staff reports
Published: May 1, 2008

One has to wonder whose agenda Ms. Kirkman, a Stafford County planning commissioner, is really pushing. In January 2008, this newspaper pointed out that Cecilia Kirkman continues to be active with the Save Crow’s Nest organization she helped found at the same time she is serving on the planning commission and on the Board of Zoning Appeals. These are among the most influential non-elected public bodies in Stafford.

In January 2006, as a representative of the Crow’s Nest group, Ms. Kirkman publicly protested the realignment of Andrew Chapel Road, claiming it would negatively impact Crow’s Nest. Just two years later, she successfully convinced her peers on the planning commission to take only one project off the county’s road priority list. Surprise, it was Andrew Chapel road. This time she claimed it was too expensive, yet there were several more expensive projects that she didn’t seek to have eliminated.

I also find it interesting and alarming that Ms. Kirkman has advanced several anti-property-rights measures prior to serving on the commission and now as a member of it. Veiled in noble sounding titles like the Potomac Watershed Overlay District, these measures would sacrifice the development rights of thousands of hard-working families, for Ms. Kirkman’s zealously pursued effort to conserve the Crow’s Nest at any and all costs.

These actions lead me to believe that Ms. Kirkman may be taking advantage of the power of her positions to advance her personal agenda. I wonder if at any time Ms. Kirkman has advised board members and the county’s legal officials that she lives on a parcel immediately next to the Crow’s Nest. It just so happens that this portion of Crow’s Nest is not in the current purchase agreement. The very same agreement she railed against would immediately protect 1,700 acres of the Crow’s Nest, just not acreage near her home. So whatever development rules are put in place or road projects pursued near her family’s property, they will impact her financially and in other ways. If our county’s officials are going to turn a blind eye to this fox, us chickens better beware.

Tim Carter
Fredericksburg