Jeanine Lawson: The Rural Crescent Suffered a Significant Blow

The beginning of this week, I emailed about a critical vote that would significantly weaken the Rural Crescent While the community overwhelmingly objected to this development, the majority of the Board of Supervisors ignored the community.

On a 5-3 party line vote, the Preserve at Long Branch was approved. The 5 Democrat Supervisors have again proven their loyalties lie with NoVa developers and not PWC citizens. By bringing public sewer into the Rural Crescent, the decades long policy to preserve our rural area has taken a major blow, and the stage is set for more development.

During the board meeting, I pointed out that, “We have to make sure that we defend the rural area tonight by not allowing the sewer line to go out there. If we allow the sewer line to go out there tonight, I guarantee this is just going to be the first domino that’s going to fall. There’s going to be other applications going to this board and we’re going to see what I would call a spider web of more development.”

Along with Supervisors Candland and Vega, we fought this project into the early morning hours. We will continue to oppose overdeveloping our county, and will stand in support of the Rural Crescent.

While we suffered a major setback, more battles are on the horizon. Later this year PWC Planning Staff’s recommendations to preserve the rural area will be before the board. It’s important for the community to stay engaged so rural clustering with sewer does NOT pass.

Please stay interested and lobby other members of the Board of Supervisors. Also, take a moment to watch this video of my comments from the meeting and share it with your friends.

Sincerely,

Supervisor Jeanine Lawson