Two Falls Church Goals Clash

The Falls Church City Council spent over three hours Monday night weighing the impassioned arguments on both sides about the proposed use of a 29,000 square foot parcel of undeveloped City land. The final wording of a resolution adopted near midnight sought to appease the concerns of both.

The Falls Church Housing Corporation, a non-profit dedicated to providing affordable housing in the City, sought a tentative go-ahead from the Council for its plans to build a five-story affordable housing facility for seniors on the property, combined with an adjacent 27,000 square foot parcel owned by the F.C. Volunteer Firefighters.

But both parcels have remained undeveloped, and being adjacent the current West End Park (north of W. Broad beneath the bike bridge), have been used for years as a de facto extension of that park by neighbors to the site.

So, Monday night's session brought head-to-head the interests of the neighbors in maintaining the property as "open space," and the Housing Corporation's mandate to provide affordable housing.

In the final wording of its resolution, the Council permitted the Housing Corporation to move ahead by tentatively and temporarily removing the City from title to the site, but on the condition that a "substantial portion" of the site remain open space. Only Councilman Ron Parson, in his final meeting before retiring from the Council, voted against. Councilman Sam Mabry, absent from the meeting, phoned in that he would have voted `yes' had he been there.

"There is simply no where else for the Housing Corporation to go in the City's tiny 2.2 square miles where, partnering with the City government, it can leverage its resources to make a substantial contribution to affordable housing in the increasingly-unaffordable City of Falls Church," Housing Corporation executive director Carol Jackson told the Council Monday.

Jackson said that she'd been in discussion with Council members for months about the site, and that she'd been encouraged by them to push ahead. Her organization is also pressed by an unyielding schedule of the federal government for seeking federal aid for the project.

The work within its economic constraints, she said, the site would have to occupy most of the land in question. Still, speaking to the News-Press Tuesday after the Council's carefully-worded resolution, she said her organization remains "committed to doing everything we can to make the project work."

The F.C. Housing Corporation is a non-profit charitable organization created in 1981 to preserve and create more affordable housing available to citizens of Falls Church. It is the private sector partner named by the City of Falls Church to cooperatively achieve the City's housing goals.

Falls Church Assistant City Manager Wyatt Shields told the Council Monday that the official staff position was to support moving ahead with the Housing Corporation plan. He noted that the OK sought Monday would only allow the project to move ahead, with no assurances that it would be afforded approval of the zoning and Comprehensive Plan changes it would subsequently require in the fall, or receive a "special exception."

But a legion of over 20 neighbors to the site in question, residents of Grove, Offutt, Chestnut and Ellison Square, queued up to the microphone to take more than hour of time, each protesting the transfer of the land to the Housing Corporation. They cited a shortage of parkland on the west end of the City, a "promise" from the Council to keep the property as parkland, and expectations of the same. They cited the frequent use of the land by families and its idyllic and secure nature.

The complexities of the issue, however, began to come out when City Councilman Lindy Hockenberry reminded the residents that the Volunteer Firefighter-owned parcel remained zoned commercial, and could be sold to commercial interest which "by right" could construct a business on the site that would block access to the West End Park to many of the same residents.

"We have no control over this," she said. "And if this arrangement fails, it will likely happen. These neighborhoods will be land-locked from access to the park"

Councilman Ron Parson added that even though the City Council in 1998 in negotiating for acquisition of the City parcel in question – which is not technically been titled to the City yet because a mutually-agreed upon boundary has never been struck – expressed its commitment to keep the land as "open space," that it is common and appropriate for governments to change such commitments as needs change.

He also said it is appropriate for the City to commit its land for affordable housing as a subsidy, and that neither the Volunteer Firefighters nor the Housing Corporation are benefiting unduly from the proposal.

Former four-term Falls Church Mayor Carol DeLong weighed in supporting the Housing Corporation request, calling affordable housing "an endangered species" in Falls Church and adding, "If not here, where?" She said the Housing Corporation "deserves the opportunity to demonstrate to themselves, to you and to the neighbors if their plan can work."

Housing Corporation board member Robert Wilden, a retired for federal Housing and Urban Development administrator of its Section 202 housing program and resident of Falls Church since 1976, said, "All the good sites, all the free sites, are gone. We have to horse trade. It's simply the way it is. There will be no elderly housing in Falls Church if this doesn't work."

The ordained Presbyterian minister who began working on housing in the inner city of St. Louis in the 1970s added, "There are 80 to 100 people who are not represented here tonight. They are the ones who will reside in and benefit from the project if it is built. For many of them, it will be the best housing they've ever enjoyed."

Wilden cited the merits of the 200-unit senior housing project in McLean sponsored by the Lewinsville Presbyterian Church.

Housing Commission board member Tom Hemphill advised the Council to allow a "considered review" of the project to begin, asking it not to be swayed by "a knee jerk reaction to the unknown" by neighbors to the site.

But two of the Grove Avenue residents who spoke back-to-back admonishing the Council to keep the land as open space reflected the diversity among the neighborhood's residents. One was a resident of Grove Avenue for less than a month and the other for 40 years.

John Murphy of Chestnut St. conceded that "two undeniable goods come head to head on the same property" in this case, and his sentiment wound up reflecting the decision of the Council.

In other developments at the Council meeting Monday:

• Chet DeLong was sworn in to another term on the Library Board of Trustees.
• Citizen Lou Mauro announced a petition drive was underway to oppose the current mixed-use development plan for 500 S. Maple Street. He said that 300 citizens had signed it so far.
• Shields announced that the Washington Area Mass Transit Authority had approved the City's plans to scale back the service Falls Church's GEORGE bus system, ending service late at night and on weekends. The new schedule will go into effect July 6, and on July 4, the schedule will be a Saturday schedule to accommodate more riders to the Falls Church fireworks show at George Mason High School.
• The Council OK'd a renewal of contract with United Refuse, LLC, for collection of the City's recyclable materials at $132,300 per year.
• The Council agreed to the compensation for the coming fiscal year for the City Clerk at $72,158, for the City Attorney at $131,615 and the City Manager at $143,808 with a deferred compensation benefit of $17,000.
• The new Council will be sworn in at a special Council meeting tonight (Thursday, July 1) at 8 p.m. in Council chambers, followed by a reception at the Community Center. A vote for mayor and vice mayor will also occur.
• Next Tuesday, July 6, the Council and Planning Commission will hold a joint work session at 7:45 p.m. to mull zoning amendments applicable to the tree ordinance, residential infill, commercial zones and historic preservation. The session will be held in the Training Room at City Hall.