ISSUES
Culpeper is a growing community. This growth is stressing many of our services. This needs to be addressed to ensure Culpeper remains a place people want to live, work, and play.
GROWTH
Our growth will soon outpace the county's ability to provide its citizens with adequate services. We already see issues with traffic, classroom sizes, medical availability, and school bus ride times. If we continue growing at this pace, we will have to build more schools, add career staff to the fire and rescue departments, and ultimately, taxes will increase. The county needs to make the hard decisions on how to manage our growth and where this growth takes place. Unfortunately, the county has no control over the growth of the Town; therefore, we need to plan better for the county.
SCHOOLS
Our schools are reaching capacity. The Town is growing with little regard for how it affects our school system. The County is experiencing unprecedented urban sprawl. Construction projects on Culpeper Middle School and the new elementary school are underway, and an eighth elementary school is planned. However, if our growth continues, this will not be enough. We need to ensure that our schools have everything they need to properly support our students and teachers. I have supported keeping our teacher and support staff salaries competitive within our region, and I will continue to support having great teachers and great schools.
DATACENTERS
Culpeper established Technology Zones as allowed by state law. I worked to reduce the total number and size of these zones. We have consolidated from five zones of approximately 2,654 acres into one zone of approximately 989 acres. I wish Culpeper didn't need any data centers, but our growth is requiring numerous projects over $100 million that require additional funding. This funding could come from industry or real estate and personal property taxes. To maintain our low tax rate, data centers (in the right place) will alleviate the need to raise taxes to fund schools, roads, fire and rescue departments, courthouse and jail updates, and many other essential services we require to adequately support our residents.
Our Technology Zone is full. I do not support any additional data centers in our county. I will continue to fight to ensure our countryside isn't overrun with these large developments and their transmission lines.
INFRASTRUCTURE
Infrastructure needs to be planned where growth is indicated in the Comprehensive Plan. However, growth in our county has been haphazard and has not followed the Comprehensive Plan. Adding infrastructure to those areas will only exacerbate the development and issues that come with a lack of services. Throughout my term as your Supervisor, I have pushed for funding to be applied to our deteriorating major roads, such as Stevensburg Road and Eleys Ford Road. We need to fix our major collectors before we spread the problem across more of the county.
SOLAR
Solar is a great way to reduce the pressure on our electrical grid
-IF, and only IF-
it is installed on rooftops and in parking lots. The easiest way to reduce electric grid stress is to reduce reliance on it. Solar needs to be used at the source of the need, not randomly placed in every rural county in the state. I do not support utility-scale solar on working farms or forests.
I commend our staff for making residential solar permitting as easy and efficient as possible. Culpeper's SolSmart rating shows we are making strides, but also highlights areas where we can improve. I will continue to support our efforts to promote personal and agricultural use solar installations.
ZONING
Zoning has been a hot topic in recent months in Culpeper. I believe in personal property rights, but I also believe in effective zoning. Our current zoning is becoming antiquated and needs to be updated to reflect our Comprehensive Plan. Without effective zoning, the county cannot plan for future revenue sources or anticipate where growth will occur. This limits our ability to ensure that services are provided in the right areas and in adequate amounts.
I am willing to make the hard decisions required to address our zoning issues, which have contributed to rapid growth in areas where it was not planned and where the current infrastructure is insufficient. Although zoning reform is not a popular topic, it is necessary if Culpeper is to remain a rural community. We need to come together to protect our community's character and quality of life.
BROADBAND
The County explored every available option to work with APB to bring broadband to our residents. However, APB did not deliver on its commitments. We are currently working to award a new contract to a provider that will deliver broadband to all unserved homes in our community.
Broadband remains a high priority for the Board, and we will continue to work diligently to ensure that all our residents have access to high-speed internet. We will publish periodic updates on our progress through press releases.