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out the landscape to high-density standards.
Nineteen percent of Rappahannock County is federally protected as part of Shenandoah National Park. Sixteen percent is protected by conservation easements. The county’s Comprehensive Plan values agriculture and open space land uses. Our zoning law mandates a 25-acre minimum average zoning density in agricultural districts and restricts commercial development to villages and one Commercial District. A Lighting Ordinance prevents high-intensity commercial lighting. The county has a program to Purchase Development Rights from farmers. The county continues to be administered by local citizens who value open space, a farming economy, scenic land in peaceful repose, a country setting, and a rural way of life.
So, what does this have to do with the Hazel River?
As effective as the county’s impediments to unrestrained growth have been to date, there are too few weapons in our arsenal against the growing pressures to develop Rappahannock county. Those growth restraints that are institutionalized in county ordinances are potentially subject to challenge, and are in any case only as good as the will of current and future Boards of Supervisors.
Conservation land easements are (theoretically) forever. So too is Tier HI designation as an Exceptional State Water, as is currently proposed for the Hazel River.
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