Supplied photo.
The Albemarle Planning Commission has recommended denial of a developer’s second request to fill in a portion of the floodplain in order to build a commercial building in the county’s Broadway Blueprint.
The Commission had voted 4 to 3 in April 2025 to recommend approval of Elemental Ecotech’s first version of the permit, but the six-member Board of Supervisors denied the permit in June with a tie vote.
This time, the amount of land to be disturbed is slightly smaller at 1.346 acres, as opposed to 1.47 acres in the first submission.
“There are multiple checks in place to determine that there will be no impact to the regulatory floodway,” said Kelsey Schein, a planner hired to represent Elemental Ecotech, at the December 16 Planning Commission meeting.
The land is zoned for light industrial but the permit is required because of a flood protection overlay. The dirt to be used to fill in the floodplain will come from a neighboring property where construction is underway.
“This dirt is going to move off this property regardless,” Schein said. “This is an ideal location that is 500 feet away.”
At this point, Elemental Ecotech has not indicated exactly what would be built at the site, but industrial districts have performance standards that have to be met.
“In this case, we don’t know what the specific industrial uses are, but we have some steps in place in our ordinance to address more specific uses,” said Planning Manager Rebecca Ragsdale.
Albemarle staff determined that there would be no detrimental effect to the environment because it is not in an area that conveys flood water.
“The regulatory floodway will not be impacted,” said Deputy County Engineer Tony Edwards.
This time around, staff is requiring the developer to have a more specific timeline of when paperwork would be filed with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to formally have the official floodmap changed.
Across Franklin Street is a Charlottesville neighborhood where residents had previously urged denial of the permit out of concern the fill would make flooding worse. Eli Connell lives directly across from the property and urged the Commission to recommend denial, saying the federal government can’t be trusted at this time because some in the administration want to eliminate FEMA.
“The challenge here is that the federal regulations lag behind observed conditions,” Connell said. “We’re not going to get these protections from the federal government at this point, so it relies on our local communities.”
Bill Emory, a former member of the city’s Planning Commission, said the city should have the ability to weigh in.
“It’s really too bad on such an important issue at the border of our jurisdictions that we can’t just slow things down,” he said.
Commissioner Karen Firehock said she was opposed to filling in floodplains and listed a series of stakeholders who can’t give public comment.
“The great blue heron, the little green heron, the salamander, the kingfisher, the red bellied woodpecker,” Firehock said. “I could go on and on with a list of aquatic and riparian species that depend on that habitat.”
Firehock made a motion to recommend denial. The vote was 5 to 2. Former Planning Commission and recently elected Samuel Miller District Supervisor Fred Missel voted against the permit.
