Leesburg Town Council Update 1.26.21

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.