Category: government

Numbers $600,000

portable outhouses
Someone involved with the Charlottesville government decided it wasn’t a good idea to replace the portable toilets at Riverview park with a precast concrete unit.
The low bid for installing the deluxe bathroom came in somewhere above six hundred thousand dollars ($600,000).
World class city, assembly of geniuses. I am glad the City is holding back. The project was cancelled.

We have CATEC, we have UVA, we have thousands of hipsters. We can build a bathroom. Get people involved that know how to work with their hands. Dig a foundation, build with all the ash being cut down in the park. Make a composting unit or a vault system, using drinking water to transport human waste is insane.


Maurice

Maurice D. Cox was appointed Commissioner of the Department of Planning and Development (DPD) by Mayor Lori E. Lightfoot and confirmed by the City Council  on October 16, 2019.
Celebrated for his experience merging architecture, design and politics through multiple public, private and elected positions, Cox is responsible for leading DPD’s economic development, planning and zoning functions while fostering community-improvement initiatives throughout the city. His primary focus is under-invested neighborhoods on the South and West sides.

• Residents’ voices should be heard for all major development decisions involving new policies and projects at the local level.
• Planning efforts should ensure weaker housing markets should be equitably incorporated in the fabric of stronger markets without causing displacement or gentrification.
• Public safety is essential around the buildings in which people live, requiring the cooperation of social service agencies, schools, youth-oriented agencies and other groups, in addition to traditional law enforcement agencies.
• Policy improvements that aim to ensure neighborhood affordability should include homeownership programs, repair programs, rental assistance programs, and related education efforts.
• Housing efforts should not focus exclusively on units and costs, but also local amenities that overlap with We Will’s other pillars.–We Will Chicago

the road not taken

James Halfaday 2011 council candidate
In 2011 the announced candidates for Charlottesville City Council were Scott Bandy (I); Paul Beyer (D); Colette E. Blount (D); Brevy Cannon (D); Brandon Collins (I); Bob Fenwick (I); Kathleen M. Galvin (D); James Halfaday (D); Satyendra Huja (D); Paul Long (I); Dede Smith (D); and Andrew Williams (I). (pictured above James Halfaday)

One wonders about the roads not taken. Had the electorate made different choices in the 2011 councilmanic race would Charlottesville have avoided subsequent train wrecks?

Policies, people and leadership matter?

SB 1263 Deeds Votes against bicycle bill?

Quincy Florida bikers

SB 1263 Bicycles; permits operators to treat a stop sign as a yield sign in certain situations.

floor: 01/27/21 Senate: Read third time and defeated by Senate (16-Y 22-N)
YEAS–Barker, Bell, Boysko, DeSteph, Ebbin, Favola, Hashmi, Lewis, Marsden, Mason, McClellan, McPike, Morrissey, Petersen, Spruill, Surovell–16.
NAYS–Chase, Cosgrove, Deeds, Dunnavant, Edwards, Hanger, Howell, Kiggans, Locke, Lucas, McDougle, Newman, Norment, Obenshain, Peake, Pillion, Reeves, Ruff, Saslaw, Stuart, Suetterlein, Vogel–22.

Community meetings

Once upon a time the public stage was an open place to see and be seen
Sometime the being seen was without a particular message. Maybe one’s presence expressed support? Maybe it expressed a watchfulness.
LanCoVa BOS
There is information available from body language and the context in which it is thrown down
signs
There are means, within the physical space, even if it is not your turn to be heard to be heard.

Now there are all forms of electronic meetings. Have they increased accessibility? Have they increased effective citizen participation in governance?

Apex Energy-SouthernDevelopment-McDonough v Quercus

tree lined street
Garrett Street in Charlottesville, between Ridge Street and Avon, has excellent “green infrastructure”. It is a canopy street. Trees provide shade and shelter, and lower temperatures in the summer.

green city ideology
In 2006 the Charlottesville City Council adopted a 2025 Vision. Item five of the eight point vision was “A Green City”

voting on street elements
The City adopted a plan in 2016 to guide the morphology of its streets. Citizens were involved in the development of the plan. People like canopy trees. Shade is a necessity in a southern city if you intend to walk in the summertime.

Plan 6010 student
The Garrett Street trees have been celebrated over the years.

In the last decade development pressure has focused on this corridor. But still, in the time of COVID-19, a number of the trees remain. (construction workers maintaining distance).

Garret Street stumps
This past week, seven Garrett Street corridor Pin Oaks were dispatched. 10-15,000 square feet of shade gone. Over a million leaves, gone. Carbon sequestration gone.
Apex Energy is building an eight storey energy efficient structure to the south of the stumps . The landscape plan for Apex’s new corporate headquarters shows these noble oaks being replaced by pagoda dogwoods, a flowering plant, a small deciduous shrub that grows to twenty feet, with a trunk up to six inches in diameter. Token trees.

The proposed plantings will not provide the environmental services that these trees brought to our City. This canopy street destruction is deeply discouraging.

screenshot from search for 2025 vision
According to talk on the street, the Apex building is being designed by William McDonough + Partners, two thoughtful companies…
Sometimes green is not green.