The York County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to allow the Reserve at Williamsburg in Upper York County to develop the rest of its property without an age restriction.
Prior to the vote, the Reserve, which was approved in 2006 as an age-restricted community, did not allow anyone under age 55 from buying or renting into it. Nobody under age 19 was permitted to live in the development. The change ditches the age restriction for the yet-to-be-built 47 single-family homes, 94 townhouses and 198 apartments that will finish out the residential component of the development.
The supervisors were most concerned with how the development would use county services if the age restriction was shed. The most noticeable effect is at the elementary school level. The development falls into the attendance zone for Waller Mill Elementary School, which is already near its limit. Though the York County School Board voted this week to try to fund 10 additional classrooms and a gymnasium for Waller Mill, development in the upper part of the county is likely to force the county to build another elementary school.
County Administrator James McReynolds on Tuesday echoed comments he made during a November meeting when a proposal to build 650 residential units at the Marquis at Williamsburg was before the supervisors:
“It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when,” McReynolds said of what will be a costly proposition for the county. He said at the November meeting that design for a new elementary school could start as early as 2015, with construction potentially starting in 2016.
York County Zoning Administrator J. Mark Carter presented the proposal to the supervisors, saying the units at the Reserve would still be built with design features attractive to older buyers, such as grab bars and wider doors. Carter said estimates for the number of elementary school children from the development range from 27 to 41. The development would also produce middle and high school students, though Queens Lake Middle School and Bruton High School have enough capacity to absorb them without problems.
As part of the proposal, the developer will contribute $590,000 to the county to help ease the cost of adding new students to the school division. That money is enough to fund the construction of about one-and-a-half classrooms.
Carter said the other issue that comes with the loss of the age restriction is traffic. The development is situated off Mooretown Road near the Kingsgate Shopping Center. Carter said Mooretown Road has more than enough capacity to handle anything generated by the Reserve at Williamsburg.
The apartments that already exist at the Reserve at Williamsburg will keep their age restriction. They are currently at about a 65 percent occupancy rate. Mike Milhop, who spoke on behalf of the developer, said the market for age-restricted properties has plummeted in recent years.’
Milhop said the developer, Ryan Homes, wants to begin building the single-family homes as soon as the approval is received. He said the construction of the townhouses will start about six months later. A date for the apartment construction to begin has yet to be set.
A financial consultant spoke on behalf of the developer, saying the project would net a positive fiscal impact to the county, with between $200,000 and $350,000 per year flowing into county coffers after expenses. Part of that money would come from a block of land along Mooretown Road at the Reserve at Williamsburg that is slated for commercial development.
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