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Subject: [VA-SOUTHSIDE-L] Recent history lesson of Virginia Beach
Date: Fri, 17 Jan 2003 11:30:11 EST

Happy Birthday Virginia Beach! Your 40 years YOUNG!
The old land marker reads, Princess Anne County is 279 square miles of land.
Formed in 1691 by a Division of Lower Norfolk into Norfolk & Princess Anne,
named for Queen Ann. Then Princess Anne. The first Settlers First landed at
Cape Henry April 26 1607. They recently changed Sea Shore State Park to First
Landing State Park.
This Story has been published several times according to the Beacon, Which is
the Local Section of the Virginia Pilot.
"AS the clock chimed midnight to usher in the New Year on Jan 1 1963, a city
was born.
At that moment, two localities disappeared into the dusty recesses of history
the old, seaside 2 square mile city of Virginia Beach & suburban rural
country of Princess Anne.
In their place on that new years day stood the fledging merged city of
Virginia Beach, the product of a controversial & hastily conceived
consolidation between the 49 block long, 57 year old resort city & county
that was established nearly a century before the revolutionary war. 
It was a marriage of convenience to block the expansionist dreams of Norfolk,
the dominant port city in southeastern Virginia. Norfolk was poised to annex
ever-larger chunks of tax generating, affluent subdivisions & shopping
centers in Princess Anne County.
The political chieftains of Princess Anne viewed this threat darkly.
They had labored for 30 years to fashion a virtually impregnable machine that
wielded tremendous economic & political power over the county & resort town.
They weren't going to let the politicians of Norfolk whittle away at their
sprawling domain.
Today, the city of Virginia Beach a 310 square mile hodgepodge of cozy
suburbs, glass & steel offices towers thriving industrial parks, hunting
grounds & tourist packed beaches is the monument of their triumph in a
classic turf fight over two decades ago.

The county that Mr. Kellam lived in still exists figuratively speaking south
of the VA Beach Municipal center on both sides of the winding two lanes
Princess Anne Road South of Pungo to the North Carolina line. 1950o's
developers couldn't sub divide the areas farms fast enough to satisfy the
demands for housing as veterans began raising families & as new service men
were being shipped to staff war enlarge naval installations.
To survive Norfolk had to grow, the believed, & that meant the annexation of
surrounding county land to expand the tax base & keep the city economically &
socially balanced & healthy.
In Jan 1959, son 13.5 square miles of Princess Anne County housing 38, 000
residents were formally annexed into Norfolk, including commercial &
residential areas.
It was all perfectly legal. In other states, this wouldn't cause the ruckus;
it always created in Virginia, because the cities & counties over lapped.
But in Virginia, Cities & Counties are independent entities. In the VA scheme
of things, cities existed to provide the high degree of services required in
urban centers, & counties were supposed to provide the minimal services
required in rural, agricultural areas.
This worked until World War 2 ended & suburbs began to flourish in county
fringe areas around cities.
So the 1959 annexation of Princess Anne territory sent a shudder through the
county's Kellam organizations, which feared that Norfolk would try to take
the entire Kempsville and bayside sections in the next round.
In April 1960, Kellam a major figure in the dominant Byrd organizations that
had rule Virginia since the depression went before the Norfolk city council
with an intriguing proposal.
He promised not to seek any changes in the state law limiting a city's right
to annex in exchange for Norfolk agreement not annex any part of Princess
Anne County for 5years.
Norfolk would also continue extending water service to the new developments
springing up in the northern half of the county.
In addition, & this was perhaps the most intriguing provision of the deal,
Kellam suggested that serious study begin immediately on a metro concept that
would merge all Hampton Roads Cities & counties into one super government,
with the individual localities as boroughs alone the lines of the NYC set up.
With the assent of Norfolk city officials, a 7 member Metro committee was
established with Kellam as the Chair.
Meanwhile at the state capitol, the laws on consolidations of two localities
were being liberalized quiet to allow a merger between Richmond and
Neighboring Henrico County.
The voters there ultimately rejected the consolidation, but the preliminary
moves to facilitate the Richmond Henrico merger referendum resulted in
changes in state law that had potential applications in other section of V
irginia, such as Hampton Roads.
This didn't escape the attention of Kellam and his allies, but it seemed to
elude the notice of the city boys in the legislature. To their everlasting
regret.
On Sept. 13, 1961, 17 months after Kellam's Metro pronouncement, Princess
Anne County & Virginia Beach officials released a terse statement announcing
that a merger study was possible, with an eye toward creating a city that
would be legally invulnerable to annexation by Norfolk.
The news stunned Norfolk officials, who realized the dire implications. A new
city at their eastern border would foreclose expansion permanently.
At a carefully planned Oct. 4 1961 meeting at the new geodesic dome that
served as a convention center for Virginia Beach, some 200 residents of
Princess Anne & Virginia Beach resort businessmen & civic leaders
overwhelmingly endorsed the merger concept.
The consolidation would be less challenging that most mergers. The resort
community of Virginia Beach was legally 2nd class city under state law. That
is it's shared some of its officials with the county, largely for economic
reasons.
So, the city & county shared much of their judiciary, commonwealth's attorney
& school superintendent, although the treasurers, commissioners of revenue &
police courts were separate. The county had a traditional board of
supervisors as it's governing body. The city had it's own council, major &
city manager a professional administrator.
Next Norfolk tried to with hold new water services for new developments in
PAC.
But in the end, they finally worked things out.
The Nov. 6 meeting lasted for 4 hours & except for some loose ends, the issue
was headed for referendum on Nov 10, the Princess Anne County board & VA
beach council each approved the merger agreement & proposed charter of the
new city that the general assembly would be asked to approve if the
referendum proved successful.

the full article is several pages long and very good detail, this is only a
brief summary of the first part of it,
hope u found it interesting,
kristina
<A HREF="www.nyvagenealogy.homestead.com">www.nyvagenealogy.homestead.com</A>

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