The city sent the Pamunkey Indian Tribe and its financial backers, Golden Eagle Consulting LLC, back to the drawing board in July to redesign plans for the casino. City leaders indicated they would reject the group’s first plan, a two-phase construction approach that envisioned the casino and adjoining resort built separately. Norfolk has not received any formal plans for review since then.

“We’re working with Golden Eagle and will have a casino with them, and if they don’t perform, we will have somebody take their place,” said Norfolk City Attorney Bernard Pishko.

Casino spokesperson Jay Smith previously said developers needed to begin construction this spring to meet the statutory deadline for obtaining a gaming license by November 2025. When voters approved a casino referendum in 2020, it came with a five-year deadline. If an applicant had not obtained a gaming license within that time, another referendum would be required.

Pishko said the city is worried about the lack of progress and that the city’s 2020 option agreement with HeadWaters developers would allow another group to be brought on if the applicants didn’t perform.

“While this Option Agreement is in effect, the City will neither negotiate nor enter into any contract for the sale of, or any option contract for the sale of, any portion of the Land or improvements thereon that is superior to the rights of GEC and the Tribe,” the agreement said.

“We’re starting to get ready in the event that they run out of time,” Pishko said, though he added the city has not met with any other developers about a casino.

At the same time city officials are moving forward with a contingency plan, several General Assembly legislators have said they are open to the idea of extending the looming 2025 deadline. However, Del. Barry Knight said the city is still legally required to treat the Pamunkey tribe as its preferred partner.

The casino is slated to be built along the Elizabeth River next to Harbor Park, the home of Norfolk’s Triple-A baseball team, The Tides. The tribe and Golden Eagle Consulting, owned by gaming industry billionaire John Yarborough, has proposed plans to build a 300-room resort and 65,000-square-foot casino floor.

But the city-owned land remains untouched by excavators or builders and the casino partners have yet to submit, let alone receive, the necessary approvals to begin construction.

___

Stakes for the tribe

In a 2020 interview with the Richmond-Times Dispatch, Smith said Yarborough would provide funding for the project in the form of a “no-risk” loan to the Pamunkeys. The loan repayment would come from gaming revenue. He also said the loan deal was approved by the U.S. Department of the Interior to ensure the tribe was not being taken advantage of.

However, former Pamunkey Chief Kevin Brown still has concerns about the tribe’s partnership with a commercial group for a casino. Brown said he lives on the reservation, which is held in trust with the state.

He said he was opposed to Norfolk as a site for the casino because of how difficult it would be for the tribe to put the land in a federal trust. The 2020 development agreement bars the land slated for the casino from being placed into a trust.

Other tribal members are also wondering what’s going on with the casino, according to Brown.

“I’m sure the chief and the (Tribal)] Council know what’s going on, but they’re not being completely open with the rest of the tribe,” Brown said.

The casino applicants have also not provided information about the conditions of the deal between the tribe and Yarborough, or said whether tribal members would be allowed to view it or vote on it, Brown said.

City officials said they are not in the loop about the nature of the deal between the tribe and Golden Eagle.

“Golden Eagle has not been forthcoming with us about their financial agreement between the Yarborough investment group and the Pamunkeys,” Pishko said.

“You can always second guess whether you’ve done enough, but there was nothing obvious we could ask for” besides the documents, he said.

___

Shifting landscape

While the future of the casino is unclear, one thing is for certain: In the time the tribe has sought to establish a casino, the landscape around gambling in Virginia, and across the United States, has significantly changed.

From charitable gaming and horse racing, to sports gambling and casinos, to the proliferation of slot machine-like skill games in bars and convenience stories, the ways to gamble in Virginia have expanded rapidly since voters gave the Norfolk casino a green light in 2020.

“Recognize that most of the legislative activity occurred in 2020 as COVID hit and as the economy and the operations of businesses and state agencies drastically changed,” said Kevin Hall, a gaming consultant who was the executive director of the Virginia Lottery from 2018-22.

In addition, the Rivers Casino opened in Portsmouth in January 2023, generating nearly $250 million in gaming revenue in its first year.

Though there is a flood of interest in ways to gamble, so far there is no indication that all the new options are stepping on each other’s toes, according to Steven Light, a professor at the University of North Dakota Institute for the Study of Tribal Gaming Law and Policy.

“We haven’t reached that tipping point in any market in the U.S.,” he said.

The amount spent on gambling in Virginia has risen drastically over the past decade as options have increased.

In 2012, Virginians wagered $2.4 billion. But between 2018 and 2022, wagering in the state tripled, from $3.4 billion a year to more than $10 billion, according to a 2022 Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission presentation, which evaluates programs and provides oversight of state agencies on behalf of the General Assembly.

During that time, historic horse racing was allowed at facilities like Rosie’s Gaming Emporiums in 2018, the internet lottery sales started in 2019, and sports wagering in 2021. The legality of skills games has been in flux over the past few years, but could become legal again this year if Gov. Glenn Youngkin signs a bill regulating the machines.

The amount spent on gambling in Virginia could rise to $21 billion by 2025, according to the audit commission, but the data also assumes that four casinos will have been opened for one year by then. Three are currently open in the commonwealth — in Portsmouth, Danville and Bristol. Richmond voters rejected a casino, but legislators are considering another location, such as Petersburg.

The Pamunkey tribe had been seeking federal recognition for decades, even before federal tribal gaming was legalized, according to Brown. And by the time they got the recognition about 10 years ago, the tribe sought to establish a federal tribal casino, now equipped with the recognition and looking for a spot for development.

The country has gradually become more amenable to gambling, including a short-lived but lucrative online poker boom in the mid-2000s. But the promise of revenues following the Great Recession subdued much of the reservations about gambling’s proliferation, according to Light.

“The language changes around legalized gambling that to the idea that it’s a form of economic development,” he said.

This trend is reflected in Virginia, as longtime proponent Democratic Sen. Louise Lucas of Portsmouth was able to build a coalition with Southwest Virginia Republicans who wanted to fuel more economic development in the late 2010s. Lucas had long been in favor of using gambling as a revenue source to improve Portsmouth.

Another big moment was the U.S. Supreme Court decision in 2018 that struck down a federal ban on sports betting — an area of gambling that ties directly into Americans’ love of sports, according to Light.

“That opens the door to states to legalize sports wagering and things are often running at that point with a renewed almost craze among state lawmakers to be the first to legalize sports wagering,” he said.

___

A new timeline

Now, several delegates have said it could be time to press pause, regroup and think about this new landscape.

Knight, along with Dels. Paul Krizek and Mark Sickles, both Fairfax County Democrats, have said they would be open to legislation to extend the timeframe needed for the casino in Norfolk.

“If it looks like both parties are moving ahead in good faith, I would support that,” Knight said. “I don’t want to hurt, first and foremost, the Pamunkey Indian Tribe. My first loyalty’s to them. My second loyalty is to the state of Virginia on the tax revenue and the oversight to help the Indians help themselves. And my third loyalty is to Norfolk, and if all three of them can win in this situation, we are all going to be happy.”

Knight was among those to help bring about the legislation allowing localities to hold referendums on allowing commercial casinos. He said it was to make sure there was state oversight if the Pamunkeys were already planning a casino.

The tribe’s current approach is like the state’s other commercial casinos, with none of the extra federal protection that comes with a tribal designation. Because the tribe declined to answer questions for this article, it was unclear whether they could or would take the extra steps to pursue becoming a federally-recognized tribal casino. Knight said when the legislation for commercial casinos was being written, the HeadWaters applicants indicated they were open to being involved in the new commercial approach. 

Tribal gaming is a $44 billion industry with 244 tribes operating 519 casinos, which operate under the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, according to Light. Tribal casinos can be indistinguishable to a commercial casino to the naked eye, he said.

“Only in recent years do you see some tribes with the willingness and the wherewithal to step totally outside of the IGRA (the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act) framework and not worry about having land in trust and not worry about the protections that come from having a tribal-state compact but instead operate like a commercial operator only under state law and paying state taxes,” Light said.

Brown said the tribe is biting off more than it can chew with jumping into such a large casino operation before solidifying its footing in the industry with smaller gambling operations.

“Under IGRA, there’s a lot of safeguards for tribes, but you jump into the commercial world, there’s no safeguards for tribes,” he said. “So that’s what I’m worried about.”

Knight said the state’s commercial oversight would also make sure the tribe is not being taken advantage of and the Norfolk casino rules have a clause that requires proceeds go to not just the state and owners but also to the other Virginia tribes.

Krizek, who chairs a subcommittee on gambling, Sickles and Knight all expressed interest in taking a look at centralizing the collection of gambling tax revenue by one state agency or group. Currently, revenue from different kinds of gambling are under the auspices of different departments and agencies.

“That’s why I’d like to see pause [in new types of gambling] going forward, especially until we have an agency that’s up and running that can be a regulator for all gambling in Virginia,” Krizek said. “And let’s all just take a deep breath and wait and see how that all plays out for the next couple years.”

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097

A developer, The Hanson Company, is seeking to breathe new life into the closed Park Place Baptist Church at the corner of West 31st Street and Colonial Avenue with help from the Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority.

NRHA Board of Commissioners approved the partnership at a March meeting. The plans are still in their early stages, but Tarvaris McCoy, executive vice president of The Hanson Company, said he expects the project will include an investment of more than $12 million. The firm intends to open 40 to 70 affordable senior units and a potential senior community services center at the church site, depending on the planning, zoning and design process, he said.

“We respect that many of these churches were jewels to their communities in both their architecture and their actions,” McCoy wrote in an email. “We saw an opportunity to preserve and restore one of those jewels within a community to which we are truly committed.”

The development would give a chance for elderly residents in the area who want to downsize a chance to do so but remain in their neighborhood, according to McCoy.

More and more seniors are in need of an affordable place to live, and affordable housing designed for seniors will be a critical part of the housing landscape going into the future, said Steve Morales, chief development officer with the NRHA.

“Straight up, you have an aging population, and as you can imagine, a big portion of that are folks that don’t have a lot of income,” Morales said.

The Hanson Company’s goal is to save historically significant structures while redeveloping them and it uses various tax credits and other loans to do that. The tax incentives the NRHA is able to help the developers get will be key to accomplishing the project and ensuring that the units remain accessible to those below thresholds of the area’s median income, according to Morales. Under the agreement, NRHA would help garner funding for the project and would also have a 30% stake in the development, according to NRHA documents.

Norfolk’s affordable housing supply continues to dwindle with the city’s most dire shortage of rental units for those making less than $35,000, which is about 3 in 10 city households, according to the city’s most recent housing study. The city lacks about 6,800 units for such households, and for families making less than $20,000 a year, it’s short another 4,600 units.

Talks about renovating the property in residential apartments go back at least half a decade and discussions for a senior center date back even further to about two decades, according to previous reports. The Hanson Company owns the site, which is held by an affiliate, Park Place Dev LLC, which purchased the property in 2021. The church property is less than 1 acre and valued at $615,000, according to Norfolk city property records.

“While this is a national phenomenon, we heard this loud and clear from the Park Place community, which has recently been desiring additional housing options for seniors,” McCoy said.

There is no timeline for the project yet, though McCoy said one should be ready in the next couple weeks.

“In the planning process there will be many surveys and inspections to ensure appropriate environmental, structural and architectural consideration,” he said. “It can be difficult to retrofit historic church spaces into residential spaces. However, among the benefits are the preservation of a historic structure which has been an institution in the community for a very long time.”

Morales said the partnership represents a great opportunity to save the building.

“We in the past have been part of the Park Place conservation/redevelopment efforts and definitely want to continue to see the community do well, and certainly it’s also an opportunity for our seniors in the city to have another option,” he said.

Just two blocks north of Park Place Baptist Church on Colonial Avenue, work continues on the renovations at the former Park Place United Methodist church, which is also being turned into apartments, according to city documents and a city spokesperson. Richmond-based company Monument received a special use permit from the City Council in 2022 for a 60-unit multifamily, six townhome project.

The historic church was once home to the largest Methodist congregation in Virginia, according to previous Pilot reporting. A representative of Monument could not be reached for an update on the project.

Another renovation of a former synagogue into housing also received support from City Council in March — giving Beck Associates the greenlight to transform the former Beth Messiah Synagogue of Tidewater at 7130 Granby St. into almost a dozen residential units and some commercial office space.

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097

The challenge is twofold.

The landfill is facing an uphill regulatory challenge to expand its capacity, according to Dennis Bagley, executive director of the Southeastern Public Service Authority.

Meanwhile, a facility that burns up to 70% of waste destined for the landfill and converts it into energy is closing in June and has already dialed back how much waste it’s burning. The reduction in capacity means the landfill is receiving over 500 more tons of waste daily, though the figure fluctuates.

Landfill portions that were planned to be full by early 2028 will now be full by December 2026. Bagley said if the SPSA is unable to get the next planned landfill cells permitted, the Suffolk landfill will be entirely out space in the next dozen years.

___

The capacity problem

SPSA handled 761,000 tons of commercial and municipal waste in the last fiscal year, including trash from the cities of Chesapeake, Norfolk, Portsmouth, Suffolk and Virginia Beach.

Much of the trash collected had been taken to the WIN Waste plant, formerly known as the Wheelabrator facility, where it was burned to create energy that was then sold to the adjoining Norfolk Naval Shipyard. The plant had a contract to burn SPSA trash through at least 2027. It was working well, burning about 70% of the region’s trash and only sending 30% to the landfill, according to Bagley. At least until a fire at the facility in 2022 reduced its capacity, and as operations wind down at the site. 

The plant is set to close in a few months. The Navy decided to find a source of its own energy, and built two natural gas-powered turbines capable of generating its own steam power. With the Navy’s new source of power, it did not renew its contract to buy steam from the Portsmouth plant after June.

Now all the trash will have to be diverted to the landfill.

“What do we do with the other 1,400 tons a day that they can’t process that they’ve been processing and we’ve been planning for that’s coming to the landfill?” Bagley said. “Landfills have a definite amount of life in them and we can’t put but so much in there.”

One option would be for the landfill to expand capacity. SPSA has been working on opening up new “cells” — the portions of a landfill where the trash is layered with materials to mitigate the environmental impact. But Bagley said the Environmental Protection Agency does not seem interested in letting landfills open up new land for pits. SPSA has sought to put multiple other planned cells into a permanent preservation easement that would bar them from being turned into cells in order to get at least the next two cells permitted, according to Bagley.

___

Other options

To find a solution, Bagley is asking Hampton Roads localities to band together and consider nontraditional waste disposal options.

Now, the SPSA has put out a request for proposal seeking bids from companies to process, recycle, reuse and/or dispose of 100% of the region’s waste. SPSA is expecting to get 10 proposals back. Those proposals will be evaluated based on the cost to process the waste per ton to make sure the finances are viable for both the company and SPSA, according to Bagley.

Bagley said he is not asking localities that belong to the SPSA for money, but rather commitments to remain part of the regional waste authority for 20 years. If all the member localities remain committed, he said it will increase the financial feasibility of any future contracts for waste disposal. That way, waste from member localities — including Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Portsmouth, Suffolk and Chesapeake — could be diverted to companies that might create value from the waste instead of just dumping it in the Suffolk landfill.

“I just need (the cities’) commitment to go forward with a deal that’s going to allow these companies to come in and get the money and the capital they need to build these plants,” Bagley said.

SPSA’s philosophy is to put as little in the landfill as possible because that way it can use the site for as long as possible. Bagley said the closer it gets to being filled, the harder it becomes to bargain for a good price to haul the region’s waste elsewhere, which would fast become prohibitively expensive.

___

Past operations

The landfill can trace its roots back to the 1970s when there were plans for a regional water authority. The water plan fell apart at that time, but a waste authority, SPSA, came out of those talks, according to Bagley.

It started to buy land along Route 58 in Suffolk and expanded, even including a special state-level carve-out for it and Danville to expand as regulations changed in the 1990s. Plans called for the total footprint of the landfill to be able to last until at least the 2100s based on the volume of waste in the 1980s with calculations based on growth of the region. Yet, the EPA has not been enthusiastic about permitting any more landfills and a search for a new regional landfill was unsuccessful, Bagley said.

The Portsmouth waste burning plant played into the calculations of how much space and time the landfill would have, according to Bagley. Wheelabrator, now called WIN Waste, bought the plant from SPSA in 2010 and there were no previous plans to eventually close or wind down operations, according to WIN Waste.

“At peak operation, the facility can process 691,226 tons of waste while producing 330,513 (megawatts) of power per day,” WIN Waste said in a statement. “That’s about 1,894 tons of waste converted to renewable energy every day.”

Two years ago, the plant processed around 505,000 tons of waste, about 1,382 tons a day. So far this year, it has processed about half as much — almost 57,000 tons — or about 777 a day, according to WIN Waste.

The energy plant’s burned waste is brought by the truckload to the landfill. That ash is about 30% the size and weight of the original waste, representing a huge decrease in how much trash goes into the landfill, Bagley said.

Ash can be used as cover in the landfill, following the WIN Waste fire in 2022, the landfill has been receiving lower quality ash that is not fully burned. As a result, that poorly burnt ash must be dumped into the landfill with the rest of the trash, Bagley said.

After the plant closes in June, it will be demolished and the site will be remediated, according to WIN Waste.

“I’ll be pushing daisies when this landfill is at capacity even with all the waste here, but the fact of the matter is somebody’s got to deal with this,” he said. “Somebody’s got to deal with the nation’s waste problem and I want it to be us.”

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097, ian.munro@virginiamedia.com

City Manager Pat Roberts presented his spending proposal, which includes a $1.53 billion operating budget and $323 million Capital Improvement Plan, during Tuesday’s City Council work session.

The budget has four focus areas: improving neighborhood quality of life; addressing homelessness, substance abuse and mental illness; maintaining and repairing city infrastructure; and enhancing city organizational effectiveness, according to Roberts.

Fast rising revenues made the spending plan possible, according to Roberts. The budget includes a 3.5% raise for city employees, raises between 3.5% and 6% for police, and retention bonuses for 911 Call Center staff.

Revenue estimates have grown by $63 million, almost 8% from the current fiscal year — from $795.1 million to $858.2 million, according to budget documents.

The city’s fastest growing revenue has been through its consumption-based taxes, such as the sales tax and the 6.5% food and beverage tax at restaurants, where revenues grew by $18.6 million this fiscal year. Real estate tax revenues grew by $9.1 million. Over the past five years, tax assessments in the city have grown by almost 24%, according to Roberts.

To help offset the rising assessments, the proposed budget would decrease the real estate tax rate by 2 cents to $1.23 per $100 of assessed value. This would result in a roughly $53.36 tax savings annually for the median home, valued at $266,800. Each cent in the tax rate represents about $2.5 million in city tax revenue, according to Roberts.

The budget also keeps in place the personal property tax rate. Vehicles are taxed at $4.33 per $100 of assessed value, but the city has a 51% reduction for vehicles valued between $1,000 and $20,000 and full tax relief for vehicles valued under $1,000.

Roberts said the proposed budget would also include some funding earmarked to start a housing trust fund, though an amount has not been set, and staff expect to propose an amount to City Council for a vote later this calendar year. Consultants recommended earlier this month that the city establish a housing trust fund and  invest $3 million to $5 million annually.

A homelessness task force would also be convened, with $1.7 million and 14 fulltime employees to help with street level intervention and working with groups to help those who are chronically homeless. The budget also calls for $1.5 million to be in the CIP for improvements to the Center, the city’s homeless shelter off Tidewater Drive.

Also on housing, the city recommends site work on the former JT West school in Olde Huntersville and the Moton Circle site in Bruce’s Park to prepare the properties for residential development. Other real estate improvements include around the NEON District such as for underground water systems.

Smaller amounts of money set aside for other projects would appease recent public appeals for funding. The budget funds reopening the Ingleside Recreational Center, which has been closed for a couple years and community members recently called on City Council to reopen it. Another $31,000 would be set aside for development of a park at the former Lamberts Point Golf Course, another development item community residents made clear they wanted from the city.

However, some residents were already voicing concerns about the proposed budget. About two dozen Berkley and Campostella residents spoke at Tuesday’s meeting about a lack of city outreach to their neighborhoods, staffing issues at the aquatic center, and the closed Berkley Neighborhood Service Center.

The budget does include funding for studies for recreational facilities in Berkley and in east Norfolk.

Earlier this year, Roberts moved Norfolk Cares Center, which handles city service requests, under the City Manager’s office to increase accountability for timely responses. The Norfolk Cares will be renamed Citizen Services and five new positions will be added as part of a $2.2 million spend on organization effectiveness across the city, that also includes enhancing zoning inspections to crack down on issues raised by residents, according to Roberts.

The city will also hire another seven fulltime employees to help bring capital improvements plans to fruition, according to the budget proposal. The city is still devising next steps for its MacArthur Center and Military Circle Mall sites.

One spending proposal included in the five-year CIP is $10 million allocated toward construction of new Maury High School. The building is expected to cost $187 million. Another proposed CIP spend would be $1.3 million for the St. Paul’s Blue/Greenway.

Other large projects outlined in CIP are renovations of the Scope and Chrysler Hall, which will get $4.5 million and $1.5 million respectively in the next fiscal year. Additionally, there’s $10 million over two years for the sand replenishment in East Ocean View.

The budget calls for almost $224 million for various infrastructure repairs including on the Hague bulkhead and reviewing and fixing other bulkheads across the city. The seawall continues to be a big ticket for the city budget as well, with the city allocating $73.8 million in the budget. Robert emphasized the city cannot meet the federal match on its own and building the seawall relies on state funds helping.

The City Council will have a work session about the budget on April 9, followed by an April 10 public meeting at Granby High School at 6 pm. City Council will discuss the budget again April 23 and later hold a public hearing on the real estate tax rate. The budget is expected to be voted on May 14.  

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097

Thirteen cities across the commonwealth are part of Operation Ceasefire, an initiative launched in October 2022 that blends an approach of prevention, intervention and prosecution efforts and isn’t just about locking up criminals, Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares said at a Wednesday news conference at the Slover Library.

Altogether, the recorded 7,374 violent crimes (including murder, rape, aggravated assault and robbery) in 2023. That was 225 fewer compared with 2022, according to data provided by the attorney general’s office.

The five Hampton Roads cities involved in the initiative saw mixed results from 2022 to 2023.

• Norfolk had 1,254 violent crimes in 2023, down 26%
• Portsmouth had 813 violent crimes in 2023, down 8%
• Chesapeake had 1,076 violent crimes in 2023, down less than 1%
• Hampton had 421 violent crimes in 2023, up 5%
• Newport News had 1,614 violent crimes in 2023, up 40%

Newport News was the only one of the Operation Ceasefire cities that did not see a reduction in any of the four violent crime categories. The city recorded more homicides in 2023 than in any year in at least five decades.

Part of the Ceasefire program includes a grant system that provides economic support to local groups, such as Ketchmore Kids in Newport News, to make inroads with youth, starting in elementary school to prevent them gravitating toward gangs, said Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates Don Scott, a Portsmouth Democrat.

Activities and groups like youth sports organizations can make young Virginians feel less isolated, especially after the coronavirus pandemic, according to Miyares.

“You have to invest in young men’s lives to show them not to go down a separate path but a path of hope and dignity,” he said.

Also, Operation Ceasefire means backing prosecutors to be able to effectively do their jobs.

Scott said he was inspired to seek funding for a statewide witness protection program after hearing stories from Hampton Roads prosecutors that witnesses didn’t feel safe coming forward and that was a huge hurdle to solving cases.

Scott also recalled hearing from residents during a civic league meeting who voiced concerns about fewer police during the political climate of the “defund the police” movement in the wake of the George Floyd killing in 2020.

“People in the most impacted communities, they want to see the presence of law enforcement,” Scott said. “People say they don’t understand, especially in Black and African American communities, [where] a lot of times there’s that stereotype that’s not true. We want to be safe.”

Howard Gwynn, Newport News Commonwealth’s Attorney, also lauded the program’s support for prosecutors to be able to secure convictions. 

Miyares’ office has added over a half dozen prosecutors to help with violent crime cases, aiding in 117 federal cases and 38 state cases since the initiative was set up. . Of those, 106 cases have resulted in guilty pleas and 41 are still pending trial, according to data provided by the attorney general’s office.

Scott and Miyares also said they are working in the digital realm, such as buying ads explaining the legal consequences for illegal firearm use before videos that are circulating of local criminal behavior as method of prevention.

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097, ian.munro@virginiamedia.com

But City Council members didn’t enthusiastically jump at the idea. Instead, they had some other thoughts on how to bring down the cost of living in the city.

“Your challenges far outweigh the resources available,” said Phillip Kash, a consultant with HR&A Advisors who presented the final findings of the most recent housing study at Tuesday’s City Council work session.

Though the city’s various housing programs are generally well-run, they are smaller than what is needed, according to Kash.

“We have a shortage of affordable rental housing and it’s dropping,” Kash said.

He said housing costs are on the rise sometimes because of improvements and sometimes because landlords know they can increase rents.

Norfolk’s most dire shortage of rental units is for those making less than $35,000 a year, which is about 3 in 10 city households -— about double the rate of neighboring Virginia Beach. The city is short about 6,800 units for these households, including 4,600 units for households making less than $20,000 a year, according to the consultant’s comprehensive study.

Establishing a housing trust fund would mean dedicating a pool of local money to affordable housing, according to Kash, who did not make any recommendations for a specific dollar amount during his presentation.

The idea is not new or unique to Norfolk. Richmond established its own housing trust fund in 2004 and Virginia has a state fund. Kash said the advantage of the trust fund is that the money is more flexible than federal funding, such as the often used low-income housing tax credit, and helps build capacity for nonprofits who would be more willing to expand or invest more in Norfolk if they knew there was a pool of money dedicated to the issue.

A previous study completed in 2016 also recommended Norfolk establish a housing trust fund. At Tuesday’s work session, council members voiced a variety of concerns around affordable housing, but there was no obvious excitement around establishing a housing trust fund.

Councilwoman Andria McClellan said if the city were to set one up, Hampton Roads Ventures should put forward money to the effort. HRV is a community development fund.

Councilman Tommy Smigiel voiced concern about the city’s middle class. He said zoning constraints and municipal red tape cause costs to rise for residential developers.

“I think there’s some other things we need to work on as a city to make it a little bit easier to make the process of providing affordable housing easier,” Smigiel said.

The city’s growth is stagnant at 1%, compared to the region’s 6% growth between 2010 and 2020. The total number of units built in the city has steadily dropped each decade since the 1970s, when almost 8,300 units were built. Between 2010 and 2019, only 2,170 units were built, according to the study.

“The majority of housing investment is occurring in a few neighborhoods, while many other neighborhoods continue to experience market-driven disinvestment and decline,” the housing study says.  Some of the neighborhoods with the most growth include East Ocean View and around Old Dominion University.

Councilwoman Mamie Johnson said she has tried for years to get developers to look at other areas to develop, such as her ward, which spans mostly east of Tidewater Drive from East Little Creek Road down to around East Virginia Beach Boulevard, yet they have been hesitant.

“We’re trying to change that and it starts with me to get developers so they can have an opportunity to see everything that is offered in the city of Norfolk and not just where they are used to building,” she said.

She also voiced concern about making sure middle class families are able to stay in Norfolk and investing in those areas.

“But if we’re not careful, those neighborhoods that have withstood the test of time will become tipping points and we’ve discussed those and once those communities become tipping points, it’s extremely difficult to bring them back to where we need them,” Johnson said.

Councilwoman Courtney Doyle said the city should also focus on landlord outreach to connect and deal with “unbelievably reckless” landlords who are irresponsible with their properties.

“I know we only have so much room over that landlord who owns their own property but I think if we could do more to really make it difficult for those landlords to be as dismissive as they are,” she said.

Doyle also said the city should accelerate its program that auctions of properties the city has seized for unpaid property taxes.

“We have a lot of properties that are just sitting there,” she said.

In addition to recommending the establishment of the housing trust fund, the report also included a five point strategic plan for the city’s office of housing and community development to accomplish through 2028.

Norfolk has the most diverse stock of housing in the region, including the most variety in number of bedrooms in rental units, and most of its affordable housing is not income-restricted. But the city is also a regional concentration of poverty, with pockets of poverty within the city itself. A draft report required by a federal department every 10 years found that segregation patterns in Norfolk public housing still exist almost 100 years on.

“There is an improvement on where new affordable housing is being developed,” Kash said. “You still, of course, have a legacy of of historic affordable housing in areas of concentrated poverty.”

Deconcentrating poverty is also a focus of the council’s, as several members mentioned and lauded the remaking of St. Paul’s and the Tidewater Gardens overhaul.

The issue came up Tuesday as the council considered a request from the Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority to approve $56 million in bonds to cover in-unit renovations at three Section 8 housing complexes. The council was asked to approve the funding as NHRA had to act as a pass-through entity for the funding.

Standard Communities, a national affordable housing developer, has 260 units of Section 8 housing across three complexes: Lexington Park on Tidewater Drive, Oak Park Apartments on Berkeley Avenue and Colonial Hall Apartments on Colonial Avenue.

Steven Kahn of Standard Communities stressed no one would be displaced and rents would not rise unless the resident earned more money, which is a condition of the federal program not a decision by Standard.

Concerns around the City Council table revolved around the impact of doubling down on areas of concentrated subsidized housing and members chafed at the rigidity of the conditions for the federal funding. But the City Council voted Tuesday to approved the measure for the funding.

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097, ian.munro@virginiamedia.com

Memories shot through Norman Mack’s mind of the kind women who wore checkered scarves and unique hats and held up signs as they guided him and his classmates to school at St. Helena Elementary in Berkley.

“I was just looking for something to do in the beginning and now I love it,” said Mack, while stationed at one of his daily crossing guard assignments at the intersection of Sewells Point and Robin Hood roads in Norfolk.

Mack’s position is overseen by the Norfolk Police Department, which like many employers is trying to deal with labor shortages. While the department believes it’s an important role to ensure children get to school safely, staffing and scheduling for civilian crossing guard positions can be a timely administrative burden. The toll of running such operations now has local police departments hearing out a company that says it can take the burden off police to let them focus on other priorities.

That burden of personnel management for crossing guards doesn’t just include scheduling but payroll and myriad other duties that exacerbate already struggling police departments, according to Lt. Michael Felix of the NPD traffic division.

Norfolk’s crossing guards work at least an hour in the mornings and 45 minutes in the afternoon through three staggered shifts, meaning those on the first shift can make it to the third, according to Sgt. Jeff Clifton, who oversees the crossing guard program. He said the schools and police have a good relationship to figure out how best to get kids to school safely based on the road activity, the amount of walkers taking a certain route, bus availability and school start times.

But Clifton said hiring for the positions is difficult; many applicants don’t pan out as they stop responding to emails.

Adam Bryan, founder and CEO, of Connecticut-based Crossing Guard Services, has met with officials from several Hampton Roads cities to pitch a way to keep crossing guards but to reduce the administrative burden on police departments. His company privatizes the job, handling the difficult-to-staff positions.

Norfolk, Chesapeake and Virginia Beach all met with Bryan to hear more about the proposal, though officials from each city said no commitments have been made.

Bryan said the limited hours available and resulting lack of benefits for crossing guards means there is often limited interest in the positions. But, he said those who take the job often love it, just like Mack.

“Recruiting is a lot of work,” Bryan said.

Several local police departments are making do with the small workforce they have. Norfolk has the most crossing guards, 44 currently working out of 80 positions. Clifton said with the staggered scheduling they’re still able to cover all the needed bases. Chesapeake has 21 staff for 26 positions, while Virginia Beach has 20 guards for 38 school zones.

The trend toward privatization of crossing guard operations to reduce workload on police departments and municipalities in general is reminiscent of other types of municipal security outsourcing, according to Bryan.

His company started in 2022 and now handles crossing guard operations in several states in the Northeast including New Jersey and New York.

An advantage of having all the crossing guards under one regional umbrella would be the ability to pool workers, Bryan said, describing how a crossing guard from one city could be incentivized to fill a shortage in another. Currently, a crossing guard would have to be an employee of each of the three cities to be able to work in all three, according to Bryan.

The biggest change under privatization is the guards become the company’s employees.

“No one loses their job, no one — that’s always the biggest fear and it’s the polar opposite,” Bryan said. “We want everyone to stay.”

He said the company incentivizes current crossing guards to stay and matches the pay rate, keeps the same uniforms, trains applicants to the same standards and handles insurance.

Privatizing operations wouldn’t mean the police departments would be totally hands-off. Norfolk would still have a role in determining where crossing guards are located, Felix said.

“I’ve said this a thousand times, there’s nothing more important to us, not just police, but adults, to make sure little kids get to school safely,” Felix said.

In addition to crossing guards, school zones in the region, such as those in Suffolk and in Norfolk, are also getting a new method to cut down on speeding — speed cameras.

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097, ian.munro@virginiamedia.com

Almost 4 acres of land around the Larchmont Library will be improved for the new trailhead which will include a kiosk, a kayak launch to the Lafayette River, improved signage and outdoor recreational space. Plans also call for a pollinator garden, an outdoor gathering space and a new path as well as improvements to the existing path.

“The Larchmont Library Trailhead is in a wetlands area that was previously restored by the Elizabeth River Project,” said Morgan Willett, assistant director of the Elizabeth River Trail Foundation, in an email. “Our project is a perfect match as it creates outdoor recreation, community building, and an open space preservation opportunity.”

The project received a $405,000 grant through the Virginia Outdoors Foundation, a state agency, last year to accomplish the effort. The grant fund is called the Open-Space Lands Preservation Trust with a purpose to preserve open space for a variety of uses from farming to recreation, according to the Virginia Outdoors Foundation.

Willett said the ERT foundation hopes to break ground on the project, which has been years in the making, this summer with everything done by the end of the year or early in 2025.

“These trailheads, such as our signature trailhead at Plum Point Park, were always a part of the larger vision for the trail,” she said.

The grant money is The Virginia Outdoors Foundation Open Space Lands Preservation Trust Fund Grant and is the largest amount the trail has ever received. The Norfolk City Council approved passing through the funding from the state to the trail foundation at its Feb. 27 meeting.

“This trailhead will change the trail user experience by improving a highly used section of the trail, making it safer, and more accessible, and increasing public access to our waterfront,” Willett said.

The popular multi-use trail runs through several parks and neighborhoods, spanning from Norfolk State University to the Lochhaven neighborhood near the Hermitage Museum and Gardens. The new trailhead construction is the latest in a series of upgrades to the trail. Recent additions include the opening of an obstacle course at Plum Point Park and the creation of a glow in the dark section of pathway, dubbed the Glowline, in Jeff Robertson Park.

Ian Munro, 757-47-4097, ian.munro@virginiamedia.com

Del. Shelly Simonds, D-Newport News, introduced a measure this General Assembly session that included a variety of railway safety measures, including limiting train lengths to about 1.6 miles and increasing fines for crossing delays up to $500.

However, the bill was pared back and now would only require minimum crews of two on trains moving freight if signed by Gov. Glenn Youngkin. The bill does not apply to trains for utility service or railyard organizing. First violations result in fines between $500 and $2,000, second violations between $1,000 and $5,000 and third violations between $5,000 and $10,000 in a three year-period, with the clock starting on the first violation, according to the bill.

Simonds said she was surprised by the partisanship around the bill, considering similar measures found bipartisan support in states like Colorado and Ohio. At least ten states have passed laws requiring two-person crews and the federal government proposed a similar rule in 2022.

The House bill, with sister legislation in the Senate, passed both chambers along party lines with Republicans voting against it.

It’s the second time Simonds has introduced the bill. Previously, she expressed concerns about the safety of communities that trains pass through, citing hazards that could result in disasters such as the one resulting from a February 2023 derailment in Ohio. Additionally, the regional planning district is looking into railway crossings and which ones can be improved to reduce blockages.

Before the bill was presented to a subcommittee earlier this year, 115 people submitted comments in support of the full bill. Most of the submissions were from railway workers and their families, concerned about overworked employees on one-man trains and rail infrastructure that wasn’t built for long trains.

At a January presentation of the bill, railway union representatives spoke in support of the legislation and argued the state should not wait for federal rulemaking, which has taken years. They also said two-person crews are imperative for responding quickly if there’s an incident while hauling freight.

A representative of the Virginia Railroad Association, an industry group, spoke against the bill, saying though two-man crews aren’t required now, most railroad companies use them.

Last year, industry and company representatives argued against the bill citing momentum on federal rulemaking, the impact on businesses of limiting train lengths and complications companies would face as trains cross into the state, according to a recording of the 2023 subcommittee session. They also discussed how longer trains reduce the number needed, and how labor shortages have caused hiring difficulties.

At the January subcommittee meeting on the bill, a Norfolk Southern representative said the company is expecting a federal rule on crews this month or next, and it is already their standard to have two-person crews. Norfolk Southern declined to comment on the pared back legislation. Earlier this year, the company declined to comment on the original bill, how it would impact operations, or what proposals the company has regarding safety and the flow of traffic. A spokesperson said the company generally does not comment on proposed legislation.

In the future, Simonds said she may introduce parts of the original legislation into smaller single bills to get them through the statehouse.

“We want to make sure that technology innovations are going to improve safety for citizens and not just improve profits for these railroad companies,” Simonds said.

Simonds said if Youngkin vetoes the bill, she’ll try to get the legislation through somehow.

“This is too important to to just push down the track,” she said.

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097, ian.munro@virginiamedia.com

The Court of Appeals of Virginia this week upheld a lower court decision dismissing a $100 million lawsuit that Cordish Companies, the developer of Waterside District, brought against Norfolk, Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority and City Attorney Bernard Pishko.

Cordish Companies, a Baltimore-based developer, revamped Waterside in 2013. But when Norfolk leaders began to have conversations about bringing a casino to the city, Cordish-owned LLC Norfolk District Associates argued it should have had the exclusive right to develop and operate one based on its Waterside development agreement and lease.

In 2019, Norfolk approved a land deal with the Pamunkey Indian Tribe that set the stage for development of the HeadWaters Resort and Casino next to Harbor Park — less than a mile from Waterside. Those plans are still ongoing.

Norfolk District Associates sued in 2021 alleging the city breached its contract and actively sought to exclude Waterside from being the site of a casino. The case was based on definitions of a 2013 lease agreement between city leaders and the Waterside developers about the potential support and rights of the development to be home of a future casino.

The case was dismissed by a Richmond Circuit Court judge in 2022, but Cordish and its lawyers appealed.

In a 12-page ruling issued Tuesday, the Court of Appeals of Virginia affirmed the lower court decision, finding the written agreement over Waterside “does not place an obligation on the City and NRHA to use NDA to develop a casino.”

“All of NDA’s assignments of error, and the underlying claims, turn on the premise that the City and NRHA breached enforceable contractual obligations owed to NDA under the lease agreement,” wrote Judge Richard Y. AtLee on behalf of the three-judge panel. “Because we find that section 10.2.1 was an unenforceable agreement to agree and a casino was not a permitted use under the terms of the agreement, we find that the circuit court did not err in sustaining the demurrers.”

Cordish did not respond to a request for comment. 

“We are pleased to have the Court confirm that Cordish and [John] Lynch sued the city, city attorney and NRHA without a basis,” Pishko said in a statement.

The appeal was first heard in July Judges AtLee, Doris Henderson Causey and James W. Haley, Jr. The ruling was released Tuesday after another round of oral arguments were heard in December.

This second round was agreed upon by the lawyers after one of the judges who heard the first appeal had to recuse themselves due to a conflict of interest.

The judges who heard the new round of oral arguments in December and made the ruling were AtLee, Haley and Dominique A. Callins, according to court documents, indicating Causey was the judge who recused. Requests to speak with Causey about the reason for the recusal were denied by Court of Appeals staff.

Ian Munro, 757-447-4097, ian.munro@virginiamedia.com