Good evening, everyone! I hope you’re having a great week so far. I don’t have much commentary to add tonight (maybe y’all are grateful for that), but as always, I really appreciate you being here and supporting this endeavor. Even 13 weeks into this newsletter, my open rates and page views remain sky-high, and I’m just so impressed and heartened by the level of community engagement.
Floyd really is someplace special. Even its mundane (what? I meant thrilling) government meetings are important to me—and that’s exactly what I tuned in for yesterday. The Floyd County EDA held its first meeting of 2021 on Monday night.
You can read my coverage of the meeting below. Questions? Comments? You can reach me at aspinksdugan@gmail.com.
-Ashley
Beegle remains chairman of EDA after reorganization meeting
The Floyd County Economic Development Authority met yesterday evening for its reorganization meeting, its first in 2021.
The brief half-hour meeting mostly involved electing new officers and tying up a few other administrative loose ends. However, those tuned in via Zoom were privy to the latest developments at the Floyd Growth Center, after EDA members voted to certify their closed session.
The closed session of yesterday’s meeting marks the second such session recently. On Jan. 14, the EDA held a called meeting that consisted almost entirely of a closed session. Chairman Jon Beegle justified the meeting closure under Virginia Code sections A.3, A.5 and A.29. Those sections allow closed meetings for the following purposes, respectively: acquisition of real property; prospective business or industry and award of a public contract.
Yesterday, there was a motion to “approve the option to lease part of the Floyd Growth Center as amended during closed session for Project Floyd Growth.” This suggests Building 1 at the new complex near Floyd’s Commerce Park has found a tenant. There are no further details on the leaseholder right now.
As for the authority’s leadership, Beegle will remain the chairman for the upcoming year. Andy Finn was approved as vice-chair, replacing Eddie Worth. Worth said his primary focus at the moment is his work with the Safe Surfin’ Foundation, which aims to educate kids about internet safety. Worth is the foundation’s executive director and president. The foundation recently moved its headquarters to downtown Floyd.
Joy Gardner, who had initially planned to leave her position on the EDA at the end of 2020, has agreed to stay on for another year. She will be the treasurer/secretary for 2021.
“I feel like we’ve got a really strong set of people in our EDA...with skill sets that really do our community justice,” Beegle said after all the nominations were approved. The authority agreed to maintain its current regular meeting time—the fourth Monday of each month at 6 p.m.—for the next year.
For several consecutive meetings, the EDA has revisited the matter of suspending required payments for the 5 & 10 Loan Program. The program lends money to business owners in Floyd that, as EDA member Jim Newlin pointed out, typically have to put up 130% of the loan’s value in collateral. Tabitha Hodge, who helps manage the loan program, said the number of participants making good-faith payments has ticked up slightly. By March, she expects that seven of the 11 businesses with loans will be making their regular payments.
Hodge also explained that the loan fund is solvent. “There’s still plenty of money in there that if multiple companies needed to access a loan,” Hodge said, the county would be able to accommodate it. Community & Economic Development Director Lydeana Martin explained that she and Hodge preferred a vote on extending the deferral at this January meeting. Prior to last night’s meeting, mandatory payments were suspended through March 1, 2021. However, since the EDA meets near the end of each month, they wouldn’t have another opportunity to consider the suspension until a few days before it expired. The county wants to give businesses at least a month’s notice, Martin explained.
At Monday’s meeting, the EDA approved an extension through April 1. “There’s still an obvious lag of people getting out and doing what they normally would have done,” because of the pandemic, EDA member Marty Holliday explained. So it was right for the EDA to try to help.
Finally, Beegle asked the EDA to consider a proposal from a local scout troop. As part of a project to earn badges, Beegle explained, the troop wants to plant trees along Pioneer Trail at the Commerce Center. There will be 12-13 trees in total; a mix of mulberry and various types of dogwood. The trees are saplings. The project is being coordinated by Jayn Avery of the Partnership for Floyd.
Gardner expressed strong support for the idea. “I think that’s fabulous and Jayn is my neighbor - she won’t let anything go wrong, I’m sure,” Gardner said.
Martin also supported the idea, but reminded the EDA that part of its property surrounding the Commerce Center has been dedicated as a conservation easement. The conservation easement is part of an agreement with the Department of Environmental Quality to earn nutrient offsets for development of the park. Martin said the EDA should confirm that the agreement doesn’t place any restrictions on the species of tree that can be planted.
The Floyd County EDA will next meet Feb. 22 at 6 p.m.
Editor’s Note: In the Jan. 23 edition of this newsletter, which covered Floyd Town Council’s consideration of adding an invocation to its meetings, I wrote that Floyd resident Alan Graf “often” attends Board of Supervisors meetings. Graf asked that I clarify that he attends such meetings “on rare occasions.”