The Background
Chesterfield County launched a comprehensive Zoning Ordinance Modernization (ZOMod) effort to update a zoning code that, in many ways, no longer reflected how the County actually planned, built, or grew. While portions of the ordinance had been amended over time, its foundation dated back decades and had become increasingly difficult for residents, businesses, and developers to interpret or navigate.
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The intent behind ZOMod was practical. The County wanted a clearer, more modern zoning framework that aligned with its Comprehensive Plan, reduced unnecessary complexity, and created greater predictability around development decisions. From a policy standpoint, the effort was thoughtful and long overdue. From a public perception standpoint, however, it was vulnerable.
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As ZOMod moved closer to adoption, public conversations, especially online, began to drift away from the County’s stated goals. Technical language was taken out of context, misconceptions spread quickly, and concerns about density and neighborhood impacts began to shape the narrative in ways that did not reflect the ordinance itself.
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In parallel with the ZOMod effort, we were also responsible for developing content to support a broader “Yes In My Backyard” (YIMBY) narrative, an essential complement to zoning modernization work.
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While ZOMod addressed the rules, YIMBY addressed the mindset. The goal was to help normalize thoughtful growth, housing diversity, and incremental development by shifting how people emotionally and culturally engage with the idea of change in their communities.
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Rather than positioning growth as something being imposed, the YIMBY content reframes development as a shared opportunity, one that supports local businesses, stabilizes housing supply, and reflects the reality of how communities evolve over time.
Project Type
Social Storytelling
Copywriting
Campaign Ideation
Video Production and Content Creation
Photography
Marketing
Drone Operation
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The Goals:
Growth Reframed.
Elevate Understanding.
Strengthen Awareness.
The Challenge
A core challenge in housing and land-use conversations is that opposition often stems less from policy details and more from fear of the unknown. Our YIMBY content focused on reducing that fear by grounding the conversation in lived experience.
We emphasized:
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Familiar neighborhood-scale examples rather than abstract planning concepts
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The idea that many “new” housing types already exist and function well in similar communities
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The connection between housing availability, workforce stability, and local economic health
This approach allowed people to see growth not as a disruption, but as something already embedded in how communities thrive.
Zoning does not fail because of bad intent. It fails when people do not understand what is being proposed. In Chesterfield County, the challenge was not convincing stakeholders of the value of modernization, but rather ensuring the public conversation remained grounded in fact rather than speculation. Without clear, accessible messaging, ZOMod risked being defined by fear-based assumptions instead of its actual purpose. County leadership and partners needed a way to translate a complex policy into language people could understand, trust, and share, without oversimplifying or politicizing the issue.
Content Designed for Cultural Acceptance
The Newviews Agency was brought in to help stabilize and realign the public narrative around ZOMod. Our role was not to advocate for policy behind closed doors, but to help create the conditions where informed public understanding could exist. We worked closely with senior leadership, including direct time with the CEO, to discuss how ZOMod was being interpreted in the community and where communication gaps were emerging. From those conversations, it became clear that advocacy could not live solely inside government meetings or formal documents. It needed structure, ownership, and a clear communication plan that extended into the community.
For ZOmod a key part of our work involved encouraging and supporting the creation of a defined advocacy position—someone responsible for maintaining message discipline, coordinating responses, and ensuring that public-facing communication did not fracture as the ordinance moved forward.
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Unlike traditional advocacy campaigns, the YIMBY work was not designed to argue or debate. It was designed to lower resistance.
We created content that:
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Humanized housing conversations through relatable language and visuals
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Highlighted small-scale, community-aligned development rather than large, abstract projects
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Gave supporters language they could comfortably use in everyday conversations
Much of this content was intentionally subtle. It was meant to influence how people felt about development long before they were asked to form an opinion on a specific proposal.
Reframing Growth at the Community Level
Strategy
Rather than treating ZOMod as a single communications challenge, we approached it as a series of conversations happening simultaneously across different audiences. Residents, small business owners, housing stakeholders, and community leaders were all engaging with ZOMod from different vantage points. Expecting one message to resonate with everyone was unrealistic. Instead, we developed a segmented content strategy that allowed the same core facts to be communicated in ways that felt relevant to each audience’s concerns.
At the same time, we focused on tone. This was not about persuasion or political messaging. The content needed to feel calm, factual, and credible, something people could share without feeling like they were “taking a side.”
We created a suite of content designed to function in multiple ways at once.​ First, we developed narrative-reset content that clearly explained why ZOMod existed, what it was intended to solve, and what it did not change. This content was built specifically to address common misconceptions and reduce confusion, especially in digital spaces where misinformation was spreading fastest.
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Second, we produced social media content that could live beyond official County channels. These assets were designed for internal use, organic sharing, and distribution through micro-influencers, small businesses, and community partners who already had trust within their networks. The goal was to let accurate information travel naturally through familiar voices.
Finally, all content was structured with paid distribution in mind. Zoning education requires repetition, not one-time exposure. Short-form video and visual assets were created so messaging could be reinforced consistently over time to the audiences most likely to encounter confusion or conflicting information.
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The YIMBY content worked alongside ZOMod communications without duplicating them.
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Where ZOMod messaging explained what the ordinance did, YIMBY messaging addressed why growth itself should not be feared. Together, they created a more complete narrative system, one that spoke to both logic and emotion.
This integration helped:
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Reduce friction around zoning conversations
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Create a more receptive environment for modernization efforts
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Equip advocates and community partners with consistent, values-based language
By aligning policy clarity with cultural understanding, the campaign avoided the common pitfall of asking people to accept technical changes without addressing underlying concerns.
Short Form Media Content
Lets Talk Numbers
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New Construction
Truth or False
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What is ZoMod
Horizontal Video Suite
The Impact
Content Designed for Cultural Acceptance
ZOMod ultimately passed and went into effect on January 1, 2026. While the legislative outcome followed a formal process, our work helped support the environment in which that decision could move forward with greater clarity and confidence. The campaign improved alignment between leadership, advocates, and community partners, reduced narrative fragmentation, and created a repeatable framework for how complex policy issues could be communicated moving forward. Most importantly, it helped shift the public conversation away from assumption-driven fear and back toward informed understanding.
Zoning modernization is as much about trust as it is about technical policy. By pairing leadership alignment with clear, segmented storytelling and community-aware distribution, this work helped ensure ZOMod was understood for what it actually was, a modernization effort designed to bring clarity, consistency, and long-term planning alignment to Chesterfield County.
For the YIMBY content, it was intentionally designed to outlive the ZOMod process.
Because it focused on principles rather than specific votes or hearings, it remains usable for:
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Future housing and land-use conversations
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Ongoing community education
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Advocacy efforts tied to growth, affordability, and economic development
This ensured that the work was not just reactive to one ordinance, but foundational for how future conversations around development can be approached.
Behind The Scenes
From location scouting to motion graphics, this project was a collaborative effort in capturing the city’s transformation. Explore how our team brought vision to life—one frame at a time.
Creativity and efficiency was the game, yet we made time to celebrate and capture the magic off-screen as well. Highlighting the work of each team member as well as the clients, we captured the magic behind the scenes at each location. Peeling back the curtain on how we operate, The Newviews Agency produces more than just the finished products, we make memories along the way.
It's just what we do
At The Newviews Agency we don’t just build campaigns—we build beautiful results that can stand the test of time. Our work with Home Builders is a clear testament to the level of creative and efficient work we provide.