A stroll down memory lane

 

Random thoughts generated by a stack of Goochland Couriers from 2002 to 2007.

Litter

Stories covering the battle against roadside litter abound. Initiatives from distributing free nets at convenience centers so trucks could secure their loads, to adopting stretches of local highways by various groups popped up often. In one case, a citizen followed a truck spewing garbage, got its license number, reported it to the authorities and appeared in court. The judge found the accused guilty and imposed a fine. How many people who complain about littering would take the time to do that today? Among the new state laws that go into effect on July 1,2021 is an increase in the maximum fine for littering.

The root cause of roadside litter is lack of home training. Too few parents teach their kids that tossing trash out the car window is unacceptable.

Voting precincts

In June 2003, the Hadensville voting precinct was moved from the Company 6 Fire-Rescue station to County Line Baptist Church. In June 2021, the supervisors approved moving that precinct to the county-owned Company 6 Fire-Rescue station.

Schools

A replacement for Goochland Elementary School was discussed quite a bit during the early days of the century. Former school boards even spent a good bit of money hiring architects to craft plans to expand the existing school. It’s just as well those plans never came to fruition. The new GHS currently on the drawing board will reflect changes in education.

Roads

Roads woes are always with us.

 In 2002, Rt. 288 through Goochland was just getting underway. For some reason that makes sense only to the brilliant traffic engineers in the bunker of VDOT—the state agency whose motto is “Oops!”—right of way easements along Broad Street Road were not secured at the outset in anticipation of increased traffic volume there. This made remediation of a dangerous and poorly designed intersection, the site of many serious wrecks and at least one death, take longer and cost more than it should have.

In another foresight fail, Three Chopt Road between 250 and Ashland Road was cut off by the 288 overpass to I64. There are now plans to restore it by tunneling under Rt. 288. It cost millions of dollars and several years to install traffic signals and turn lanes at the 250/288 interchange. How much will it cost to build that tunnel?

As reported on April 16, 2002

When the last segment of Rt. 288 between Interstates 64 and 95 opened in 2005, transportation authorities believed the road would not reach full capacity for many decades.

Widening of Broad Street Road to Ashland Road was finished in late 2007. The “Centerville Speedway” aka four lanes of Broad Street Road to Manakin Road, took several more years. Its completion also needed remediation because the wrong curve template as used to design at the Manakin Road intersection making it impassable for large vehicles. The entertainment value of watching moving vans and horse trailers stuck there was short lived.

Now we have more traffic than ever using essentially the same roads as traffic engineers, retained by developers, contend that existing roads have plenty of capacity, it’s just the choke points that cause problems. This is a case of putting ten pounds of manure in a five-pound bag, and likely to get worse because there is not enough money to fix the problem.

TCSD

The Tuckahoe Creek Service District, touted as the economic engine to fund the county while keeping Goochland rural, was approved by the supervisors in May 2002. The board borrowed $65 million—the total county budget that year was approximately $35 million— to build trunk lines to bring water from Henrico and move sewage to Richmond through lines that ran through the Country Club of Virginia to a connection on Maple Avenue behind St. Catherine’s School. What could go wrong?

As it turned out, lots. The bond issue was so badly structured that at one point, Goochland’s bond rating was lower than that of Detroit. (Thanks to an intrepid board of supervisors, mostly elected in 2011, Goochland now has two AAA bond ratings and hopes to complete a hat trick later this year.) The owners of West Creek, much of which is in the TCSD, and the county went to war over assessed valuation resulting in two lengthy and expensive trials. Economic development in West Creek dried up for more than a decade.

Cost over runs, including litigation with various companies involved with building TCSD infrastructure resulted in shorter “trunk” lines. The ad valorem tax initially discussed as being fifteen cents per $100 of assessed valuation ballooned to fifty cents. When a 2004 county-wide reassessment—the first in several years—drastically increased property values, people in the TCSD, especially those with little hope of ever being connected were livid.

Right now, Hickory Haven and Sammary Forest, communities that have paid the ad valorem tax since its inception, are in the process of connecting to the TCSD sewer lines. Homeowners there must pay full connection fees to do so.

The library

In 2003, the “new” library was opened after years of denial by the supervisors that the county needed one. The community turned out en masse on a frigid January day to move books from the old building, now home to the Goochland Business Center, to the current site. This led someone to quip that the supervisors’ attitude that “it would be a cold day in Hades before Goochland got a new library” came true.

Our library is part of the Pamunkey Library system, ( https://www.pamunkeylibrary.org/ a consortium of several smaller counties that provides more resources for their patrons than would be possible by stand- alone libraries. Library cards are free to Goochland residents. They provide reciprocity with the Henrico library system. Throughout the pandemic, Pamunkey provided electronic services to patrons, and limited curbside services.

County facilities

In 2002, most county offices operated out of antique buildings around the Courthouse green. A smaller version of the current clerk’s office housed the county administrator; planning and zoning department; Treasurer, and Commissioner of the Revenue. In 2005, many government functions moved to the renovated “old” high school.

The Sheriff’s Office operated out of a warren under the General District Court Room until a state-of-the-art communications center, gracefully grafted onto the building was completed a few years ago.

As Goochland has grown, so has county staff. A few years ago, the Community Development Department absorbed an unused corridor to increase its footprint. Last year, offices of the Treasurer, Commissioner of the Revenue and DMV Select got a make-over.

In the spring of 2007, the “old middle school” AKA Central High School, closed at the end of the school year. This historic and well-used building moldered for too many years as the supervisors dithered over what to do with it. Options considered included tearing it down, using it for multijurisdictional special education facility, or selling the property. In the meantime, its gym was used by Parks and Rec, in spite of dreadful restroom and other facilities.

Thanks to a collaboration between the county and hard working and creative citizens, the facility was reborn as the vibrant Central High School Cultural and Educational Center. It is now home to the Monacan Soil   and Water Conservation District; the Extension Office; a 170 seat multi-purpose theater; meeting and classrooms; a renovated gym; restrooms; outdoor recreational opportunities; and a museum. Additional uses are in the works.

Housing

In 2003 Knight Bowles, then a District 2 planning commissioner, cautioned that, unless Goochland took an active role, it would become a high-priced bedroom community. People who expressed a desire for the county to be an inclusive mixed income community with a place “at the table” for a wide range of citizens have been disappointed. Not much has changed on this front.

In 2005, the average (the total divided by the number of data points) sale price for a home in Goochland was $430,756. Last May, statistics presented to the supervisors (see GOMM A home for everyone) contended that the median (half above, half below) home price was $421 K. (Many homes in the county have not yet returned to their pre-Great Recession 2009 valuations.) This is still out of reach for deputies, teachers, and fire-rescue providers.

Fewer county employees currently live in Goochland than in 2005. We don’t know how many people who work for large employers in the county live here. Land prices here remain higher than surrounding jurisdictions, housing costs follow.

Developers used to tease that if they were allowed higher density—more houses on less land—the prices would be affordable by teachers and deputies. That rarely materialized, even with the higher density.

Land values

A front-page headline on January 17, 2007, declared that land values in Goochland were $5.56 billion, the prerecession high. In January of 2021 that figure was $6.12 billion, $84 million of which was attributed to new construction during the year of Covid lockdown.

Weather

There were droughts and floods—sometimes in the same year. In 2003, Hurricane Isabel hammered Goochland with long and widespread power outages. Ice storms and snow storms knocked over trees and closed roads. Our intrepid fire-rescue volunteers were often first on the scene with chainsaws and strong backs to clear Mother Nature’s debris.

Fire-Rescue

There are lots of stories about our valient Fire-Rescue volunteers giving freely of their time, talents, and treasures to save lives and protect property in Goochland. This year marks the 70^th anniversary of the formation of the first volunteer fire company in the county at Dover, now Manakin Company 1, when a group of local men learned how to fight fires.

Goochland is a special place.