‘Public Comments’ will remain on 7 p.m. Town Council meeting agenda; Lloyd COVID ‘Medical Freedom Resolution’ fails to get consensus

The Front Royal Town Council began its lone work session of January with an hour closed meeting on topics dominated by Economic Development Authority-related business, both new and old.

The “new” was formation of the new unilateral FREDA Board of Directors, the old cited in the motion to convene to closed session read by Vice-Mayor Lori Cockrell included “the relationship of the Town Police Department funding and the Warren EDA, and the litigation between the Town and Warren EDA and Personnel”. No announcements were forthcoming after the closed session.

Following reopening of the Monday evening, March 8 work session council got a brief budget update from Finance Director B.J. Wilson. Wilson noted that a public hearing on the Fiscal Year-2022 tax and utility rates was anticipated for April 26. Council has committed to keeping Real Estate and Personal Property rates flat in the coming year. However, water-sewer rates will rise as recommended by a consultant to cover departmental costs from mandated improvements continuing to be implemented. Those increases average to about 2.5% total, Wilson told council, with the sewer rate going up 3.5% and water up 2%.

Town Purchasing Manager Alisa Scott briefs council on draft Special Events Ordinance. Royal Examiner Photos by Roger Bianchini

The rest of the 10-item work session agenda was highlighted by discussion of a number of high public interest topics. Those topics included:

1- where Public Comments will be scheduled in a revamped single monthly meeting agenda;

2 – further consideration of Councilman Scott Lloyd’s “Masks and Medical Freedom Resolution” proposal;

3 – plans and scheduling of the Afton Inn renovation by new owner 2 East Main LLC;

4 – establishment of a “Special Events Ordinance, Policy, and Permit Application” system that would include future downtown street closings for special events and any return to last year’s weekend walking mall initiative;

5 – scheduling of a public hearing on a Department of Corrections request to lease space at 842 North Shenandoah Avenue near the current Warren Memorial Hospital as a District 11 Probation and Parole “sub-office”;

6 – an update on the Mayor’s 5-item “100-Day Goals” list;

7 – a planned joint meeting with the Warren County Board of Supervisors; and

8 – an Open Discussion opportunity.

As for the joint meeting, a decision was deferred pending further discussion and establishment of availability of involved parties from both municipalities.

Public Comments
Council concurred with the staff recommendation forwarded by Town Manager Steven Hicks that Public Comments not be removed from the meeting agenda to an earlier, untelevised time, as had been proposed. Rather, they were listed as the 8th agenda item, essentially where they had been, following a moment of silence, pledge of allegiance, roll call, approval of previous meeting minutes, addition/deletions to agenda, recognitions and awards, agency presentations, and just prior to opening public hearings for proposed legislative actions.

Councilman Meza worried that at time disconnect between Public Comments and council member reports could prevent an occasional informational give and take with the public.

Councilman Meza expressed concern that manager, mayor, and council reports had been taken off the front end of the agenda and placed as the final agenda items prior to any closed session that might be scheduled. He explained that sometimes council members might want to respond to public comments that might contain what he termed inaccuracies or misperceptions that could require clarification.

He suggested the mayor be given the option of asking if there were any council responses to the public comments immediately after they were made while leaving the member reports at the meetings end. However, after a lengthy discussion, it was decided to move the council, mayor, and manager’s reports back up the list to immediately follow public comments as they had before.

COVID mask-wearing exemption
A distinct split arose over Councilman Lloyd’s proposed blanket acceptance that if people are not wearing a protective mask in the Town of Front Royal, they will be assumed to have a medical condition that exempts them according to Governor Ralph Northam’s Executive Order 72 medical exceptions. There already appeared to be somewhat of an altering of the original proposal in that a “resolution” was presented rather than a legislative ordinance/code change.

In prefacing his proposal, the policy attorney and former Trump Administration official said that he didn’t want his initiative interpreted that he “wasn’t concerned about health issues” but that he was “going to gravitate toward legal issues”. He restated a belief that Virginia’s governor, whom he acknowledged as an opposition party Democrat, had overstepped his legal authority in mandating public COVID-19 Coronavirus pandemic mask-wearing. Mask wearing has been medically suggested as a preventative safeguard against spreading the highly contagious airborne-spread viral infection that has killed over 2.4 million people worldwide and over half a million Americans in little more than a year.

Lloyd reiterated his belief that his initiative was simply an amplifying of medical exceptions contained in Executive Order 72 related to HIPPA prohibitions on disclosure of private, computer transmitted medical information, in this case about conditions that might qualify one not to wear a mask for health reasons. Lloyd’s initiative would assume that if one is not wearing a mask there is a medical reason which the person could not even be questioned about, which as stated, he believes is already part of Executive Order 72.

Siding, at least to some extent, with Lloyd were fellow self-identified council libertarians, Jacob Meza and Joseph McFadden. However, council’s fourth self-identified libertarian, Letasha Thompson, expressed concern about the nature of Lloyd’s proposal.

“Is part of your resolution … in essence that you’re going to try to force certain businesses … are you going to tell them now, they have to let people in?” Thompson asked, adding, “I’m not of the mind to telling other businesses what to do.” She pointed to the decision of some business owners to require masks to enter or find other ways to order and pick up as a protective measure for employees, vulnerable relatives, and other customers against what has determined to be a highly contagious and potentially fatal disease. It is a disease she pointed out, that has led to a higher death to known cases ratio in Front Royal and Warren County than the national and state averages.

Lloyd replied that business owners have “a private right or freedom to generally do what you want with your business … essentially you can open up your business and not let anybody in until the business fails”. What he wants to do, he said, was “educate and accommodate” the information on what business are obliged to do or NOT do, per Executive Order 72’s medical exemptions. He suggested there may be people with “anxieties or some other issue or legitimate health reasons who are masking just because they want to get through their daily life and have to feel pressured to explain … I actually have an issue. – That’s actually excluded in the language of the executive order,” Lloyd noted.

Mayor Holloway noted businesses with “no shirt, no shoes, no service” requirements that council hadn’t felt compelled to address in the past. The mayor asked Councilman McFadden if customers had to wear a mask to enter his gym business. “No,” the councilman replied, leading to the follow-up question, “Can they come in and wear a mask?” to which McFadden replied, “Yes because I believe in freedom to do whatever the hell you want to do. You can’t be mandated to do things or not do things.”

As the conversation took various twists and turns, including disseminating information without a resolution or an ordinance, it appeared to be a 3-3 council split with Cockrell and Gillespie siding with Thompson on there being no need for council action regarding the masking situation. And with the mayor clearly expressing his opinion council should not become involved, the writing was on the wall.

After leaning Lloyd’s way on the legal perspective, McFadden expressed frustration with a direction council could meaningfully take. “I’m on team ‘I wish there was something we could do on this – I’ve been racking my brain. I don’t know what we can do as town council unless we did something in regard to the Constitution and reaffirming Constitutional rights … So, it’s a Constitutionality thing, unless we take it that direction I don’t really see having any direction right now. So, I agree with the mayor that I don’t see where it could go, unfortunately.”

And with that, it appeared the initiative was abandoned as a local ordinance or resolution matter, at least for now.

Afton guarantees
Town Attorney Doug Napier briefed council on a proposed agreement on scheduling the Afton Inn renovations to be completed within essentially a 2-1/2-year timeframe that if not complied with, would result in $200-a-day fines to owner 2 East Main LLC until the project was completed. Napier noted he had sent a draft to the developer’s attorney but had not heard back in a week, so was assuming the draft was acceptable as written and presented to council.

“Why would they sign this?” Councilman Meza asked.

“Yea, why would they? – If I was them, I wouldn’t sign it. That’s why you haven’t heard anything. I wouldn’t respond,” Mayor Holloway, who is in the construction business, added.

Town Manager Steven Hicks told council that he had spoken to 2 East Main representatives, observing, “They wanted me to share with council that they’re excited about this project. They want to get going.” The town manager said he had told the owner-developer the Town wanted to partner with them in seeing the necessary steps on both sides were achieved to facilitate an aggressive redevelopment schedule the owner has expressed hope for with an approximate two-year timeframe.

Well, if they want to sign it, we won’t stop them, Mayor Holloway may have been thinking after Town Manager Hicks said he believed Afton developer 2 E. Main LLC would sign a $200-a-day punitive agreement setting a timeframe for completion of the Afton Inn project. Below, the Afton Inn is due for a serious facelift.

“We want to make sure that they’re successful. So, they’re eager, they’re going to start. And I think this agreement is part of their commitment to the Town to let you all know they’re serious about it. So, I’m comfortable they will sign it because they really want to show their commitment and they appreciate what the Town is doing. In exchange, my commitment is we want them to be successful,” Hicks told council.

Thompson called the draft agreement “spot on” and Mayor Holloway suggested inviting 2 East Main to brief council on where they were in their process.

See the linked Town video for these and other discussion.