Homebuyer beware
VDOT’s road-expanding project threatens Fontaine Avenue
On April 16, a State appraiser showed Monica Vieira approximately how much of her front yard will be appropriated by the Virginia Department of Transportation.
“I kept saying, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me,’” Vieira says. She and Kevin Kotlarski bought the house at 2316 Fontaine Ave. for $210,000 in December, after deciding against a bungalow on nearby Monte Vista Avenue.
“We really liked the character of this place,” says Vieira, standing beneath a towering pine tree. “I had all kinds of plans for fixing up the yard.”
Her landscaping agenda changed last month, when a VDOT official said the agency wants to purchase some of her land to widen Fontaine Avenue. Vieira and Kotlarski will lose several feet of lawn, including the pine tree, where their property borders Montpelier Street. If property owners along Fontaine don’t sell their land, VDOT can take it by eminent domain.
Furthermore, City Council in June likely will approve zoning changes to allow taller buildings on Fontaine. Drawings from the City’s comprehensive plan show a U-shaped apartment building where the Vieira and Kotlarski’s house now stands.
Had they known about the impending changes, would Vieira and Kotlarski still have bought the house?
“That’s a good question. I ask myself that every day,” says Kotlarski.
“We certainly wouldn’t have paid so much for it,” says Vieira.
The home’s previous owner, Michael Carmagnola, knew about the construction plans before the sale. “I was aware there were discussions about that, but I thought VDOT had put those plans on hold,” Carmagnola says. “I don’t recall if we had a specific conversation about it, though. I’m sorry that they’re upset.”
Kotlarski says talking with Carmagnola is “on the agenda.”
“We’re waiting until our emotions aren’t so much on our sleeves,” he says.
For now, the couple, along with other Fontaine residents, is directing its feelings at City Hall. On April 21, Vieira made a tearful appeal to City Council to stop or scale back the construction plans. Hans Gerstl, Jr. has been holding meetings with residents and City officials at his Fontaine Avenue restaurant, Ludwig’s Schnitzelhouse.
“My mother and father started this business in 1970, and I lived up upstairs as a child,” says Gerstl. “I’ve seen all the nice homes on Jefferson Park Avenue turn into apartment complexes. We’re determined that’s not going to happen in our neighborhood.”
The Fontaine project, however, actually began during Gerstl’s childhood. In 1974 City Council first requested that VDOT widen the road, which is an important thoroughfare for UVA football traffic and one of the “entrance corridors” Council has long targeted for redevelopment. VDOT’s original designs called for a five-lane road, which residents thought was too massive. In 1996, a task force of City officials and Fontaine residents agreed that VDOT would instead make Fontaine three lanes––two travel lanes and a turn lane. The State also agreed to build sidewalks and plant trees. VDOT said it would pay half the cost to put utility lines underground, but City Council ruled that only commercial districts like Downtown and West Main require clear skies, and refused to pay for the undergrounding on Fontaine.
Since then, residents have come and gone in that neighborhood. “All the residents who sat on that task force no longer live on Fontaine,” says Councilor Meredith Richards, who works with the State on local road projects.
If Council were to back out of the project now, it would have to pay VDOT nearly $800,000 for engineering work that’s already been done. “That’s extremely unlikely,” says Richards.
Because major road projects are typically approved in one decade and built in another, new residents can feel ambushed when construction begins. As Vieira and Kotlarski can attest, homebuyers can’t rely on sellers or the City to warn them about projects that might be lurking in their neighborhood. Sellers want to seal the deal, and, say critics, City leaders keep residents in the dark so as to minimize political turmoil.
Kotlarski says he wants to delay VDOT’s land acquisition as long as possible in hopes of scaling back the widening project. Councilor Richards says the project may be “tweaked,” but will not be significantly changed.
Somehow Vieira has found the situation’s upside. “One good thing about this,” she says, “we’ve had all these meetings and we’ve gotten to know our neighbors pretty quickly.”
––John Borgmeyer
Two of a kind
Two of three local banks report profits
During the past two months, most local banking news has been dominated by one story, the $2.4 million check-kiting scheme perpetrated by Ivy Industries against Albemarle First Bank. But recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission by Albemarle First and other locally owned banks indicate it’s not all bad news out there. “This is chapter one of a long story—and so far, so good,” says Virginia National Bank President Mark Giles, assessing his bank’s performance last year.
VNB and Guaranty Bank each experienced solid growth in 2002, according to annual reports recently filed with the SEC. Both posted earnings, too, in contrast to Albemarle First, which lost 22 cents per share for the year and, which, besides the Ivy Industries’ fraud, grappled with the lingering after-effects of aggressive lending and poor underwriting in previous years.
VNB grew assets by nearly $30 million in 2002, to stand at $170.6 million and earned 41 cents per share. Loans were up and VNB’s loan loss reserve was a healthy 1.07 percent of outstanding loans. Loan loss reserve refers to the allowance for bad loans that a bank builds into its financial calculations.
“It’s an unfolding story,” says Giles. “We’re ahead of where I expected us to be in all areas, and we’re still growing into our capital, which will take a couple of years.”
On May 1, VNB stock closed at a price of $18.50 per share, on the low end of its 52-week range.
Last year VNB posted a small dip in mortgages and consumer loans. Giles says that alteration doesn’t reflect a specific bank policy: “I can’t imagine why in 2002 anybody would get a car loan when they could get one from GMAC with 0 percent interest. It’s not so much our intention as it is the way the world has evolved.”
Guaranty Bank showed the most dramatic progress of the three locally owned banks, earning 89 cents per share in 2002. On top of that, this year Guaranty has already paid out a cash dividend to shareholders and has announced a second dividend to come. While assets have steadily decreased in the past two years to stand at $209 million at the end of 2002, this is positive news for the bank. Guaranty has undertaken a steady process of reform after entering into an agreement in October 2000 with the Federal Reserve Bank. Generally, a written agreement between a bank and the Fed indicates that regulators harbor some reservations about whether the bank is being run in a safe and sound fashion. As part of the agreement, Guaranty revised a number of its policies and realigned its loan portfolio. Its real estate-related loans have been on the decline, while its commercial business loans have seen steady growth.
Guaranty President William E. Doyle, Jr. says it’s all blue skies for Guaranty: “There was a very rapid ramp-up in lending practices and a high concentration of real estate-related loans,” he says.
“We were on a rapid-growth track, and the bank just didn’t have the procedures and personnel in place to take care of that,” Doyle continues. “There was a conscious decision to downsize the bank, not with a target in mind, but to focus on profitability as our primary objective.”
Indeed, commercial business lending currently comprises 51 percent of total loans outstanding at Guaranty, and residential mortgages decreased by half in 2002 from the previous year to $20.1 million. Its overall loan loss reserve last year was 1.36 percent.
Guaranty’s shares closed on May 1 at $14.76, at the high end of their 52-week range.
While Albemarle First posted a loss last year, its total assets climbed to an all-time high of $101.1 million, nearly a 12 percent increase over 2001. The bank’s loan loss reserve was 1.58 percent, reflecting the risky loan portfolio that has troubled the institution. Albemarle First President Thomas M. Boyd, Jr. predicts 2003 will be the start of a turnaround, even as the lender copes with fraud: “We’re working on our loan portfolio and the size of the troubled loan portfolio will decrease this year.
“Later on this year,” he continues, “things will improve greatly.”
Albemarle First shares closed on May 1 at $8.24, in the middle of their 52-week range.
—Aaron Carico
Batesville P.O.
Town faces identity crisis last business goes on the block
A dilapidated barn slouches along the side of Plank Road. The overgrown entranceway of Lochwood Farm waits quietly, not a car in sight. Just 100 feet beyond the farm’s tilting brick pillars, a small sign reads “Welcome to Batesville, established 1741.” It’s the only indication that this rural Albemarle area has a name, not to mention a community. But with the closing of the only general store in the area, Page’s Store and Post Office, locals wonder how long Batesville’s identity will stay intact.
“We wouldn’t have a community out here if it weren’t for the store,” says Rose Page, who owns the barren and musty remains of Batesville’s Page’s Store, “or the Post Office for that matter.”
Opened in 1914, Page’s Store and Post Office was originally purchased by Rose’s father-in-law in 1913. His son, Charles Page, took over the store in 1939, also becoming postmaster. When Charles married Rose in 1942, she became the store’s bookkeeper, making certain the full line of meats and produce were in stock, the horse collars and shoes were ordered and the monthly bills for freezers and televisions were being paid.
But when their son Charlie, who began working in the store in 1970, decided not to run it any longer, the Page family store closed its doors in 1994—on its 80th anniversary.
“We had all grown up in the store,” says Charlie, whose grandfather and father prided themselves on providing Batesville with everything from groceries to baby clothes. “There wasn’t anything the store didn’t sell at one time or another,” says Rose.
From January 1996 to July 2001 a local retired couple occupied the store carrying, according to Rose and her son, “a miniscule amount of stock in comparison to ours.” For the few years to follow, the 200 local postal boxes would continue to be filled by the new Postmistress Debra Fitzgerald. The need for a place to quickly grab a gallon of milk would not.
“The community’s identity is in this space,” says Charlie. “If we lose the post office for example, then Batesville’s mail will filter through Charlottesville or Afton, and Batesville will no longer exist.”
Furthermore, if no one purchases Page’s Store any time soon, it could face the fate of many other retail locations in rural Albemarle being changed into single-family residences.
But that’s progress, a movement nearly as incomprehensible as the laws that govern it. An arcane ordinance at best, the present RA—or rural areas district zoning—hovering over Page’s Store hasn’t been updated since 1969, a time when most rural general stores survived as “stores” under grandfather clauses.
But RA zoning laws, born out of concern for preservation of rural agricultural activities and water supply, can go into effect if the store isn’t occupied within two years. Page’s Store’s grandfather clause will then expire, and so will the only retail operation in the village.
“Page’s was a legal nonconformity, and we allow it to stay in that existence,” says John Grady, manager of zoning permit review for the County’s Building Code and Zoning Services. As a nonconformity, Page’s Store is declared incompatible with the RA zoning district in which it’s located unless it is discontinued, removed or changed. If it’s vacant for more than two years however, then it must go back to residential to fit into the original zoning ordinance. Some in the village claim this alone is pushing retail opportunities right out of town.
“There were once five stores here,” says Charlie Page, “now they’re all homes.
“This was once a self-contained, self-sustaining village.”
Currently listed at $285,000, the Page’s Store building does include the post office, which is due to renew its lease in 2005. If renewed, the new owners of Page’s Store would also be the proud owners of the local post office at least until 2010.
Still, while locals fight to keep the last remaining vestige of business alive and well in the community, not every Batesvillian understands the need to live in the past. Carol Marvel, three-year Batesville resident and the current Postmaster relief for the Batesville Post Office, is one of them. A Postmaster by trade, she’s not necessarily wedded to the Batesville Post Office, or store.
“Batesville is on some maps, and I don’t know why,” says Marvel. “It must be from something in the past, and I just haven’t found it yet.”
Marvel, like others, sees no need for the store, or the rural mentality. “Maybe some feel more secure in staying within the little community, but we have our big city problems here, too,” says Marvel, whose husband is the Pastor of Batesville United Methodist Church. “They just get shuffled under the rug a little more.”
Although Page’s Store has seen a small amount of retail action as of late (local artisans held sales there during Thanksgiving and Christmas of last year), there’s still some debate as to whether this July will officially marks its second year of vacancy.
“If we lose the grandfather clause,” says Charlie, “there’s never a chance to get it back.”—Kathryn E. Goodson
Cupola hoopla
Mt. Vernon turret moves north to 7-Eleven
Fans of historical preservation have a new friend: The 7-Eleven at Woodbrook Village Shopping Center on Route 29N. Now you can catch a glance at the bygone days of Charlottesville while picking up a Coca-Cola Slurpee. How so? Management for the shopping center on April 25 imported the stately cupola formerly perched atop the Mt. Vernon Hotel.
The hotel on 29N near the Route 250 Bypass exit is undergoing demolition to make way for electronics superstore Best Buy. While others in town opposed to big box development did the normal Charlottesville thing—they held meetings—Van der Linde Homes, the new owners of the Woodbrook strip mall, decided to preserve a part of the 55-year-old structure by saving the ornamental roof piece.
According to Patty Cornell, property manager at Woodbrook Village, it’s all part of the shopping center’s mission to bring “a little bit of Williamsburg to Charlottesville.” (Among other Woodbrook Village businesses are Amigo’s and Paint Plus. We’ll have to look for them on our next trip to the colonial tourist destination.)
Cornell says that the cupola transfer was precipitated by Van der Linde Homes’ owner Peter van der Linde’s desire not to lose a piece of what is the City’s past as well as his own. “Mr. van der Linde stayed there when he was a kid and first moved to Charlottesville,” Cornell says, adding she did the same. “It’s got such a history to it and it’s such a beautiful piece of architecture that we though it would make a beautiful addition to the shopping center.” (See photo, page 5.)
Van der Linde made arrangements with the Mt. Vernon owners and voila, the cupola now sits atop the gas-and-grocery while the Woodbrook’s carpenters intermittently fix it up. After that it will be relocated again to the top of the Pakistani/Indian eatery Taj Mahal. As an added bonus, Cornell says the light that briefly beamed from the cupola may be reinstated after renovations (apparently years earlier the airport forced the Mt. Vernon to quell the light since the megawatt bulb interfered with planes).
Cornell says the shopping center would be open to incorporating other historical artifacts, but only if they fit the Williamsburg theme. Perhaps they could find a home for poor Aunt Sarah from the Pancake House, which is also in the line of Best Buy’s construction. We hear she makes a mean flapjack. What’s more colonial than that?—Eric Rezsnyak
Write turn
West Main typewriter still key after 50 years
West Main Street, like most City streets, carries the whiff of technology. Cars stop and go while their occupants devour precious cell phone minutes. Joggers adjust headsets and catch their storefront reflections mingling with Sprint offers for the next wave of wireless. Still, efforts to turn the street into a high-tech corridor have crashed so far like an overtaxed hard drive. Nowhere is this more evident than on at the intersection of 10th and West Main where low tech decidedly has the upper hand.
That’s the corner that for 50 years has been home to the Charlottesville Office Machine Co., a business that has weathered the whims of City officials, developers and, lately, the digital world. The view through the window is itself a trip through history: Remingtons with the intricate workings of a baby grand piano, slim portable Olivettis, hefty Selectrics.
Inside, owner Ted Wood cheerfully explains that even in the age of the PDA, his customer base is “almost everyone.” It’s not just Grandpop who’s browsing Wood’s shop for a machine, ribbon or repair.
According to Mike Moore, a national service manager for office equipment company Olympia, typewriter buyers range in age “from 16 to 80.” And with the average price for typewriters ranging between $300 and $800, Olympia has no plans to phase out the machines, Moore says.
Not that Wood’s prices fall into that bracket exclusively. He sells plenty of second-hand machines, too. Apparently, “The older they are the quicker they sell,” he says.
Still, much of the store’s business is in repairs, an increasingly rare service. Customers lug their ailing machines from as far away as Washington, D.C.
First trained in his craft in 1955 on sturdy Underwoods, there’s little that by now Wood hasn’t encountered in the way of keyboards, platens and return carriages. In 1987 Wood bought Charlottesville Office Machine, which he shares today with his wife, Shirley, and son, David.
While Wood believes typewriters of all makes still linger in the shadows of most offices, cranking out government forms and more, he’s heard the statistics: Smith-Corona went bankrupt, IBM no longer manufactures typewriters…. (Even company man Moore admits that the rigor of Olympia’s typewriter sales has everything to do with “the demise of competitors.”)
Yet Wood has a survival strategy, namely his son. Besides selling elegant Royals and charmingly dated-looking electric models, David fixes computer printers and fax machines—a market with a clear present and foreseeable future. This not only keeps business rolling. It frees up dad Ted to do what hardly anyone else in Virginia can: tune up the Underwoods and refurbish the finicky IBMs.—Sheila Pell