Washington Town Council names Sullivan to vacancy, considers annexation policy
By Jay Ward Brown
The Washington Town Council appointed John Fox Sullivan to fill the open Council seat at its snow-delayed February meeting on Monday night. Sullivan, a long-time resident of Rappahannock County who moved last year to the town, was the only applicant for the seat vacated in January by Reinhardt Lynch when he resigned after moving.
Sullivan, 63, is the publisher of The Atlantic Monthly, The National Journal, and other Washington publications. He and his wife Beverly live at the Meadows, west of Main at Porter Street in the town.
Sullivan’s appointment was approved unanimously by the four council members then in attendance. Promising to support and defend the constitutions of the United States and Virginia, Sullivan took the oath of office from Circuit Clerk Diane Bruce and was invited by Mayor Gene Leggett to “take Reinhardt’s chair.”
“Reinhardt left some very big and special shoes to fill,” Sullivan said, adding that he is excited by the opportunity to serve the Town in his new position. “As a professional, I’ve spent 40 years watching and covering politics, and loving American history, and now I have the chance to be directly involved in politics and history, at least on a small scale,” Sullivan said.
The Council deferred to a later meeting the election of a new Vice Mayor. Lynch had served for a number of years in that role, which will be filled from among the Council’s current members.
Mayor Leggett indicated that the Council also will likely defer for a few months filling vacancies on the town’s Architectural Review Board and Planning Commission. Sullivan plans to resign his current seat on the Board because of his elevation to the Council, and an opening occurred on the Commission when Robert Ballard resigned earlier this month because he and his wife, Joan, are moving out of the town, to Amissville. The Ballards will continue to operate their shop on Main Street.
The Town Council then convened a joint working session with the Planning Commission, addressing the procedures for consideration of a proposed boundary line adjustment policy that has become the subject of considerable controversy.
As The Rappahannock Voice has previously has reported, a petition filed late last year by residents of Piedmont Avenue requests that the town annex their residential neighborhood, now part of the County. The town has no existing policy governing annexation and, before acting on the Piedmont petition, the Council tasked the Planning Commission with drafting a set of policies that would guide any future adjustment of town boundaries, including the proposed Piedmont annexation.
In the meantime, some of the Piedmont residents have expressed frustration at the pace of proceedings on their petition, prompting a February Washington Post article in which some of the petitioners were described as attributing the delay to racism on the part of “rich white folks” in the Town. Neither the Post article nor the accusations of racism were mentioned at Monday’s meeting, which none of the Piedmont petitioners attended.
The Planning Commission, however, approved the draft policy statement at Monday night’s meeting and recommended that the Council adopt the policy. The Council will consider the recommendation at its March 14 meeting.
If approved by the Council, the policy would provide that any future boundary line adjustment should be undertaken only where it would serve the health, safety and welfare of town and county residents and where an adjustment would be consistent with the town’s comprehensive plan.
As approved on Monday by the Planning Commission, the policy also would provide that any additions to the town should be “orderly, incremental and gradual,” and that any annexed property would be subject to the following conditions, among others:
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Newly annexed property would retain the same zoning it had under county jurisdiction unless and until rezoned by the town. Such property could not be subdivided unless first rezoned by the town.
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The property would become part of the town’s Historic Overlay Zoning District, and would therefore become subject to the jurisdiction of the town’s Architectural Review Board.
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Any habitable structures on the property would be required to connect to the town’s wastewater treatment system when such service is available to the property.
Although the town had originally indicated that the policy statement itself would be the subject of public hearings, the town was advised by its attorney Monday evening that no public hearing is required on adoption of the policy statement. Rather, before any annexation can take place, the Comprehensive Plan must be amended and that process, which will be based on the policy statement, will require public hearings.
Accordingly, if the Council approves the policy statement at its March meeting as expected, the next step likely would be for the Council to task the Planning Commission with recommending proposed amendments to the Comprehensive Plan, which might take the form of general amendments, or could deal specifically with the Piedmont petition or other specific, possible annexations.
As Mayor Leggett emphasized, at the end of the day, any annexation is the product of a political process that involves both the town and the county, and the county’s position on all of these issues is unknown at this time.
At their Monday meeting, the Council and Planning Commission also reviewed proposed amendments to the town’s zoning ordinances.
As consultant Milton Herd explained, the town’s zoning ordinances are currently scattered randomly, making it difficult for residents and business owners to locate pertinent information. The proposed amendments would consolidate and number in logical sequence all of the zoning provisions, making it easier for someone contemplating activity in the town to identify rules that might govern their plans.
Among the more substantive proposed changes, the Town would no longer permit new agricultural uses as of right, but only upon successful application for a special use permit. Retail operations larger than 1,000 square feet would be permitted anywhere in the town upon successful application for a special use permit. And various changes to the ordinances would be used to encourage cluster development in any future subdivisions – that is, the concentrating of houses in one area of a subdivision in order to maximize the amount of open land retained around them.
The proposed amendments to the ordinances must still go through several steps, including final approval by the Planning Commission and action by the Town Council, before they take effect.
-- Admin
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