Fairfax County has updated its Chesapeake Bay Preservation Ordinance to reinforce requirements for developers along the Potomac River and its tributaries to protect older trees and guard against rising sea levels.
However, even as they voted unanimously yesterday (Tuesday) to amend regulations related to the ordinance, Fairfax County supervisors expressed some frustration with a lack of clarity in the guidance handed down by Virginia’s State Water Control Board (SWCB).
The approved changes took effect at midnight today (Wednesday), although projects already in the pipeline will in many cases be allowed to continue forward under previous rules.
“The proposed amendments increase the resilience of the built environment and adapt to the future conditions as result of climate change and improve the natural environment through preservation of mature trees for future generations,” county staff said in a summary for the Board of Supervisors.
In place since 1988, the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act sets expectations for land use and development practices in order to prevent pollution and improve the quality of water in the bay, whose watershed spans six states and D.C. and includes over 100,000 streams, creeks and rivers.
The Virginia General Assembly passed a bill in 2020 that directed the SWCB to create regulations for preserving and planting trees and adapting to rising sea levels that local governments can use to evaluate development in protected areas.
According to a county staff, the SWCB adopted two amendments to its regulations in 2021 that:
- Added language that mature trees must be protected during development in resource-protection areas and resource-management areas.
- Require “resilience assessments” for development within resource-protection areas to determine the potential impacts of sea-level rise and increased storm intensity due to climate change.
On the tree preservation front, changes for local residents would be minimal since the county’s existing conservation rules remain in place, county staff said.
However, county officials acknowledged the state government has not yet finalized its own guidance on specific criteria for the resilence assessments, leaving local officials and the public to their own devices. A model ordinance, checklists and other documents are still under review after informal comment periods in 2022 and this past spring, according to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality’s website.
As a result, “each situation is a little bit unique,” observed a less-than-thrilled Mount Vernon District Supervisor Daniel Storck.
Jerry Stonefield, an engineer with the county’s Department of Land Development Services, said residents with questions about implications of the new rules should “come in and talk with us.”
“We can work with them,” Stonefield said.
But county officials can only help if they have sufficient clarity from their state counterparts on the nuances of the regulations, said Springfield District Supervisor Pat Herrity.
“If we can’t explain it, it’s hard for citizens to understand it,” he said.
Storck noted that property owners should be cautious about relying on information from their contractors, since misinterpretation could cause problems for them down the road.
Representatives of the Mount Vernon Council of Citizens’ Associations and Great Falls Citizens Association were the lone speakers at the public comment that preceded the board’s vote. Larry Zaragoza, representing the Mount Vernon group, asked county leaders to work proactively and collaboratively with waterfront-property owners to address the impact of the changes.
After adopting several changes proposed by the Planning Commission, the board approved the preservation ordinance amendments on a 10-0 vote.
