As the neighboring counties of Prince William and Loudoun, both controlled by Republicans, take steps to slow the growth of housing, Fairfax County, where the Board of Supervisors is controlled by Democrats, is resisting the urge:
This week, Loudoun County supervisors voted to approve a one-year freeze on rezonings for home construction. The Prince William board ordered a similar halt last month. Across the Potomac River, the Montgomery County Council will hold hearings next week on a proposal to halt consideration of big commercial and residential development projects until August while officials conduct an annual review of the county’s growth policy.
So why won’t Virginia’s largest county stand in solidarity with its neighbors?
The answer lies in political strategy and the Fairfax’s board’s battle-scarred history when it comes to taking confrontational stances on development issues.
Some Fairfax board members sniffed at the recent Loudoun and Prince William votes as political theater with little practical effect, because it takes a year for most rezonings to wend through the system.
Part of it, though, is tied to the fact that Fairfax has been on the losing end of this battle before:
In the early 1970s, a moratorium on sewer hookups was invalidated by the courts. In 1972, when a board with slow-growth leanings took office, members tried to suspend rezonings while planners drafted a five-year growth strategy. Led by John “Til” Hazel, the developer-attorney who influenced the evolution of modern-day Fairfax, the private sector squelched the idea.
More importantly, as one Fairfax Supervisor points out, the Prince William and Loudoun “moratoriums” are entirely pointless:
Supervisor Michael R. Frey (R-Sully) said the Loudoun and Prince William measures mislead the public into thinking home construction will halt. Projects already in the regulatory pipeline will continue.
“The headlines say ‘building freeze,’ but they’re still issuing building permits,” Frey said.
In other words, it was all a pointless political exercise.
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