Milan and Rayner pass resolution pushing false narrative re planning commission

By Valerie Cury

At the Feb. 27 Purcellville Town Council Work Session, Vice Mayor Erin Rayner made a resolution to direct the planning commission to send any potential bylaw changes to the town council for approval. Rayner indicated that this resolution was important and necessary, even though the drafted bylaw revisions had already been sent for review to the town attorney and then town council. 

Creating a false narrative, Rayner implied that updating and reviewing the planning commission’s bylaws had been done in an underhanded and secretive way, even though updating the bylaws had been on the planning commission’s agenda for two years. 

Explaining why she added a resolution to the Feb. 27 council agenda, Rayner said, “Alright, this was put on the agenda because it came to the attention of myself and the mayor and a few others that if you looked at the planning commission’s agenda, that they were planning to adopt a major rewrite of their bylaws that have significant changes that will affect the town budgets and staff.”

Rayner said the council should be able to approve the changes before they are adopted. “And so, we spoke with legal and drafted a resolution that would require the planning commission to submit their rewrite to town council for consideration and approval before they can adopt it.”

Postering, Purcellville Mayor Stan Milan asked, “Does anyone know what the proposed rewrite by the planning commission is? I didn’t think so.” He said the commission hadn’t notified council of their draft bylaw revisions – and the “revelation of the planning commission” revision of the bylaws “smacks in the face of being transparent.” 

Addressing the subject, Council Member and Planning Commission liaison Chris Bertaut said, “Contrary to what you just stated, this is mentioned both in brief and in detail from the latest report from the planning commission.”

Additionally, this is the exact protocol the planning commission had already followed. On Feb. 15, after finishing work on their draft proposed changes to their bylaws, the planning commission sent a draft of their bylaw revisions to the town attorney and town council for review. 

The suggested changes to the commission’s bylaws were something on their horizon for a few years. It was delayed until January after the zoning rewrite was completed.

What pushed back the review and update to the bylaws was that the zoning ordinance rewrite required a complete revision when the planning commission received it from a company who was tasked with rewriting the document. The company had not aligned the zoning ordinance with the town’s comprehensive plan. 

One of the commission’s proposed changes to their bylaws is to move the expiring terms of planning commissioners from the end of August 2024 to March of 2025 – to get them more in line with town elections, which were moved from May to November to coincide with the general election. 

The commission suggested ending commissioner terms in March 2025 to give a newly elected town council – which would be seated on Jan. 1, 2025 – time to settle in before making commission appointments.

At the end of August, three of the most senior planning commissioners’ terms will be up for reappointment. The protocol has been to reappoint commissioners who have been serving if they so wish to continue to serve. 

Aligning himself with a now majority of other council members who favor growing the town, Milan does not like what the planning commission is doing with the rewrite of the zoning ordinance, and is trying to scuttle a slow growth planning commission – even though Milan fought and won all his elections on slow growth promises, including promises to have a strong zoning ordinance which would protect Purcellville’s small-town feel. 

At the March 7 Planning Commission Meeting Chair Nan Forbes addressed council comments regarding the draft revision of the bylaws and other commission work that was mentioned at the Feb. 27 town council meeting.

Regarding transparency Forbes said, “This is absolutely inaccurate.” She said the commission has been “completely transparent in documenting our intent to revise our bylaws in our periodic reports to council,” along with the planning commission priorities and goals.

“Reviewing and updating the commission’s bylaws has been on our list of priorities and goals to address since 2022.” She noted that “this topic was on our meeting agenda as a discussion item, but in April 2023, we tabled it until we finished our highest priority work on the zoning ordinance rewrite.”

Forbes indicated that on Feb. 15 the bylaws update was “back for discussion as an informational item” and their agenda packet led off with “a suggested motion that the planning commission forward the attached draft of the revised planning commission bylaws to the town council for their review and subsequently forward them to the town attorney for their review.”

Forbes said this “should have been sufficient to allay any concerns town council may have had regarding our procedures.” 

Instead of council members reviewing the agenda, the council majority passed a resolution “that accomplished nothing other that what the planning commission’s original motion set out to do,” Forbes said.

“An unsubstantiated allegation that the revised bylaws have significant changes that will affect the town budget and that staff thinks it would be prudent for the town council to have a look of its effects on the town budget? Please identify any budgetary impact. We are aware of none.”

Forbes said that Rayner’s comment of speaking with legal to draft the aforementioned resolution was an unnecessary legal expense to the town. She said that town council members “can apparently have conversations with the town attorney whenever they wish and for whatever reason they wish; while the mayor and staff have asserted that the planning commission cannot.”

Forbes said that the statement by Rayner that the town council “has not been apprised of any work done by the planning commission regarding the draft bylaws update, “is absolutely untrue.”

Forbes responded to Rayner and Milan’s statement that the council gets data dumps, and the mention of the proposed revisions to the commission’s bylaws are buried in “that data dump.” 

“The planning commission’s annual report of 2022 contained two bullets,” Forbes said. “One, we will be reviewing our bylaws which are influenced by our new election cycle and by the COVID epidemic. Second, the 2023 priorities and goals mentioned conducting a review of the commission’s bylaws.” 

Forbes added that the four quarterly reports also mentioned the commission would be revising their bylaws – to include the April 20, 2023 commission’s agenda number eight which mentioned this revision as well. “So, this has been a regular part of our report to town council.”

Also, Forbes addressed the comment that the town council has not been kept abreast of the zoning rewrite. “We believe this is absolutely inaccurate. The record shows that the planning commission has been reporting on these issues since 2022. We stand ready to answer any and all of council’s questions.”

Forbes said the commission’s meetings are public and are streamed online and recorded “thus available for any member of council to review and listen to.” That goes for agendas, attachments and minutes as well as quarterly and monthly reviews. 

“Our reports are usually four pages which is hardly a data dump,” said Forbes.

In a carefully rehearsed move in February, Milan used copies of two state bills 544 and 304 as props and put them on the front of the dais, griping that the planning commission is responsible for reviewing the bills and claiming it is their duty to do so.

“The response to that is, no it’s not,” said Forbes. It’s the responsibility of the zoning administrator and others on staff to maintain awareness of the goings on in Richmond that may affect zoning in Purcellville.” 

Forbes pointed out that the senate bill mentioned by Milan “is not yet signed by the Governor by the way, and has an effective date of July 1, 2025.”