City Council Meeting   1/4/2010

Do you need a prenatal care?

Thank you.

Mm-hmm.

But I see you closed off.

Thank you.

So open the nominations for the office of mayor.

Is there a second?

With pleasure to second that nomination.

Is there a second?

I thought you were my friend.

So the nomination, you're withdrawing the nomination?

Yes, I am.

And you nominated Dave Norris.

And I second it.

Jeffery?

Yes.

Yes.

Ms. Davis?

Yes.

Congratulations, Mr. Mayor.

And condolences.

I'll entertain nominations for the Office of Vice Mayor for the City Council of Charlottesville.

I'd like to make a nomination of Holly Edwards for Vice Mayor.

I'll second that one, too.

Are there any other nominations for the office of vice mayor?

Seeing none, am I correct?

Dr. Brown?

Yes.

Mr. Harris?

Yes.

Congratulations.

Any other announcements or items to be added to our agenda tonight?

You can register online or you can register in person, 970-3101.

When you come to speak, the first person to sign up is John Cruikshank.

I know there are more people who would like to speak on the same topic who are not able to sign up, and I thank you very much for letting me speak.

David Steinberg.

Happy New Year.

As this tendency of the mayor's agreement suggests, we are the city on the hill we've been waiting for.

Thank you Mr Steinberg and Knox

The possibilities are just endless there and I think could be very positive.

So anyway, I look forward to the many benefits that the Y can bring to our community and thank you for your support.

Eric Gunderson.

Thank you.

Randy Salzman.

Thank you.

So a creative solution can and should be developed.

Dick Howard.

Thank you very much.

If any of you doubt Professor Howard's credibility in quoting the Virginia Constitution, you may not know that he was the lead author of the Virginia Constitution.

Thank you.

Joshua Baer.

On a night that is bitterly cold and where people are sleeping on the streets and under bridges, desperate for shelter, they will not be covered by a 40-room SRO, but who will be helped by hope and an emergency shelter.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Collins.

This is not good planning, this is not good public policy, this is not protecting the assets of our city which have been handed down to us through many generations.

Thank you Mr. Fenwick.

We call for our leaders to listen to the voice of reason, especially as our children are left vulnerable.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Salinas.

Ms. Szakos?

Well, first of all, I'm sorry that there were people who came to speak about issues, both the ones that got covered and didn't get to speak, but I do think it's wonderful that so many people come to City Council meeting and want to speak and are heard.

Thanks.

The only comment I'll make is I'd just like to personally thank Josh Baer for the good work he's doing in our community.

Ms. Edwards?

We'll be able to talk more about the design of the wall when we get to that point in our agenda, but I wanted, what you didn't know, that I was, I'm aware, I am hearing you, and I do have concerns about the use of the park for the facility.

There are two or three comments I'd like to make about related to basically bike and transit and there have been some suggestions today and in previous meetings like the idea of bike-friendly city and better transit system and I would like to pursue those things and I think the Council is very supportive of those ideas I think in my mind I'm ready

We certainly need to be careful of their safety, but I think that to assume that walking is unsafe on its face is probably counter to our hope to make this a pedestrian-friendly city.

Is there any opposition to such a measure?

We got this by email and Mr. Huja hadn't been home yet, so I've just given him a conference.

Give extra copies.

If you'd like, we can hold off and bring it up under other business.

And again, for those of you who came to speak on the noise ordinance, we are going to allow you a chance to do so when we bring that up momentarily.

Dr. Brown.

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to move that Steve Ivory be appointed to be a member of the CVBG task force representing the Rose Hill neighborhood.

Is there a second to the nomination?

Second.

Item B is an appropriation of $7,500, Center for Watershed Protection grant, second of two readings.

And item M, ordinance noise control from restaurants in NCC district, first of two readings.

Are there any items counselors would like removed?

The noise ordinance.

Move the agenda with item M removed.

Second.

If not, please indicate your vote.

Mr. Tolbert, I don't know if you are prepared to speak on that.

Again, this is consistent.

It's not restricted or it's still at 75?

It probably should in those zones and so we don't feel like that's an undue restriction at all to place there.

Are you saying that there is no noise requirement on restaurants and neighborhoods till 11 o'clock?

Am I reading that correctly?

Except within the downtown.

Yes, it's only after, I get confused with that in front of me, but there's, outside the downtown there is no noise restriction anywhere from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m.

Because I know there are a lot of residences that are affected by noise on West Main.

No ma'am, West Main is in a different zoning classification.

Were there any other parts of the city that you envisioned at some point falling under the same zone, the NCC designation?

The way we wrote our zoning ordinance, I would not anticipate that.

What's the noise allowed on the mall?

It's 75 dBA.

Is there anywhere in the city that has a 55 decibel level?

That's any residential zone, which is the vast majority of the zoning in the city is 55 DBA.

This is the standard in other cities?

It's not every city, but there are other cities that seem to recognize 55 as the level in those zoning districts that would appear to... Do you have examples of like a neighborhood in Richmond or a neighborhood in Alexandria that has this type of...

I mean, I'd just like to make sure we're entering territory that we're actually comparing apples to apples.

venues, but Austin was one that really had this.

And can you tell me what, just so we know what we're going from and to, can you give me examples of what does 75 decibels mean and what does 55 decibels mean in terms of a law mower or... We have a decibel meter in the room and at no point this evening have we crossed the 55 threshold below.

The entire meeting is single.

Generally what you hear if you're standing at the post office when the pavilion has a show.

Does it tell you something about what the difference between, I mean is 75 twice as high as 30?

It is considerably quieter than 75.

That's just where I am at the moment.

But I would like to give people a chance who did come down expecting to be able to speak and give them a chance to speak and not necessarily take action tonight.

But it will be useful, I think, to have a public hearing, an advertised public hearing on the item and let everybody know that we are going to do this or not do this so that we can have opportunity to hear from everybody.

That's fine.

I'd also like to suggest that if we do a public hearing that we might try to figure out how we could do it in the neighborhood rather than here.

Okay, any other questions and then we're going to have our impromptu public hearing.

or not they probably they do not comply with the zoning ordinance and what they're doing there is not appropriate so that's a that's another matter that you know we can give you one more time to study it probably will work itself out some there too.

Mr. Fisk, would you like to get us started?

Thank you.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

Yes ma'am.

Thank you.

So I'd love to see the research on Austin, Texas.

We feel like that to your point, Dr. Brown, there should be some more research being done and maybe look at other cities that have addressed this problem because we think it's a value to the community and just want to make that point.

Yes.

My name is Stan Braverman.

Thank you for your time.

I just want you to know this gentleman, I'm from Southern Wayne Farm, 942 Canvas back road.

I look forward to your open whatever you're going to do next.

But we do have a lot of other business on our agenda tonight.

So, Jeff, maybe there's a solution the city has to address because we've had two very interesting meetings with Jim and we were struck by how none of you attended.

I'm sorry, I don't need to open this debate tonight, but you make a good point, I think they've addressed it.

We need more debate, it sounds like, more discussion.

Dr. Brown, did you have any?

I'd like us to at least be thinking a little bit about finding something that works, but not necessarily limiting it to this district.

I do plan to go on and ride along with the police on the weekend in the Belmont neighborhood too.

Take it away.

that we really don't have the equipment to handle in a manner that I think we all would have liked to have seen it, everybody would have liked to have seen it done much, much quicker.

Just out of curiosity, if you were to give a ballpark estimate on what it would cost to be fully equipped for that 0.01% contingency

The phone calls, we did open up a second phone line, the 3301, it's actually the line that comes directly into my office, and two of us took about a thousand phone calls between Monday and Tuesday.

I'm happy to take any questions that you might have.

Questions for Ms. Mueller?

No.

We warned people that we had a fine.

We tried to work with the adjacent property owners.

went to school in Iowa and my daughter is now in school there and she describes these things that they have that have blow torches that you know heat the highway and then these big combine things that lift the snow into these giant trucks and they and it would be irresponsible for us to buy that sort of thing and so with what the equipment that you had I just would like to I think probably on behalf of all of us to thank all the people who are responsible for working so hard to and continue to with this continued cold to deal with that.

The one comment I have is that the degree to which we can prioritize bus routes, because I know the buses didn't run for several days.

One of the problems is that we could get the 7 going once 29 got clear, but every other, most of the other routes that go out in the county, they just weren't, and that was the decision made by the CTS operations manager in trying to drive those routes.

So I'd just like to see us with CTS, with the county, you know, work on trying to make that an effective strategy.

I think that that might help us get some of that clear.

That's a very, very effective service.

But Ms. Shaughnessy.

98% of them said they'd recommend Jaunt to a friend.

temporarily on a short term basis work something out that would be really helpful to us.

Are you looking for any kind of specific action from us tonight on that?

We were grateful to her for saying those lovely things about us, and I'd be happy to answer any questions for you.

If somebody wanted to use Jaunt, what would they have to pay?

If they're a city resident and they are certified by CTS as having a disability, it's $1.50 each way.

I would be very supportive of the city

We were very impressed with that.

And thank you for everything that you do.

Have a good night.

Mr. Tolbert?

Those things will be, that will have to come back to you, but as far as your requirement that the Planning Commission and the BAR see the project before it come back to you this time, that has been done, those approvals have been given, and it's ready for presentation to you tonight.

And that's something I think we also do for the Boys and Girls Club, isn't that right?

Can I ask one just clarifying question?

Because clearly it's affecting...

Is that your recollection?

I've drafted that language.

I wish it had never been in there.

So do we need, just as a process point, do we need to have that removed or is it non-removed?

I would not want to go back through the amendment process of that given the rather cumbersome procedure that you have to follow to grant one of these leases.

The master planning process set the site, set the five acre site and I think the language basically is just, it's confusing but it is not necessary to remove at this point.

All right, so Mr. Bullard.

Let's see, I guess we have a 3D digital model which would need to be presented here and we can either show that to you now or I know it's going to be kind of a long evening for you if you'd rather that we reserve that for reference, we can do that as well but it would probably take, I don't know, three or four minutes to go through that digital model.

Is that the same models that were shown at the Planning Commission?

Yes it is.

I don't want to keep you from it.

The plaza, is the plaza itself a green space or what is in the plaza?

So this portion of the entrance road is realigned, the existing alignment is somewhat in that direction.

My interest was especially in another entrance near fire station.

It's just been slightly reconfigured in that area.

Is that going to be done in the winter?

and then to provide sort of a secondary way to get through to the other part of the park via this existing parking area in the off season but to obviously I think we can't just shut down the park to build this building and so there would have to be a phasing plan worked out with the construction contractor and there would simply be a requirement that access to all parts of the park would be maintained at all times.

How does this site plan accommodate transit?

Well, certainly a bus can turn around in this loop.

Yes.

In terms of a short pedestrian walk that is accessible to every child in the city, I'm not sure there's another location that would offer that better than this one does, which I think is part of why the master planning process.

Is there a pedestrian access for rugby only?

Am I right, Jim?

All you see is parking and no sense of arrival in the park as such.

There's good things being done in the new parking areas as well.

Other questions, comments from Mr. Bullard?

And then the last thing that was brought up with this note was, again, talking about the loss of trees, and was there any kind of plan to be able to save some of the trees?

As I said a moment ago, we are planting more trees than we are removing, so there is a net gain in trees in the park.

It has been documented somewhere that you are going to be adding more and you are going to be taking away?

So we've tried to accomplish that just in a different way that is, we think, more feasible.

I think it works better.

Other comments, questions?

Are you putting in kind of middle-sized trees or bitty trees?

size and canopy that they didn't seem spindly.

Not the twigs and straws.

So I don't have the actual caliper with me but I do understand your point and that would be our intention.

Is there a second?

I'll second.

Last item on our regular business agenda.

Mr. Rogers.

Yes, Mr. Mayor, Members of Council, I have a very brief presentation for you tonight, just very introductory, of course.

I know that representatives from the applicant are also here as well should you have questions for them.

I had asked a question in the planning commission meeting, 60 is not all SRO units, they're going to be all SRO units or 30 and 30?

The specific mix of the units still remains in flux due to some limitations on our zoning code, but that's something that will be worked out during the final site plan based on my discussions with the applicant.

These are not going to be 60 units of SRO housing.

I would defer to the applicant to talk about sort of those things.

And it'll probably be a mix of somewhere between 30 SRO units and 40 SRO units somewhere in that.

Other questions?

Please let me know if there's more questions.

You're not asking us to approve the design of the building tonight, the financing of it, the programmatic aspects of it.

The approval before you tonight is simply that the land use is appropriate.

Other questions, comments, or a motion to approve?

I move the motion that we approve this recommendation.

Any further discussion?

If not, please indicate your vote.

I'm trying to remember if there was any other business that had been added to our agenda tonight.

The intent of this letter is simply to reaffirm existing council policy.

I'm just having a difficult time reacting to that today.

Just what we're trying to reflect is council's current adopted position, which was not clear in the letter that got sent to ADOT.

That was my impression, too, is that it's not so much expressing our opinion on this position as saying this is what has actually been decided and approved so far.

Dr. Brown, do you have any thoughts?

I'm okay with this letter.

Well, I'd be happy to entertain a motion to approve the submittal of this letter.

I'll so move.

Is there a second?

Second.

We will now wrap things up with one last comment session, matters by the public.

Sir.

For a world class city, it could have been done a lot better.

Thank you, Mr. Long.

And I think that the council should honor this consensus and not proceed with the parkway until these conditions are satisfied.

Is there anybody else who would like to speak?

Please call, contact Governor Kean and ask him to sign an executive order to restore voting rights for former felons so their rights are automatically restored when they finish their sentences.

What is the number?

Oh, it's not on there?

Can you just say the number?

Okay.

Thank you very much.

L'OCCITANE