ARLINGTON, VA — Four of Northern Virginia's top elected officials called for greater regional cooperation Wednesday as they confronted the intertwined challenges of data center growth, transportation funding and a shortage of affordable housing.
Arlington County Board Chair Matt de Ferranti, Loudoun County Board of Supervisors Chair Phyllis Randall, Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chair Jeff McKay and Alexandria Mayor Alyia Gaskins participated in the 11th Annual Northern Virginia Regional Elected Leaders Summit at George Mason University's Fuse at Mason Square in Arlington.
Moderated by NBC4 Northern Virginia reporter Drew Wilder, the discussion highlighted both shared concerns and differences over how much authority local governments should retain as Virginia responds to growing demands for housing, energy and transportation infrastructure.
Randall described Loudoun County as a cautionary tale for communities seeking the economic benefits of data centers without first adopting rules governing where and how they can be built.
Data centers were originally classified as office buildings in Loudoun and permitted by right anywhere an office could be built, meaning they did not require Board of Supervisors approval, Randall said. The county has since changed its zoning ordinance to require special exceptions.
"If we could rewind the clock, we would do a lot of things differently," Randall said.
She advised other Virginia localities to establish zoning, environmental and design requirements before approving their first data center. That includes determining where electricity and water will come from and how far facilities must be set back from homes.
"Look at Loudoun County as a precautionary tale," Randall said.
The industry remains a major financial benefit for Loudoun. Randall said the county receives $26 in revenue for every $1 it spends on data center-related infrastructure, helping support schools, parks and lower tax rates.
McKay said Fairfax County has between 3 million and 4 million square feet of data center space, representing a small portion of its commercial market. Fairfax recently strengthened its zoning rules after observing the industry's growth elsewhere in Northern Virginia.
McKay said Virginia should establish minimum environmental protections statewide while allowing localities to impose stronger rules. He opposed blanket bans, saying data centers are necessary to support the technology residents and businesses use every day.
"We've just got to make sure we're putting them in the right places with the right rules," McKay said.
Gaskins emphasized that data centers can produce effects beyond the jurisdiction that approves them. She cited a proposed facility on Edsall Road in Fairfax County near Alexandria's West End.
The site is within 1,000 feet of more than 2,000 Alexandria homes, and less than a mile from a Title I school, Gaskins said. The surrounding community also has some of Alexandria's poorest health outcomes and a life expectancy more than 10 years shorter than other neighborhoods in the city.
"While data centers can be zoned and built in a particular jurisdiction, they still have regional impacts," Gaskins said. "The impact on energy usage, water usage, health, noise — those things don't stop as the line goes on."
De Ferranti, who chairs the Northern Virginia Regional Commission, said energy use must be considered as the region seeks a better balance between the industry's business interests and its effects on communities.
"The next 10 years on data centers look very different for Northern Virginia than the last 20 years did," he said.
The officials agreed that Virginia and its localities need to establish a dependable, long-term funding source for Metro rather than relying on repeated short-term fixes.
De Ferranti said regional transit systems are commonly supported by sales taxes, although he acknowledged that sales taxes can disproportionately affect lower-income residents. He said Northern Virginia jurisdictions must act collectively so that no locality commits dedicated funding without knowing whether its regional partners will do the same.
"We have got to fix this," de Ferranti said. "We have to have a long-term capital funding stream so that Metro sustains the improvement that we've seen under the current GM, Randy Clarke."
McKay criticized a Virginia proposal that would allow Northern Virginia localities to use revenue from a 1-cent sales tax for either school construction or Metro. That structure unnecessarily pits two essential needs against each other, he said.
"We need a sustainable, proper answer for Metro divorced from the 1-cent sales tax that's meant to go toward education capital in Virginia," McKay said.
Randall cautioned that the region's transportation needs extend beyond Metro. Many Northern Virginia communities will never have Metrorail service, making continued investment in roads, buses and other travel options essential.
"We are a region where you work in one place, you play in another place, you go to school in another place, you worship in another place," Randall said. "Having multimodal options, as well as getting the Metro funding correct, is also vitally, vitally important."
Gaskins said Alexandria faces particularly difficult choices because its sales tax revenue is smaller than that of neighboring counties while its school construction and Metro costs remain substantial.
"Neither is going away," Gaskins said. "The longer you put off these capital investments, the more expensive they become and, honestly, the more dangerous they might be."
All four officials agreed that Northern Virginia needs more affordable housing, but they differed over whether the state should mandate zoning changes or primarily provide financial support to local governments.
De Ferranti said Northern Virginia localities have made significant housing investments that deserve recognition in Richmond. He called for state incentives and additional money for Virginia's housing trust fund while preserving flexibility for jurisdictions with different land-use needs.
McKay said the state should target localities whose zoning practices exclude affordable housing while providing financial tools to communities already producing it. Fairfax has worked to place affordable housing throughout the county rather than concentrating it in selected areas, he said.
"I need Richmond in a lot of ways to get out of my way and to provide financial incentives to build more affordable housing," McKay said.
Gaskins offered a different perspective, saying state policy changes could help Alexandria accelerate housing production. The city supported faith-based housing legislation because its officials believe the crisis's scale and urgency require new approaches, she said.
"There is a crisis and an urgency around affordable housing," Gaskins said. "To get that housing, we're going to have to consider tools we might not have for other housing."
Randall strongly opposed statewide mandates requiring localities to permit housing without funding for schools, roads, water systems and parks needed to support new residents. Loudoun prefers the term "attainable housing" to encompass homes for residents across a broader range of incomes, she said.
"If you want to help us, help us," Randall said. "But you do not help us by telling us what to do with our zoning and then giving us nothing at all to help us get there."
Despite their policy differences, the leaders agreed that housing and transportation cannot be addressed separately. Randall said attainable housing must be connected to reliable multimodal transportation, while McKay called housing the region's most important cooperative challenge.
Fairfax County created three times as many jobs as homes over the past decade, McKay said, making it increasingly difficult for workers — including young adults raised in the county — to remain in the community.
"If you don't have the housing, you won't have the people to fill those jobs," McKay said. "Those jobs will go somewhere else over time."
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