HoodaThunk?

There’s an interesting story in the recent edition of the Loudoun Times-Mirror regarding a building I was aware of but haven’t seen for a long time. As you ride westbound on Route 7 out of Tyson’s Corner, you’ll pass into Loudoun very close to Dranesville. The section of Route 7 right there at the county line has a retail presence that includes an “outdoor” mall, some restaurants, a car dealership – and 1 classic case of urban blight.

The building, detailed in this story, used to be an Exxon gas station. I recall seeing it when it was open and I recall seeing the station close down and the building go up on the market. Shortly after that, my job location changed and I quit traveling that section of road, but it’s been 5 or 6 years since then. The last time I passed by there was several months ago and I recall thinking to myself that I was amazed no one had fired up another business in that building, situated as it is. Apparently, I’m not the only one who thinks so:

With its cracked parking lot, torn siding and gaping holes, this shoe-box-shaped building along Route 7 has sat empty for at least five years, and Erica Laufer of Potomac Falls wants to know why.

“How many more years must we be greeted by this eyesore shell when entering LoCo?” she asked in a postcard mailed to county officials and the media.

The property is at 47000 Harry Byrd Highway, across from the Sugarland Crossing Shopping Center, and squeezed between Saturn of Sterling and Mattress Discounters.

It turns out that Erica Laufer is the only person who actually put in a complaint about the building, and she’s got a point. More to my point, however, is that with all the talk about eminent domain that’s gone on since the  Kelo v. New London decision it’s fascinating that a property that has truly taken on a blight condition is allowed to stand in full view of what is arguably the county’s busiest road. And just why is it that it is allowed to remain this way? Pretty simple: the county’s Board of Supervisors have never implemented the process that would allow them to remove the building:

Properties like this, and the dozens of foreclosed or abandoned homes sitting empty and unkempt across Loudoun, point to a void in Loudoun government: a spot blight abatement program.

Unlike Fairfax County, which has had this program in place since 1996, Loudoun does not have the authority to acquire an abandoned property through eminent domain and have it torn down or renovated at the owner’s expense.

Keith Fairfax, Loudoun’s zoning enforcement manager, said state law allows Loudoun to enact its own program to rid the county of unsightly properties. But, “because [blight] really hasn’t been that big of an issue” in Loudoun, he said, county leaders have not done so.

Sounds like something the BoS should put on their schedules, and pretty blasted quickly. If you’d like to put in a word to them you can visit this page and send your Supervisor (or the whole board) a request.

I’m an advocate for the very, very careful use of eminent domain and I would absolutely not suggest using it to pull a non-blighted property from 1 owner and giving it to another, as was done in Kelo case. I’m not even suggesting that this property be confiscated from the legal owners – yet -  but they should be required to maintain the property so it doesn’t start to look like… well, an abandoned property. Like it looks now. If the owners can’t or don’t want to either sell the property or get a business going in it, then they should be given a choice. Either maintain the building and the lot in keeping with the other businesses in that line of buildings or take it down, tear up the parking lot, and plant some trees. If they’d rather put up a privacy fence that they will then maintain, I could live with that but that building would have to come down.

In any case, the BoS should move to give itself the tools necessary to apply the pressure these owners so clearly need to have applied.