The staff in PEC's Charlottesville office works with citizens to solve the many land use and conservation challenges facing the Charlottesville and Albemarle area.
At this free workshop, representatives from organizations, local businesses, agencies and passionate individuals who share a mission to promote walking, biking, running, everyday access to nature and active lifestyles will gather to identify areas of collaboration and lay out work plans.
Last year, landowners partnered with The Piedmont Environmental Council (PEC) and other land trusts and conservation agencies to permanently protect 6,651 acres of land in Albemarle, Clarke, Culpeper, Fauquier, Greene, Loudoun, Orange and Rappahannock counties.
With over 1,700 acres of land protected this past year and 111,305 total acres conserved, Albemarle now has more lands under conservation easements than any other locality in the Commonwealth.
Decisions that are made affect everyone and I’ve spent a good chunk of my career trying to show people where and when they are going to happen.
This Tuesday marked the halfway point of Virginia’s 2023 General Assembly Session, a date known as ‘crossover.’ The House and Senate have each finished voting on the bills their members put forward, and now move on to consider legislation passed by the opposite body.
It’s another busy week on local and regional government, so let’s get right to it!
It is another one of those strange weeks that begins with a Fifth Monday that also includes a First Wednesday. There’s a rhythm to all of these meetings and an extra couple of days at the end of the month either allows for a break or allows for an extra meeting that no one anticipated.
The year 2023 in local government has certainly gotten off to a fast start. There are still so many stories I will want to write from the past three weeks. This week is a little bit of a slowdown with no meetings in Fluvanna County and Louisa County. But this is a community with nearly 250,000 residents that is planning for more. Every week there’s something important going on somewhere.
This week, you’ll see there are a lot of links to stories I’ve already written. Sometimes these stories have more information than what’s in a staff report or what’s in the minutes. My goal is not to compete with the various governments to get out information. Instead, my goal is to make sure as many people as possible know what’s coming up and what’s happened.
The year of business has truly begun with a full week. As always, Tuesday seems to be that day when the air is ripe for a government meeting. And this week has a lot of interesting events.