City Council   11/5/2018

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Yes, ma'am it is.

Entirely.

Dr. Bellamy.

Mr. Signer.

Here.

Dr. Bellamy here.

All right, announcement.

I'll go first.

Tomorrow is election day.

Polls open at 6 a.m. and close at 7 p.m.

Voters can look up their own registration information and polling place online at vote.virginia.gov or call the voter registration office tomorrow at 970-3250 beginning at 6 a.m.

at all polling

photo ID for voting in the voter registration office even on election day between 6 a.m. and 7 p.m.

Voters have received an absentee ballot by mail and did not return it, may personally return it to their local voter registration office before 7 p.m. on election day or take it to the regularly assigned polling place where they will be issued a replacement ballot.

All right, so I have a couple of announcements.

The first one being

Charlottesville has been recently recognized with the WaterSense Sustained Excellence Award by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, also known as the EPA, at the Water Smart Innovation Conference.

The city of Charlottesville received one of 21 WaterSense Awards and only one of nine Sustained Excellence Awards for helping the Charlottesville community save water in 2017.

This is the city's first Sustained Excellence Awards, which is the highest honor the EPA WaterSense program

gives to organizations and for which Charlottesville was eligible after having received three consecutive promotional partner of the year awards from the WaterSense program.

For more information on the city's water conservation program, please go to charlottesville.org forward slash water conservation.

City council expresses his appreciation for the work of Crystal Riverboard's team in the Environmental Sustainability Division.

I understand Ms. Jill Greiner.

The city's water conservation program coordinator is here to receive this award.

Jill, are you here?

Thank you City Council for the recognition.

I really appreciate you taking the time to acknowledge this.

It's a really great accomplishment that the City of Charlottesville has achieved through the great support from you all as well as the City of Charlottesville and also the community of course.

We could not have gotten this award without the community's commitment to save water and we're really always excited to find new and innovative ways to keep saving water as well.

Can I just squeeze in on something while you do?

Sure, please do.

We'll be talking about this later on our regular agenda, but just for those who are paying attention more on the front end.

In mid-October, City Council distributed a survey

an opportunity to include feedback on the qualifications and qualities that council should be considering in its next city manager.

And the survey is still active.

You can find it on our website.

It's been sent out by our communications office a couple times.

But really want to encourage everyone in the community to take the time to provide feedback on that survey.

Thank you.

So for those who don't know, Mr. Alexander is a local historian, one of the individuals, the Charlottesville 12 who first integrated the city schools.

He sent us an email that he wanted us to an announcement rather that he wanted us to make called Words.

Words matter more than we know at home, school or wherever we go.

Words can help hurt this.

We all know.

So think then speak and you will all grow.

And this is from Mr. Alexander.

He said, please let the community know that he'll be having a words matter competition coming soon.

So please be on the lookout for that.

So again, words matter more than we know at home, school, or wherever we go.

Words can help hurt, this we all know, so think and speak and you will grow.

And I think that's rather timely for our city council meetings.

I know that there's been a great deal of conversation about things that have transpired.

over the past 15 months or so.

There have been a lot of emotional meetings, a lot of people who feel very passionately about things that have transpired.

And I think all of that is welcome.

However, the way in which we do so needs to be in a sense in which we are leaders in our community.

Whether you want to be or not, when you step up to this podium, people are looking at you as a community leader.

While others are talking, let's try to make sure that we can be as respectful as possible whether we agree or disagree because we want to be able to have a variety of voices no matter who the individuals are.

I've heard people from several different ends of the spectrum feel as if they do not feel comfortable coming to the meetings for a variety of different reasons.

And these are people who are very passionate about social justice issues, one of which was at the meeting last week.

A mother I know and she actually left the meeting because the climate that was here.

has been rather disparaging hearing from members of our community as well as elsewhere saying that when they see our meetings were looked at as a circus or a show.

We've had a lot of traumatic events to take place.

Let's try and get back to a point in which we move forward, not only with equity, but respect for all.

And we can be the leaders in doing that.

So I hope that we can do so moving forward.

Words matter.

Thank you, Dr. Bellamy.

All right, I just need to read this disclosure.

Please let the meeting minutes reflect that pursuant to Virginia Code Section 2.1-3115, I have filed a written declaration with the Clerk of Counsel stating that I am an employee of the Department of Parks and Recreation and I am able to fairly and objectively participate

Item A, minutes from the October 15th, October 22nd, October 24th, and October 29th council meetings.

Item B in appropriation, funding for the West Haven clinic coordinator position for $85,000, second of two readings.

Item C in appropriation VDOT funding for multimodal improvements for $413,217 first of two readings.

Item D resolution transfer from the CIP of $560,347 as matching funds for multimodal improvements first of one reading.

Item E, a resolution, utility leak credit to Albemarle County Schools, Burley Middle School for $27,842.88, first of one reading.

Item F, a resolution, approved statement of support for solar energy, first of one reading.

And I just have one question about item E. I'm sorry that I didn't ask it in advance but just wanted to make sure because part of the provisions that I read states that this leak must, that we must be notified of a leak early on and I just want to make sure that this was captured after at least the first billing cycle.

I'm fine with pulling.

You need a second, correct?

Correct.

Do we have to go to her?

All right, so A through G minus E, that's what we're voting on now.

All right, all in favor?

All right, so that carries five to zero.

I think from our last meeting the few follow-up items are scheduling of work sessions for the standards and design manual.

Some follow-up is being done with that consultant right now to arrive at the additional costs and I imagine that will come to a future

Council meeting.

So I thought it might be important to provide a little bit of background for the folks that are unfamiliar with the study that was provided on the downtown mall.

As an outcome of what happened in August of 17, the city manager at that time wanted a comprehensive study of the downtown mall as well as the city government buildings in the local area through the Department of Homeland Security.

So we went ahead and had Homeland Security come in and evaluate our buildings.

And we engaged with an engineer that's on contract to provide services to the city to do the assessment.

What we learned was that it's an area of expertise that the engineering firm and most engineering firms did not have.

So we engaged with a sub-consultant that specialized in doing threat and risk assessments.

And so that firm came

and provided a scope of work that I shared with council back in early March and we engaged with them in early July.

In July they came out and did a site survey, they interviewed city staff as well as a lot of the stakeholders down in the mall and they provided

A list of feedback items.

On October 19th we received the draft threat and risk assessment and we are currently reviewing that document once there's been sufficient time for us to review it and to understand the corresponding data with the pedestrian and vehicular traffic counts.

Yes, so basically what we'll do is city staff is we'll go through and make sure that we're in agreement with items that were identified and then take from the menu of options that they provided what we feel to be what we feel to be the best and appropriate measures and then we'll bring it before council.

But we will see the entire document.

We're going to need permission to release some of the details of the document.

You know, I think it's clear that there's a budget impact if we go forward.

I think that the, you know, how this comes up with a comment about make them all pedestrian, it's part of a bigger question for Council, right?

Do we want to follow a lot of infrastructure recommendations, which some of which are required or would be recommended

Regardless of whether you have the vehicular crossings, but then there is the additional matter of what kinds of things you're going to put in, right?

What is the type of infrastructure?

And if council wants to have what I think is a bigger community conversation about not letting people drive through the mall anymore, that's a little bit different, right?

And you might put in static

Barricades instead of barricades that come up and down.

But again, I think that's really a community discussion.

There was a lot of discussion when those vehicular crossings were instituted, and I imagine there'll be quite a bit if you decide.

to close them.

From a actual volume standpoint, I think we know that there's not enough volume to say they have to be there.

So how would we go about Mr Murphy having that discussion?

Would it be setting up a meeting with the Downtown Business Association and others?

Because from my personal perspective, I mean, taking into account what's transpired.

I think that, just me personally, I believe that many in the community would be in support of us closing 4th Street just out of respect of what's transpired.

So if we wanted to do that or move forward with that as a council, does that require a work session or a special community meeting or what would be the steps?

Because I would be very interested in pursuing

I would say that at the very least you're going to need to have a public hearing on the matter and it may be that you would want to have a work session on it.

But we want to have all this data available to us.

All what data?

But in terms of the recommendations coming from the consulting group who has been looking at this along all of the whole comprehensive plan for making them all more secure.

When you're describing what we can't have access to, it sounds like it's a security concern.

I'm just trying to understand, give me an example of what we wouldn't be able to have shared with council.

Right.

So we could speak about an actual implementation of options of things that we could do infrastructure-wise to fix that.

I'll give you an example.

So one of the items on there was lighting, and lighting is a big

issue, right?

So what we did when we identified that right away, we went out and did a light survey.

We found out Dominion has 12 lights out and City has 15 lights out.

So we already have the work orders entered to correct that issue.

But as an outcome of that, we looked at the lighting quality and the lighting quality is very poor.

So we're looking at possibly switching over to LED fixtures before we add anything to improve what we have.

So without getting into the details of what

Well, I, you know, Walker and Mr. Murphy, I would like to be able to see the recommendations from staff and I think it would be a richer work session.

when we have that information and we can then have a discussion as to who we would like to invite to that work session to participate or just to be in the audience.

That would be up to Mr. Murphy.

I mean, it's the holidays, and it's going to be tough to get everybody together.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, next we're moving into community matters.

Just be mindful of the three minute time frame I did discuss at the end of the last meeting that I would focus on time.

So we all know that the Charlottesville schools have a mandate to offer equal opportunity to all its students.

As the New York Times ProPublica article recently made clear, that isn't happening.

I'm very glad that this issue is getting that kind of publicity.

But there is another serious life-threatening issue going on in the schools that are affecting all of our students of all ethnicities, which is not getting so much publicity.

And that is bullying.

Serious, sustained, life-threatening bullying in person and online is going on in the Charlottesville schools.

When bullying is present, all students suffer.

Those who bully others are usually themselves victims, among other things, of a school system which has failed to give them a sense of personal empowerment.

And so they take out their frustration and rage on other students, similar to how a child who has been abused often abuses the younger sibling.

So we have

a situation where the bullies are not doing well academically or socially, those who are victimized cannot function in school because they're walking around in terror, scared children cannot learn, grades fall, the incidence of suicide increases in schools,

Children who have been bullied are nine times more likely to commit suicide than a non-bullied child.

Students who know about the bullying but don't feel empowered to speak are also being affected in the schools.

My granddaughter, Cecilia Hernandez, is like the younger sibling who has been bullied seriously at Viewford Middle School since September.

is finally erupted in an assault on her by four girls near the downtown mall on October 13, which was publicized by CBS News.

We are getting an excellent response from the principal at Buford, but we need more.

Looking into Virginia law,

on bullying, I believe that the Charlottesville City Schools is not in compliance with the recommendations made by the Virginia Department of Education for how to handle bullying in schools.

It's a very detailed manual.

It begins with having a bullying coordinator at the school district level.

It means reporting every incident, having a written report on every incident.

We have a folder of our emails to the school about bullying incidents that go back to early September.

No written report has ever been made on any of them.

Thank you.

Can I?

Thank you.

I've got other things.

Hello, counsel.

My issue won't take very long.

It's pretty simple.

It's about, I have a business on the downtown mall and the trash situation has been kind of out of hand for a while.

and I'm not sure if this is the right place to address it but also dog shit.

I have had to clean up and I have actually had to hire somebody to help me clean up off the bricks.

So I'm just wondering if we could consider like putting up the little doggy bags for people on the mall to

to do that.

I have them in my store.

If somebody comes in and says, oops, my dog had an accident.

I know it's a relatively simple issue, but I think it's important.

I think people should clean up after themselves.

That's all I had to say.

I'm not sure where to go with this next.

But they're not being used, I guess.

The next meeting?

Yep.

Alright, thank you.

Good evening.

I am Riddell Fleming, a lifelong resident of Charlottesville, a former educator in the Charlottesville City Schools, and I speak to you this evening as a representative of the Education Committee of the NAACP.

In response to the ProPublica article,

We have a response in today's newspaper.

If you have not read it, please do so.

I won't take up your time by reading it.

It's quite lengthy.

We are extremely concerned, discouraged with the results of that article.

Many of us already knew it.

We just didn't know the magnitude of it.

And so we're asking you to pay particular attention.

There are risks and calls to action, but they are far less

than the long range, not action, not appropriating and getting after.

I think this is what happened.

We've become very complacent.

We ask that you would be mindful of climate of low expectations that has been set for our brown and black babies in Charlottesville.

That you would make sure in your work, because you do the funding, that you are vigilant, diligent, watchful.

with where funding is going, what programs are being rubber stamped.

Look at things very carefully because evidently children who are in the most need are not getting what they need.

And if you always do what you always done, you always get what you always had.

Okay.

Mary Curtis, City resident.

I agree with Miss Glenn.

I agree with the lady from the that's got the bullying going on in school because a lot of bullying come from the teachers too, let's not forget.

But anyway, I don't like coming up here and being told how I should talk.

Y'all disrespected our mayor the first week she came in office.

And y'all haven't supported her since, as far as I'm concerned, in a lot of the city residents have seen.

So, is it that you wanted to do your bidding?

Or is it that you want her to be a good mayor?

You have to ask yourself that.

So, get to what I'm coming up here for.

I don't like the fact that y'all talking about remodeling.

I'm going to talk.

Can I talk on that now?

Sign up for this Main Street redevelopment type thing.

You want me to do it when I get to it?

They don't know what to talk about.

But anyway, there's so much going on out here, like you say.

I mean, once you get on city council, it's not your thoughts that you're supposed to carry to the community.

It's what everybody on the city council thinks that's supposed to go to the city council, to the people.

And as far as the downtown mall is concerned, I don't see very many black people on the downtown mall when y'all have functions.

And yet and still, y'all still get money.

Give money to $75,000 to, you know,

your ex people down there.

But anyway, I think that when it comes to the downtown mall, I can remember, like my sister graduate from Burley High School, Ms. Flemming, we marched

from the church at Monticello Avenue and Avon Street, all the way through Charlottesville, down through the Main Street, which is now the downtown mall, all the way up Main Street, down to Jefferson Park Avenue when I was in high school.

That's the Burleigh High School band.

I've been seeing pictures, two or three weeks, about reminiscing the way Charlottesville used to look.

Charlottesville was really beautiful.

It's ugly now.

It's ugly.

And when I saw a picture of a lady saying, oh, look at that beautiful maple tree on Preston Avenue, which was facing the dairy that y'all getting ready to do something to.

I said, take that picture now, because it'll be gone in a month.

Oh, you see in Charlottesville now, it's beginning like Solomon and Gamoah.

You see a lot of watering holes, places to eat, hotels misgivin'.

Banks, but what do you see for people?

Thank you.

Nothing.

We have Michael Payne.

Michael here.

Tony Wash Jr.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, Council members.

I would like to ask for clarification of a statement that the Mayor made at the October 15th Council meeting and was published in the Daily Progress on October 17th, and I quote, I am not in the business of trying to control people.

I asked, if the mayor won't control these meetings, then who will?

At a council meeting in July, the mayor got in a discussion with a woman right over there, sitting over there, excuse me, who stated that she did not recognize the First Amendment to the Constitution or any other amendments to the Constitution or even the Bill of Rights.

Then also at this meeting, there was a woman who was on the list of speakers, came up to address her council members.

But because some in attendance did not like what she was saying, started yelling and screaming.

So no one could hear her.

Her husband saw how shaken she was and came up to comfort her, but the yelling and screaming only got louder.

They gave up.

and to add insult to injury, when they walked up the aisle, they were yelled at and even cursed at.

I saw that the woman was crying when she passed me, so I went out to say how sorry I am for the way she was treated.

She said, and I quote, that they have lived in Charlottesville for 30 years.

This is the first time she has come to a city council meeting.

and it will be their last.

She said that no person should ever be treated like she was.

We all remember August 17th when the white supremacists came to our city and they shouted the ideas and beliefs and didn't allow anyone to express any different opinions.

This is the same behavior that the fascists used in Europe back in the 20th century, remember?

Now I ask you, what is the difference between them and those in attendance that will not let anybody speak their piece before the council?

These meetings stopped being democratic months ago and are now just bordering on anarchy.

These council meetings have been a disgrace to the city and an insult to our citizens.

Thank you.

So for clarification for me, I'm not in the business of controlling people, so that's clear.

And I also wrote a piece recently on the two-ish years that we've been dealing with trying to figure out under the former mayor and myself.

I would like for you all to look at the 256 years

of behavior that the city and the actions of the city.

And if there's any other clarification needed, we can talk about it when we have break.

Thank you, Ms. Mayor and council members.

I wanted to thank you all for some of the attention that you've given for the, this is a really exciting topic, but the standards and design manual.

Because that's really the building blocks of how we begin to develop the good places that we all want.

Places on the mall, places around the mall, affordable housing.

I wanted to say a number of things that this is one of the most important documents that we will consider as a development in the city as we move forward and I would like to request that the city and I saw that you had scheduled or are in the process of scheduling some work sessions and unfortunately an amendment to the

to the contract that you have with the existing consultant to sort of fix some of the things that haven't been done yet.

But we wanted to just encourage you to continue the momentum, to sort of follow that through and pursue that aggressively.

And specifically, I would like to ask that you generate a process

that compares the side-by-side recommendations between the staff's draft version and the Charlottesville area development roundtable's comments on the document because we've had hundreds and hundreds of hours

of volunteers looking through that document, comparing it to the best standards around the country and trying to make those things applicable to Charlottesville.

And among the things that we're concerned about and think that our recommendations promote are that they would promote affordability by reducing pavement,

eliminating unnecessary easement dimensions and other restrictions that reduce the buildability potential of the scarce city lots that exist and promote more efficient and affordable standards rather than defaulting to the biggest or widest standard or sometimes just general standards that are included in the current document.

and we can't make things more affordable if they are more expensive to build.

I specifically know of a project right now that if the current easement options were adopted, a buildable lot would become unbuildable.

And they also promote safety by adopting street and right of way guidelines that create a better balance between cars, bikes and pedestrians.

They insist upon narrower, slower speed, low volume residential streets.

that promotes great places by requiring that the guidelines reflect what we want Charlottesville to be rather than what the easiest or what the standard of any town in USA might reflect.

And also following the proposals of the streets that work.

Thank you.

Is that it?

OK.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Christine Mahoney, I'm a professor at UVA and I direct social entrepreneurship at UVA and I wanted to just make a note of support for item four on the agenda for this evening, the equity fund allocation for New Hill.

A team of faculty and staff have been working alongside New Hill for 17 months now as they develop their vision of an African American led redevelopment initiative.

They have made such tremendous progress.

In those 17 months, they have established the first African American led community development corporation in our city's history.

They've built a tremendous board.

They've partnered with foundations and nonprofits and community development corporations and community development financial institutions around the country.

They have partnerships with LISC, which is run by our former Secretary of Commerce, African-American Virginian, and who has deep roots here in Charlottesville, who's passionate about their work.

I think they create the best opportunity for the city as they think about, to your point, righting the wrongs of the past 200 years and particularly righting the wrongs of the demolishing of Vinegar Hill which was a vibrant African American community as we all know which not only had high levels of home ownership but also flourishing African American businesses.

So New Hill's vision is to create pathways

I think it's really important for us to be able to move forward toward home ownership, to minority entrepreneurship.

That's why I'm really passionate about supporting them.

And they have built not only a tremendous team here in Charlottesville and an incredible first step at support, but the funding that they're requesting will allow them to

begin really engaging in a community development process that will reach homeowners, community residents far and wide and bring in an independent third party to help broker that process.

As we know, this community is fraught with a lot of tensions and there is a lot of healing that needs to be done.

and if we can partner with national organizations that have been doing best practices and community engagement around the country, I think we'll be one step further down that line.

And so I thank you for considering that today.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Thank you mayor, council.

Good evening.

Council people.

Melvin Burris, full disclosure, I'm also on the board of the New Hill Development.

But I'll start out to say as I read from a very knowledgeable person and listened to him, the place we live, the place we live in shape our lives.

So it's important

that this New Hill development come into being.

The mission of New Hill Initiative is to close the severe income and income gaps between African Americans and white Americans in Charlottesville and to diversify not just how we do urban planning, design, and development,

in Charlottesville, but by whom?

This would be the first African American orientated developer in Charlottesville.

We have many of them.

Let's give them the opportunity to show how we can be inclusive

in our planning here in Charlottesville and not just ignore them because of whatever reasons we may have, personal reasons we may have, but let's do it as a unit, okay?

And I hope fully that we would do affordable housing as well as commercial and market housing.

So it's a, the word I want to say, it's a,

It's all together.

It's not one or the other.

You don't do one or the other.

It's a mix.

And so that's what we're looking for.

That's what we want to do.

Okay.

Good evening, Council.

Good evening, Mayor Walker.

I am not here to speak in opposition at all to the New Hill initiative.

It looks like an incredible piece of work and long, long in coming.

I would, if I offer any pushback whatsoever, I would like to have had more information, especially if

The funds are going to be appropriated tonight.

I realize that they've already been approved through the equity package.

But if we're going to actually appropriate them, we would have liked to have known what the budget entails, what the proposed outline is for planning, how that money may be spent, what the exact area is, a timeline for the completion of or the beginning of the project.

We would have just like to have had more information on the front end.

Thank you.

Next we have Dave G. Come on, Dave.

Hello, Nikuyah.

What's up, bootlickers?

Good evening.

Assata Shakur said that nobody in the world, nobody in history has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.

I think that the brothers and sisters, we need more self-respect and dignity than to come here begging for our human rights and freedoms.

I'm appalled by the way that council responds to things that they don't like hearing.

But I'm not surprised that puppets for the rich and powerful ignore us, insult us, or will call a cop-up for rebuttals.

We won't get free in these chambers because these chambers are the master's house.

I think that we can accomplish more by working together with a self-help mindset than we can coming up here twice a month and begging.

Despite how they treat us, I think that we are smart and can figure out how to organize and build the world that we want by lifting each other up.

Politicians are not our leaders, especially not puppets like Bellamy.

Their loyalties lie with the Democrat party, not with the people.

You all serve the rich elites and then turn around and try to misdirect us and waste our time by telling us to go to another meeting or to fill out another survey.

And we won't get free through elections.

Malcolm X said that a ballot is like a bullet.

You don't throw your ballots until you see a target, like Nikuyah was.

And if that target is not within your reach, then you put the ballot back in your pocket.

No slave ever got free by voting.

But the capitalists, the owners of this country, and the shills want to herd us to the polls like sheep.

Tomorrow, the vote in a false choice.

I also have a confession to make.

I used to be a Democrat.

I voted for Obama, or should I say Obama, who was the drone president and the porter in chief.

The Democrats show that there's no way to vote against the banks, against war, against poverty, or against deportation.

The businessmen own and control both political parties and working people don't have a party that represents our interests, that's anti-racist, anti-war, and anti-capitalist.

So I don't think that we should be scared or shamed into voting in tomorrow's farce.

Instead, we need to become ungovernable.

We need to educate and motivate each other and organize and build the future that we desperately need by any means necessary.

We need to reach out to each other and meet in the streets, the classrooms, and the living rooms.

I believe in socialism because I believe in the people and the 99%.

So all power to the people.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

Good evening.

Good afternoon.

It's night time.

Wes, I understand that you're saying that respect, how we as leaders should come forth, but when you have harmed us from the past, and y'all expect business to be as usual, and y'all expect us to be transparency, we can only come to agreement and act in the way that y'all treat us.

And Mike,

You would never look over me because still I rise.

And especially after watching that movie, you ought not open your mouth to say anything but say, I apologize to the city of Charlottesville.

And Mr. Murphy, I have a very important request from Miss Cookie Smith.

She would like this to be done before her eyes close and that could be any day.

She would like to speak with Chief Bratney in her living room.

Can we make that possible for her this week?

Yeah, it was Friday.

And she would like this done before she closed her eyes because she need closure.

and when are we still going to go back looking for Sage?

When are we still going to go back looking for Faye Tinsley?

When are we still going to go back looking for Quinn Wolfock?

How many more times do we have to keep looking on this TV and looking at little white children?

being missing in Albemarle County and Charlottesville jumped to the rescue.

But our black bodies are still missing.

And there's no answer.

And then our police chief is going to only go back to what was now when she came.

That's very offensive to us as taxpayers.

Because there's information that should have been out to us that still ain't out.

And as city councilors, if y'all want respect, you got to earn respect.

So you're saying that Ms. Smith asked just to have a conversation with this police chief?

That's fine.

Jarvis Stewart?

How are you Madam Mayor?

I'm not going to take much of your time.

Counselors, good seeing you.

I am new to Charlottesville.

I actually live in Washington D.C. and I've been invited down to help New Hill as well as other organizations begin to think a little differently and a little bit more expansive as it relates to affordable housing.

I'm excited about it.

I think we have some good ideas on paper and we're going to move forward with even better ideas.

As I mentioned to the organizers of New Hill and some of the other organizations, I do think nationally there's a lot of funding both in Washington D.C. as well as from Impact Investors that

is interested in Charlottesville and would like to work with the council as well as with the organizations to figure out how we can infuse capital here so that people that live here can own their homes and be a part of a broader agenda of growth and revitalization.

And that includes the public school system.

I think as another young lady mentioned earlier, we know that they are somewhat under threat right now.

have some serious challenges but I think you know that the best way to begin to attack or to address issues around public education and housing is obviously have a stronger economic base so whatever role I can play in this process I look forward to it and thank you for your service and madam mayor thank you for your hard work and dedication to the people of Charlottesville.

Good evening.

Nancy Carpenter, city resident.

One fact I want to pass on to you all that I think city staff ought to be realizing is that in 1987, low income tax credits started for 30 years.

So the first units in this country are starting to go offline on those projects.

There are quite a few here in Charlottesville.

The National Low Income Housing Coalition says that by 2030, about 486 million units

will come offline as low income tax credit programs.

They will either revert to fair market rent and who knows where in the sky they will be or they'll be torn down because they have outlived their useful life as housing options.

So it's something that I think our planning commission, whatever boards and commissions deal with what's happening in the future to consider that fact and to hopefully have it

shown up in some of our plans as they come forth because we will probably lose units somewhere after 2030 because some of these were not built that long ago.

I'm interested in this New Hill Development Corporation, but I want to push back on a different reason.

Every day, you know, I talk to folks who look like, I think the folks that will be the beneficiaries of New Hill Development Corporation and to know that there's $500,000 that could be appropriated for this program.

sounds good, but I look at how much $500,000 could do to people who are in affordable housing.

Granted, all renters are rent burdened like we all are paycheck to paycheck sometimes, but for a serious medical emergency, a serious car repair, having to go out of town for a death of a loved one, something that happens at their job, something that happens

In all facets of life and you fall behind in your rent and you just cannot make that second month up.

You just don't have the wherewithal in your network to make that rent up.

Could there be something as far as this corporation comes forward that we look at

you know two thousand dollars for some people two thousand dollars is all it takes to get back on that playing field so that they're going forward like they were before they had that stumble and it's no fault of their own and to know that a lot of

Services come and beg through the ABRT process for funding to help try and do some of that and there is, I know it's a special fund and it had a special focus to look at and 17 months is a long time of talking, that's a lot of conversation.

Didn't realize it was, wow, that's a lot of meetings.

I can't even imagine how many meetings.

But there are folks out here that could immediately

Ms. Carpenter, I have a quick question, if I may.

Not to pull you back like that.

In regards to the fun in which you're describing, would that be similar to like what you do at the Haven or like with AIM?

For those who know what AIM is?

Exactly, I mean the need, well I don't want to talk out of church, but I feel like the need has increased over the past year and I think that's

indicative of the disparities of income.

I think it's indicative of the economic realities of this world that we live in.

And I don't know how we're going to fully address it, but even if it, like in my neighborhood, we have a house.

I knew who lived there.

They're not living there now.

It's now been, looks like they've been gutted.

And it's Assist to Sell is marketing the product, which is a company that usually helps with foreclosures.

and they're selling it for like $159,000.

Right.

You bring up a very good point.

So, Mr. Murphy, is it possible to find out by the next council meeting or I don't know if you know offhand

If the city currently provides funding or resources to programs such as The Haven or AIM for these emergency funding kind of situations.

And if not, then I would be interested.

Ms. Carpenter is aware that we do fund those and absolutely I think what she's asking for is to put more money into it.

The City does fund emergency assistance and the Haven is part of the screening for that process.

And people are finding housing.

That's a great program.

I've ran into a lot of people that are finding housing with that supplemental program.

Just to that point, we are

addressing the need in that regard to a certain extent.

But in your opinion, we could be addressing it more, maybe increasing the amount of dollars to the haven or to the emergency funding or not.

That's okay.

I would be interested in one Mr. Murphy as possible and Mayor Walker and the rest of council members finding out what that number is now that we're providing for a multitude of different agencies through emergency funding and if it was possible to look at if we could provide or have a clear-cut need and have the data to back it up look at us increasing the number after we can get maybe a presentation of some sorts

or maybe even hear from the different service providers of what the need is now, where they've seen the increase.

Because I don't think it has to be either or.

We may be able to do both.

I know I said that.

You get it?

Right.

The emergency assistance might help somebody keep their car or something like that.

And I just want to remind council that we are looking at the overhaul in the ABRT process and being more strategic with funding.

So instead of spreading thin, giving maybe a lot of money to some areas and

Mayor Walker, I'd like to make a comment relative to Ms. Carpenter's statement.

It's related to the New Hill and the New Hill project is related to the small area plans.

We've got about 12 areas of the city that really need to be reimagined and repurposed if we're going to ever accommodate the 3,300 units of affordable rental housing that we've just discovered that we need.

and by 2040 that's going to be over 4,100 units.

So the only way we can do that is by revisiting areas that we think are already developed but are really not fully at capacity.

And this area, which used to be called Vinegar Hill, which is now called Starr Hill, has areas in it.

One of it is the city yard.

We need to be looking at this in a very far seeking, far visioning manner so that we're not dealing with crisis every time.

We've got to expand our land supply.

And this is an amazing opportunity to have it be led by an African American community development corporation.

So this is a small area plan, operated, managed, led by an African American company.

I just want to get that in your mind that the goal is to expand housing and housing choice from affordable home ownership to affordable rental.

And also include entrepreneurship so that there's actually a way for our African American community to close the wealth and income gaps that we'll be talking about later.

But I did want to get that other picture out there.

That this is a way to expand our supply of land so that we can actually deal with

OK.

Thank you.

Gregory Robertson.

Cecilia Hernandez.

Is she not?

Stay.

Oh, great.

What's up, man?

Hey, Mr. Bellamy.

Oh, OK. Gregory.

Hi.

Can I begin?

My name is Gregory Robertson.

As some of you may remember, I came to speak at City Council five years ago.

I came to help raise awareness not only for the years of torture and physical abuse that I experienced while attending Charlottesville City Schools, but also to raise awareness for the thousands of other kids who were forced to go through the same thing that I did.

I know many of you may not remember, so I will remind you.

While I was attending Charlottesville City Schools, I was relentlessly and brutally bullied for all the years that I attended.

I was punched, kicked, and spit on more than once.

I came then to try and ask for something to be done to prevent anyone else from having to experience that.

I come here tonight for a similar reason.

I have recently been in contact with a 12-year-old girl.

In my time of knowing her, we have discussed much, including her experiences at Charlottesville City Schools.

It has infuriated me to find out that she has been having to persevere through the same experiences that I did.

Over five years have passed and it seems as if nothing has changed.

These poor, helpless, defenseless little kids do not deserve the treatment that they receive from their peers.

It is not kids being kids, being pushed and shoved and kicked and spit on while lying on the ground, praying that it would just stop as I did.

is not kid behavior.

to give them the help that they desperately need.

How do you expect us to learn and be successful in life when we cannot feel safe in the place we are required to do so?

I come here tonight to beg you.

I am truly begging you to do something, something more than what has been done.

If not for me, if not for the girl that I've talked to, then for your own children and for the thousands of other children all around Charlottesville.

What's happening?

No, we stopped the meeting.

But you were done?

Were you not done?

No, well, we've just.

Yeah, that's all I had to say.

The dog was behind me.

I'm going to call this meeting back to order.

Dr. Bellamy, we're starting the meeting.

I understand there was a request earlier and it was regarding, I know we've received communications around a task force being formed.

I'm assuming these items have been brought also to our school board during their recent meeting.

I understand some people spoke.

No, ma'am.

I actually didn't get to finish.

That would be okay if I could finish my statement.

That would be okay.

I thought you said thank you.

Okay.

Do you know how much time was left, Mr. Will?

One minute.

It's not long.

Just moments ago, I had to go and lay on the ground with my friend who collapsed and began having panic attacks and seizures due to the post-traumatic stress that she received from her experiences at Charlottesville City Schools.

If this does not prove to you that this is important and that something needs to be done, then I don't know what does.

Mayor Walker may I respond?

I don't know but Councilor Signer and I were talking that perhaps we could include that in our next

So I do know that the matter at hand, I know the schools have attempted to address it in some capacity.

I know the schools have tried to address it in some capacity, I think.

The particular situation, there's several different layers to it.

So I would also be interested in hearing what the schools provide.

Mr. Murphy, I don't know if you can provide any update legally.

I know that the schools have met.

I think that we heard the grandparents say that she was pleased with the Buford principal's response.

I think that they're particularly interested in what is the systemic response, right?

What does the, you know, the Charlottesville City school system

do more globally on bullying.

And so we know at different ages, there are different bullying programs.

I know they implemented many years ago the OWAIS bullying prevention system for at least some of the grades.

I believe that some of the violence prevention stuff they do is consulting with one of the leading experts in the country who happens to live here, Dewey Cornell.

So I would imagine that the

The school system could do a good job telling us what they're doing today and what else remains undone.

And I don't know what the date is of the next council school board time together.

I think it's fair for us to get an update, even if it's not in an in-person meeting from them immediately.

Just a statement?

Yeah.

Yeah, I was going to say, and I found your story very brave and very moving.

And my father-in-law works on anti-suicide.

He's a social worker who works on anti-suicide prevention with kids in schools and has seen a real skyrocketing rate in Massachusetts in the public schools where he works.

and these are it we've heard a couple different questions about the schools tonight and it's really tough because we have when you have independent separate school boards there's a it gets very tricky when the City Council starts getting involved in saying here's what we think you should do with

our dollars.

And that's tough, not on topics as tough as bullying.

But I would like to know, I mean, we have pushed that boundary some.

There have been real discussions about, hey, this is what we think about the schools, and we do give you all the money.

And they react pretty, they kind of push back pretty quickly.

But Ms. Galvin was a member of the school board, but it's always a dynamic.

It's always a dynamic and I think I would like very much to get them the issues that have come up today because we are having folks come to the city council about school issues and deliver them to them and say we would, I don't know if we would get, I mean there's three specific issues that came up I think.

But it's not us saying do this because we're not allowed to do that in the independent system.

If I might add to that, because while I was on the school board, there was a federal grant that was done, a three-year grant that actually was an anti-bullying program, and as I understand it, it was very successful.

When the grant ended, so did the program.

So I just want to, again, prepare this money, this dollars involved.

All right.

So as I mentioned a little bit earlier, City Council recently engaged S. Renee Narlock and Associates to conduct executive recruitment services for the next city manager on behalf of

City of Charlottesville.

Part of the firm's duties include gathering and considering input from council, city staff, and the general public for the recruitment process.

So we had public hearings on the search process held on both August 6th and August 20th.

Additionally, as I mentioned earlier, in mid-October, a community survey was launched, and the survey includes opportunities to provide feedback on the qualifications and qualities council should be seeking in the next city manager.

And again, that closes on Friday, this Friday, November 9th.

So that input may be considered as we develop the advertising materials for this position as well as the process that follows.

So we put a high priority on our community participation.

This hearing is designed to gather any additional feedback, specifically on public engagement throughout this process.

These last two public hearings have been focused more on the qualities and qualifications of the city manager, and this is really specifically looking at the public engagement from this point forward.

and for council to align on the framework tonight.

Hopefully the engagement process begins in earnest right now.

So really our goal as a council is after we hear from the public and have a chance to engage with Ms. Narlock, who has met with each of us one-on-one today.

And I think our goal is to try to understand what is this process that we can all align on looking forward to the end.

The timeline for this is starting right now and running through late February, possibly early March.

So we could either have, I mean, Ms. Narlock wants to say anything kind of introductory.

I think we kind of talked about just kind of laying out some of the processes that she has seen in other communities.

And then if the public wants to weigh in, it might give them just some kind of context in terms of some of the options that have been done in other places.

Thank you.

Good evening.

As Vice Mayor said, I'm Renee Norlock with Norlock & Associates and we have been selected to partner with you on this search for new city manager for the city of Charlottesville.

We are an executive search firm that specializes in public sector search.

I have personally been doing recruitment for 25 plus years now for a variety of organizations, large and small nationwide.

for a variety of positions, including city managers.

I do want to thank you for selecting us again to partner with you in this.

It's very important project.

This is a very important decision for the city of Charlottesville.

We do appreciate your vote of confidence in us as a firm.

That said, we were, as you know, on site today meeting with you as council members and with some other folks, and we'll be here tomorrow.

doing the same to get input about the city manager process.

What I'm hoping to do is to have a picture painted for me by this input of what the ideal candidate looks like, what I call the ideal candidate, because that establishes our target and helps us to know what we're looking for in our recruitment efforts and then even as we move further along in the process.

some of the things that were important to us that we asked for were traits and characteristics of a city manager as well as background and experience and then beyond the person itself that we're recruiting for it was important for us to get a handle on and understand some of the issues and challenges that are currently facing the city of Charlottesville again so we can match up skill sets and match up candidates that will come in and best serve the city.

I understand that you

as a council have reached out to the community on the front end of this process as I understand it through some meetings that you've done on site as well as the survey that was mentioned earlier and public meetings and public input and I appreciate that we're having some more tonight.

I appreciate the ability and the opportunity for me to be present at this meeting.

I think it's very helpful to me again to understand the whole of Charlottesville and what we need to be looking for.

In a candidate so so all of the input that that I will be getting from you through the survey through Meetings that you've had as well as the information at Garner today and even tomorrow while on site All of that will be very very helpful to me

including the community's input.

That's not just falling on deaf ears, I wanna make that clear.

We are listening, we're on a listening tour here.

It's important for us to get a 360 on this city to really understand what it's gonna take in a leadership role here to move you forward.

That said, I wanna just quickly, if I may, Mayor, just cover some of the types of processes that we have seen or done over the years and talk about the value of those.

Certainly at some point in this process there are certain things that, again, we'll talk with you further when we meet with you to determine what you want to do, but examples of things that we have done previously include things such as having a meet and greet for the finalist candidates, an open community event where you put the word out in the community, come and meet the city manager candidates if you'd like, get a chance to talk to them, interact with them in a social setting,

We find that to be very helpful not only to the candidates but to the community as well as to you as a council.

Something else that we typically have seen done is somewhere along the way when we're interviewing finalists if you want to include

what I call an external panel to the process.

I think that's helpful too.

What I would suggest or what I've seen done and I feel works well is perhaps we have a panel of say five community members, perhaps one appointed by each of you to serve in that panel.

to do a round with candidates and again weigh in on their impressions of candidates so you have that element of feedback from the community at large.

And then other things that we've done is made sure that when they're on site we have a guided tour of the community by someone who knows this community inside and out and just to give them that scope.

They may be from the community, maybe they don't want a tour, maybe they know it all,

but that's something that we just generally like to offer.

Also probably a meeting with your department heads, your senior leadership team where they could interact with the candidates and again it affords the candidates an opportunity to see the team that you have in place and kind of get to know Charlottesville a little bit better from that perspective.

That's it.

I think we're off to a good start here.

I think your timeline is pretty accurate.

I do want to say again that I've been doing this for a really long time.

I commend you for using an outside search firm, and we will be doing a national recruitment for talent.

That doesn't mean someone won't have ties to Charlottesville.

There may be someone somewhere else that went to school here, grew up here, you never know.

But we're going to scour the nation for good, strong candidates.

I think that's basically it.

My information will be available in the advertisement that we place for this which will be on the city's website also on the HR page.

So if there's any community member that doesn't have a chance to

to be part of whatever we may do, they're welcome to call me.

I know somebody said, you sure you want to put your number out there because you may be flooded with phone calls.

That's OK.

If somebody feels like they need to share something with me and they don't get an opportunity in this meeting or in some of the other meetings that you had, I want to make sure that there is a way for them to do that here.

Any questions?

Thank you very much.

Sure.

Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am.

And we've released a community survey.

I've had a couple community dinners and we've been having employee luncheons to give feedback on the search process.

So every Tuesday at one we've been having luncheons.

We've had, um,

Two community dinners so far at First Street and West Haven Community Center.

And then the survey is out.

So really, you know, attempting.

I know there was some feedback this weekend on Facebook about, you know, there are a lot of surveys and tired of, you know, filling out surveys.

But we're really trying to reach as many people, you know, as possible.

I know the last survey that

that we did.

Dr. Bellamy and I, we were out door to door.

It's hard to do all of the work.

We have to do family work, you know, full time, this double full time position on council and, you know, get door to door.

But we are attempting in each, you know, in every way that we can to make sure that we're

We are actually reading them.

We are, you know, taking copious notes when we are in these meetings.

We are taking a lot of, you know, feedback from employees.

They've been employees who told us that they haven't been asked the questions that we're asking since they've been here.

One person said 30 years.

so we're really in every possible way trying to make sure that from community members to you know employees that people feel like that you know they own this because you do and we want to you know get this right and maybe sir the survey part is you know a bit overwhelming because we do have them coming from a lot of angles right now and trying to

Before you move forward, I think it's important to give both you and Vice Mayor Hill a great deal of kudos for leading council in this search.

I don't think the public quite knows because we don't have, we're currently working to fill the city clerk

position and you know we have a lot of things that we're working on in terms of the city.

Both Mayor Walker and Vice Mayor Hill decided to take on this task and they have kept all of us in the loop.

Dated every day.

They've sent us a lot of emails which made sure that we all were included.

They've shown a great deal of teamwork and I really appreciate you both going out and getting us the best possible search format I think that we could get.

and I'm really, really looking forward to us bringing in a phenomenal city manager, but on the front end, you two have done phenomenal work, so thank you both.

Is it possible if we could give these ladies a round of applause, please?

And we've also, just since we have a few minutes, a few seconds, but we also hopefully have wrapped up the search for our clerk, so hopefully we'll be able to, you know, get that wrapped.

But the closed sessions that have happened, that's what they've been the interview process for that.

So we're really trying to

you know, get some of this stuff wrapped up so we can free up some of our time for what you elected us to do and we have people in positions that, you know, in our office that are helping us with some of this administrative stuff.

Thanks.

So I wanted to talk with you about the city manager's position.

I'm going to circle back to it.

It may seem like I'm off topic, but it's going to come back to it.

So I've been, as a member of a board and commission, I've been working on the community engagement part of the comprehensive plan.

It's a new chapter and expected to have a comp plan before council, I think next month.

And we have yet to see a draft of the community engagement chapter.

So we are, we're saying that we need to put the brakes on and go through a full community engagement process on this over the next year.

six months or so.

And so I think it's going to be really important that the new city manager thinks that this process of changing how we do community engagement to think about community empowerment is going to be really important.

You know, because staff is going to take direction from the city manager's office and we're going to be trying to

to redevelop the way we do community engagement over the next six or nine months.

And that's going to either become a priority or it's going to sort of fall away.

I'm not asking for the new city manager to be an expert in community engagement, but if that person at that level

explain you know makes it clear to staff that this is important and it's important to me and I hope it's important to you I think it is I mean you've been paying a lot of attention to it so yeah I just I think it would be it would be important for the new city manager to to really

want and expect staff to connect with the community in ways it maybe hasn't before and offer training maybe.

And not just as part of the comp plan.

We're trying to use this to develop a process that goes beyond

just the comp plan every five years, something that's ongoing.

The kind of things that would be used for what we do with West 2nd or the Neighborhood Leadership Institute.

We need a rethink of our community engagement and that starts with letting the participants or the people, the public, design their participation.

like they have to be involved from the very beginning of how they want the process to go and that's why we think it really needs to have its own separate time frame for it because

when a chapter can be prepared in time for council, but not in time to go back to the public.

With even a draft, it's laid in the process.

And we want, you know, one of the core principles.

Thank you.

I'm going to be on top, because we've been to Tanisha Hudson, 116 Longwood Drive.

First off, city manager process.

The streets are really important.

We can't continue to talk about redevelopment.

We can't even accommodate traffic in this town.

How long it take y'all to get downtown, seriously, when we talking about bringing in new developments?

We need to bring in some new streets.

We need to expand some streets, build some beltways, backpacks.

Something's gotta be done.

Ridge Street is absolutely ridiculous at five o'clock.

Fifth Street is absolutely ridiculous at five o'clock.

Fontaine is absolutely ridiculous after five o'clock.

All of these streets are, if you go off the bypass, like coming by Bodo's on 29, the pipes are coming through the street.

Have y'all paid attention to that?

Like this city is so focused on like middle class to rich people that we're forgetting like what is really important.

We can't grow and we got four streets, four main streets, 64, 250, Rugby Road, Main Street.

It's ridiculous.

Like, I mean, it's other things that y'all have to take into consideration around here than just keep putting up multiple developments.

And low income housing is needed.

I'm not saying that it's not.

It's very well needed.

Kathy, you said something about bringing in the, we need 3,300 homes, it's going to be 41.

We knew that 50 years ago, lady.

We knew that 50 years ago.

We knew that.

We knew that when they took Vinegar Hill.

We knew that when they took Gospel Hill.

We knew that when they took this black neighborhood right over here by the slave auction block.

Y'all knew that.

You knew it coming in here.

All of y'all know there's history around here.

And y'all know how they've done black people.

Y'all know that.

We could redevelop Hardy Drive.

You could rebuild Hardy Drive.

You could rebuild First Street.

They got a whole baseball field.

They don't even use the field.

Somebody's dog probably used the bathroom on the field.

Now let me get off topic.

People with these dogs,

I was at Washington Park filming for my documentary.

City manager need to notice.

City manager need to notice the new one coming in.

Somebody had their dog on the sliding board.

The dog was in the swimming pool.

The disrespect is ridiculous.

The city manager that's coming in need to be all for changing the power structure.

The mayor should have the power.

Not the city manager.

Washington Park and Parks and Rec need to go back to being accommodated for children.

The new Parks and Rec system is absolutely horrible.

The new city manager needs to handle that.

I mean, the list goes on what we need to fix in this town.

And y'all all sit up here like, I'm all for it.

I really want to do it.

Really make it happen, though.

Don't just talk about it.

We've been talking for 100 years.

Is there anyone else who would like to speak?

Is the city manager's search process?

First of all, I applaud you, young lady, from the search committee.

And I heard what you said about making a nationwide search and possibly having someone with ties to the Charlottesville community.

I think it's equally as important that you look within internally, because I think that we do have some very viable people who could do a magnificent job in that particular position.

You have given the opportunity.

So I think that someone who has already invested in the city

If such a person exists, also should be considered and be considered highly for the position.

The new city manager, whoever that individual may be, he or she, will have to be a bridge builder because

Once again, there is a huge lack of trust between the communities that you serve and the leadership that sits in these positions.

So someone has to be willing to go out and do the tough, blunt groundwork that will be necessary to try to regain and rebuild that trust.

And they also need to look at it through eyes and through filters as to what's best for the city.

It may not be

spending millions of dollars on beautification of streets or tree plantation or bike lanes.

It may be earmarking some of that money for reinstituting the anti-bullying program in the school system.

It may be that we need to go out and figure out how best to invest some of the monies that sit there

towards redevelopment of housing or towards affordable housing and towards affordable home ownership.

And that individual has to be aware of the problems that exist in this city already.

It would truly behoove us to have someone who has the finger on the pulse of what's already going on in the city and what continues to go on in the city.

It's imperative that we bring in someone

who is willing to spend the hours, to do the work, to get out into the neighborhoods and find out what is necessary from the residents of the neighborhoods, especially those that are most in need, the low income residents and low income neighborhoods in the city.

So I implore you, I urge you during your search that you do consider these things and that you would again, once again, be certain to look internally because I think that we do have some very viable people who are capable of doing the work.

Franky, Mary Curtis, City resident, City manager.

I remember when Maurice Jones was the sports caster on Channel 29 News, then he was like,

our public affairs person.

I followed his career all the way to the day he left.

I think the new city manager should be able to come to Charlottesville with some experience.

Like maybe experience from another place where he has been or she has been city manager for more than five years.

to know how to run a city with a lot of people with a lot of problems because that's what Charlottesville is.

It's a lot of problems for low-income people and people of color.

To go back to what Ms. Hudson said, infrastructure is terrible.

I mean, like Red Street.

When I was married, I lived on Ridge Street before all of that reconstruction came in there, or whatever you call these things.

Y'all do that nowadays.

Now, it used to be a beautiful neighborhood.

You got grass growing through the concrete.

You got cracked sidewalks.

I mean, it's no longer a black neighborhood anymore.

People have to have permit passes and things.

It's ridiculous what's going on in Charlottesville.

Y'all talking about building down on city yard.

I used to go through there going home from school.

There used to be a black neighborhood.

A city manager needs to know that while they are approving things that to be a hotels and tear down communities, the city manager coming in need to know what happened to the communities that were here.

They're gone.

And y'all trying to tear some more down.

but I think that city manager, whoever y'all pick, shouldn't be a friend.

It shouldn't be somebody that got a degree in business.

It should be somebody that has already dealt with stuff like what's going on.

They should be a person that have already dealt with a city or a town for at least five years or more.

because y'all sitting up there, especially you, Ms. Hill, you're sitting up there like a peacock, and you don't halfway, we don't know what you're talking about, you go so fast, and then you gonna say that this here, that's the way it sounds to me.

But you, excuse me, it's my time.

But see, what you need to do is, you need to actually go out and find somebody with some kind of experience to come in this town and deal with what we got.

and probably make it better.

Thank you and good night.

I work to oppose the mob.

Please vote.

I like that.

Olivia Patton, city resident.

resident.

I think that it is important that the next city manager holds values being held accountable to community members.

From an outside position and somebody who's not privy to many backroom conversations, it feels like the city manager has previously only been held accountable to the Chamber of Commerce.

And I would like to see somebody who is not so proud that they can't

respond to questions in real time when community members ask them and somebody who is willing to make mistakes in front of people and not so nervous about disappointing whoever the biggest money person is in town.

My name is Robin Hoffman, and I'm finding that sometimes I do workshops in the schools, sometimes I substitute for the school nurses, so I know about a lot of different problems that go on in the schools.

What I'm saying is in terms of the city manager,

I feel that there should be less busing and maybe some dispersing of the populations of the schools and I don't know how that could be possible but I think it would help a lot because it's a small town but we're condensing all the kids like CHS and Monticello, I mean

but also the Buford School.

It's just, it's too vast and there's very little staffing to support that.

So, and then the busing is ridiculous, so that's just my take on it.

I've only been here 11 years, but also I feel like the roads, if they could consider

Belmont Bridge as being some sort of way to, and even Pantops being tunneled in and having housing other than the high-end housing that they have over in Pantops and that sort of thing and sort of tunneling everybody through 250 and that sort of thing.

I mean those are the things that could really, I think, bring the city less problems to begin with and certainly the way you develop it and that sort of thing.

Hi, Walt Heinecke, Amherst Street in the city.

Thanks for asking the question that you're asking here.

One of the things I really appreciate about what you're doing tonight is way in advance of the hiring process, you're engaging the community in a discussion about it.

That to me is, I laud you for doing that because the further out we can get from the decision point,

to get engaging citizens in the input process.

I think the better it is for people to think about things, to sit on things, to listen to different candidates' perspectives and those kinds of things.

So I really laud you for doing that.

There's two things about community engagement and public input that I think are really important here.

One is taking the public input.

and I see evidence that you're doing that with your search firm and I see evidence with the survey which I filled out and others have filled out.

I see evidence of taking the input which I think is really important.

The other part of public engagement and public input which I think we don't really pay much attention is to listening to that input.

Like what are you going to do with that input?

Are you really going to listen to citizens?

Are you going to put people on the, what do you call them, the polling, the task forces that you have, the citizen advisory committees that you have, like for the hiring committee, like you have citizen panels, are you really going to put people on there that have, you

varying ideological perspectives and who can really sort of dish out dissent from the cities from their point of view about the way the city works on things.

So the other part of this is really thinking about the action part.

Are you going to listen to citizen input?

And it's about trust.

And I think we have a huge trust problem in this community.

And I just don't understand how we can trust you to do that process of actually listening and acting on what people tell you when we have things on the agenda tonight that have not gone through the ABRT process, that have not had a public hearing, and that are large amounts of money that are going to be applied to a project that hasn't really had citizen input.

How do we trust you when you do things like that?

I don't understand it because you're not engaging in public trust when you do those kinds of things.

And it's not an example of what we should be doing with the city manager's process of listening and then acting.

It's not that I don't support this project.

That's a different issue.

It's the process like Deacon Gathers had said about getting information and then acting on that information in a way that enhances the public trust.

So I ask you to really think about the trust issue and about how you're going to use public information and how do we trust you when these kinds of things are going on tonight.

All right.

Is there anyone else that would like to speak about the city manager search process?

All right.

So we're going to close the public hearing.

Any comments?

I look forward to hearing from more people throughout the community in regards to what they would like to see in this, doing this project together.

Or use the survey.

Or use the survey, but if you want, yeah, but some, the survey, yes.

Mayor Walker, if I may, I'd just like to kind of recap some of the things that I've heard that tonight there was a lot of

interest and concern and appreciation for community engagement and that the city manager would be very much involved with meeting the community being out in the neighborhood.

That was repeated several times tonight just in this brief public hearing.

I heard a lot about the importance of streets, having the streets be well maintained, well functioning.

People are in congestion, so that's also thinking, wow, the public works end of it is really, really important to people.

We've been hearing that a lot in our town halls, so it's good to have that reinforced.

And then experience.

This person needs experience in running a city before they get here.

So I thank you for that.

That's really good messaging.

I think it's important for us as a city to challenge ourselves.

I mean we know that we can give lip service to the work that we know that needs to be done here, but we need to make sure that when we are asking

or giving Ms. Narlock that list of what we expect here, that we are challenging ourselves to push past what feels comfortable and normal to us and that we know that for us to really bridge and heal and for all these things that we are saying needs to happen here,

that we're going to have to have a pretty dynamic person that's going to have the experience that's going to extend beyond just simply running a city somewhere else.

And so I hope when you're completing the surveys, when you are sending the emails, calling us, calling Ms. Narlock since she's going to put her name on there, because if I didn't have to have my number,

on the website or not.

So I'll point that out.

But I want you all to really, you know, push, you know, challenge ourselves that we, I hear almost daily people saying this is what we want, but then when it's time and then when the challenge comes, they don't really know how to face it.

So we're either gonna end up in the same spot or we're going to progress.

I just wanted to add one other thought.

All of us have many different opinions on a lot of different things.

There are some things we have arguments about and this goes out throughout the whole community, but one of the themes I think that you are going to hear and that I just heard

There is unity in this community in wanting things to get done, in wanting effective solutions.

And one of the frustrations that I've heard, no matter what your preference is, is that a lot of projects get stuck in our government for too long.

And they don't get affected, whether it's a study or a plan.

And I think what will be challenging, and maybe this is another way of

of a facet of what the mayor is talking about or a way that I relate to what she was talking about which is one of the things that can hang up a project from becoming effective is some disagreement or some controversy and a lot of what the more that I've learned about there are thousands of city managers around the country.

There are thousands of communities around our size who have a city manager.

This is happening all around the country.

and there are ones who are very good at being effective and they're effective in different ways but they do work their way through to something, having a vote, something getting started, program being, something being built, something happening as opposed to getting just stuck.

However they do that, whether it's through better community engagement, better relationships, alliances, listening, they focus on that.

And that to me is what I'm really hoping that we're all looking for.

And it will require working with the city manager in a slightly different way because hopefully the one that we hire is going to come in and be like, I want to get things done.

You all want to do a lot of things.

Let's get some things done.

And they will relate to us differently.

They'll probably relate to the public differently, to stakeholders.

And they'll hopefully do the right things that meet all the goals of equity and transparency and justice that we're all talking about.

And to speak to that, I think it's important.

I just shared with Mr. Edwards this week

I took a photo of one of Dr. Alworth's journal entries and I put in the message that we are still working on eight of the nine items from August 11, 2010.

and he sent back a reply that said, no, I think it's just seven.

I think we got this one right.

So seven of the nine items we are still working on 10 years later.

So having somebody who's effective that's gone to, and I think that's under a very different council and a very different time, way before August 2017.

So, since we are all here and Ms. Narlic had spoken to each of us, I just wanted to just ask because we are here and we're doing this in a public, we have to do this in a public setting clearly and it's a process.

Is there anything that you feel would be beneficial for council to kind of align on as part of this process at this point?

Or do you feel like you have the information you need and can kind of see where that, that alignment is already taking place naturally among the council members?

I just figured we're all here together.

I think we have a good starting point on this.

I think it's very helpful tonight just to hear again from everybody.

And moving forward, what I would like for us to come to terms on is the process moving forward.

I will be sending a timeline to you with milestones and tentative dates on those, and we'll get on the calendars to make sure there's no delay in this process.

We've hit the go button, we're starting, and we have to keep momentum here.

in order to reach our end goal and to be effective in doing that.

As far as process is concerned, I mentioned that some of the things I've done in the past is recommend that we do a meet and greet, that we do a tour of the city, that we have department head meetings and

and things like that, I would certainly recommend that we do those things at a certain point in the process.

We do have on the front end of this, we're afforded the ability to go into executive session on matters.

I do think we need to exercise that on the very front end of this because what I've seen in that regard is if

when candidates first apply for the position and it's open and if it is not handled in executive session, what happens is we lose candidates.

They basically are exposing themselves, maybe unnecessarily.

Maybe they won't be a finalist.

Maybe they won't be considered further.

But we don't want them dropping out on the front end of this when we have the affordability of some level of protection for

candidates.

I do searches in, well, all over, but recently in Georgia, Texas, in Virginia, in Ohio, and there's another one I'm trying to think of, North Carolina, where we do have executive session for personnel matters on the front end, and we do utilize that.

And I've seen the process when we have used that, when we haven't used it.

In Florida, where I'm from, you have no executive session whatsoever.

what we have in that situation is we have candidates who will not put their name out there because it's you know it's for the world to know it'd be like you and me applying for a job and our employer knowing about it instantly you know it's just not the best situation it puts them at risk or what have you so what I would encourage you to do is to if so inclined is to

go through the process up until the point where we have sort of the first round of narrowing down of candidates and executive session, and then once we know our finalists, folks that you are strongly interested in, that we then make that public, and then all of the other steps that I mentioned, bringing in a panel, bringing in department directors and all that, and doing the community meet and greet, that we bring that in at that point in time.

Thank you very much for coming.

You're welcome.

Good evening, I'm Jeanette Janicek with the Department of Neighborhood Development Services and I'm here to talk about appropriation for West Main.

We last, or I last saw you on October 16th, 2017 when I requested a resolution of support for two grant applications.

One was for the multi-modal that was on the consent agenda, the second is for West Main.

We've broken out West Main into four different

pieces.

The first piece we applied for last year for $3 million.

We have been awarded $2,704,319 in state funds that we matched with local dollars.

It was prorated based on the priority that the application qualified for.

And then we also have another $408,000

and $94 that was transferred from older projects.

So the Route 250 interchange at McIntire Road was the project.

So I'm simply here to ask for an appropriation of state funds for the $3,112,413.

Just a clarifying question because there's been some confusion in the public because I think of a recent newspaper article.

Yes, this is previously appropriated funds that we are receiving for the local match.

So we have 3.1 million in local dollars and we're doubling that through the state revenue sharing program.

Going to the state for revenue sharing funds, but then the next year going through smart scale Yes, we have an application out so one we got for next year because they're doing it into two-year cycle for revenue sharing We got 1.7 million in state funds for phase two, and then we've applied for phase two for federal funds as well

Okay, thank you.

Well, I'm doing the appropriation, there's a different project manager.

But I would say what we need to do with this is we need to finish up the final design,

do construction documents.

We also have right of way.

And then we also have a public utility project that is going to go ahead of this.

And then we're undergrounding private utilities.

So construction like ground will be broken within two years, definitely, whether it is the public utility relocation, the private utility or the roadway.

So I guess one thing that would ask all the

Government leaders involved in this, let's go Mr. Murphy all the way through, is that because this has taken so long, just to continually, there was an excellent website and a lot of community engagement, very large, I mean the public sessions were about this, hundreds and hundreds of people came.

I just think that looking at some of this coverage recently, it's easy to forget or have it fall apart, and it's just really important

keep educating and reminding the public as the years go on because these projects take a long time of all the different reasons we're doing this, different pieces of it.

As I'm getting older, the different pieces are different because now I'm biking more with my kids and the protected safe bike lanes are really necessary because it's a very dangerous central artery to bike on and we really want the bike here.

Somebody asked a question recently about

the Drury Brown Bridge and the historical narrative part.

Having been involved in this for a long time, before I got on council I was on the committee that did this many years ago.

The history and the surrounding neighborhoods are the reason that this got passed.

This is supposed to embrace and be very welcoming and supportive of the historic neighborhoods that surround it.

It is designed in the architecture firm.

the historical firms they've incorporated they have and they very much want to embrace the authentic local resident history and stories and names and past that are the nature of those historic neighborhoods Fifeville, 10th and Page, Starr Hill and they really want to do that and it's really important and they don't want the project to happen without it and for that public history to be

highly visible all the way throughout.

And so the Jory Brown Bridge will be prioritized.

It will be elevated against people know why it's there.

And that's, anyway, I think, but it's easy for these pieces to kind of get forgotten as year one becomes year two becomes year three becomes year four.

So I just want us to keep on putting it all together so the public gets it.

If I may follow up with a comment on

I think it does speak to the importance of the ongoing community engagement that was mentioned by one of the members of the public that this needs to be, and this is not just for you, Ms. Janicek.

I'm not sure if this is our communications arm or, but the website hasn't been updated since the design phase was over.

So there's no way for the public to understand and get this history.

It is easy for the press to miss,

understand an aspect of the project because, as you just explained, the various funding mechanisms and how they're alternating is pretty complicated.

So I think it is extremely important to understand too that this has implications for public safety,

on the congestion that was also talked about tonight is related to the traffic signalization that hasn't been adjusted in over 10 years.

And that was one of the findings that they came up with in this report that we got years ago about the West Main Street.

So the idea is that it's supposed to function better for people who walk, people who take the bus, people who ride bikes, and people that drive.

And again, hammering that back over and over again, when you go there, I see a lot of people sitting on the curbs.

sitting on the edge of the street.

There's no place for people to sit in a safe way.

The buckling of the sidewalks because of the street trees not having enough cubic feet for soil to thrive is actually making it an ADA accessible problem all along that corridor.

So these are really essential issues to be resolved from a public safety standpoint.

And once it happens, it will also be a more accommodating place for all users.

You've done a marvelous job keeping this on track.

Not quite sure.

It's certainly in the CIP request for this year that I've tried to combine the strategy for getting future funding, putting the $5 million in that UVA has also contributed.

I think there's an agreement.

I know there's a letter of support.

outlining and we gave an estimate based on like pedestrian improvements that we can amass out of this project.

We're getting $5 million worth of pedestrian improvements that they're willing to contribute.

I'm not giving you an answer.

I can certainly give you an answer tomorrow or the next day.

Madam Mayor, I have a meeting with the new chief operating officer next Tuesday the 13th and I'm meeting with her staff this Wednesday the 7th.

Thank you.

And can we ask for some more?

Since it's a new president, might as well try.

I have one more question, if I may.

I recently went to an all-day workshop with the Piedmont Environmental Council and they talked a lot about Dominion Energy.

And it was brought to my attention that Arlington County actually has an agreement with Dominion Energy to go 50-50 in the undergrounding of utilities.

Could that be pursued in some way or some Get some information about that because that that is an important piece because the undergrounding utilities alone was ten million dollars and our understanding was that the mean energy was not going to budge on on paying for any of that additional cost they would have put in the the old poles back in the sidewalks eating up our

Yes, absolutely.

That's very interesting.

In the past, working with Dominion Power, if they see it being an issue where trees are taking down their lines or they're having issues maintaining service, they will pay to Underground.

On the interchange project, they paid to Underground a certain section of their lines.

But if we're asking for it, then it becomes our cost.

So if you can let me, let us all know.

Absolutely.

Are there any other questions?

All right, is there a motion?

Oh, wait a minute.

Public hearing.

Yeah, public hearing.

Yeah, that's all that.

Yeah, is there anyone that would like to speak about West Main Street?

Public hearing opened.

OK, I'm going to close the public hearing.

Is there?

Oh, are you coming up?

Council, audience.

I'm Scott Bandy.

I'm located at 1639 Cherry Avenue.

Well, the good news about this plan going forward, it seems, is that planning seems to have a handle on the sprawl.

The bad news,

Maybe just a little more thought, particularly the section with the Lewis and Clark and Sacajawea statue.

I sure hope that, I mean, I was kind of distressed when I heard talk before this was open.

for public comment.

Just say it.

It's OK. Maybe.

The short of it is this plank, particularly the section where this statue is in front of the, I believe it's the Marriott, could be given more thought.

And, you know, you have buses going into the bus, Greyhound bus terminal there.

and I think some of the community has already alluded to the fact that if that is taken out or reconfigured so that the buses have to turn at a sharper angle, you may be creating more problems than you might be under the impression that you're taking out.

I think I've said enough, but stick with it.

There's got to be a good plan out of this and hopefully West Main will be completed before

I would like, since he brought the question of the statue, because when we were in session months back, that was one of the questions that I had about what we were going to do with that area and what happened with the statue hadn't been decided.

Because we were supposed to have some public discussion on, it was moving ahead if we... We were going to scoot it over, but they were also doing historical interpretations

of the whole corridor.

So that has been kicked off.

So I would like for us to really consider whether that's in what other space that statute can occupy.

And again, this is going to be a public process that they are going to be kicking off.

They already had the first meeting.

Yeah, could you send us the announcement so we can make the announcement?

I know that came up during our meeting.

I was in there with Councilor Galvin.

And absolutely.

And this is a state project.

So we will need to coordinate with the Virginia Department of Historic Resources.

All right.

Is there anyone else who would like to speak?

All right.

I'm going to close public hearing.

OK.

But we all can agree it's going to go on consent next meeting.

So it's a here.

All right.

Can I just confirm that, Madam Mayor?

Can I put this on your consent agenda?

Is that OK?

I do have one quick question for Mr. Murphy, if I may.

Mr. Murphy, you and I had exchanges via email about the clauses in both resolutions that enabled the West Main Street project and then also the Belmont Bridge project because those clauses were directly related to

local job training and hiring that was patterned after the re-bricking of the mall.

And that was particularly with regards to West Main Street.

And the correspondence you shared with me, it sounded like there was actually, because there was federal money, a lot, considerably more federal money involved with the Belmont Bridge, that the federal hiring requirements actually do

insist upon local hiring.

So there might be more opportunities with that.

So I'm not sure where that stands now with West Main Street, but could we have a more detailed update?

You gave me some indications of earlier correspondence with other staff, but I think this is something the entire council would like to be kept apprised of because it is a very important element of

equitable development and we're tying the redevelopment of our infrastructure to job creation for our residents whenever and however we can.

And as I understand it, a federal project doesn't limit, we're not limited as we are with state procurement laws with contractors.

Because it's a federal project, you can actually do more local hiring.

and then again we need to get a handle on how many new jobs from our city departments will be created with these infrastructure projects so that we have an idea of how much kind of teeing up we're going to have to do for recruitment and training and so on.

Is that possible for us to get an update?

I know when we enabled both of those resolutions that we're supposed to have gotten an update nine months since we agreed to get those resolutions passed.

It's kind of in keeping with what Counselor Signer was saying about needing to get things done in a more timely basis.

And the West Main Street resolution was passed in, I believe, in 2015.

All right.

OK, so can we take a 10 minute?

You just walked in, Mr. Markey.

All right, so I call this meeting back to order.

Next, we have a resolution equity fund allocation to New Hill Development Corporation.

And Madam Mayor, I will give a brief introduction and then turn it over to Councillors Bellamy and Galvin for a deeper discussion about this, but just wanted to go through procedurally.

In December of 2017, the Council did set aside a racial engagement and equity fund

and appropriated approximately a million dollars at that time.

Now there is approximately 1.534 million dollars in that fund that's been appropriated.

The council does not need to hold a public hearing as it would in an appropriation, but the council can certainly take public input tonight since this is an allocation.

Since it's an allocation, therefore, it doesn't follow the same rules as an appropriation.

Before you, you have a donation agreement between New Hill Development Corporation and the city.

The agreement itself talks about that New Hill will expend approximately $350,000 on a small area plan for the Starr Hill area and also engage in financial training programs for city residents.

If the council chooses to, again, it can allocate this half million dollars to New Hill Development Corporation out of its already appropriated equity fund.

We actually are going to turn it over to Ms. Yolanda Harrow, who is currently the Executive Director of the new HEAL Development Corporation.

Good evening.

How are you all doing this evening?

It's a pleasure to be here to speak before you this evening.

So I guess what I'd like to just kind of start out is talking about what New Hill is.

And while we formed, we are a community development corporation.

We are a non-profit corporation.

We started talking about what would it be like reimagining Charlottesville in a different way and how can we look at helping to

Grow an African American middle class here in Charlottesville and what would that be like?

And what would it be like if we had more businesses here that were owned and operated by African Americans?

And what would it be like if we had more home ownership here?

And what would it be like if individuals did not have to go way out into the county in order to be able to afford to buy a home in Charlottesville?

Is there a way that we can have pathways that allows for individuals to have upward mobility?

And so as we started the process, we started looking at who our potential partners could be in it.

So a lot of work we wanted to do on the forefront so that we were not coming to the community and then trying to do that work.

As we were trying to engage with the community because we needed to be able to build capacity internally.

We needed to be able to think through what we wanted to focus on and we need to understand the history.

We need to understand what type of resources were available and to start building those relationships.

to be able to gain access

you know a certain area of land that being Vinegar Hill along with other areas in Charlottesville then it really is an opportunity for government to help give some of that back to the community and for us to start to reimagine and to come up with a vision.

So the area that we're looking at is not something that was not a part of the plan to have a small area plan, it just hasn't been done.

It's been on the plan since 2013

And we want to be able to move things forward.

And so again, part of what we've been working on is to be able to get that capacity ready so that when we start, we start and we move forward and we work to completion.

And that we have some real partners that can help us get there that have done this.

All throughout the United States in many different communities and they've been doing it for quite a long time and we want to be able to leverage their expertise so that we're not reinventing the wheel.

We want to use the best practices that have been

and so many other communities in so many different ways that are

Every community is a little bit different.

So I have a few questions if you don't want to answer them.

Absolutely, and thank you for that question.

So one of our partners, we'll start with the financial piece of it, because one of the things that we understand that we need to close the wealth gap in order for African Americans to really realize

our potential and to be able to to build wealth and own assets then we've got to look at a couple of things and one of those things is credit, money management.

So we decided to look and see like who does this very well and so we we were introduced to Operation Hope.

They are out of Atlanta.

The gentleman John Bryant who is CEO of that organization

is an African American gentleman that formed it when he was living in Compton after the riots happened after the Rodney King trial.

And in his mind it was like, wait a minute, why are we the only ones that are angry and why are we destroying our things?

And his conclusion was is that we, because we don't own this or because we don't understand or we don't have the, we're not included in the financial system.

And so what he sought to do is to create a program that does that.

And so what he was very good at doing is he said, I'm going to put all of the credit bureaus on my board.

I'm going to get the Federal Reserve on my board.

I'm going to get the large banks on my board.

I'm going to get Gallup on my board.

Because these are the people that are creating the game, creating the rules, so let us work with them

So what we would be working with them is they do what they call hope insights.

And what that is is a financial coach.

And so that individual works with, in our particular case, we want that person to focus on the individual as well as the entrepreneur so that that individual, they can work with folks to raise their credit scores so that they can get what they call 700 communities and they can get their

they have a personal plan, someone working personally with them because they may not necessarily be wanting to buy a home but they may already be a homeowner and they may want to put themselves in a better financial position.

Then the other aspect of that is the access to capital for entrepreneurs.

We have many people that want to start businesses or have businesses in the Charlottesville but they want to be able to expand those businesses and unfortunately

maybe they're not in a position to be able to do that either based on personal finance or based on the fact that they are not speaking the language that the bank is speaking.

And so you need to want to walk that process with you and to be there and so that if you were to go to a bank and that bank says, we're going to deny your loan, then you can then work with this individual.

We want to partner with the bank to say,

So this is the financial literacy component that you were discussing in the packet.

And so our other national partner is LISC.

So LISC is, LISC stands for Local Initiatives Support Corporation.

They were started in 1979 by the Ford Foundation.

and what they started out to do, they said, hey, you know, government, for profit companies, as well as foundations have the money, they have the capital.

And then you have your local people that understand their community.

We want to work to bridge that gap so that we can get the capital to the individuals locally and we can leverage our

expertise, we can leverage our resources to be able to help the local communities.

Yes, LISC has an office over in Richmond.

That's one of their local, so they have offices in 44 states.

But they work in a number, they've worked in about 1400 different communities throughout the United States.

And so, but we have actually been working personally with the CEO of the organization because he does have ties to our community.

He does live in the state of Virginia.

Absolutely, so you know obviously we are looking at, we've got to, one we've written other grants and so we do have other

Monies out there that we are seeking to get.

We do need to, it does cost to do a small area plan.

And what we've looked at is, you know, over the, some of the other organizations that have received similar funding for smaller areas were about, I think PHA got like $350,000 or something like that for 12 acres.

This is a considerable size.

is actually 48 acres so it's a little bit larger than that and so what it will go towards the small area plan itself it will go towards community engagement it will go towards capacity building internally for us and so this is not all of our budget this is just a portion of our budget and then this is our opportunity to be able to

So when you say something like the small area plan, I know that New Hill is a new CDC, so who would actually be doing... LISC.

LISC will do the small area plan.

Yes, they are the gold standard of who does this.

Right.

And they do a number of different types.

And so you have three different types, they gave us three different examples.

they have what they call a quality of life small area plan and what that means is they're looking at how can we improve the life of the individuals living in a particular area then they have the economic development type of small area plan and again that's all about you know if they're looking at commercial area and

looking at standing up businesses and looking at growing job opportunities.

And then they also have housing and development type planning as well, small area plans.

And so what we're asking or what we're looking at is let's take a look at all of those things.

You know, it doesn't need to be this or that, let's do and, and, and.

Do you want to do another 10 minutes?

Yes, please, another 10 minutes.

So one of the questions, excuse me, one of the things that we've heard in emails and just communications from different community members, such as FAR and the like, and that they represent, and me personally, as a housing authority rep on council,

and working a great deal with Farr.

I know there's communications about, well, how will LISC or how will New Hill work with other community partners or the community as a whole in terms of community engagement, about what will transpire.

Oh, absolutely.

So, again, we are about collaboration.

We're about community building.

and we understand that FAR has its role, PHA has its role, CRHA has its role, Habitat for Humanity has its role and so we would love to be able to say that there

isn't enough work to go around, but the unfortunate reality is that it is.

And so we certainly work to collaborate.

I've met with some of the leaders, not all of them, and we've talked and we've looked at what they're doing and one of the things that we talk about is where there are aligned interests and aligned goals, then we will certainly look to partner on that because we want to be able to leverage the resources.

If we have access to resources that

Last question for me.

And just looking at your board, I mean, you have a variety of different people.

I see a few of them here, Mr. Hunter Smith and Ms. Shamour Cooper, Mr. Harrell and Ms. Mahoney and Mr. Koogie and others.

One of the things I've noticed is that

And we've also got this question, why has it been, excuse me, and Mr. Birx as well.

Sorry, Mr. Birx.

But one of the things that we've continuously heard is from people as well, why wasn't this like more out?

Is there a reason?

Were you guys trying to keep things secretive or is there like a, can you speak a little bit about why it's kind of just been an underground?

We heard Ms. Mahoney talk, it's been in the works for 17 months.

Absolutely.

So I think it, I mean, I'm an entrepreneur by nature, and so we approach this like we would start a business.

And when you're in your business planning phase, that's exactly what we were in.

We were in our business planning phase.

We're looking at what is it that we want to do?

And we were looking at doing our research so that we're not taking the public through that process.

We're doing that process

So we did look to see, okay, who do we want on our board?

We want to make sure our board is very well rounded.

We want to make sure that we had great representation of people that

lived and grew up here in Charlottesville as well as individuals that have access to other resources and other connections that we could then leverage.

We want our board to work.

We want our board to work for us and we want to make sure that the individuals that were on that board were individuals that, one, could help us

really be able to move this project forward.

The people that are native to Charlottesville?

Yes, ma'am.

So you would have PJ Harris, who's native to Charlottesville.

You would have Shamara Cooper, who is native to Charlottesville.

you would have Ann Brown, who is native to Charlottesville.

And so again, some of these individuals work in nonprofits.

But all of them have been working in the community.

All of them have been putting sweat equity in for a long period of time and money into this community.

Makes sense to me.

That's all I have.

There's anyone else?

You have some questions and I'll follow up whenever.

Well, so I think this is really exciting.

I think there's a tremendous amount of work that's gone into this.

I know Maurice Jones from a long time ago working together in the Warner administration.

I do say the name and I'm wanting confusion.

There's a different Maurice Jones who is just, you know, a different Maurice Jones in Virginia and this is like one of our

Leading lights, he's been in Governor's Administration, ran a newspaper, he's a Rhodes Scholar, he's very gifted, he's on UVA Board of Visitors, he's just like a real genius and a really nice guy and he does care about these communities and it's like a really impressive results-focused outfit that uses leverage to build things in communities that matter and leverage is what we've been talking about here for

Small city, it's hard to do big things because if you fund them directly with dollars, that gets very expensive.

Whereas if you use leverage like we have with some of our affordable housing projects, $1 to $5 or $10 from another group, that is just a smart, good way to go about it.

And that is the model that you all are working on.

And one of the things I just wanted to suggest, ask about, very impressive board, two great organizations.

We've had some conversation tonight about these wonderful projects that we come up with in the city and the city manager search hopefully can address some of this a bit, but some of them can have a hard time having enough shoulders behind the wheel to get it over the various humps that develop.

We just heard about West Main Street.

We will break down on it at some point, but

I first got involved in this five years ago.

It started actually 40 years ago.

But this phase, we did do the vote, the second meeting of the last council in 2016.

So these things take a while.

So it would be great to involve the help of community members.

Maybe there's an advisory board that goes into this where people like me, lots of other people will have

an idea or a connection or a relationship or will want to do some of the work or be involved because it's a very big project.

Not to muck up the gears, not to have committees to make decisions, but to employ

Absolutely.

And we do currently have advisors that are not on our board that are individuals that do this type of work nationally as well as in other capacities.

And then part of what LISC would look to do in their small area plan is to develop that so that we make sure we have complete local participation.

Thank you.

No, and I've expressed just the importance of really getting the buy-in from some of these stakeholders who kind of have the rights to these, solve the properties that fall within the small area plan because it is different than our housing authority or PHA who own the properties which they were doing their planning on so there's a lot more opportunities they have to kind of drive the direction that those things take and obviously the city is one of those main stakeholders but there are others and so that's just been always been like you know just a flag for me in terms of just I realized that

I want to engage people at the right time, but having those folks at the table moving forward is going to be critical to the success, because I don't want it to see just another plan.

I want to see a plan that can be actionable.

And so that was definitely a concern for me.

And I would say that my biggest concern has really been less about the projects.

I really do believe in this, and I want to support it, but the process does throw me a bit.

it surprised me in some ways that it was all of a sudden in front of us and I understand the dollar amount and I guess I would just ask my colleagues I guess how do we address the concerns that some have around like you know this didn't go through a normal funding process such as AVRT which we do obviously throughout the year and I realize this is from funds that have been earmarked for this specific purpose but I just want to acknowledge that those concerns exist and I understand where they're coming from because

So may I respond to some of that please?

Please.

So with regards to the process, this is a small area plan and it's been identified, it's been stated since 2013 that this was one of the 12 small area plans.

It has been in the past different ways that a plan actually starts getting instigated

The Planning Commission can make recommendations.

The community can come forward and ask to have it done.

And then the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission can make an effort and overture because it's a major state infrastructure project that's of interest.

So those are the three small area plans we have in play right now.

At all times, the council can also initiate a small area plan.

Those other groups are advisory.

The community came from Fifeville to get it done.

But again, to Councilor Signer's point, what is amazing about this arrangement is that in the agreement, within nine months, this plan will be done.

And it's not only a small area plan, it's also a strategy for empowerment.

We have looking at Fifeville right now,

The Cherry Avenue plan is going on to its second year.

We've had, the hydraulic plan was done within a year, but implementation now is kind of like lagging.

Our staff and our planning department, our Naval Development Services, simply does not have the capacity to do the community engagement that LISC is going to be able to do.

And so this is amazing.

and the avalanche of resources that are coming to us.

And it has to be stressed that it was a government act that destroyed Vinegar Hill and with great consequence to the African American community in Charlottesville.

And there is a certain kind of rightness and logic to it.

No one else was limited.

I didn't realize the timing had flown so fast.

Another 10 minutes please.

And so the other thing I just want to also underscore is the income wealth gap, when you look at the numbers, the African Americans make 55% of white median income.

According to the New York Times report, for every $100 in white family wealth, black families hold just $5.

So this is hugely important.

And the other piece that I think is pretty critical is that when you look at the disparities in who has the power, those who are connected to capital and financing, those are the banks and developers, within the for-profit development, private development sector, 80% are white, 2% are African American.

So again, we have a situation here where an African-American led community development corporation is taking the lead to provide a very in-depth visioning process for the city of Charlottesville in an area that has needed repair for a long time.

And I just want to thank the tenacity on the part of Ms. Harrell

and everyone else in this group who has shown that over the 17 months, they've crossed T's and dotted I's.

And it is in keeping with our comprehensive planning process.

It's in keeping with our small area planning process.

I think that answers to a certain extent.

Sorry, Ms. Hill, I know you.