Manassas Park Throws A Hail Mary
By Greg L | 9 November 2007 | Manassas Park | 28 Comments
Manassas Park has announced it is courting a developer to build a mixed-use project including 6,200 housing units near the Manassas Park VRE station in a strange attempt to profit from the realignment of thousands of defense workers from Crystal City to Fort Belvoir. Just as Colonial Downs targeted this small municipality in recent years as a pliant and desperate locality in which to place a satellite wagering facility, now American Building Corporation is seeing a rare opportunity to slam in a huge high-density development under the guise that people who live there would find a commute from Manassas Park to Fort Belvoir more convenient than a commute from Woodbridge, or southern Fairfax County.
This proposal is so patently inane it makes my head spin. At the same time Manassas Park has a record amount of vacant housing and foreclosures, it wants to add thousands of new residential units in an area where transportation infrastructure is severely limited, under the expectation that defense workers will want to take the VRE to Fort Belvoir. The VRE’s Manassas Line doesn’t go to Fort Belvoir. It doesn’t go anywhere near it. So what the heck is going on here?
Manassas Park is heavily over-reliant on residential property taxes, and as a result tax rates in Manassas Park are 20% higher than in surrounding jurisdictions. As this revenue source shrinks, it strains the city’s nearly non-existent financial reserves and has necessitated huge cuts in public works spending — spending that is only deferred, not avoided. In an attempt to re-balance the commercial-residential mix, the city got a developer to start working on a Town Center project which is going as slowly as possible since the developer’s revenue is tied to leasing revenues when they materialize, and commercial vacancy rates are so significant currently that spending money to build commercial space now in order to get revenues later isn’t that great a prospect for a developer. To incentivize this commercial development effort, the new idea here is to drop in a huge number of residential units in close proximity and improve the potential value of commercial space the Town Center project. Until that project is ready for occupancy, the city makes nothing, and the terrible imbalance between relatively stable commercial revenues versus declining residential revenues continues.
Meanwhile, the city is trying to keep residential real estate assessments as high as possible, denying that property values have declined in Manassas Park as they have everywhere else, in an outrageous scheme to prop up tax revenues. City residents really haven’t been complaining about this yet, but at some point these fictitious assessments are going to overcome resident’s typical reluctance to take the Governing Board to task to any of the serial inanities it engages in. With an electorate so disconnected from its elected officials, the opportunity for shenanigans is huge, and the Governing Board doesn’t seem to be passing many of these chances up. This proposal is a huge one.
Dropping such a massive project that will undeniably place thousands of additional vehicles on Route 28 is going to overwhelm the transportation system in both Manassas and Manassas Park. VRE is not going to handle more than a small fraction of the transportation needs for relocated defense workers, it’s pure fantasy that workers being relocated because of BRAC are going to be eager to move to Manassas Park in order to pay higher taxes than they were, and 6,200 housing units on a 115 acre parcel is dramatically higher density than any other proposed developments in the region. The 6,800 Brentswood development, which was soundly rejected due to transportation infrastructure concerns, was proposed on a 1,500 acre parcel very close to interstate 66. This proposal of nearly the same scope has only over-burdened Route 28 to handle its transportation needs.
This proposed project is a recipe to turn Manassas Park into a huge slum, and given current economic conditions and geography is about one of the most brain-dead ideas ever to come out of Manassas Park’s Governing Board. This looks a whole lot more like the game of picking the one location a developer might want to do this in, and two more he wouldn’t, and using the exercise as a justification to get 6,200 units approved for rezoning in Fairfax County. Let’s hope that’s the case, because if this really is as serious a proposal as the Manassas Park Governing Board makes it out to be, this is going to utterly destroy what remaining value this municipality retains for its beleaguered residents.
Such a patently stupid proposal must have some basis in corruption if it’s serious, just as I expect that there’s going to be corruption discovered at some point in the Cougar Elementary project, where the city is spending about twice the going rate for elementary school construction than any other jurisdiction is paying. Making utterly stupid financial decisions at a local level doesn’t happen because elected officials are themselves are stupid, but because they’re darned smart. They know better than anyone how to line their pockets, while hiding what’s going on from a somewhat disinterested local press and a disengaged electorate by burying the shady details in pages of mind-numbing legalese blather.
This desperate move to supposedly rescue the financial position of the city is pathetic. Manassas Park residents should be outraged.
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28 Comments
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Great. More traffic.
We are and we will do nothing about it as usual. Welcome to the park.
This indeed may be a “Hail Mary” by Manasas Park.
There last best hope to obtain economic viability as
a city before their financial foundation starts to really
slide down hill.
Prince William residents should wish them well. If this
doesn’t pan out, I predict they will seek reversion to
town status and become a part of PWC - then the
county would have to foot most of any outstanding bills
and operating cost. MP tax rates would fall while
PWC cost would rise.
“THEIR last best hope”
If Manassas Park does lose their financial footing and must become part of PWC, that means that illegals living in the Park would also be subject to the county resolution.
Big Dog: From your mouth to God’s ears. MP falling on to PWC would be the best thing that could happen to this town. We could get rid of that corrupt mayor and city council and pay reasonable real estate tax rates. $4000 a year on a house that I couldn’t give away now that the illegals have swarmed the town is an outrage of the 10th magnitude and I won’t stand for it any longer come reassessment time in February.
Most active-duty military families have children. Like many, we look at schools and school district when choosing where to relocate, which is why we chose the Brentsville area when my husband was assigned to Quantico. Military families aren’t going to want to locate to Manassas Park because the schools are terrible. The word is already out about Manassas Park — in military circles it is known derisively as “Manasty”.
Notes-
-If Manassas Park became a town, it would still
have a mayor and council and many of the same
services it has now - just in a different format.
(For example: Leesburg and Herndon are towns as are
Haymarket, Dumfries, Quantico and Qccuquan).
The MP school system would merge with PWC.
- The last city to revert to town status in Virginia
was South Boston (Halifax County) almost a decade ago.
It apparently has worked well for both jurisdictions.
This proposal and its undeniable consequences (slums, crime, rats, poor schools) is the natural result of allowing a foreign invasion force to take over a jurisdiction with impunity.
Prince William County and Manassas City residents have a very vested interest in this proposal NOT happening. Just the traffic congestion alone makes it a horrible idea.
As for MP reverting back to town status, I sincerely hope it does not. It would help the Park and cause problems for all county residents.
Advocator: Huh?
Manasty Park, I like that! I shall email Jones and the council with that new term and see what they think of it. These guys are seriously nuts if they think anybody other than illegals and/or their legal/illegal family members would ever consider living here now that the town has been ransacked. This is nothing more than a last ditch effort to save what’s left of the tax base from eroding.
park’d,
Will you be addressing that letter as “Jellyfish Jones”, as someone once called him on there. It’s unbelievable what’s become of the Park. It’s a little better here in WestGate, but thank goodness there are concerned citizens in the county willing to take action and report things to the county.
You can be concerned all you want here in the park and they will just call you racist. They will do nothing when you bring it to their attention. The police are pretty good at responding, but the mayor and council are a disgrace.
park’d
They call us racists here too. However, the PWCBOS have listened to the legal citizens, and taken action to fix the problem. We all know this crap didn’t happen overnight, and won’t go away overnight either.
A connecting line to the VRE will be completed in say 30 years?
Well, if the military families pass on MP (which in all probability they will) MP can provide the housing units for more illegals in an already well established illegal community. Make sense?
Why would PWC have to accept MP if they went belly up. They made the choice to be independent a long time ago. Make your bed and lie in it!
The town and its citizens shouldn’t have to suffer for the corruption and mismanagement of the lunatic mayor and city council. It’s not exactly like the town will just be allowed to go bankrupt and the police force and school system employees allowed to go without pay. An outside entity needs to come in at that point and go through the MP books and deals with a fine toothed comb; which is something I am sure that the mayor and his cronies wants to avoid at all costs.
Couple key points:
- Less than 5% of the 19,300 jobs being realigned to Fort Belvoir are jobs not presently in this region — less than 500 of the jobs are at places like Aberdeen and Fort Monmouth.
- More than 95% of the 19,300 jobs are filled by people who already live in the region, next door to me and you. How many people whose jobs will move from beltway leased space to space closer to their homes do you think will actually move?
- Out of the entire 19,300 being realigned to Belvoir, only about 5,000 are military. The rest are federal service and embedded contractor (civilians).
- The 6,200 that would move from leased space in Crytal City and elsewhere are almost all civilian. It’s those folks ABC would have move into its office park. (And, again, they already live here).
- Whoever would move into new homes AMC might build, it won’t be anyone realigned to Fort Belvoir under BRAC05.
One who knows:
Re: realignment from Crystal City — you are right — the majority are contractors who are already located in the DC area and would not move because the job site has been realigned. Our neighbor works for DHS and his physical worksite has moved four times within the DC/NoVA area, yet he hasn’t moved, just changed his commute.
As well, there is more than enough existing housing stock due to turnover (military move about every three years), overbuilding and foreclosures that there is no need for adding yet MORE housing stock to the mix.
Actually, most of the 6,200 in question are DOD civil service, with only a few contractor.
I cannot imagine any Department of Defense employees really considering to relocate their families to Manassas Park. It will be interesting to see who really winds up in this type of housing project after the rates are dropped to encourage residency.
cdubbs said on 9 Nov 2007 at 8:57 pm:
I cannot imagine any Department of Defense employees really considering to relocate their families to Manassas Park. It will be interesting to see who really winds up in this type of housing project after the rates are dropped to encourage residency.
read post: Anonymous on 9 Nov 2007 at 4:50 pm:
Have you been to Haverhill Apartments? I have several friend in the community- those units are rented by mostly white folks. The apartment complex has exceedingly high credit standards to get a unit, which probably plays into the demographic make up of its residents. The Centex development is mostly white and upper middle class. The newer developments are going to attract newer, more affluent residents. It’s the older sections of town as well as the townhome communities that will continue to become more heavily Latino. I think after the all the foreclosures, the single family homes will not have the same overcrowding issues that they do at present. How that all balances out, I don’t know, but I think you are wrong assuming that expensive, new housing will be rented or owned by the largely Latino immigrant community.
park’d said on 9 Nov 2007 at 5:09 pm:
The town and its citizens shouldn’t have to suffer for the corruption and mismanagement of the lunatic mayor and city council.
Park’d, as much as I sympathize with you (and I truly do), I have to say that the citizens of Manassas Park made their bed a very long time ago with their apathy. You know yourself that voter turnout is ALWAYS abysmal and that we’ve TRIED to get voters there involved in cleaning up the corruption their community for a long time, to no avail. Do you want to know what happened to the recall movement (against your Mayor and City Council)? We couldn’t get more than ONE MP citizen to get interested in doing anything, and that person didn’t have the time to take point (only citizens of the Park can circulate and witness petitions). We, on the outside, can do very little to clean up your mess for you…the people of the Park have got to resolve to do it themselves.
I may not agree with MP politics but II have to laud this effort. Both Manassas and Manassas Park have fallen prey to the economuic development is a strip mall mentality. While this would worsen traffic, in the long term it moves thousands of high paying jobs to the region. I’d gladly trade my hour plus commute for one. Think quality of life!
Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts. There are 6,200 DoD jobs to be relocated, not 6,200 housing units. It would be just as accurate to say that Columbus discovered the new world in the year 2984 A.D. (For the record, 2984 is twice as much as 1492.)
Each government job usually creates 2 civilian support jobs, and most of us in the D.C. area owe our living to this relationship. So 6,200 DoD jobs are estimated to create up to 20,000 total jobs at a mass transit hub.
Studies show that by locating offices on a Metro stop, half of these 20,000 workers quit driving and use mass transit. Many more would walk to work from 3,000 housing units on site at the town center. Assuming two workers per home, that leaves only 4,000 cars to “reverse commute” to work.
Any way you cut it, 20,000 cars are taken off the rush hour side of the road and 4,000 cars are put on the empty side of the road. Unless you’re someone who enjoy gridlock, every commuter is better off with these cars removed.
Right now the VRE train loads up with suburban commuters in the morning and takes them into D.C. Then the empty train drives back to the suburbs for another load of commuters. Why not fill this train both ways by putting employment around suburban train stations? The proposal estimates that the extra ticket sales will eliminate $300 million of VRE subsidies. Every taxpayer is better off.
Finally, the site is proposed to be the highest (Platinum) rated for energy efficiency and environmental design. How is anyone hurt iby creating jobs and help the environment at the same time?
I don’t know about everyone else, but I want less traffic.