Albemarle County received $819,300 in new proffers in the first three months of this calendar year, and spent $814,000 from various proffers collected in the past several years. The information was released as part of the County’s 3rd Quarter Proffer report, which also states the County has the potential to receive up to $56.7 million in cash proffers as approved residential and commercial developments are built-out.
The new proffer money came from the rezoning of land for the Fontana subdivision on Pantops and the Patterson subdivision near Crozet, and will be mostly added to the County’s Capital Improvement Program (CIP). The County now generally receives a $17,500 cash proffer from a developer for each new housing unit approved, as well as the expectation that 15 percent of units be designated as ‘affordable.’ If a developer opts to not build affordable homes, an additional cash proffer of $2,809 per unit is expected. In the case of the Fontana 4C rezoning approved on March 19, 2008, the developer chose to pay $95,500 in lieu of constructing the affordable units.
However, the County actually collected just over $69,000 in cash during the quarter. That’s because a developer often is not required to pay up until certain conditions are met. The process by which the funds are transferred to County coffers are governed by the proffer statements signed by the developer prior to the approval of a rezoning.
Proffer money spent in the quarter mostly went to help pay for the construction of the $5.9 million Hollymead Fire Station. Funds totaling nearly $555,000 came from the rezoning of Hollymead Areas C and D, which are in the process of being built out. The rezoning that allowed for the construction of the 35-unit Wickham Pond contributed $59,000 towards the Crozet Streetscaping project, and the proffer fund for North Pointe contributed $200,000 towards the County’s affordable housing fund.
At the end of the third quarter, staff tallied up the outstanding obligations owed by developers and came up with a total of over $56.7 million, adjusted for inflation. The biggest single category is the Biscuit Run rezoning, which carries an adjusted total of $17.9 million in cash the County can expect if that development reaches full build-out. There are also additional non-cash proffers from the Biscuit Run development including land for a park and for a school.
The next largest cash proffer is expected to come from Hollymead Town Center Area A2, which was rezoned the same evening as Biscuit Run. In all, the County can expect $15.2 million in cash proffers in exchange for changing the Rural Area zoning to Commercial and Neighborhood Model zoning. According to the proffer statement, the developer won’t have to pay until a building permit is issued for the 151st market rate unit. However, the amount per unit will be adjusted for inflation each year.
Sean Tubbs
