Comments on: COMMUNITY COMMENT: Taken Aback by FCHC Request

By: Richard Donnelly

Richard Donnelly — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 18:52:41 +0000

Has anyone noted the fact that we are all happy the Mr. Young will be building an all-office building there as part of the deal:

Have we not noticed the exmpty office building sitting just North of the site on Annandale Road?

Or the empty retail building lining the end of South Maple Avenue?

Or how about the empty office buildings on North Washington Street?

Or what about all this empty office space throughout our City:

http://www.fallschurchva.gov/Content/Docs/CommercialDatabase.pdf

Will this new empty office building really add anything? Or are they planning to fill it with City Services so it looks full even if it brings in no revenue?

By: Lloyd Crowther, Falls Chirch City

Lloyd Crowther, Falls Chirch City — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 04:17:56 +0000

As I recall. the proposed Wilden tenants are, for the most part, current residents of city subsidized housing located on James Street and South Virginia Ave. These people are neither homeless nor picketing to be relocated elsewhere to my knowledge. The problem seems to be that the funds from HUD are drying up for that current city housing. The idea, as previously presented to the neighboring residents, was to move those current city housing residents to a new building with a renewed federal funding (HUD) cash flow.

This would allow the current city housing complex identified above to be sold to get out of the expense of maintaining those existing buildings no longer funded in part by HUD. Several proposed uses of the existing city housing property have been mentioned in the past, included selling to a a developer who, in better times, could have erected several highrise appartment buildings with their increased traffic and parking problems in an otherwise single resident townhouse neighborhood.

By: Richard Sommerfeld

Richard Sommerfeld — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 04:02:18 +0000

My comments pertain to the essence of a sustainable Falls Church at this point in time. If we lose the VA Supreme Court decision in our dispute with Fairfax County, we are going to have to dip into the fund balance for $2.2 million. The fund balance was meant to be restored over time by allocating $0.02 from the 16% real estate tax hike, but now some people want to put it to subsidized housing. The City Manager’s recommendation against agreeing to the FCHC request for accelerated funding was thoroughly supported by well-reasoned items. The City Attorney also recommended against the request.

Affordable housing can help the community in terms of diversification. Northern Virginia is an expensive area. Why didn’t the FCHC redevelop part of Winter Hill, which is already a residential area? Could it have done so at a lower cost because it already owns the land? Why take commercial real estate essentially off of the tax rolls? The EDA submitted a study with alternative uses. The Chairman of the Planning Commission was opposed for the same reasons. We have 2 square miles and need to make the best use of that finite real estate. We heard during the Council session this evening at the cost of rental housing has come down because of the Great Recession and he said that there were places nearby the city limits.

Those who spoke in favor of subsidized housing did so for all the right reasons. Unfortunately, our City budget is currently under great stress, so the timing is not in their favor. It should have been done 5 years ago or wait 3 years for the economy to recover.

Aside from the economic arguments behind The Wilden, the FCHC asked the City to accelerate $1 million of the $2 million loan because it could not find all of the equity over the past 5 years to comply with the bank’s requirements. If the banks want the equity now, they must have a perception of higher risk. If Mr. Young thinks the project is so good, and he’s a shrewd businessman, why doesn’t he make the emergency loan to the FCHC and take the risk? This evening we learned that the FCHC will make a $1.2 million equity investment in Mr. Young’s property with borrowed money. Mr. Young hasn’t lined up all of his financing yet nor has he leased as much office space as he thinks he should because of economic reasons in Northern Virginia.

By: Andy Rankin (Falls Church)

Andy Rankin (Falls Church) — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 02:54:49 +0000

This meeting is fascinating (and not necessarily in a good way).

By: TFC

TFC — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 00:12:51 +0000

Andy, you have smoke pouring out my ears. I am more confused than ever. I am streaming the webcast right now.

By: Andy Rankin (Falls Church)

Andy Rankin (Falls Church) — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 21:24:23 +0000

Dan, I’m still confused about what the FCHC is really asking for. The new language seems to prevent release of any funds until financing for the garage is “committed” (used to say “secured”) but it sounds like the garage financing can’t be nailed down until the land is purchased, with the $1M from the City. So either “committed” means something different than “secured” or this new language isn’t going to help (or I’m missing something).

Does the FCHC control the AHTF (and what is the source of that $500k)? If so, why not just use that and ask for $500k early from the City instead of $1M? It might make some people feel better about the request.

Does anyone know if this scenario is possible: the City puts in $1M this week to help buy the 360 land. Mr. Young’s committed loan from the bank runs into problems and he can’t get the money to build the garage. The Wilden construction begins anyway and gets about halfway done. Something strange happens and the FCHC ends up needing another $2M to finish the project. The City Council isn’t willing to sink more money into the project and the feds yank the rest of any funds they have committed. The FCHC has to completely sell the Winter Hill properties as part of a bankruptcy settlement to pay off its debt – but doesn’t raise enough money to pay back the City’s $2M. In the end the City is out the $2M, there’s no more Winter Hill. The Wilden sits half complete. The FCHC no longer exists and all the funds they have saved up over the years are gone.

I assume that scenario is farfetched but it’s the sort of thing that stresses me out. Investing $2M doesn’t stress me out that much. Taking up valuable commercial space for an apartment building stresses me out some – but building a 30k SF office building next to it makes me feel a little better.

By: Bob Loblaw

Bob Loblaw — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 20:44:13 +0000

“Ms. Jackson describes a current member of Council and a current EDA Board Member as ‘giving me the creeps’ and the Council Member as a ‘tightwad conservative trouble maker.’ Not nice and not wise if you want their assistance.”

Sam, too bad you do not have some of the e-mails between Ms. Jackson and the Chamber of Commerce. She dogs city staff, city officials, and whole departments. Basically anyone she sees as having a differing opinion is a conservative idiot. Despite Ms. Jackson’s ranting and perceived enemies, her loose lips are her own worst enemy.

By: Dan Maller, City of Falls Church

Dan Maller, City of Falls Church — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 20:39:03 +0000

There are some good questions and comments here, but this talk of bailouts and insolvency is way over the top. The City took a fairly hard line regarding the linkage between the commercial development and the Wilden, and basically told the FCHC to go forth and make it work. It seems all of the financing and construction plans are ready, with the lender for the McKeever requiring more money up front to buy the land before the loan is closed for the parking or building. The request is to pay in advance for the parking spaces, which were always part of the financial plan. Of the $1 million in question, half is available in the AHTF so the “risk” in this disbursement is really $500,000, assuming the $1 million was used and the project just fell apart. If the City did sell bonds for the $1 million then the $500k would pay the debt service for many years. However, the FCHC is borrowing the money so they owe it to the City regardless, and the Winter Hill property imo is certainly sufficient to provide the ultimate value to repay the City. I guess those who wish only to evaluate the direct economic consequences would say that this kind of “failure” that would prove beneficial to the City since the result would be to return the properties in question to “higher and better” uses.

The balance of the comments deal with the Wilden building itself, which is not really affected by the variables in the parking transaction, or affordable housing policy more generally, which is a very important topic but not what is before the Council tonight.

It should be a lively meeting tonight.

By: sam mabry

sam mabry — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 19:56:05 +0000

With regard to Ms. Hockleberry’s comments–many of which are at least dissembling: The City of Falls Church was a party to a Federal Fair Housing conciliation agreement in 2004 as a result of the manner in which developers physically designed–which the City approved–the Broadway condominium project to appeal mostly to adults. In addition, the City Council took legislative action to diminish children in the building by placing a “tariff” on their residency in the building above a certain number (numerous articles appeared in the Washington Post regarding this matter). As a result of the Federal action, the Council rescinded the legislation and entered into the agreement with the Civil Rights Center acting as the agent for the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. Having worked in the Congress in a committed fashion on Fair Housing laws for many years, and as a Member of the Falls Church City Council, I wanted to make sure that the City never again tried to short stop Fair Housing laws. But it attempted to again with the City Center South project, which the developer stated in submittals to the City justifying its approval, that the residential multifamily portion of the project was designed for the purpose to mitigate school age children. While reference to school children was removed from the documents, the configuration of the proposed project did not change. When the City Center South project fell by the wayside as a result of the collapse of the condominium and credit markets, USHUD has placed its review in abeyance—but I am told not formally ended it. If there is further movement by the City to push the project ahead with the taint of discrimination against families or any other class of citizen, I have been given ever assurance that the Federal Government will again review the conduct of the Council’s legislative actions in this regard. Documents pertaining to the aforementioned are available on request…just let me know.
In the matter of the Falls Church Housing Corporation Project, the compelling financial review and critique by Richard Sommerfeld on his own personal behalf, as well as others, parallels the message Councilman Kaylin and I delivered to officials of the Housing Department in Richmond. Apparently to Ms. Hockenberry’s distress, the citizens and several of the Members of the Council are now applying prudent fiscal and policy measures to their decision with regard to this project. In short, I would say to my former Council colleague, we need to commit ourselves as a community to providing for the citizens needs rather than clamoring endlessly for what one special interest group wants.
The end of the Falls Church Housing Corporation project as it is now configured could well be the beginning of a stronger and better Falls Church City Government committed to a new level of fiscal and policy integrity.
And by the way Lindy, I am still working on the FOIA but in other public city documents in my possession I have found both substantive issues to address down the road as well petulant comments such as the one on February 2, 2009, in which Ms. Jackson describes a current member of Council and a current EDA Board Member as “giving me the creeps” and the Council Member as a “tightwad conservative trouble maker.” Not nice and not wise if you want their assistance.
We must always seek a level of civility where people can have different points of view without being demeaned. I feel you and I have passed that test in our dealings with each other. Best regards. Sam

By: Suzanne Updike

Suzanne Updike — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 19:39:36 +0000

Andy, I didnt see your comment when I was responding to TFC. I agree with you that the issue at hand should be the risk of failure — but lots of the commentary has been on how we “can’t afford it.” I think regional approaches make sense but that costs money too — we would need to be paying in our fair share.