ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, March 24, 1996 TAG: 9603250086
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: NEW BALTIMORE
SOURCE: Associated Press
They have churches. They have a fire house. They have a history. But they don't have their own address, Karen Cosner told the Fauquier County Board of Supervisors.
Cosner and other residents of this community are tired of a five-digit link to neighboring Prince William County. Their ZIP code is 22065, which straddles the county line but whose home post office is on the Prince William side. That means the Fauquier residents get bills for Prince William taxes they don't owe, receive Prince William junk mail and sometimes even get asked by Prince William police why they don't have a county tax decal on their cars.
Residents say the county line separates one way of life from another.
Prince William is the outer suburbs of Washington. Fauquier County is romance and, to some, prestige. It is rural horse country, home to farmers and to established Virginia families, many of whom see it as a gateway to ``ole Virginny,'' not the last outpost of metropolitan Washington. And they want their address to reflect that.
``My biggest complaint is our loss of identity,'' Cosner told the board.
Cliff Mashburn, who founded Concerned Citizens for New Baltimore and has pushed for the ZIP code change, said he just doesn't think he has much in common with the people of Prince William.
``This is a unique county,'' he said. ``We're not a town-house community. We all seem to be very compatible with each other but not very compatible with the people to the east of us.''
Fauquier Supervisor Larry Weeks said there is a ``country, fox-hunting, farmland, good-feeling identity'' that comes with a Fauquier address that you just don't get with one in Prince William.
The outcry - along with a petition with 513 signatures - persuaded the supervisors to ask the U.S. Postal Service to switch the area to a Fauquier ZIP code.
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