Chesterfield County supervisors will begin delivering prayers themselves at the start of their board meetings, changing a long-controversial policy that was criticized as unconstitutional in the wake of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision.
The county’s prayer policy required ministers who delivered invocations before meetings to be ordained religious leaders of monotheistic religions that follow Judeo-Christian traditions but instructed them to keep their prayers generic.
The Supreme Court in May upheld a New York town’s right to hold Christian invocations before its board meetings. But the ruling was less clear-cut on whether certain religions could be excluded from participating.
The American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for Separation of Church and State demanded in a letter that the county allow people from all faiths to participate in the opening prayers. Anything less, the letter said, would be “discriminatory” and at odds with the First Amendment.
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Instead of swinging open the doors to people of all faiths, the county instead will experiment with allowing only supervisors to open meetings with a prayer or moment of silence.
“We’re proposing a method whereby the invocation is offered by the members of the board and rotates throughout the board,” County Attorney Jeff Mincks said, “and each board member can choose whatever invocation or a moment of silence at their discretion.”
The board unanimously approved the change without commenting on it.
The new policy will take effect in January because the county has already booked ministers for the prayers through the end of the year. Mincks described it as a trial policy for 2015.
Chesterfield previously fought in court to retain its old policy: A Wiccan priestess sued the county after it denied her request to open a meeting with prayer in 2002.
A U.S. District Court judge found the county violated the First Amendment in the same way the ACLU and Americans United argued. But a three-judge federal panel overturned the decision, ruling in the county’s favor.
“This approach has the benefit of avoiding the problem of picking and choosing among community members who are permitted to offer prayers,” Carl Tobias, a constitutional law professor at the University of Richmond, said in an email. “Much will depend on the content of the prayers that the supervisors offer.”
The board also on Wednesday continued to grapple with how it will handle cash proffers.
Proffers are fees set by the county to offset the cost new homes have on schools, roads, libraries, fire stations and parks. The county’s maximum proffer fee of $18,966 for each new home is the highest in the region.
In one case, the board unanimously approved a 61-lot subdivision plan near Woolridge Road by Landing Development Corporation in which developers agreed to pay the full $18,966 proffer.
But Supervisor Dorothy Jaeckle said the case was a perfect example of how the proffer system is broken because the approved development will send students to the already overcrowded Cosby High School.
“It doesn’t make sense to have full approval on (a development) when you’re having it where there’s no room in the schools,” Jaeckle said.
Supervisor Steve Elswick said that issue could be resolved if the county School Board would study how best to redistrict schools.
“It is overcapacity, but there are ways to fix it,” Elswick said. “If you look at where we are with development and impacts on schools, that could be leveled a lot if we got some redistricting. I think it’s time to take a comprehensive review of all our schools and the attendance we have.”
In another case, the board denied a developer’s proposal to build a 50-home subdivision off Courthouse Road without paying proffer fees to offset growth.
Viridis Development Corp.’s requested rezoning to build the Forest Acres subdivision and offered to build a turn lane along Courthouse Road at Cherylann Road in lieu of paying cash proffers.
D. Brennen Keene, the developer’s attorney, argued that proffers should be waived in part because the developer already plans to spend nearly $400,000 to make already-needed improvements to stormwater drainage there. Keene also said that the development doesn’t impact schools and other public facilities. He cited a study showing that if every piece of available real estate were developed, the nearby schools would still be below their full capacity.
Supervisors pointed out that new residents impact more than just the closest schools, parks, libraries and fire stations.
The county Planning Commission recommended approving the project while county staff recommended denying the Viridis plan because its proposed improvements address its impact on roads but not on schools, parks and other public facilities.
Several county residents opposed the idea of allowing the developer to forego paying full proffers.
“You had no problem raising our transportation fees,” Bob Olsen told the board during a public hearing. “But then over and over and over to give developers a break while taxpayers take it in the nose, enough is enough. It needs to end now.”
In denying the development, supervisors cited environmental concerns and questioned whether the subdivision was of high enough quality along with the lack of cash proffers.
Jaeckle, who abstained from voting on the Viridis case, said she agreed that higher-quality homes should be promoted for infill developments. But she said certain schools in the county will continue to suffer if the county doesn’t do anything to promote a higher mix of home owners versus renters near them.
Jaeckle supports lower proffer fees for developers who build in areas that already have infrastructure instead of moving farther to the county’s west.
“We can do all we want to the schools, but if we don’t improve the demographics going into the schools, nothing is going to change,” she said. “I think I’m going to cancel all my meetings on revitalization because I don’t think anybody gets it.”
