[JYO] Power Plant Threat Could Be Eliminated With Settlement

from Leesburg Today...

Power Plant Threat Could Be Eliminated With Settlement
<A HREF="mailto:andrew@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx";>Andrew Parker</A> 

Sep 20, 2002 -- Loudoun County Board of Supervisors Chairman Scott K. York 
(R-At Large) told the Leesburg Annexation Negotiation Committee Thursday that 
he was not ready to obligate the county to support the town’s proposal to 
begin a study of the area surrounding Leesburg Executive Airport and weigh 
the merits of annexation. But York said he was intrigued by Leesburg Town 
Council member Robert J. Zoldos’ proposal to bring more than 1,350 acres 
around Leesburg Executive Airport into corporate limits through a boundary 
line adjustment following the completion of the study. The county annexation 
team, consisting of York, Leesburg District Supervisor Mark R. Herring (D) 
and Catoctin District Supervisor Sally R. Kurtz (D), will meet Sept. 30 at 
4:30 p.m. to further discuss the proposal. The two annexation committees will 
then schedule another meeting. 

Meanwhile, town and county legal representatives are waiting to see what 
happens with the annexation negotiations in order to move forward with the 
settlement of a lawsuit brought against the town and county by Tractebel 
Power. The suit seeks to force the town to extend water and sewer service to 
a 32-acre tract south of Leesburg owned by Siemens Power Partners, where a 
power plant was proposed last year. Tractebel withdrew its application for 
the power plant from the State Corporation Commission in February, but the 
lawsuits remain, according to Town Attorney William Donnelly. 

Tractebel is no longer interested in building a power plant at the Siemens 
site, but Siemens would like to have water and sewer service extended so it 
can sell the property, according to Donnelly. Siemens is “very interested in 
dropping the lawsuits for the extension of water and sewer,” he said. 

In return for being brought into the town’s boundaries, a covenant 
prohibiting the construction of a power plant on the site would be written 
into the settlement. 

“We would effectively kill the power plant threat,” Donnelly said. But, in 
order to bring in the Siemens property, the 262-acre Hunter-Dowdy property, 
or portions of it, would have to be brought into the town in order to keep 
the boundary line contiguous. The Hunter-Dowdy property is along the 
southeastern border of the town on both sides of the W&OD Trail. 

Hunter-Dowdy attorney Michael A. Banzhaf said that the owners of that 
property would also be interested in putting a restrictive covenant barring a 
power plant on their property in exchange for being annexed into the town. 

Leesburg Mayor Kristen Umstattd wondered if the town and county could break 
out the Siemens and Hunter-Dowdy issue and pursue it independent of the 
larger BLA proposal in order to eliminate the power plant threat as quickly 
as possible. She also said members of the board would likely not be opposed 
to settling that issue if it was removed from the annexation debate. 

Donnelly said the lawsuits against the town and county are “in limbo,” 
pending the town-county negotiations. If the talks begin to move forward and 
a study begins, Siemens and Hunter-Dowdy could “piggyback” on the BLA 
proposal, but if negotiations break down, Siemens and Hunter-Dowdy would like 
to move forward separately, according to Donnelly. 

“It’s fair to say Siemens can’t wait forever, [but] are willing to 
resolve 
[the lawsuit] as part of the BLA proposal. At some point they would want to 
proceed separately,” he said. If the restrictive covenant is written into a 
settlement, future boards of supervisors or town councils could not undo it. 

Zoldos reiterated his reasons for the boundary line adjustment—economic 
vitality of the town, protection of the airport runway, relief of traffic 
problems in southeast Leesburg and a “genuine public interest” to expand 
the 
town as it grows—and asked the county to set a Feb. 1 deadline for completing 
the study. 

York said the county staff is currently involved in the revision of the 
county zoning ordinance and zoning map, hopefully wrapped up by November, and 
likely would not have the resources to make the Feb. 1 deadline. York said he 
would discuss the issue with staff and asked the town to define what would be 
included in the citizen process. 

Siemens and Hunter-Dowdy are looking for a target date, but Feb. 1 is not 
critical as long as they are given a “reasonable time frame,” York said. 

Another deadline the town and county are facing is with the Virginia 
Commission on Local Government, which hears annexation petitions. The 
deadline has been pushed back several times and is currently scheduled to 
come before the COLG Board sometime in November. 

Among the issues to be resolved involving the annexation process are 
transportation questions about two arterial roads—Crosstrail Boulevard and 
Sycolin Road. 

The town’s proposed alignment of Crosstrail Boulevard runs roughly from the 
northeast corner of the county-owned Shellhorn tract, where Phillip A. Bolen 
park will be built, to the southwest corner connecting into Sycolin Road. The 
county’s current proposal for the park shows Crosstrail Boulevard hugging the 
north side of the park, connecting with Sycolin and turning south, running 
along the western edge of the property. 

Future runway expansion of the airport will require the town to realign 
Sycolin Road. Town and county staff members will need to work out whether to 
combine the two roads into one for a stretch east of the airport or keep two 
parallel roads in the plan. The town is holding a citizens information 
meeting on the widening of Sycolin between Hope Parkway and the southern town 
limits Oct. 1 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. The widening from two to four lanes is 
aimed at alleviating traffic concerns around the airport and the Loudoun 
County support services sites. 

The meeting of the town and county annexation negotiation committees marked 
an advancement in the negotiations, as talks stalled out for months after the 
town originally proposed to annex nearly 7,000 acres east and south of 
Leesburg following a series of closed-door sessions held by the previous town 
council. Many citizens of Leesburg and Loudoun and the board of supervisors 
opposed the annexation process without more citizen input. Not getting the 
public involved from the beginning was a mistake, Zoldos said Thursday, and 
the town has “paid the penalty for that.”

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