On Tuesday, January 26, the Leesburg Town Council met for our second meeting of the year.  The work session from Monday evening was cancelled due to weather.  The discussion on the Airport Commission will take place at the first work session in February (Monday, February 8.) 

At the meeting on Tuesday, we recognized and presented proclamations to Girl Scout Troup 2718 for the tree and marker they placed at Georgetown Park for COVID-19 victims, Eagle Scout William Murphy, and National Mentoring Month (January.) We passed an update to a previously approved zoning ordinance text amendment to allow small convenience store or kiosks at gas stations in the JLMA. We also voted to postpone the town council retreat that was scheduled for this coming Saturday.  I'm disappointed that we had to postpone the retreat, but I totally understand the situation due to Covid-19 and being able to properly hold the retreat.  I look forward to trying to reschedule further down the road to discuss our goals and areas of focus as a council for the next two years.  Due to the postponement of the retreat, I brought up an idea to send our three or four goals for the next two years to the Town Manager and then any that we have in common, we can discuss at future work sessions.  My aim is to keep the dialogue going about future goals for the town so that council can be more proactive.  

Finally, I asked council to suspend the rules and bring up my Pandemic Business Assistance and Recovery Plan.  Council unanimously voted to bring up the plan and discuss.  We had a great discussion about the impact of COVID-19 on our business community, our town revenue, and the recovery needed to dig out of the current deficit.  I made a motion to split up the plan and we passed (7-0) $500,000 for business grants for Leesburg businesses, as well as $50,000 for the Economic Development team to put together their marketing website and marketing plan to drive consumers to Leesburg to shop and eat at our small businesses.  Finally, we allocated $25,000 to close down King Street on the weekends this spring.  I have heard from a number of businesses downtown about how helpful closing the street down is for their foot traffic.  We will discuss the other items from my plan at a future work session, including the $500,000 recovery fund and continuing to partner with the Small Business Development Center here in Leesburg.  I appreciate my fellow councilmembers discussion and their willingness to push the grant program forward.  

As always, you can reach me at zcummings@leesburgva.gov with questions.  We have a lot of important topics coming up including the budget, town plan, and ethics policy to name a few.  It will be a busy couple months, but I'm looking forward to continuing to work together and get things done for Leesburg.  

On Monday, January 11, I attended my first town council work session as a member of the Leesburg Town Council.  It was a learning experience being among the councilmembers and discussing the issues on the agenda.  We ran through a list of organizational topics that included the town council rules, an ethics policy, the invocation during council meetings, and re-organizing the Airport Commission.  These issues will come up during the next couple work sessions.  I look forward to discussing the issues.  

A few notes from these organizational issues, I do not support eliminating the invocation.  I proposed and will pursue asking the Diversity Commission to find a diverse group of religious leaders or residents to lead our invocations during the town council meetings.  I believe this will be a way to keep the quiet moment before our meetings intact and engage our community members.  My intention to ensure the participants come from all religions and all areas of Loudoun County.  I look forward to discussing this at the next work session.  

Additionally, I'm interested in discussing the ethics policy for the Leesburg Town Council.  We need to ensure that all members of the town council are acting in an ethical way that best represents Leesburg.  When someone does not act in a way that follows our ethics code, there must be a process to discipline those members.  

I asked for a work session on my Pandemic Business Relief and Recovery Plan.  I will post more on this plan, including the full text,  this week.  

At our first official town council meeting on Tuesday, I was disappointed that a proposal to allow disconnections via Leesburg Water & Sewer passed.  I voted against ending the moratorium.  I do commend our staff for working hard to communicate with residents that are behind on bills to get them into a payment plan before taking the drastic step in shutting off water.  If you or someone you know are struggling to pay utility bills, please reach out to Loudoun County Information & Referral for help.  Their phone number is 703-777-0420.  If you'd rather reach out to me, I'm happy to help connect you as well.  

Additionally, I was honored to be selected to be the council liaison to the Thomas Balch Library and the Board of Architectural Review for the town of Leesburg.  I look forward to working with the board members on these boards.  

Finally, I wanted to leave you with the comments I made during the Council comment section of the meeting: 
"I'm honored to be here and to be serving the people of Leesburg.  I urge any member of the public to reach out to me with their questions or concerns."

"As elected officials, our words matter.  When you question the validity of an election with rumors, innuendos, and conspiracy theories you harm our democracy.  Those elected officials that inspire divisiveness and insurrection must be held accountable for their words and actions.  What we witnessed on January 6 was an attack on the very seat of our democracy and was spurned along by the words of some of our elected officials.  We all must remember that our words matter. "

"With that being said, I look forward to working elbow to elbow with all the members of this council.  When I disagree with you on an issue, I will do it without being disagreeable.  We have a lot of issues to handle to keep our town moving forward and I look forward to working on these issues with all of you."

The next town council work session will be Monday, January 25 and town council meeting will be Tuesday, January 26.  Both begin at 7 PM.  As always, don't hesitate to reach out to me via email at zcummings@leesburgva.gov.