The Harrison Road Connector by the Spotsylvania Towne Centre will not be built anytime soon, if ever.
The Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors last night voted unanimously to cancel the road project indefinitely.
The decision surprised more than 50 residents who attended the public hearing on creating a special service district to pay for the road.
Not one of the speakers supported the project. Most of them live near the mall and would have been directly impacted by the 1.5-mile road that would have started behind the mall and ended on Harrison Road near Hazelwild Farm.
Contrary to what Supervisor Jerry Logan had told Waverly Village residents last month at a community association meeting, the mall company has no plan to sue the county if the road is not built. In 2006, the Board of Supervisors approved a rezoning for the mall under the condition that Cafaro Co. build the connector road. A promise that residential properties would never have to pay for the road was not followed, and attempts to rectify the situation didn't work.
"It wasn't true," mall owner J.J. Cafaro said about the accusation that he threatened to sue the county. "I didn't want there to be any more misconception."
After the vote, Cafaro said not having the road built is "fine with me."
Residents urged supervisors not to create a special service district that included residential properties in the taxing boundaries. Some wore orange vests made out of trash bags and held signs that read "Stop Eminent Domain Abuse" and "Stop the SSD."
Although supervisors said those residential property owners would never have to pay an additional real estate tax as long as they did not convert their land to commercial or industrial zoning, the service district ordinance did not exclude those properties from the boundaries even though state law allows it.
"I think all of you should be ashamed yourselves," said Bragg Road resident Scott Smith. "This road was presented as a way to relieve traffic on Route 3. It was a total lie."
Those who opposed the road said it was being built to benefit developer interests and that it could lead to a lawsuit over eminent domain.
Dale Swanson, who lives on Burgess Lane, is responsible for rallying nearby neighborhoods to oppose this project. She presented 511 signatures of people who did not want the road. Swanson said she was surprised that supervisors decided to cancel the project, but she thinks it might resurface later.
"It's not over," she said. "It's only gone until we forget about it, which I am not going to do."
Logan said the state's elected leaders in Richmond have dropped the ball with transportation, which has forced local governments to try to find unique ways to get roads built. He said staff members and supervisors spent hours trying to do what was fair for residents and businesses, and that he was persuaded by the large showing of people who opposed the project. He thanked Cafaro for "setting the record straight" and publicly stating he would not sue the county if the connector road is not built. He then asked to postpone the project indefinitely.
Supervisor Hap Connors urged all of the residents to use the same passion they used last night to contact their elected leaders in Richmond to force them to act on the transportation problem in Virginia.
"We've bent over backward to hear the concerns of citizens," he said. "We do listen to you, and again, that is why we are here tonight. If you don't want us to do this kind of stuff then tell [the General Assembly delegation] to get off the dime and fix transportation in Virginia."
Dan Telvock: 540/374-5438
Email: dtelvock@freelancestar.com
The 56,000-square-foot building will house the planning, code compliance, social services and economic development departments on the second and third floors by 2010.
This building will replace the current rented space in Capital One, where about 150 county employees work.
The county will lease 36,000 square feet at $15 a square foot. It has an option within five years to purchase the building at $200 a square foot or about $11 million. On the first floor will be commercial space and offices. The red-brick building will mirror the historic Princess Anne Hotel in Fredericksburg.
The county currently pays about $13.25 per square foot at Capital One, but that rate was to increase to at least $16 next year. Vakos will pay up to $334,500 for furniture and moving data cable to the new building.
According to staff, the county will save at least $13,000 in employees' salaries by avoiding the long drive from Capital One to the Courthouse area when staff members need to meet. The county also won't have to lease high-speed data lines from Verizon, which costs about $40,000 a year.
--Dan Telvock