A new housing development that will provide both senior and market-rate units can move forward after a Danville City Council vote Tuesday. This project is the latest of several in the region proposed by Florida-based developer Joe Cubas.
The council voted to approve three items related to the housing development, which will include condominiums and assisted living housing, on Goodyear Boulevard.
Cubas submitted a rezoning application and two special use permits for this project to the city this fall; all were unanimously recommended for approval by the city’s planning commission at its October meeting.
All three items had to pass through the city council to allow the project to move forward.
The council unanimously voted to approve the rezoning application, which requested that two parcels on Goodyear Boulevard be switched to a multifamily residential designation from highway retail commercial and threshold residential designations.
It also voted unanimously for both special-use permits. The first will allow assisted living units on these parcels and the second will grant a waiver of maximum density on these parcels.
These items were passed on the condition that a traffic impact analysis is conducted.
Together, these parcels consist of about 22 acres of undeveloped, wooded area, according to the staff report in the council’s agenda packet. This includes the entirety of one parcel, which is almost 12 acres, and about a 10-acre portion of another parcel.
The area is served by public utilities and located on a major thoroughfare, according to the staff report. The city’s updated comprehensive plan designates future land use for this area as residential, the report says.
Cubas’ proposal lays out a housing development that includes 240 condominium units and 180 assisted living units.
These numbers are speculative, according to the staff report. The net developable acreage may decrease once stormwater, floodplain, floodway and utility easement restrictions are accounted for, it says.
The intention behind the project is to allow families to live within the same development as their older relatives, Cubas said at the planning commission meeting.
“The idea is to create a resort style community where you could have both,” he said. “Instead of having your elderly far away, you could have them within walking distance.”
Several Danville City Council candidates, as well as older residents, have said that the city needs more senior living housing options.
The conceptual site plan includes open space, recreation areas and parking in the development.
This is not Cubas’ first effort to develop in the Danville-Pittsylvania County area.
In 2022, Cubas applied for a special use permit to build a luxury RV park in Pittsylvania County. The county planning commission recommended approval for the project, but the board of supervisors denied it after strong resident opposition.
Cubas brought the project idea to Danville, where residents also opposed the project, saying they disliked its proposed location near a residential area rather than the idea of an RV park in general.
The Danville Planning Commission recommended approval for the special-use permit, but the city council tabled this item indefinitely in 2023.
Cubas then submitted rezoning applications that would allow for a housing subdivision on one of the parcels on Jenny Lane that he originally considered for the RV park, which the council approved in January. That is a different project than the Goodyear Boulevard housing development.
