Looks like we’re not the only ones

I just took a look at the AC44 county survey and some of the results are very interesting. At least for me, the bulk of the questions were useless or were added to the survey because the county wanted results that would help support their case for expanding the growth areas and developing the I64 interchanges. The one really bothersome issue with the survey was instead of displaying percentages or raw numbers, they display the rankings, which to me made no sense. As for the overall response rate of the survey, it represents only 0.4 percent of the total population. The good news from the survey came with responses from the majority of residents who felt it was important or somewhat important to preserve “scenic highways and streets”, which bodes well for the future protection of Rt. 250 West. As a matter of fact, the survey also shows residents value maintaining historic buildings, dark skies, scenic streams and rivers, forestry land, agricultural land, and wildlife habitat all of which supports the results we obtained from Crozet residents on the recent aboutcrozet.com poll. The results just add more evidence that the residents of the county want to preserve our rural areas and not use them as a land bank for future development. This theme continues, with the majority of respondents NOT preferring to live in “large scale mixed use town centers”. In fact, in many of the responses where the county asks about what living conditions respondents prefer, the answers are always not favorable to what the county is proposing in AC44. Another positive for Crozet is, when asked where the respondents live, the highest response rate was from Crozet, but what else would you expect. There were some results that provided a more subtle view that probably did not make the county very happy. For instance, they asked the question “What opportunities would help you feel more financial and stable”, which I’m sure was the county looking for answers that support more development, meaning an ever expanding Albemarle. Instead the most frequent answer, by far, was “Not applicable, I’m financially stable. Finally, the county formed the question on future growth, “Where do you think the county should direct new residents and businesses in the next 20 years? Surprise, surprise, the lowest response rate was for expanding the growth area. Here’s a link to the survey results:

https://engage.albemarle.org/phase2/survey_tools/step-one-questions?tm_source=substack&utm_medium=email .

While the survey is closed it’s not too late for you to let the county know what you think. To do so it’s important is for you to attend the CCAC zoom meeting on Wednesday July 12^th at 6pm. Here’s the registration link:https://albemarle-org.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZMtdO6vrDsiGdxly5zO8aoa4X0iWnnbQh18#/registration . Hope to hear from you.