See below for our Northern Virginia Advocacy Manager, Sonya Breehey, testifying before the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors on behalf of CSG and Fairfax Healthy Communities regarding the FY22 budget.
Category: Virginia
CSG Comments on ALU proposal in zMOD
March 9, 2021
Fairfax County Board of Supervisors
12000 Government Center Parkway
Fairfax, VA 22035
RE: Testimony in Support of Accessory Living Unit Provision of zMOD
Chairman McKay and Members of the Board:
Please accept these comments on behalf of the Coalition for Smarter Growth (CSG), the leading organization in the DC region advocating for walkable, bikeable, inclusive, and transit-oriented communities as the most sustainable and equitable way for the Washington, DC region to grow and provide opportunities for all. CSG appreciates Fairfax County’s efforts to update its zoning ordinance. Our comments focus primarily on the proposed accessory living unit (ALU) provisions, which we fully support. CSG has become a leading expert on Accessory Dwelling Units through our work in DC and our just-released DC ADU homeowners manual.
We also support the liberalization of home-based businesses — particularly in view of the advantages we have seen for home-based work during the pandemic. Home-based businesses would be a great benefit to stay-at-home parents, people with disabilities who have trouble traveling, and the Fairfax economy.
The need: Housing in the county is expensive, shutting out young adults, downsizing empty-nesters, essential workers, teachers, firefighters, and many more. Prices are high and smaller homes can be hard to find. If this pandemic has shown us anything – a home is vital to our health and well-being. Now is the time for Fairfax County to prepare for the future and ensure people have affordable places to live in our county.
Accessory living units can offer less expensive housing options than renting or buying a single-family home because of their smaller size and provide housing opportunities in communities that might otherwise be too expensive. ALUs can also offer a stream of income for homeowners, including lower-income homeowners and retirees on fixed incomes.
Changes proposed are modest and should not be weakened as the Planning Commission proposes: While Fairfax County staff has proposed some positive changes to the ALU policy, which is a step in the right direction, they are very modest and do not go far enough to truly make ALUs a viable housing option in the county. The Planning Commission is proposing to weaken these further by keeping the special permit process in place for interior units for several more years. This will further delay the wide ranging response the county needs to apply to the affordability crisis we’re facing.
Supporting ALUs is in line with Fairfax County’s goals. The Communitywide Housing Strategic Plan developed in 2018 at the request of the Board of Supervisors recommends that the zoning update modify the county’s accessory dwelling policy, now known as accessory living units, and to explore zoning districts for missing middle housing types. However, this zoning update does not tackle ALUs robustly enough and does not consider missing middle housing options at all.
Looking at the comparison chart in the ALU fact sheet provided on the zMOD website, you can see that Fairfax County is lagging behind other local jurisdictions that are doing more to embrace accessory dwellings as a tool to provide more housing options. Meanwhile, Arlington, Montgomery, and DC are all taking steps to study and expand missing middle housing.
Recommendations: CSG supports the county’s proposal to remove the current age and disability requirement for all ALUs. No other local jurisdiction has this requirement. Removing the age and disability requirement is more equitable so people of varying ages can take advantage of these types of apartments. It provides greater flexibility to a homeowner to provide a home for an adult child and other family members or friends needing a moderately priced apartment.
Streamlining the process for interior ALUs located within the main home by allowing for administrative approval will make the process less burdensome and costly for homeowners. ALUs, like the principal home, must meet all required building and zoning codes and are subject to inspection. According to the ALU fact sheet on the zMOD website, Loudoun, Arlington, Montgomery, and DC have moved to allow ALUs by administrative approval.
The 2-acre requirement for detached units is unfortunate and retains an inequitable requirement by only allowing detached ALUs for those who can afford 2 plus acres. It also puts these detached units in car-dependent locations. Homeowners throughout most of the county should have the right to build a detached unit on their property.
In fact, Fairfax County should particularly encourage detached ALUs near transit stations and transit-rich corridors. This can be done by removing the 2-acre requirement for detached accessory dwellings and allowing them on smaller lots closer to activity centers and transit. In addition, removing the parking requirement when ALUs are within a mile of frequent transit helps to remove another regulatory and cost barrier and incentivizes housing in the right places.
The Board should accept the staff recommendations for ALUs and home-based businesses, and reject the Planning Commission’s proposed rollbacks. The county can then monitor the implementation of these changes as part of a more robust study to expand the creation of ALUs and evaluate missing middle housing needs and solutions.
Conclusion: We encourage the County to take the necessary steps to further expand opportunities for accessory living units and missing middle housing in the county as a way to make more affordable homes available in our communities. Creating more housing opportunities near transit and jobs is essential to ensuring an inclusive and economically prosperous Fairfax County where people are able to live near their work, helping to reduce long commutes through the county, and contributing to a diverse and vibrant community.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sonya Breehey
Northern Virginia Advocacy Manager
RE: Support for Accessory Dwelling Units in Alexandria
January 23, 2021
Alexandria City Council
301 King Street
Alexandria, VA 22314
RE: Support for Accessory Dwelling Units in Alexandria
Dear Mayor Wilson and Members of City Council:
Please accept these comments on behalf of the Coalition for Smarter Growth (CSG), the leading organization in the DC region advocating for walkable, inclusive, transit-oriented communities. CSG appreciates the City of Alexandria’s efforts to develop an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) policy and writes to convey our full support of the proposal. CSG has become a leading expert on ADUs through our work in DC and our just-released DC ADU homeowners manual.
Accessory dwelling units can offer less expensive housing options than renting or buying a single-family home because of their smaller size. They are great for an aging parent you are caring for, offer a home for your recent college graduate, or a young professional just starting their career. ADUs can also offer a stream of income for homeowners, including lower-income homeowners and retirees on fixed incomes.
CSG is enthusiastic about the strong provisions being proposed that will help make the City’s program a success, such as allowing ADUs citywide, and enhance their feasibility and affordability by not requiring off street parking in our transit-rich, walkable city, and not requiring owner-occupancy on site.
An owner-occupancy requirement lacks flexibility for the homeowner and may limit one’s ability to build an ADU. It can make it difficult for homeowners to finance an ADU. This may serve to exacerbate income and racial inequities by limiting the ability of homeowners to construct ADUs to those with sufficient equity in their homes. An owner-occupancy requirement would also be limiting to people who must move on short notice, such as military and diplomatic families, who often choose to rent out their primary residence. We also note that single-family homes today are already frequently rented out by owners who are not living on site. The owner-occupancy requirement would be a barrier to constructing ADUs and undermine the goal of increasing the supply of ADUs in the city.
We encourage the city to include requirements for regular review, reporting, and recommendations by city staff on refinements to the program. This could include creating an affordability program for low-income renters or buyers, assessing size limitations and setbacks and their impact, whether or not the program has exacerbated or improved racial and income inequalities, and recommendations to address any other barriers towards creating new housing through ADUs.
We understand that some Alexandria residents who are opposed to ADUs and previously opposed the Seminary Road safety project have attacked CSG and our supporters as being outsiders. CSG is a longstanding, 24-year-old regional organization advocating for transit, safe streets, transit-oriented development, and affordable housing throughout the DMV and were honored with the Council of Governments’ (COG) Regional Partnership Award in 2017. Our staff live in Northern Virginia, Maryland, and DC and work with local advocates in each jurisdiction. We sent emails about the ADU program to our Alexandria members and subscribers encouraging them to participate in the ADU study process and to contact the City Council, and we remind our supporters that the emails on Alexandria issues are focused on Alexandria residents. At the same time, local elected officials meeting at COG have agreed that housing, like transportation, is a regional issue, requiring shared effort by every jurisdiction.
CSG believes the proposed ADU policy is a bold step forward in establishing a strong program that will help provide more housing options in Alexandria. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
Stewart Schwartz
Executive Director
Sonya Breehey
Northern Virginia Advocacy Manager
Event: A Virtual Walk & Talk Along Little Hunting Creek
If you missed our virtual stream walk with the Audubon Naturalist Society and Fairfax County staff, you can watch the presentation here.
From ANS: On September 10th, 2020, Fairfax County staff Charles Smith & JoAnne Fiebe led us on a virtual walk-and-talk of an area around Mount Vernon Plaza, part of Little Hunting Creek, one of the sites of a proposed “ecological spine“. This concept, introduced in Chapter 3 of the Richmond Highway Urban Design Guidelines, envisions how streams can be made part of the community again. Instead of burying streams and building on top of them, how can redevelopment integrate streams and their riparian buffers into walkable, bikeable areas where people and nature can thrive in urban settings?
Tune in to the webinar to hear about the vision for the Route 1 redevelopment and hear about how redevelopment can be tied to creating healthier streams, and therefore a healthier world for us.
TESTIMONY re: Support of the Heritage at Old Town
We urge you to approve the Heritage at Old Town. Alexandria has lost over 90% of its affordable housing over the past two decades. We face a housing affordability crisis in Alexandria and neighboring jurisdictions. Multiple studies demonstrate that we need both more supply and more long-term committed affordable units. This project provides both. Supply is critical to avoid displacement, and a range of tools are needed including leveraging land value and density to ensure we create more affordable units.
Coalition Re-releases Fairfax Healthy Communities Platform
Coalition for Smarter Growth, Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions, Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance, Audubon Naturalist Society, Fairfax Alliance for Better Bicycling, Friends of Accotink Creek, Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Potomac Conservancy, Friends of Dyke Marsh, Audubon Society of Northern Virginia, Virginia Clinicians for Climate Action, Fairfax County NAACP
Fairfax Healthy Communities: Sustainable, Inclusive, Livable
A Joint Vision for Fairfax County in 2019
We support a vision for Fairfax County that is sustainable, inclusive, and livable and urge candidates for local and state office in Fairfax County to support this vision and to commit to the implementation steps necessary to make this vision a reality.
We share a vision for Fairfax County where the County commits to:
- Providing housing opportunities for people of all incomes, ages, and stages of life in every district in the county, investing in improving affordable housing and access to opportunity in communities where there are concentrations of poverty, and fostering greater racial and economic integration in single-family, low-poverty neighborhoods.
- Ensuring transit, walking, bicycling and other modes of active transportation are well-funded, safe, convenient and accessible for people of all ages, giving residents more choices and reducing traffic congestion.
- Creating vibrant, mixed-use, mixed-income transit-oriented communities which provide a range of housing choices and employment opportunities, while reducing vehicle trips and vehicle miles traveled.
- Fighting climate change by dramatically reducing greenhouse gas emissions from buildings, transportation and other sources.
- Restoring watersheds to ensure clean drinking water and healthier ecosystems.
- Expanding parks and trail networks.
- Ensuring access for all to affordable health care and healthy local food.
- Taking specific steps to realize its One Fairfax commitment to racial and social equity, community involvement, and the 17 goals laid out in the One Fairfax policy.
A sustainable, inclusive, healthy, competitive, and fiscally sustainable future for Fairfax requires a fundamental shift in land use, transportation, housing and energy policies toward walkable, mixed-use, mixed-income, and transit-oriented and green energy communities, and the full engagement of the community in achieving this future.
Signed:
Coalition for Smarter Growth
Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions
Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance
Audubon Naturalist Society
Fairfax Alliance for Better Bicycling
Friends of Accotink Creek
Chesapeake Bay Foundation
Potomac Conservancy
Friends of Dyke Marsh
Audubon Society of Northern Virginia
Virginia Clinicians for Climate Action
Fairfax County NAACP
* The above signatories are 501(c)(3) organizations. This platform is strictly educational and is being shared with all candidates and the public. By law, our organizations are strictly prohibited from participating in, or intervening in (including the publishing or distribution of statements) any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office.
Update! Fairfax Healthy Communities Platform – 2 new groups incl Fairfax County NAACP
Coalition for Smarter Growth, Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions, Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance, Audubon Naturalist Society, Fairfax Alliance for Better Bicycling, Friends of Accotink Creek, Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Potomac Conservancy, Friends of Dyke Marsh, Audubon Society of Northern Virginia, Virginia Clinicians for Climate Action, Fairfax County NAACP
Fairfax Healthy Communities: Sustainable, Inclusive, Livable
A Joint Vision for Fairfax County in 2019
We support a vision for Fairfax County that is sustainable, inclusive, and livable and urge candidates for local and state office in Fairfax County to support this vision and to commit to the implementation steps necessary to make this vision a reality.
We share a vision for Fairfax County where the County commits to:
- Providing housing opportunities for people of all incomes, ages, and stages of life in every district in the county, investing in improving affordable housing and access to opportunity in communities where there are concentrations of poverty, and fostering greater racialand economic integration in single-family, low-poverty neighborhoods.
- Ensuring transit, walking, bicycling and other modes of active transportation are well-funded, safe, convenient and accessible for people of all ages, giving residents more choices and reducing traffic congestion.
- Creating vibrant, mixed-use, mixed-income transit-oriented communities which provide a range of housing choices and employment opportunities, while reducing vehicle trips and vehicle miles traveled.
- Fighting climate change by dramatically reducing greenhouse gas emissions from buildings, transportation and other sources.
- Restoring watersheds to ensure clean drinking water and healthier ecosystems.
- Expanding parks and trail networks.
- Ensuring access for all to affordable health care and healthy local food.
- Taking specific steps to realize its One Fairfax commitment to racial and social equity, community involvement, and the 17 goals laid out in the One Fairfax policy.
A sustainable, inclusive, healthy, competitive, and fiscally sustainable future for Fairfax requires a fundamental shift in land use, transportation, housing and energy policies toward walkable, mixed-use, mixed-income, and transit-oriented and green energy communities, and the full engagement of the community in achieving this future.
Signed:
Coalition for Smarter Growth
Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions
Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance
Audubon Naturalist Society
Fairfax Alliance for Better Bicycling
Friends of Accotink Creek
Chesapeake Bay Foundation
Potomac Conservancy
Friends of Dyke Marsh
Audubon Society of Northern Virginia
Virginia Clinicians for Climate Action
Fairfax County NAACP
* The above signatories are 501(c)(3) organizations. This platform is strictly educational and is being shared with all candidates and the public. By law, our organizations are strictly prohibited from participating in, or intervening in (including the publishing or distribution of statements) any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office.
10 Orgs Release a Platform for Fairfax Healthy Communities
Coalition for Smarter Growth, Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions, Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance, Audubon Naturalist Society, Fairfax Alliance for Better Bicycling, Friends of Accotink Creek, Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Potomac Conservancy, Friends of Dyke Marsh, Audubon Society of Northern Virginia
Fairfax Healthy Communities: Sustainable, Inclusive, Livable
A Joint Vision for Fairfax County in 2019
We support a vision for Fairfax County that is sustainable, inclusive, and livable and urge candidates for local and state office in Fairfax County to support this vision and to commit to the implementation steps necessary to make this vision a reality.
We share a vision for Fairfax County where the County commits to:
- Providing housing opportunities for people of all incomes, ages, and stages of life in every district in the county, investing in improving affordable housing and access to opportunity in communities where there are concentrations of poverty, and fostering greater racialand economic integration in single-family, low-poverty neighborhoods.
- Ensuring transit, walking, bicycling and other modes of active transportation are well-funded, safe, convenient and accessible for people of all ages, giving residents more choices and reducing traffic congestion.
- Creating vibrant, mixed-use, mixed-income transit-oriented communities which provide a range of housing choices and employment opportunities, while reducing vehicle trips and vehicle miles traveled.
- Fighting climate change by dramatically reducing greenhouse gas emissions from buildings, transportation and other sources.
- Restoring watersheds to ensure clean drinking water and healthier ecosystems.
- Expanding parks and trail networks.
- Ensuring access for all to affordable health care and healthy local food.
- Taking specific steps to realize its One Fairfax commitment to racial and social equity, community involvement, and the 17 goals laid out in the One Fairfax policy.
A sustainable, inclusive, healthy, competitive, and fiscally sustainable future for Fairfax requires a fundamental shift in land use, transportation, housing and energy policies toward walkable, mixed-use, mixed-income, and transit-oriented and green energy communities, and the full engagement of the community in achieving this future.
Signed:
Coalition for Smarter Growth
Faith Alliance for Climate Solutions
Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance
Audubon Naturalist Society
Fairfax Alliance for Better Bicycling
Friends of Accotink Creek
Chesapeake Bay Foundation
Potomac Conservancy
Friends of Dyke Marsh
Audubon Society of Northern Virginia
* The above signatories are 501(c)(3) organizations. This platform is strictly educational and is being shared with all candidates and the public. By law, our organizations are strictly prohibited from participating in, or intervening in (including the publishing or distribution of statements) any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office.