Harrisonburg City Council votes to approve Bluestone Town Center

HARRISONBURG, Va. (WHSV) - More affordable housing is coming to Harrisonburg after the Harrisonburg City Council approved the Bluestone Town Center zoning request by a vote of 3-2.

Vice Mayor Laura Dent, along with council members Dany Fleming and Monica Robinson, were in favor of the project. Council member Chris Jones and Mayor Deanna Reed were two no votes.

At the Feb 14 meeting that lasted eight hours, council decided to table the proposal after the late night.

At a work session Tuesday evening before the regular meeting, the council discussed the proposal. Jones said he was hesitant because the developer has not done a project to this scale before.

He said this wouldn’t fix the housing problem in Harrisonburg as it would bring in more people from other localities.

Fleming and Robinson gave push back and were more in favor of Bluestone Town Center. They said this is a project that would lead Harrisonburg in the right direction of fixing its housing issue.

Bluestone Town Center will have 900 units of mixed-income housing. The developer has been firm saying the buildings would go up sporadically through an eight to 10 year time line not all at once.

This project will be placed at the corner of Garber’s Church Road and Erickson Ave.

Through its building phases, it will go in front of council multiple times.

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