Va. Delegates, Senators Propose Raft of Legislation to Slow Growth
By Michael D. Shear
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 7, 2007
RICHMOND, Jan. 6 -- Voter anger about traffic congestion caused by unchecked growth has bedeviled officials in Northern Virginia for decades. Now, that rage has pervaded the state Capitol, where nervous lawmakers are attempting to take action before the November elections.
Many supervisors in Fairfax, Prince William and Loudoun counties have been ousted by voters for failing to slow growth. But state delegates and senators have rarely been held accountable by their constituents for the region's surging population and the inevitable consequences, both good and bad.
Now, though, rapid growth has become entangled in the bitter legislative debate over the state's traffic problem. And lawmakers fear Virginians will punish anyone who refuses to vote to slow sprawl during the 2007 General Assembly session, which begins Wednesday.
Voters "are so angry about traffic, they'll strike out at your mama if they think she's got anything to do with it," said John H. Foote, a land-use lawyer and former county attorney in Prince William.
The result is a slew of legislation from Republicans and Democrats, including House Speaker William J. Howell (R-Stafford) and Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D), aimed at reducing traffic congestion by better managing growth.
"The Republican political consultants and the pollsters are telling politicians at every level that a pro-growth vote is a death knell," Foote said. "It's moved right up the chain of command."
Howell has introduced a package of bills that would force local governments to take over the maintenance of new neighborhood streets in exchange for money and other resources the state now spends on building and maintaining roads. Howell's proposals would also give local governments flexibility to concentrate growth in built-up, urban areas where the transportation system has matured.
Kaine said Thursday that he will again fight to give local governments permission from the state to stop growth if an area's roads are clogged. He submitted legislation to do that last year, making good on a promise from his 2005 campaign that helped him carry Northern Virginia. But the bill was defeated after pressure from home builders.
This year could be different, said Mike Toalson, chief lobbyist for the Home Builders Association of Virginia. He said he will fight the proposal again but acknowledged that the psychological distance lawmakers used to feel from local growth politics is shrinking quickly.
"I recognize that, and I'm very fearful of it," he said. The housing industry "could be the victim of a political quick fix designed to convince voters that we are a solution to the transportation crisis."
Toalson and his allies in the development community will argue that slow-growth proposals raise housing prices and force builders to put up houses in far-flung counties, adding to sprawl. That forces longer commutes and makes traffic even worse, he said.
Toalson's efforts will be centered on the Senate Committee on Local Government and the House Committee on Counties, Cities and Towns. That's where most growth-control legislation has gone in past years, only to be killed.
"We used to call it the Committee Against Counties, Cities and Towns," joked one lobbyist, who didn't want to be named for fear of offending the lawmakers on the committee.
U.S. Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.) recalled his frustration with the legislature as chairman of the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors in the early 1990s, when the county was growing rapidly. He said lawmakers in Richmond rarely viewed the issue of growth as a threat to reelection.
"The average voter didn't connect the state legislators to it," Davis said. "The problem is, the developers have always controlled the legislature."
But this year could be different, several lobbyists and lawmakers said, thanks to the high-profile backing of slow-growth legislation from Kaine and Howell and the fear of retribution from traffic-weary voters. All 140 members of the General Assembly are up for reelection this fall.
"Certainly a number of my colleagues feel that," said House Majority Leader H. Morgan Griffith (R-Salem).
For years in Virginia, it has been local officials who felt that fear.
In the 1980s, John F. "Jack" Herrity (R) led a pro-growth, pro-development Fairfax Board of Supervisors that was swept out of office by slow-growth candidate Audrey Moore (D). Four years later, she was ousted by Davis, who promised a more business-friendly development agenda.
In Prince William, growth and development wars have dominated the scene for years as supervisors debated growth limits, moratoriums and how to restrict growth in the western and rural parts of the county.
And in Loudoun, voters have seesawed between growth and anti-growth candidates. In 1997, they voted in a pro-growth board, only to change their minds four years later. In 2005, they flipped back again, ousting many of the slow-growth supervisors in favor of candidates who pledged to let the county grow more quickly. But even those supervisors have voted in recent months to limit growth, feeling pressure from constituents stuck in traffic.
If voters want to blame someone for traffic and crowded schools, they usually have started with their county supervisors.
But "I believe that has changed," said Fairfax Board of Supervisors Chairman Gerald E. Connolly (D). "People are connecting the dots to the state legislature in a way they never did before. We're tired of being blamed for something we didn't create and are not responsible for."
Members of both parties say the thing that has changed is the escalating aggravation caused by traffic -- and the political power of that issue.
It used to be that growth politics was driven by concern about the environment or open space or crowded trailers on high school campuses. Now, polls show that many voters believe traffic will ease when growth is slowed. And they want their state leaders to do something about it.
Some say Kaine is largely responsible for the change.
Toward the end of his 2005 campaign, Kaine began airing a provocative television commercial aimed at the outer suburbs of Northern Virginia. "I'll give your community more power to stop out-of-control development that increases traffic," Kaine promised.
The ad angered developers who had been supporting Kaine. And it energized slow-growth activists who saw it as an endorsement of positions they had been pushing for years without much luck.
In a recent interview, Kaine took credit for helping change the thinking about growth and transportation. "I think we have turned a corner in realizing that, going forward, we've got to do land use in a very different way, connected with our transportation planning," he said. "That had not been the norm."
Others say some of the credit should go to Howell, who represents Stafford County, one of the fastest-growing localities, where concern about growth and traffic is intense. In 2005, voters tossed out four members of their board of supervisors -- from both parties -- in favor of slow-growth advocates.
Howell emerged from that election unscathed, in part because he has paid attention to the growth issue. Years ago, he pushed for Stafford's ability to impose impact fees on new houses, a powerful authority that few other Virginia localities have.
But Republicans and Democrats worry that, come November, their constituents will be looking for someone to blame.
"The more frustrated the voters get," Griffith aide Jeff Ryer said, "the wider net they cast."
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