What happened to our quiet, peaceful little county?
Newcomers tell me they came to Floyd County for the peace and quiet. Lifers and long-time residents say our area is known for its laid-back, peaceful lifestyle.
So where’s the quiet? Where’s the laid-back, peaceful lifestyle?
The sound of jackhammers ripped through the town of Floyd this week. A new crosswalk is under construction. Workers continue to put the finishing touches on The Station on South Locust. Tomorrow night will bring throngs to downtown for the Friday Night Jamboree, music at Cafe del Sol and Oddfellas and dinner at any of several eateries. Even with a new municipal parking lot, finding a place to park on a Friday night, Saturdays and some days during the week can be difficult.
Trying to turn left out of the parking lot at the Village Green on Main Street after 3 p.m. can try one’s patience. Traffic headed for Fandango backed up 20 deep or more at the stoplight last weekend.
Over at the County Administration Building on Oxford Street, officials are rushing to put the final details on a “major announcement” of a new business in the town’s industrial park that, we are told, will bring a significant number of new jobs to the county (which we need) along with increases in traffic and demands on the infrastructure (which we may not be able to handle).
My Blackberry chimed with reminders for five appointments and events for today — three of them conflicting with another.
Last night, while attending a wedding reception, somebody remarked: “Remember when there was nothing to do in Floyd? I’m starting to miss the old days.”
Yet Floyd County government faces these times of growth with a budget stretched so tight it could snap at any time. The Sheriff’s Department is laying off deputies because of budget cuts. Other county departments will have to curtail services in the coming year. The Virginia Department of Transportation is running out of money for road maintenance and has no funds for new construction. The Department of Social Services could not fund every request it had for assistance last year.
Growth does not always translate into prosperity nor does it necessarily improve the quality of life. It comes at a price. While changes that bring new business and opportunities to town should be welcome, can they succeed when the town and county governments lack both the planning and resources to handle that growth?
There’s talk of an English pub at the Station on South Locust and an Italian restaurant on Webbs Mill Road but has anyone conducted a demographic study to see if Floyd can support two more restaurants? I doubt it.
Floyd County is awash in grand plans but we are a desert when it comes to strategic planning and focus. No one, to my knowledge, has yet come up with the answer some simple questions: What is it that Floyd wants to be? What’s the goal? What’s the theme? Where’s the focus?
A lot of good people have put their own money on the line to bring change and prosperity to Floyd but they put all of that at risk with government leaders who wander aimlessly in the dark without a road map to the future.
Can Floyd succeed in spite of itself or are we just cooking up a recipe for disaster?
Floyd County needs land use planning and development guidelines and regulations in order to effectively move growth in the direction county residents desire. The current subdivision ordinance is not the answer.
Until we have a progressive solution to development that helps to maintain what we value about life in Floyd, all our investments in land, improvements, and our lives will impacted by uncontrolled subdivisions of land and unrestricted land uses.
This is not to suggest we need less freedom/more restrictions, it is only to say we need to act in the interest of what we value.
There are many good examples of development guidelines and land use planning regs from small towns all over America. Until Floyd adopts a County Master Plan, and designates certain areas for specific types of desirable or complementary growth, we will see all manner of land use…positive and negative.
Jack:
While the comprehensive plan has some good points it does not address much of the growth and current issues surrounding growth. It is woefully out of date and the revisions are way late. It has a lot of nice buzzwords and boilerplate language indicating standard consultant fare but I found it lacking in substance.
It also does not address the central questions I raised about the goal, focus and theme for Floyd’s current construction activities nor does it adequately address solutions to the problems such growth brings: traffic, water resources (already strained) and financing for infrastructure improvements. Like so much of what has been planned for Floyd County, it appears based more on the "if we build it they will come and we all will prosper" mentality.
Land use plans aren’t enough for Floyd County. We need zoning and until we get it the problems will increase.
Compounding the problem are government entities dominated by obstructionists and/or good-mined citizens who are in way over their heads. Last month, the board of supervisors had a chance to apply for a grant for solar power as an alternative to the library and county administration building. They dismissed it with a rountineness that defied both logic and common sense. That kind of attitude does not serve the needs of the county.
Hey Davis,
A comprehensive plan has been in existence for some time for Floyd and Floyd Co. I believe that the Town and County may be in the process of revisions to that plan this year, with the assistance of the New River Valley Planning District Commission. Here is a link to the 2002 plan that, even considering its age, states the Town and County’s values and goals for such planning.
http://www.floydcova.org/government/code_of_ord.shtml
Back in the land use sections of the 2002 version the plan actually envisions some of the concepts quite popular today, such as cluster development that would preserve more open space for all of Floyd and Floyd County. I do know that there was pretty remarkable, facilitated, citizen input gathered leading up to that edition. While the .pdf file available via the link above is perfectly readable, I believe that there is a print copy available at the library, too. I think the County offices might have a copy available to read as well.
The subdivision ordinances and interpretations are also accessible via the link above.
Yes, correct and I knew that…was posting in a rush.
Thanks for making that clear to other readers who may want to take a look at it.
If the Board of Supervisors starts to seriously consider zoning Doug won’t have to write about the lack of citizen involvement in local government for a while. I think a large majority of landowners in the county are opposed to zoning and would vote out supervisors who were in favor. A good land use policy would preserve open spaces, but for whatever reason Floyd seems to be a very desirable place for people to move to and I don’t see a land use policy doing much to change the rate of growth.
As for new restaurants (an English pub—-seriously???), it is up to potential owners to determine if this is a good business decision. I never though Floyd could support 3 coffee shops, but they are all still open. If new restaurants don’t have prices locals can afford they will be struggling outside of Friday and Saturday.
Well, there is alot more to our quiet, beautiful county than the town of Floyd. I moved here for the roots, the stinging nettle tea, the spring up in the woods, the crisp clean air and water, the honeysuckle blanketing the fence along the driveway, the fertile soil, sharing tales around the fire, making music on the porch. I loved our town when I went there for seeds and fertilizer. And I love it now when I go there for coffee and art. But what I love the most is visiting friends, laying in the middle of the Little River just for fun, and going home to a certain peace, night sky bursting with moon and stars and comets, watching the animals and the change of seasons…and my garden – a profusion of flowers.
I’m glad that Doug brought this up, from my perspective Land Use Planning is probably the single greatest policy factor with promise to favorably affect growth in Floyd.
Lydeana Martin has advocated (in my words) the establishment of a transparent system of incentives which allow residents and developers to increase density or in other ways exceed a baseline of County land use regulation. The Regulations would be developed to offer protection of classical values. (i.e. viewshed, water shed, emergency vehicle access, erosion and stormwater protections etc). Some of these regulations have already been implemented by the Commonwealth, Erosion and Sediment Control, Onsite Sewage Permitting, Stormwater Management are good examples, some have been managed by Floyd E-911, the Sub-Division or Mobile Home Park Ordinances with varying degrees of success. All of these regulations should be focused on aligning growth with a desirable build out vision, and a minimum of conflict between potentially conflicting resource allocations.
Unfortunately we only see agreement with the premise of restriction by zoning when an individual property or location is affected, but the mindset is “I want to retain the right to develop my land unhindered by regulation” and this seems to be the general reaction by the body public, unless they have been affected by poor choices by a neighbor. Every location that has ever implemented a Zoning policy has had to overcome this one reflex.
One of the strongest incentives for the county to encode a zoning ordinance may be the Dillon Rule, which as I understand allows certain revenue vehicles only to counties that enact zoning as a function of codifying their Comprehensive Plan.
The conversion of a lot to a set of lots (subdivision) has uncompensated costs to the county in general. And there are means to recover all or a portion of this expense by the public. Some counties use a proffer system, others use transfer taxation. I am not as familiar as I would like to be, but I can see many applications for the education of citizens in better land use choices. This is one of the means pioneered by early advocates to interest landowners in the quality of their environment.
I have spoken briefly with members of the Planning Commission and understand the Comp Plan is up for revision this year, and they are interested in citizen input. Those that take the time to read the Plan will realize that it is a living document. Unfortunately all the good (an not so good) ideas expressed in this document are just so much text on a page without acceptance by the public and political leadership, and development by the County’s staff. I for one hope that Lydeana will be able to head this project, and that the County will provide her staff and resources to advance a policy which fits our time and place.
As Floyd continues to think about sustainability, the availability of water should be considered. What are the variations in annual and seasonal rainfall and rates of changes in the water table and demand? Next, if an increasing supply of food is to be produced, what lands are best suited to a sustainable supply? The New River Planning Commission has been working on a Green Infrastructure Plan for several years and it would be useful to come up to speed with their conclusions and see if questions of the community are being addressed. There are other resources at Tech, within state government and in the federal government that can help with information.
There is a minor problem with ‘encouraging jobs’. That’s corporate welfare. It’s paying companies to pay people.
But the companies make more money than they will ever pay out, because it’s their job to make money. And they will only hire people who will make for them more money than they pay them.
Where’s the extra money going? Grand Cayman, I suspect.
So why not just take those “encouraging jobs” tax dollars and spend it on the people directly? Skip the middleman? Logical? Not to business-own/ed/ing politicians. Whatever hits the fan shall never be evenly distributed, whatever it be.
And multiplier effect? Hardly. When there’s a rakeoff at every level, from the bankers on down, the ‘creation of jobs’ is, at its root, a wonderful corporate scam.
Enjoy your Kool-Aid.
Ian
It would be helpful if someone (or several people) who follow Floyd government closely could prepare a “report card” before the upcoming election so that those of us who are less able to follow things up close could have a better idea of who the visionaries are and who would be less than helpful in guiding Floyd into what is admittedly an uncertain future. I know this is a task that would be difficult to perform objectively but it would still help if someone could give it a shot. We don’t want to rush headlong into the unknown but I don’t think we need idealogical obstructionists running the show either. The key will be qualified, open-minded representation and good planning with the ability to make neccesary course adjustments as the future of Floyd unfolds before us.