Despite the contract being signed and a deposit already put down, the HS-8 site at the National Conference Center is still being met with resistance by some Lansdowne residents, as evident by the number of concerns and questions asked of Supervisors-elect Ralph Buona (R-Ashburn) and Geary Higgins (R-Catoctin), who held an informal question and answer session and site walk-through Dec. 10.
Concerns about students parking in the surrounding neighborhoods, the impending traffic on Kipheart Drive, noise from extracurricular activities and athletic field lights were all concerns voiced by members of the Lansdowne community throughout the question session.
Several residents have raised these concerns at recent town-hall meetings and Buona was asked to have an informal get together to answer their questions.
Buona mentioned to residents during the meeting that one of his major concerns was relieving the overcrowding at Broad Run High School and Tuscarora High School, and just how much HS-8 was needed to do that.
“I live over by Broad Run High School and you have students practically bursting out of the windows of the school,” he said. “We have trailers lined up all along Ashburn Road to accommodate these kids at Broad Run so the bottom line is we need HS-8 by 2015 to help alleviate that overcrowding.”
Buona noticed after the meeting that it seemed as though one issue was raised more than others.
“I think traffic of course remains a major issue and the newest plan, or option C, does expand ingress and egress to and from the school, and at the same time, it takes traffic down one particular street that has a residential nature to it and that’s Kipheart [Drive],” Buona said. “People are concerned about the traffic on that particular street and that has to be the number one issue I heard from people on [Dec. 10].”
Buona felt the informal session went well and helped to relieve some of the concerns Lansdowne residents had.
“I think it was a good dialogue and I have received a few emails from folks that were there on [Dec. 10]. They were very thankful that there was a dialogue and considered it quite informing and they were glad that two of the supervisors were willing to come out and listen to their concerns,” Buona said. “There were also people there that were very much in favor of the NCC site, so it was a good mix of people. There are differing opinions as I would expect on a neighborhood site like this. There are always pluses and minuses.”
With concerned residents unsure of how this site will work, Buona feels the best course of action is to wait until the 120-day due diligence is completed Jan. 18.
“I think we need to hear the results of the 120-day due diligence where engineering and other studies are taken into account so we understand the viability or non-viability of the site,” Buona said. “To me it’s a matter of getting the rest of the facts and once we have those facts, then we can have a discussion about the outcome and which direction we need to go in.”
Eric Hornberger School Board-elect (Ashburn) was not present due to a previously scheduled School Board orientation. He has been a staunch supporter of finding a site for HS-8 over the last couple of years and was not surprised to find the NCC site tour has been ripe with controversy.
“It does not surprise me that there would be persons opposed to the NCC site for HS-8, as it is quite common for persons opposed to the designation of public use sites to push for reconsideration. In this instance, however, there has also been a professionally orchestrated and rather aggressive public relations campaign behind the opposition,” Hornberger said. “For much of the past year, this professional campaign has encouraged residents to oppose the NCC site in favor of another site that has been paid for by the owners of another site that they are looking to sell to the county for such a public purpose.”
Hornberger feels that amongst the controversy, people may forget the most important aspect about finding a site as soon as possible.
“My perspective is that first and foremost we need HS-8, and we need it to open as soon as possible. I was among the earliest residents recognizing the need for HS-8 in the northern Ashburn area and advocating for its prioritization. I also believe that HS-8 should be located in or near the majority of those it seeks to serve,” Hornberger said. “This is consistent with the comprehensive plan, as well as in the best long-term interest of the kids, communities and taxpayers of Loudoun County. Of the few sites in the northern Ashburn area that are even possibilities for a high school site, the NCC site appears to best meet these criteria. This and other reasons related to the benefits of this particular site over the others is why I support further pursuit of the NCC site for the location of HS-8.”
Supervisor Lori Waters (R-Broad Run) is in agreement with Hornberger and feels the NCC site is best suited to serve the Lansdowne area.
“This site is the best one that is available to meet the needs of the Ashburn area and we did an extensive three-year search to find a location for HS-8 and with the overcrowding currently happening at Broad Run High School and that will happen at Tuscarora High School because Lansdowne was moved out, we need a site in Ashburn for HS-8,” Waters said. “This site is ideally located to meet the student population it needs to serve.
“Over the last two years of the three-year search we spent looking at all the potential options, including different configurations, assemblages, leasing properties and a lot of different others,” Waters said. “We spent a lot of time as a board looking through all of the available land in the Ashburn area and concluded the NCC site was the best site of all those we reviewed.”
Waters understands the concern being voiced by Lansdowne residents and believes their concerns are warranted.
“Anytime you propose a change to a community, there will be an uneasiness about it and there are questions. People want to know what is going to happen next door or in their backyards and I certainly respect that,” Waters said. “In my eight years on the board, I found that land use can be quite controversial and wherever we wanted to go in Ashburn, there was going to be a neighbor that we have to sit down and work with.
“In Lansdowne, there are many neighbors that we are going to be working with to mitigate any potential impacts, whether its traffic or noise or visually and that is what we have to do as a Board,” Waters said.
Put building any more schools on hold for a year and give the LCPS employees a step raise! Four years without a raise is four years too many. No wonder their moral is down.
I love it! I will be a nice school once its done!
This is Scott York’s baby. Pay twice as much for land that really has half the usable space which equates to four times as much? Really makes alot of sense to me. This is probably why Scott York is under investigation by the FBI and the Dept. of Education. He continues to push land projects that are way over valued….but as long as they are his buddies in the commercial real estate, he get’s everything he wants. That high school education and NVCC dropout education has really done him well. I wonder how many LLC’s have his name on them as a minority interest? How about that $10,000 he “won” from Chevy Chase bank? Or the Multi million contracts his closet building company had with Toll Brothers? Where’s the integrity in local politicians? It’s not in Loudoun County.
To quote my daughter: “BFD”. I am saying don’t dismiss the real concern and issues that my neighbors and I have, period. And just because this guy is involved and we are on the same side of this issue isn’t a bad thing. Real issues and real concerns up here along Kipheart.
Kipheart mom-
Much of the bad info and fear mongering going around has been fueeld by the Lex 7 crew. I personally witnessed David Donofrio stand up and walk over and hand one of our anti-NCC HOA Board members a note at the HS-8 meeting on Nov. 16, right before she got up to publicly speak. They are involved, whether you realize it or not.
Disgusted, that is insulting on many levels. I live behind the NCC and the only people I have talked to are my friends and neighbors. Don’t try to minimize my real concerns for my daughters and family by saying this is manufactured. It is very real and very concerning to me.
Casey Group even has ties to THIS newspaper, and that is why many of the “articles” in the past about HS-8 have ended up being non-objective press releases for Lex 7.
There have also been huge related political campaign contributions to many of the new Board members to try to sway their decisions with HS-8.
D.D. of Casey Group and the Lex 7 developers are personally responsible for pitting neighbor against neighbor for their financial gain. I wonder if they sleep at night.
We must keep causing trouble so we can get our big pay day!
To Resident who’s done their research:
I live in Lansdowne and the majority of residents are in favor of the high school at this site.
Lack of attention and ignorance to public affairs is no excuse for not knowing this was happening. Droves of NCC supporters have been going to meetings and public input to support the Board’s idea of HS-8 at the NCC site since the Board first brought this idea to our community a year ago. The Lansdowne HOA even sent out emails to all residents about meetings. This info was dropped in your lap and you didn’t get involved till now.
It will be so nice if this land decision is finalized so a community can stop being divided and move forward with solutions.
Two words, Bank Lien, on the NCC property. Two more words, bad deal.
Resident who’s done their research—For Loudoun parents, students, and teachers, overcrowding is not just “one small issue.” Also—the NCC is not a “temporary fix.” Quite the contrary—the reason we need HS-8 at the NCC is to offer long-term stability.
HS-8 is not in my backyard and I am completely oppposed to it. So much for the lame argument of NIMBY. I am opposed because it is simply too expensive, it is terrible plan, and only is so because it is being sold as a three school solution. Ashburn needs to relax, they are getting the elementary and middle school. Stop being so greedy, HS-8 will be built, but it should not be at NCC.
Over the last three weekends Ive gone door to door in Lansdowne urging residents to attend the meetings or call/email their supervisors so they have a voice in this decision, what ever side it’s on. I have knocked on over 200 doors and talked to over 100 residents in Lansdowne, of which I have only met 3, yes three, that supported HS8 being located at NCC site. Almost everyone I spoke with was in shock of how it got to this point as they have heard nothing further, very few were aware of any of the local meetings, and felt the county was pushing forward with out a strong enough effort for the community to know what was taking place. I heard over and over again they felt robbed and cheated of their ability to express their opinion on this subject. I think the Lansdowne residents should be polled to find out just how many support or don’t support this site. There are a few very loud supporters in my opinion who are trying to mount personal attacks and name calling of those who don’t support NCC. Every One I talked to was in support of HS8 just the location was the problem. The community of Lansdowne should not suffer the long term affects as a result of poor land planning and land use by the developers and Loudoun county government. Those who oppose NCC are not nimby’s, the are well educated citizen who see the bigger and longer term pic here. The NCC site may solve one small issue of over crowding and be part of a temporary fix, but the impact on the community such as traffic that it causes are long term negative affects that the county will be paying for and dealing with for decades. It hardly seems like a good decision from any aspects. And none of my efforts have ever been paid for by an alternate site.
One thing is for sure, the Loudoun Times Mirror will keep doing whatever they can to help keep this controversy alive to help out their friends that are hawking Lexington Seven.
I grew up in an urban area with little open land and schools were forced to share stadiums. Yeah, it was a hassle, but it saved millions of dollars.
I don’t think there is much argument that more high school seats are needed in Ashburn, but does it have to be an outrageously expensive $110 million new high school?
Let’s not forget that one option is to expand 4 existing high schools by 400 seats each. This was rejected by the outgoing school board and was probably one of the main reasons John Stevens and others were not re-elected.
The new BOS and SB need to re-examine this and find the most cost effective solution for taxpayers. Larger high schools and shared stadiums just might be the best solution.
The biggest problem here is the past boards who let Lansdowne and other nearby sites develop with insufficient school proffers, closely followed by the inept school planning staff who screwed up the student forecasts for these areas. That’s who created this problem that needed to be solved at the last minute by this past board.
Whenever the Board needs to acquire land for public service, the NIMBYs come out. Happens every time. Thank goodness the NIMBYs aren’t in charge because we’d have no schools, no fire stations, no roads…no jobs.
To the NIMBY’s:
You didn’t want more residences on this site. Now you don’t want a school here. This property will be sold to someone. What will be next before the planning commission? A juvenile detention center, a huge office park, or even a bridge connecting VA to Maryland? A school is the only use that will be an asset to our community. Embrace it! It’s needed!
The Board of Supervisors was being fiscally responsible by choosing the NCC site for the needed high school: 1. It is the cheapest piece of land available in the Ashburn School Planning District. 2. The Board used land already owned by the county for the new elementary and middle schools to complete the Ashburn 3 school solution, so 3 school sites and only having to acquire 1 is good savings. 3. Using less acreage, getting creative with the site plan, and efficently co-locating with a middle school. 4. Long term bus transportation savings to taxpayers by having a large walk zone.
Thank you BOS, for getting us the HS that is needed to stabilize Ashburn, Leesburg, and Dulles while remaining as fiscally conservative as possible!
I think they should scrap HS 8 altogether and move forward with HS 6. Maybe in a few yers the Nimby’s will realize that their kids actually need a school near by. I heard Heritage wasn’t overcrowded…
Ncc is in a flood plain is it not? 60,000 out of 63,000 kids take the bus to school in Loudoun. Acreage that cannot be used at 800 k per acre is just nuts and that’s no red herring. No eminent domain needed on the Lexy 7 site. 800 k per 20 acres that will not be used equals 16 million in wasted expenditure. Fire the people that voted yea for NCC
@No Way…..other districts share “stadiums” all the time. Keep some practice field area but you don’t need lights for that. One school has games on Friday the other on Saturday. It could work, but the parents of LoCo would never go for it just because they are too spoiled to “share”.
As for Buona’s justification for pushing this, Valley was packed tight for years with kids “bursting from the windows” and no one was willing to look at anything different than what they had set their mind to. This district is so reluctant to pick the right location for schools it’s amazing——prime example: Heritage—not where the students are at all…..the new Leesburg Elementary school…not where the kids are. One would have thought that once the BOS got involved with this, they’d do a better job of getting the land at the right price. The amount of money being paid for this school is crazy.
They’re essentially dismissing these arguments from residents and yet the people who sued over the Aldie fire station kept that much needed community facility from happening. It could be argued that the one community needs the fire station even more than the other needs the high school.
The NCC site is the right place at the right time. The conspiracy theories, developable acres, and price per acre arguments are red herrings—look at the final cost, long-term savings, advantages of co-located schools, and minimal impact on Route 7 and commerical development. I have faith that the new Board will keep this on track. There has been too much time (years!), expertise, research, and community support that’s gone into this desperately needed solution to throw it all away. The cost of this continued overcrowding and instability is immeasurable.
Let’s see how well the political operatives use their new connections to the new supervisors to get NCC killed and Lexington Seven back on the table.
@ outside the box. Sharing stadiums is not a possibility.
There are too many sports played at each school to share facilities. These are used as practice spaces when they are not being used for games. In the spring there are 8 teams that use the stadium field per school, and this doesn’t include the track teams that need the space around the field.
There is barely enough time to practice prior to all of the scheduled events on the fields at night, an additional schools worth of teams only further complicates this.
You need to understand the scope of the ideas you present, before you present them.
Loudoun $$ to burn - some of the reasons against Lex7:
1) Major boulevard will bisect the site representing a huge safety issue, a bridge/tunnel to link each side would add significant cost.
2) It is prime commercial real estate which will eventually bring in a large sum of tax revenue for the County - both of which we will need increasingly more of as time advances.
3) It is not in a residential area - no students live anywhere near it.
Lex7 owners are the ones with $$ to burn considering the advertising and political campaigns they have funded. Time is critical, the decision and negotiating phases are completed, the best thing to do now is to be creative and find ways to mitigate the impacts and move forward at NCC.
The bottom line is that the NCC site is far too small for a high school and has massive traffic and design issues. In addtion, the site is outrageously expensive. (More than $800,000 per usable acre!!)
The Lexington 7 site is the right size, FAR less expensive on a per usable acre basis, is ready to build on NOW and the ultimate price tag to build a school would be $20 to $25 mm less than at the NCC site. We don’t know (and probably will never know) why the B of S won’t seriously consider Lexington 7? Tell me why Lexington 7 won’t work. if there’s a nuclear waste dump there and it’s not suitable, that’s fine. What is driving this decision? Why is there no transparency on the process when Loudoun is building its first $100 mm plus school? Fiscal accountability? Ha! The mnoney was already approved by a bond referendum so no need for any fiscal responsibility.
Eliminate the stadium, which will eliminate lighting concerns and a significant amount of traffic concerns; save existing parkland; and, reduce the project cost. School systems are increasingly sharing stadiums - why not Loudoun? Tuscarora is close and has a fine turf field, allowing more games to be played than typical fields - so pair HS-8 with Tuscarora for scheduling sports competitions. Parity is nice but 1) we simply can’t afford all the bells and whistles everywhere and 2)if you have to buy a site for $1M/acre or place schools far from the majority of its students, then the cart starts driving the horse.
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