MINUTES OF THE PUBLIC HEARING FOR THE STRASBURG TOWN COUNCIL HELD ON TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 2006, AT 7:15 P.M. IN THE COUNCIL CHAMBERS OF THE TOWN HALL.

COUNCIL MEMBERS present:  Mayor Crisman, Vice Mayor Taylor, and Council Members Le Vine, Mauck, Nicholson, Rinker, Terndrup, Wallace, and Whittle. 

The purpose of the Public Hearing is to receive public input on the adoption of a transient occupancy tax.  The Town will impose a lodging tax on hotels, motels, bed and breakfast establishments, etc., within the Town of Strasburg.

Gary Rutherford, 4610 John Marshall Highway, Strasburg, VA; owner of Hotel Strasburg:  Mr. Rutherford said he is against this because people who come and stay and see the tax will not stay or visit again.  He said this will add $2 - $5 to every room stay and many who stay spend money downtown and this will have an impact on this, too.  He is in favor of the 2% tax going to the County because it is a needed thing; none of the towns in Shenandoah County are a tourist destination, but the Shenandoah Valley is and the 2% tax helps to promote that.  The County “piggybacks” with other organizations to help market the entire County and this makes Strasburg stand out.  It takes a lot of money to market.  He thinks this is the wrong avenue to go down for the amount of money you will receive and he believes it will hurt us down the road.

Richard Seelbach, 133 E. King Street, Strasburg, VA:  As a local business owner, the hotel is very important to his business.  He really sells to the tourists and the people out of Washington.  If this means people will chose to go elsewhere, it will impact negatively on local business. 

Public hearing closed at 7:19 p.m.

The purpose of the Public Hearing is to receive public input on the changes to and additions of the following ordinances for the Town of Strasburg:

3-14.10 Site plan

2-5.6 Frontage regulations

3-6.1 General parking requirements

402.8 Prohibit Cul de sacs

Occupancy standards 

Richard Hockman, 217 Pouts Hill Road, Strasburg, VA:  “I see you all are going to make a bunch of ordinances, but who enforces them?”  He has been trying, or “fighting with the Town” over the past two months to get land near Eden Pines cleaned up.  It has been allowed to go since the building was built and now he is suffering because of it (he owns property beside it).  He was told it was going to be cleaned up Saturday, a week ago, but it wasn’t.  He is not satisfied with the way Town Staff is handling this.  He gave Town Staff the name of a person who would brush hog it, but was told they would use somebody from Edinburg.  He wants to know who takes care of the ordinances once they are made.  This needs to be addressed; if you can’t enforce the ordinances, don’t make them.

Mayor Crisman told Mr. Hockman this would be looked into.

Jeff Aimonetti, 168 N. Massanutten Street, Strasburg, VA:  Mr. Aimonetti said he wanted to speak on the prohibition of cul-de-sacs.  He feels that rather than prohibiting cul-de-sacs, the definition of a cul-de-sac needs to be looked at.  “There is a reason why there is a limit on the number of dwellings allowed on a cul-de-sac and as far as the Town is concerned, or any municipality is concerned, that reason should be the safety of its citizens.”  He thinks what has happened is that the definition has gotten “taken away from the town and given to the engineers.  If you go into a street and the only way out is to go past that same point --- it doesn’t matter how many streets are inside that same area --- if you start and come out on that same street, that street is a cul-de-sac.”  He went onto say if a tanker would be burning at the entrance to a cul-de-sac and you have to evacuate 30 homes or eight homes, there is a huge difference.  Another item, “it seems we are allowing development in excess of the number that the Town says you can do presently; we are allowing that to happen based on the promise of future development.”  When the future development happens then allowing more dwellings can be considered, but as long as it is considered a cul-de-sac, the Town should go by the ordinances in place now.”

Being no further speakers, the Public Hearing closed at 7:23 p.m.