditions and zoning requirements are met. Her motion was seconded by Vice-Mayor Cockrell. However, after discussing points raised by Councilwoman Morris, the resurfacing and council-ordered inspection requirements were removed on Morris’s amendment to the original motion.

Responding to questions, Planning Director Lauren Kopishke explained that the parking lot repaving condition was inherited by the current owner when he bought the property due to plans of the previous owner to establish commercial uses on the first floor that were never realized. Morris also observed that inspections by council members or their reps seemed superfluous when the regular zoning process, including complaints for non-compliance would lead to staff inspections within existing regulations.

Council agreed, and Morris’s motion to amend the original motion with those deletions, seconded by Thompson, was approved by a 4-0 roll call vote.

Next up was the first of two SUP requests for Short-Term Rentals, this one from Joy Allen and Patrick Masch for a property located at 425 North Royal Avenue. The request is to rent three bedrooms out to a maximum of six people at a time in the C-1 property. On-site parking for up to six vehicles was cited in the staff agenda summary.

Again with a recommendation of approval from the planning commission, this time with no specific conditions, there were no speakers at the public hearing. Councilwoman Morris made the motion to approve, seconded by Thompson. After an observation by the vice-mayor that the wording of “no more than six people at a time” was a tad vague as to how that six-at-a-time might be attained, two per bedroom or six in one bedroom if the other two were unoccupied, council approved the request by another 4-0 roll call vote.

The final public hearing was on Jerry and Martha Britton’s SUP request for a Short-Term Rental at 18 East Stonewall Drive. The applicants are seeking up to eight occupants in four rooms. The staff summary noted onsite parking for three vehicles in a driveway. Council hit the trifecta of no speakers at the public hearing, leading to Councilwoman Thompson’s motion, seconded by Morris, to approve without specific conditions. Vice-Mayor Cockrell inquired if parking would be a problem with three onsite parking for four rental rooms. But with on-street parking also available, the motion passed on another 4-0 roll call vote.

Work Session Agenda
That led to adjournment after 11 minutes. Council then went immediately into its work session with an agenda review of five items slated for public hearings on the September 26 regular meeting agenda; 13 items earmarked for the September 26 Consent Agenda of routine items generally defined as of a “housekeeping” nature, and five items related to ongoing projects.

Planning Director Lauren Kopishke, podium top right, briefs council on coming agenda items during work session immediately after special meeting adjourned.

Those latter five included amending Town Code 142-4.1 to require residential owners or occupants of residential properties fronting Town-owned sidewalk right-of-ways to be responsible for removal of snow and ice from those sidewalks within 24 hours of winter storm events, as commercial and industrial occupants already are required to do. Public comments from a citizen dating to January 24, noting citizens having to walk in cleared streets (in the South St. and S. Royal Ave. area) after a snow event creating a hazardous situation for those pedestrians with passing vehicular traffic was cited in bringing council and staff’s attention to the need for a code update.

Also recommended for routine approval on September 26 was a Resolution of Support for a three-year-term, joint wind energy purchase through the Town’s municipal cooperative membership in American Municipal Power (AMP). The joint municipal power purchase would lock in a $47.50 per MWh (Mega Watt hour) price from October 2022 thru September 2025. The agenda summary noted that “AMP recommends Front Royal commit to a 2 MW purchase to help hedge against the current volatility of the wholesale power market as well as provide replacement power for a scheduled fall outage at the Prairie State Coal Fired Plant.” The AMP membership included 132 municipalities in eight states (Ohio, Pa., Va., W Va., Md., Kty., Ind., Mich., and one joint agency membership in a ninth state (Del.).

The collective purchasing power and member sharing of excess production capacities at reasonable costs has long saved the Town on energy costs. But with a turnover in council membership in recent years and the retirement of some related department heads, council decided to take a harder look at the relative costs associated with its AMP offers and power purchases. The result of that hard look was a staff recommendation of approval of the most recent joint purchase opportunity locking in fixed prices over a three-year term in a volatile energy market. The purchase involves power produced by Locust Ridge Wind Energy out of Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania.

Also discussed was the necessity of the Town authorizing the transfer of $1 million from paving projects to the 8th Street bridge replacement project due to VDOT’s readiness through its Revenue Sharing Program to split the $3-million cost of that project 50/50 at this time. The staff summary noted the Town has put aside $500,000 with the intent to provide the additional one million dollars when the project reached VDOT’s list of ready-to-proceed projects, which it now has.

Fourth on the projects list was an update on the Town’s lengthy effort to establish and enact a Property Maintenance Program and codes to enforce a basic standard of property and building maintenance. The staff update on the program included: “Drafted policies/procedures for inspections and blighting properties; LBBCA board advertisement and application form; Updating renter responsibility guide: and Creating property maintenance page on town website.”

Finally, there was an update on policies moving forward with the Town’s unilateral Front Royal Economic Development Authority (FREDA). Council is totally responsible for funding FREDA, unlike the half-century-old joint Town-County EDA the Town withdrew from, in which it had no operational funding responsibilities in recent years, only debt service on its EDA-overseen Town projects. The Town’s withdrawal from the FR-WC EDA was decided upon when council chose to litigate against the joint EDA over lost assets related to the FR-WC EDA “financial scandal” of 2014-18, as opposed to sitting down to engage in offered “good faith negotiations” to determine who was owed exactly what as a result of the alleged unauthorized movement of Town, County, and EDA assets during the tenure of former executive director Jennifer McDonald.

The staff agenda summary noted: “At the August 8, 2022, Work Session, Council requested a future work session to discuss the set up/support of the Front Royal Economic Development Authority (FREDA), Staff is recommending the October 11, 2022, Council Work Session.”

See the special meeting and work session in part or their entirety in the Town Video labeled “Town Council Special Meeting Sept. 12,” the first 11:30 of which is the Special Meeting, the remainder the Work Session.