Letter from the HFCA President

Dear Neighbors,

As the seasons change and we find ourselves spending more time outdoors, I want to take a moment to talk about something that strengthens the heart of any community: being neighborly.

Whether it’s a wave from the driveway, a quick chat while walking the dog, or a helping hand with trash bins or snow shoveling, these small gestures go a long way in making our neighborhood a place we’re all proud to call home. In that same spirit, it’s also the perfect time to revisit the shared responsibility we have to maintain the appearance and value of our community.

Keeping up with yardwork is a big part of this. Regular mowing, trimming, weeding, and general upkeep not only enhance curb appeal, they show respect for one another. A well-maintained yard doesn’t have to be elaborate. Neat, tidy, and cared-for makes all the difference.

If life has gotten in the way or if you need assistance—whether it’s due to health, travel, or any other reason—please don’t hesitate to reach out. We’re a community first, and help is always closer than you think. Many students in our neighborhood are looking for volunteer credits, and this is a perfect way to help both parties.

Thank you all for doing your part and for being the kind of neighbors that make this place special.

Warm regards, Steve Kubrak President, HFCA

Save the Date!

Neighborhood Reminder

Please slow down and STOP at stop signs!

Speeding continues to be an issue in our neighborhood, and an increasing number of residents have raised concerns about the safety of children, pets, and pedestrians.

If the problem continues, we may need to pursue next steps, such as requesting increased police presence or exploring traffic calming solutions like speed bumps.

Let's work together to keep our neighborhood safe and welcoming.

Please drive carfully - thank you!

Traffic Advisory: Area Graduations at Eaglebank Arena

Expect heavy traffic near George Mason University’s Fairfax Campus for area school graduation ceremonies at EagleBank Arena at various times of the day until Monday, June 16. Traffic will be entering and exiting campus (e.g., via Braddock Road, Route 123, Roberts Road). View the FCPS graduation page for more information.

Thank Your Neighbor for Volunteering

By Melissa Stark

Thank you Clair Hill (Cotton Farm Rd) for joining the Board as Secretary and taking a newsletter delivery route!! Thank you also to Danielle Hawkins, Philip Donnelly, Bob and Judy Cosgriff, Mindy Koo, Lauren Seger, Cathy Basl, Heather Webb, and Bob Sottile for volunteering to be Newsletter Delivery volunteers! We appreciate your volunteerism and thank you for hearing our call for help!

Volunteers Still Needed!

Folks - we still have volunteer needs! It takes a lot of volunteers to run the HOA at the yearly dues price each homeowner is paying. We have been running it below capacity for too long and we need community members, long term and new, young and/or retired to step up. It allows the Board to balance their work, family and volunteer life better. It also reduces volunteer burnout by having too much of a volunteer workload. Without filling these positions, we will need to look into other professionally run companies to assist in tackling this work load. Please hear the call and volunteer!

Committee: Welcome Wagon Representatives - (Time Commitment varies monthly/yearly and is solely driven by the new homeowners/tenants that move in to our neighborhood)
This position welcomes new homeowners and tenants to our neighborhood. It requires greeting them in person, handing them our welcome packet and collecting their contact information to bring to our Treasurer Team.

Committee: Common Areas Committee/ Reserve Study Member
The Common Areas Coordinator will be dividing the positions workload amongst Common Areas Committee (CAC) volunteers. It can be as little as no hours a month, to 1- 3 hours a month, depending on tree issues that pop up or contract negotiations.

Committee: Assistant Treasurer #2 - time commitment will vary monthly, but will not be a heavy loaded position. This position is to take care of more of the administrative end of the Treasury duties. Membership renewals, updating the VPOAA, assistance in tracking dues collections are just some examples.

Volunteer: Newsletter Delivery Neighbor - delivering paper newsletters to 14 - 16 houses, roughly 11 times a year. (30 minutes or less, depending on your walking speed and talking to neighbors while out on delivery).

Do you live in these unrepresented neighborhood blocks below? We are looking for you to be a Newsletter Delivery Neighbor for your block!

Route 5: 4349 - 4379 Farm House Lane
Route 7: 10117 - 10110 Roundtop and 4374 - 4320 Still Meadow Road
Route 8: 4301 - 4329 Still Meadow Road
Route 9: 4322 - 4344 Still Meadow Road

If you are interested in any of the positions, please email the Board at HFCA@hickoryfarms.org

Common Area Tree Issue Request Form

By Melissa Stark, Common Areas Coordinator

The start to 2025 has been a busy one. We have received a record number of tree issues that have popped up and have already consumed our entire Common Areas Remediation budget. Unfortunately, the multiple-year drought is impacting the tree health in our community (common areas and homeowners property).

The Common Areas Coordinator currently receives a lot of tree issues via word of mouth, phone calls and personal emails. Please note that there is a process and it requires that the Common Area Tree Request form on our HFCA website under Common Areas be filled out first. The form will email the entire Common Areas Committee (CAC) and then the CAC can review your request from there.

Please make sure to review 2.2 Maintenance of Tree Issues found under our Hickory Farms Rules and Regulations prior to emailing; in addition we request to learn about trees in decline prior to them being 75 -100 percent dead. A 75 -100 percent dead tree costs more to remove due to the safety risk to the climbers and additional machinery may be needed to be brought in to remove it.

Fairfax County Exploring Option to Use New Residential Waste Collection System

Source: https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/publicworks/recycling-trash/unified-sanitation-districts

Fairfax County is considering an option to implement a new waste collection system through Unified Sanitary Districts (USD). Virginia law requires the County to provide five-years of advance notice to private collection companies in advance of implementing the USD. The first step is approval by the Board of Supervisors to start the five-year waiting period clock before implementing USD; this does not mean the County will eventually implement USD. Once the Board of Supervisors initiates the required five-year waiting period, the County will perform more detailed analyses informed by additional input from Board of Supervisors and the community about the type of services to be provided in USD. Initial analysis indicates a cost savings to the average resident for comparable services provided today. If the USD are implemented after the five-year waiting period ends, the County would manage waste for all single-family homes, making the process easier for single-family residents.

The Board of Supervisors will vote on moving forward with starting the required five-year waiting period for USD following a public hearing on June 24, 2025, to be held at the Fairfax County Government Center Board Auditorium located at 12000 Government Center Parkway, Fairfax, VA 22035.

The Birds of Hickory Farms

By Bob Cosgriff

April finished with a bang with four additional species arriving after I submitted the last newsletter, with Chestnut-sided Warbler, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Black-throated Blue Warbler, and Northern Parula (a warbler) showing up before the end of the month. The action continued into early May with Chimney Swift, Common Yellowthroat (a warbler), Indigo Bunting (only our second-ever yard sighting!), Black-throated Green Warbler, and Great Crested Flycatcher. Then things slowed down in term of new arrivals, until 24 May, when we had an early morning surprise. Seeing some bird activity in our large Japanese cherry tree, I got my binoculars out and focused on one bird in particular. It played a bit of hide-and-seek as it fluttered about feeding on the small cherry fruits produced by this kind of tree. But I finally got enough looks to identify it as a Veery, a beautiful member of the Thrush family. This is only our fourth yard record. So as it stands, we have seen 59 bird species in our yard for the year to date. One surprising no-show is House Wren. I have heard a few singing around the area but we have still not seen one in our yard. They usually arrive in mid-April. I don’t have a ready explanation for this dearth of wrens! I am certain one will show up eventually to get us to the 60 mark for the year.

Because it is rarely seen, the Veery is our Bird of the Month. Find out more about this beautiful bird at this link and be sure to click on the “sound” icon to hear the Veery’s ethereal song.

We stopped our daily species count on 13 May. For the period 1 January - 13 May, our daily average species count was 21 species. We counted eight warblers; not bad, but we were hoping for at least 10. The few days of wet, windy weather right during the peak of the migration may explain why some warblers did not show up in numbers here.

As for the bluebird trail, in the first round of nesting, we have a total of four active bluebird nests totaling 17 eggs. Three of the boxes are fledging over Memorial Day. Strangely, our two most productive boxes in past years, both in the lower commons, were not used in the first round, but might be taken in the second nesting period. We have seen bluebird activity at one of them, so are crossing our fingers. We also have tree swallows nesting in one box with five eggs counted.

The martin colony continues to grow, with 12 birds now using the gourds. In 2023, we had six; in 2024, eight; so this year’s total is very encouraging. The best time to see the martins is in the early morning or later in the afternoon. Please remain at least 50 feet and preferably farther away from the pole if you go up there to look so as not to disturb them while nesting.

Other interesting birds seen in our commons recently include Cedar Waxwing (a flock of about 40-50 was actively feeding on Sweet Cherry Tree fruit in the lower commons on 20 May) and Eastern Kingbird (upper commons, 20 May). With birding you never know what you’re going to see. So I encourage everyone to get outside to enjoy the birds of Hickory Farms.

Rabbit Run Remediation Project Update

By Bob Cosgriff, HFCA Rabbit Run Remediation Coordinator

To follow up the Rabbit Run Remediation Project article in the May newsletter, here is some additional information from the project manager about the design process now underway. As mentioned in the May article, a preliminary step is to determine the need for obtaining construction easements from homeowners whose properties lie within or adjacent to the project work, During the design process, the engineers review existing easements and usually attempt to keep the stream design within those existing easements as much as possible. However, there will be some areas of this project that require new easements. Parcels noted as requiring new easements will be identified and the process of establishing those easements will involve the drawing up of new plats. Those will be made available to the landowners. One benefit HFCA hopes to obtain from this project is a clear idea of where our property line lies within the RPA. This way, we can place boundary markers to demark HFCA property similar to the posts that were installed along the northern path several years ago.

During the preliminary field work, designers identified, assessed, and labeled 599 trees within and around the potential project area that were 12” diameter or larger. As the design progresses, proposed tree protections and removals will be identified and evaluated. Current markings are for identification purposes only. As noted in the May article, the County office that is responsible for stream remediation is very cognizant of environmental factors within Resource Protection Areas. The plain fact of the matter is that some trees will need to be removed, certainly any that are significantly undercut by the current eroded stream bed and perhaps some others to allow equipment to access the work site. New trees and shrubs will be planted at the end of construction to restore the riparian habitat. Another benefit of the project will be a marked improvement in the aquatic environment. With the elimination of ‘gully-washer’ floods after heavy rains that scour out the creek bed, thus destroying the natural creek habitat, there will be new places for aquatic insects, other invertebrates, fish, reptiles, and amphibians to live, breed, and thrive.

The current design timeline (subject to change) is roughly as follows:

35% Design: Sept/Oct 2025
If the easement acquisition process goes smoothly, then the remaining timeline holds. Otherwise, work pauses until all easements are resolved.

65% Design: Jan/Feb 2026

95% Design: Summer 2026

100% Design: Fall 2026

Construction timeline: TBD (depends on funding and the contract process). Given the tentative timeline above, the earliest that any construction would start is sometime in early 2027.

There will be community outreach meetings associated with each of the design steps noted above, allowing interested parties to be kept appraised of design progress, and allow for comments and concerns to be discussed.

The public website was recently published and will be updated periodically. It can be found here.

As a reminder, there will be some soil testing work within the RPA during June/July. Please see the May newsletter for details. Access to the work site will be on HOA land by the creek near the curve on Cotton Farm Road. As soon as we learn the exact dates, we will put out the information via the ListServe. When work is underway, please do not enter the work zone.

George Mason University West Campus Planning

By Bob Cosgriff

GMU has held a few public meetings to discuss plans for improvements to the “West Campus” which comprises the athletic fields west of Route 123. You can read the details on this website:
https://planning.gmu.edu/planning/west-campus-planning/ The plans offer a range of improvements that will benefit students and nearby residents as well.

You will note on the sidebar the topic title “Capital Planning.” If you scroll down to “University Master Plan” you will see a list of planning study reports. Click on George Mason Master Plan Phase 2 Report (December 2021) link
https://planning.gmu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/Mason-Master-Plan-Phase-2-Report.pdf

This report is a lengthy document outlining, among other things, GMU’s long-range plans for adding a considerable amount of student and faculty housing to its current inventory. Of interest to Hickory Farms is the proposal to build 22 single-family housing units on the Tallwood House property which lies across Roberts Road from Hickory Farms at the Still Meadow Road entrance and adjacent to the Fairfax Pool. Tallwood House is currently the home of the Osher Life-Long Learning Institute (OLLI).

To see the details of this concept, scroll to thumbnails #70 and #73 on the Mason Master Plan Phase 2 link above. Basically, this proposal would be a smaller version of the existing Masonvale housing complex lying across Roberts Road from Hickory Farms.

There are a couple of things to keep in mind about this proposal:

1. The planning document is dated December, 2021. Capital Improvement Plans (CIP) are regularly updated, so there could be changes to the current document in the future.
2. Given the scope of capital projects envisioned, it will take years to decide on which projects will receive priority. Then there is the question of obtaining direct funding from the state or other sources (bonds, alumni donors, etc.).
3. The housing is intended for faculty members, not students.
4. As a state entity, GMU is not required to follow Fairfax County zoning requirements or land use procedures in proposing and implementing any construction on its property. However, the university strives to be a good neighbor and allow input from surrounding communities on large-scale projects. So if and when the Tallwood project is ready to go, there will no doubt be some sort of community outreach.

With all that said, Hickory Farms does not need to worry about seeing construction across Roberts Road anytime soon. It could be 10 years away. But it is something to be aware of, which is the purpose of this article.