Open Letter to Catoctin Meadows homeowners

By Tip Stinnette, HOA member

I am writing this note to you as a friend, neighbor, and fellow CMHOA member. Over the past couple of weeks, the County has made some significant announcements we should be aware of from both a neighborhood as well as Town perspective.

In short, the County has withdrawn their applications for development of the Fields Farm Park on the North side of Route 7, has purchased 142 acres of property to the West of 33rd Street and behind the West end Country Club Road properties, and remains committed to moving forward on the Rt 7/690 interchange as being “important to the regional transportation network.”

To be clear, these announcements signal a County strategy to expand metropolitan Eastern Loudon County development into rural Western Loudoun County. Moreover, the strategy puts CMHOA right smack in the middle with an interchange to our North and a Rec Center to our South creating an untenable cut-through traffic challenge for our neighborhood and creating a significant traffic volume impact to the Town on the West end of Main Street.

“Stopping one would not stop the other” is what the County staff said when asked what would be the impact to the interchange if the County moved the Fields Farm development to recently purchased land to the West end of Town directly behind the West end County Club properties.

It should be noted the County’s commitment to expanding the “regional transportation network” is such that they would eliminate the Rt7 Eastbound exit on to 690 to avoid having to deal with our HOA on the 14-acre parcel while they construct the rest of the interchange. While this strategy would avoid creating a direct impact to our property it would not avoid causing a flood plain impact to our HOA and Town.

The facts above point to the need to consolidate a Town position as it is now apparent an HOA vote is not needed to proceed with the interchange without the Rt 7 Eastbound exit, which would eliminate having to negotiate with the HOA on its 14-acre parcel.

To this point your HOA Board has attempted to stake out a neutral position on the interchange while advocating for the preservation of our 14-acre parcel. Given the County intent to construct the interchange and develop the 142 acres behind the West end of Country Club Road, creating untenable cut-through traffic for our neighborhood while significantly increasing the traffic on Main Street, I am hard pressed to see a middle ground for us or the Town.

We should stake a position as a Town that says “No” to Eastern Loudoun County metropolitan encroachment into rural Western Loudoun County. We should leverage the FEMA process on the interchange flood plain impacts to delay the interchange and put Federal SMART SCALE funding at risk. We should not offer to connect the 142-acre development to our Town water and sewer system making the proposed development more expensive and untenable. And we should vote for Town and County representatives that see things the same way we do.

I know this is a strident position proposal but I do believe it is one we should discuss. The future of our neighborhood, Town, and rural Western Loudoun County are at stake.

To that end I am recommending we hold an HOA Board Meeting with an invitation to our HOA members to discuss on March 10 at 6:30 p.m. in the Town Train Station, mark your calendars and details to follow. My hope is the Board will agree and you will attend.