City Council Meeting   12/6/2021

Thank you

Thank you

and you can see that there are certainly a number of areas where the vaccination rate is not where we would like it to be but there are areas where we actually have a higher vaccination rate among Blacks or African Americans than we see in the white population and areas where it's just not great in either that we continue to work on and try and get out to provide easy access to vaccination.

Overall in the city of Charlottesville, you'll see that just about 55% of individuals who self-declared black have been vaccinated for whites at 67 and it's higher in all other ethnic and racial groups at this point in time.

As I said, our community vaccination center continues to remain open.

It's in the

Old Big Lots building.

And so if you go to vaccines.gov, you can find it by looking under the Charlottesville Old Big Lots CVC.

They have all three vaccinations available, all the doses, all ages.

You can walk in now if you have a five to 11 year old

and want to get them vaccinated.

Translation services are available.

So if English is not your main language and you prefer to get your health information in another language, they can assist you with that.

And as I said, they're open Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m.

to 8 p.m.

So it's a really great service.

Everyone that I know that's been through this says it's really fast and they do a great job.

So I really encourage people to go there.

We do continue to offer testing in the area at all of the usual places and at the usual times.

Wednesday and Thursday, I do want to point out that there is considerable number of hours available for testing using the Nex Molecular.

They're a private company that we have contracted with through our central office to come and offer testing.

that's at the JC Penney lot and then Friday we're there from 4 30 to 6 30 and of course UVA continues to provide its testing at Church of Incarnation and Mount Zion First African Baptist Church and I really want to call out both of those religious organizations they've been incredibly gracious to allow testing to occur there for months on end really it's been a great service to the community and I just want to thank them for the service it's

we couldn't have done it without him.

And of course our hotline remains open and you can search for other places to get vaccines at vaccines.gov.

That's really the bulk of, and I'll stop sharing now, bulk of information I have.

I know there are lots of questions about the Omicron variant, and I wish I had some more definitive answers.

But at this point in time, we're really just trying to determine its transmissibility, its severity of disease, who we think it's going to impact.

and I would just emphasize again that the best thing that you can do right now is if you haven't been vaccinated please start your vaccination series.

If it's been more than six months and you haven't gotten your booster please go get your booster.

Everyone over the age of 18 is eligible for a booster at this point in time and then finally remember that the

Basic wearing your mask, keeping your distance, washing your hands are really great ways to keep yourself and your family safe.

I think you touched on it, but that 18 to 24 range, I feel like at another meeting you might have shared about the impact that UVA students might have in that number and where they report their vaccinations.

Yeah, so you'll notice that some of the worst census tracts are centered right around the university, and that's where there's a lot of student housing.

and we think part of the problem is for us we use census numbers for the denominator of age groups and part of the problem is that the census is very clear on instructing you to use where you live at at the moment of the census and it happens when students are in school so we have lots of 18 to 24 year olds in those census tracts but when they got vaccinated I'm

And there's no easy way for me to confirm it, but I'm pretty sure that what they did is put their home address because that's what my 18 to 24 year old did when she got vaccinated is gave her home address.

And so it's probably a little falsely low.

That being said, there are probably areas that we can continue to get buy-in to the vaccine and that.

And there are plenty of other areas that we're working on where we don't think it's the student.

And the 5 to 11, are you seeing any challenges with that age group?

Who's getting vaccinated and who is not?

Right now, anybody can get vaccinated.

If you have a five to 11 year old, supply is not an issue any longer.

It's really just getting the kids vaccinated.

So we are, as I talked about at the last one, we've been doing a lot of outreach at schools and in particular neighborhoods where we think access to other vaccination might be challenging.

So we have drive-through events in the schools.

We usually start those at four in the afternoon.

We're doing that way because we think parents for this particular vaccine would like to be present when their kid gets it, but we make it very easy.

We do it through the cars.

The couple of parents that I've talked to that have taken their kids through have said it's been really smooth and painless.

We have gone to places like West Haven and Friendship Court.

We have other outreach events at places like U-Haul, places where we know that it might be more of a challenge to get those kids to a vaccination center.

So we'll continue to do that outreach effort.

We have had a number of big events at Charlottesville High School.

We had just finished up a second shot one last weekend.

I think getting 50% of the kids vaccinated in this area in the relatively short amount of time is great.

We're having considerably more challenges and much lower uptake in some of the more rural localities.

And I'll just give a shout out to your main location because I brought three kids there two different times and it was so easy and the staff was so friendly and just really accommodating to them.

And so parents that are out there that haven't done it yet, it's a pretty seamless process and the kids really enjoyed drawing something and putting it on the wall and going back and seeing it the second time through.

I'll be sure and pass that along.

So do you believe that the rate for the 12-year-olds, that bracket, that you will, just given enough time, you'll see similar results?

Or are there areas or, I mean, demographics in the city that you're concerned about?

Like, who's getting vaccinated?

Yeah, so it's actually a pretty, I'm sorry, I didn't split that age group out by race and ethnicity, but I can.

I will say that the people that were vaccinated at the health department, it's been a broad mixture.

We're getting lots of kids from all different groups taking it up.

I think the community vaccination center, when you look at those vaccination, it's

is more skewed towards the white population, which is not unexpected.

You have to take your kid there and make an appointment.

Up until this last week, you had to make an appointment.

But I think for health department's events, because we're trying to get out to neighborhoods and make this as easy as possible, we're really having a great uptake overall.

I think my thought is that based on the next age group that if parents, and I know they're the younger kids, but it would seem that those numbers should be similar.

Yeah, I think that we'll continue to see that gap a lot longer to really focus on that 12 to 15 year old age group that we have on the five to 11.

I think there may be, you know, some parents who have the younger kids may have more hesitancy.

I don't know.

I haven't seen a lot of vaccine hesitancy.

in the Charlottesville parents I've talked to.

They've all seemed to have embraced it.

The kids do really well.

We were just talking earlier with a staff member who has a number of kids in this age group and he said they were all fine.

They didn't have any problems at all, so.

I think they do well with it.

We try and make it as kid-friendly as possible.

We will continue to do outreach in all of the areas that we did outreach for that 12 to 15-year-old age group.

We are hampered a tiny bit by the holiday season.

We did some, but not a lot of vaccination in the Thanksgiving week.

And the week of Christmas, again, there'll be some, but not a lot of vaccination.

But we'll

will continue to work hard to get these kids vaccinated.

Thank you.

Okay.

Well, thank you for joining us this evening.

I'm sure staff will be reaching out to make sure there's a 2022 schedule and appreciate the time that you, the updates that you shared with council.

And hopefully things are not

so stark in 2022, but I am concerned about what I'm reading about this variant, but understanding that we have to wait for more information.

I'm just going to take this to remind everybody that you do have actions that you can take right now that will help keep you and your loved ones safe.

So again, if you haven't been vaccinated, please use this as an opportunity to get vaccinated.

And thank you.

I think we also should continue the hand washing, the social distancing, physical distancing, the cleaning your spaces.

And I think we need to put the community on alert that some other countries have had to take more restrictive measures, again, because of the increase in transmission.

And so I hope that if it comes a time where we have to do those things, that we're open to

Absolutely.

Your three main stalwarts are wearing your mask, keeping your physical distance, and of course, good hand hygiene, washing those hands frequently.

And, you know, that'll help for the flu as well, which we are in the middle of right now.

All right, well, thank you, and we'll see you in January.

Ms.

Consent agenda, one, minutes, October 18th, work session, closed meeting and regular meeting, November 1st, regular meeting, November 5th, special meeting, November 30th, emergency special meeting, number two, resolution, appropriating Department of Conservation and Recreational Trail grant funds for construction of Meadow Creek bridges, $222,511,

21 cents second reading three resolution appropriating reimbursement received in connection with the Charlottesville circuit court renovation and addition project $6,643 second reading for resolution.

appropriating funds for the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant, $23,284.

Second reading.

Five, resolution appropriating contribution from Charlottesville City Schools to the school small cap funded program for school security projects, $250,000.

Second reading.

Six, resolution appropriating funds for Virginia juvenile community crime

Control Act Grant, $452,704, second reading, seven, resolution, appropriating American Rescue Plan funds from the Commonwealth for utility bill assistance, $359,879.30, second reading, eight, resolution,

appropriating Bama Works funds for skate park lighting $100,000 second reading nine ordinance amending and reordaining Charlottesville city code chapter 14 licenses section 14-24

tax incentives for technology businesses to extend the eligibility period for five years to December 31, 2026, second reading.

10, ordinance amending the Charlottesville Albemarle, excuse me.

Sorry about that.

Number 10 ordinance amending the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau agreement second reading 11 resolution appropriating funds from progressive and national general insurance companies for a loss associated with city of Charlottesville traffic assets 17,448 dollars 47 cents first of two readings 12 resolution.

appropriating funds for Virginia Department of Transportation, bicycle and pedestrian safety program for bicycle and pedestrian improvements at Preston Avenue and Harris Street, $245,725, first of two readings.

Thirteen, Resolution Appropriating Funds for the Virginia Community Flood Preparedness Grant, Stormwater Management Model of Moores Creek Watershed, $307,000, first of two readings.

Fourteen, Resolution Appropriating 2020 Local Emergency Management Performance Grant, $7,500, first of two readings.

Fifteen, Resolution

transferring funds from the facilities repair fund to the capital improvement program fund, $90,000, one reading.

16, resolution approving participation in the Virginia opioid litigation settlement

All right, thank you.

The two of the items had some slight amendments to them and were reposted this morning based on some feedback from Counselor Snook.

So again, thank you, Counselor Snook for catching those and for staff for responding.

And again, there were just some minor changes.

You want to just highlight the- Yeah, it was to number nine.

Yeah, but I think once you say that, I mean, I knew that, but yeah.

So the email that we just received on items four, five, and six, I think item five, there wasn't any detailed information about what it will be used for, but this is the schools sending money to the city, that the city, because of how the

Small Cap Projects work will then do some of the work for the schools, correct?

And so just want to make sure that for Kaye Fraley's email that she, we are not sending money, we are not, this is not city money being allocated

The schools have requested something and then sent it forward.

Yeah, so on the one from the schools, that is actually grant money that the schools are getting that we'll be using for those upgrades.

So that's not additional city money.

But because we are the fiscal, I'm sorry, because we do manage their projects, the money will be coming to us to do those projects.

Four and six.

And so those four and six are both grants.

So there was just a question about making sure that the city was thoughtful and maybe a misunderstanding that it was grant funding.

So I just wanted to note that we had received the email and that if we could highlight those.

And then Hunter was on for number six.

Are they...

Okay, so hopefully that gives suitable answers, because the information for both of those are included.

And the Virginia Juvenile Community Crime Control Act grant, we've received those before.

Oh, I guess the amendment isn't here, that's usually here, the contract with them, so maybe that will be helpful for somebody to have.

Okay.

Sorry, but just the email popped up and I was trying to give more information.

There's usually a contract, I think, attached to those, but maybe she has her answers.

Yeah, but wanted to make sure that we were looking at these dollars in an equitable way.

And from what it says, I think we plan to do that.

KF and TeensGive and those type of programs, I think, you know, they align with equity goals quite often.

All right.

Okay.

So I think my comments last.

So I'm going to vote on 10, which is the amending the Shawsell-Almar Convention and Visitors Bureau agreement.

You know, I think that

Seeking industry representatives is I think a goal that all of us want.

I've noted before that I wish the conversations around this had happened differently, especially with as far as branding for the CACBB.

So hopefully in the future, people will be more mindful of that.

Also more diverse representation on the board.

I know that has been discussed as one of the current board members.

But I think whoever the next board member, since it's currently Heather and I, that's on there, understanding the history of changing this position right now.

Previously, the former counselors, who I think was Counselor Signer and Galvin, they were on there under a different leadership, but that leadership was not doing everything that they needed.

needed to do and that was of their mission that a person was eventually replaced.

I think the current ED is definitely more aligned with what we say our values are, but the CACBB has a lot of work to do to create an organization that looks to look at tourism in a more equitable fashion.

And so my hesitancy here

would be just around some of the messiness of how this came about.

But I think ultimately, this may be better if it's a more diverse group that's appointed.

And I hope that the board members ensure that it is.

I joined this because I wanted to make sure that, and it was hard because COVID happened right when we were

appointed to this board, but I think we're in a position where we've been with some other things of industry asking industry representatives asking for funding and able to dictate that funding.

And I do think there should be a level of oversight to make sure that the diversity component

who we are trying to attract as tourism and what we consider as sites to highlight that we do a better job there.

And so I'm hoping that that all happens with these changes.

There wasn't a guarantee that it would happen with the current makeup.

And so I'm not going to not vote for it because it's not happening now.

And maybe with more emphasis, it'll be possible.

I just really don't think it makes a difference.

But I know that they put in there that that's a goal.

It's been a goal that we've talked about.

Yeah, but I'll get some comments.

All right, so are counselors, any other comments from you all?

Thank you, Mayor.

If you'd like to speak to council at this time about the consent agenda, please click the raise hand icon in your Zoom webinar.

If you're joining us via telephone, you can press star nine.

Each speaker will be allowed up to three minutes to speak.

Please share your place of residence when you begin.

Thank you very much.

I did not know I had the option of unmuting myself.

I'm Marvin Morgan.

I serve as interim pastor at the Sojourners United Church of Christ here in Charlottesville.

I reside at 925 Dorchester Place, apartment 306, Charlottesville.

I want to begin this brief comment with a question.

How many of you are aware that there are chains lying at the feet of the Statue of Liberty, beginning at her right foot, going underneath the shawl or the gown, and appearing again

Yeah, so you can make those comments at the next public comment period.

The invitation sent this afternoon was to log on at 630.

So this is just a public comment section on the consent agenda.

Okay.

Later this evening?

Just shortly.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Appreciate that.

Our next speaker is Mary Whittle.

Ms.

I think I may have raised my hand as well in error, so I'll wait.

Not quite yet, Ms.

Okay.

All right, so we should, I don't see any additional hands.

Okay, so we'll close the public comment section for our items on the consent agenda.

Counselors, any further questions or comments?

All right, Ms.

I got to make a motion, I think.

Oh, yeah.

Mayor Walker?

Yes.

All right.

Thank you.

That carries.

4-0.

Good evening, Council.

I do have a few items from the last meeting.

The first is there was some reference to the city needing to do something in regards to the kudzu taking over the area on John Warner Parkway.

I did have a chance to check in with Parks and Recreation to get more clarity on what is our approach for managing this problem of the invasive species.

At this moment, the focus is on getting the weeds out of the trees and then to work on totally destroying it on the ground.

That does take multiple applications in order to seriously do damage to a very aggressive species.

So ultimately, the response is we're continuing to need to prioritize funding in this space, which came up in the Planning Commission's discussion at CIP last week or week before.

So there's a need for additional resources in order to be able to effectively do something about it.

The problem is very much aware of the team and on the list of priority projects.

We just have to continue to be diligent about addressing it.

Second item is in reference to a suggestion that we probably should rethink the leaf collection system, loose leaf collection versus bag collection.

In taking a look at how we arrived at the decision, 2018 and 19, a survey was performed to complete a review of a move from the bag collection to the loose leaf collection.

There are three priorities that arose out of that survey, environmental concerns, budgetary impacts, and just optimizing efficiency overall.

So just

Ultimately, their response to the public at large is, while we know it may not be everyone's best wish that we do it this way, it does appear it's the most appropriate manner in order for us to move away from plastic bag use, focusing on budget impact, and then, of course, figuring out a better way to utilize staff to be able to get as many leaves up as quickly as possible, because we know there's a large supply.

But ultimately, we'll continue to take a look and monitor the situation, probably do surveys in the future to make sure everyone is satisfied with the approach that is currently being taken.

And if there's anything that we can do to improve that, then Public Works welcomes hearing from the public as well.

And then the third item, while it was not directly in the last meeting, but it has come up and has been a source of regular contact, just want to give a response to the public at large aware of the situation at Midway Manor.

We get inquiries and calls all the time.

City Manager's Office is very aware of the situation.

I myself have reached out and have taken a number of efforts to try to do what we can to improve the situation.

We have stayed in contact with the property managers and done what we believe as a city we can do.

There are very limited options as to what we can and cannot do and we have pretty much exhausted all of the remedies available to us.

but to simply just try to keep the property owners on notice that we are paying attention to what's going on and it is our desire that they do their very best to ensure that the elevators

work in the building that they get them repaired and up and running.

And we are aware that they are planning to change out those elevators in the first quarter of 22.

So we will celebrate along with everyone else when that is finally done.

And in the meantime, we hope that they will be able to keep them running and keep everything working as we need it to.

The last thing is just most of you may have seen our recent announcement that we do have a new director of Parks and Recreation.

Dana Kasler will begin his term, his tenure on the 20th of December.

along with our new Director of Public Works, Stacey Smalls, who'll be relocating from Fairfax.

All right.

Thank you very much for that.

Counselor, is there any questions?

I was just going to comment that relative to the leaf piece, I feel like we've heard a lot

It's just the concern of leaps going into the drain system.

So I think as we can, I think I'm a big believer that this bulk program is much better for all the reasons just stated, but I do think that as we're educating the public, that's one of the things we should continue.

I know we do it already, but to continue to highlight, because that seems to be a concern by many residences that people are piling them in front of those drainage systems.

And that's problematic, which I agree that it is.

But thank you for the update.

I wanted to note one other email that at least I got, maybe others got as well, concerned by a citizen that the manner in which the trucks are operated, they blow a lot of air apparently out through the top and it ends up blowing a lot of air and dust all over the place.

Apparently there is a way to stop that from happening, to put a

some kind of a cap on it or a filter on it or something like that.

If anybody saw that and has more details and can provide more details, that would be great.

But the citizen who was filing the request was basically doing so on behalf, he said, of people with breathing problems.

We have eight people that have preregistered.

If we can put all the hands down until we announce and then open it up at the same time at once so people can get in.

Our first speaker is Frank Vector.

There, I hope you can hear me.

Hi, I just unmuted myself.

Fantastic.

Council Mayor Walker, Deputy Sanders, thank you for this format.

I live on six and a half street, 304 six and a half street.

I've lived here for 11 years.

I've owned the residence now for five.

It's a duplex.

And I'm just a happy resident here.

I'm six and a half street this my comment has to do with the possibility of the city or addressing the half streets in town I'm told by in a conversation with Brennan Duncan that there are several half streets I knew that maybe 200 residents on such streets.

This has to do with

the half streets not being in very good sync with many corporations and such that one wants to order a product from or whatever it may be.

Healthcare.gov that I had trouble putting my address in, registering on, I had to spell out the street.

mentioned and talked to someone else who had that same issue.

You can often get around your mailing address on a half street being somewhat difficult, but you almost always have some difficulty in telling some person even where you live.

I've had things been addressed to 12th street, you know I live on a half street, instead of 304, six and a half street, it might be 3046, 12th street, things like that happen, and I was prompted to talk to Mr. Duncan the other day and learned about this possibility of addressing you.

by, you know, I was just trying to get a free three month membership to something and it wouldn't take the address and there was nothing I could do to get it to take the address.

and it said, now make sure it's your bank address.

Well, I gave them the exact bank address and something tells me that if I were to use some fake address, like somebody's address on 7th Street, that wouldn't agree with my bank address and that would probably still be a problem.

So there's an issue with that.

And I was thinking,

that the council and the city might consider having residents of those streets suggest a new name for those streets.

And it might be an opportunity for a local community to have some interaction with the broader community who might also have ideas about what streets might be named.

My street happens to have an honorary name, Winnaba Way.

I understand Charlottesville is a sister city with a town in Ghana, which is called Winnaba or Winnaba.

So I even tried to send a postcard to the guy who spearheaded that who lives on my street saying, hey, glad to be on Winnable Way with you.

But the post office, it just didn't get there at all because I guess there is a database and in the ideal, maybe both Winnable Way and 6 1⁄2 Street could be in that database, but apparently that's not possible.

All right, our next speaker is Kate Frawley.

Ms.

Yes, I can.

I wanted to speak about the PCRB and since it's on the agenda, won't there be an opportunity to speak then?

That's not a hero.

Okay.

Well, I've said this many times.

I support a strong PCRB and I support the ordinance that was written December 3rd.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Lisa Drain.

Ms.

yes hi can you hear me yes hi good evening my name is Lisa Drain and I'm a Charlottesville city resident first I just want to thank Mayor Walker for her service to the city these past four years she has taught us a lot of lessons and has been a voice for equity in our community and I hope our new city councilors will remember

her voice when considering new policies and practices.

Second, I'd like to speak to the disposition of the statues that council is discussing this evening.

I do support giving the Stonewall Jackson statue to the LAX Art Museum and giving the Sacagawea Lewis-Clark statue to Charlottesville's Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center.

On the matter of the Robert E. Lee statue,

I wanted to speak more depth about that as it has a personal significance for me.

On August 11, 2017, my younger daughter was one of the UVA students and community members who held space at the Jefferson statue as they were surrounded by torch-wielding, screaming white nationalists and neo-Nazis.

She didn't think she was getting out of that ring of fire alive.

But despite that traumatic experience, she, my older daughter, and I joined counter-protesters the next morning on Market Street.

In the shadow of the Robert E. Lee statue, we stood up to the threatening mobs of people who had assembled in Charlottesville ostensibly to protest the proposed removal of that statue.

Later, in a cruel twist of fate, that same daughter who was at the Rotunda the night before was badly injured in the domestic terrorist car attack.

For four years, I've driven by the Lee statue, reliving that awful weekend that my family and our community endured.

For four years, I've joined other community members in advocating here and in Richmond for the removal of Confederate statues in our public spaces.

Last summer, when the Lee and Jackson monuments finally came down, I breathed a sigh of relief, but I knew we weren't done.

Removing the statues was a huge symbolic victory, but that act would not bring back Heather Heyer or undo the physical and emotional damage to my daughter and the dozens of others who were injured on A12.

And above all, it would not correct the harms of the past 400 years that our Black citizens have endured.

As long as the Lee statue remains intact, the harm persists.

As you consider your options for this statue, I urge you not to send it to another place.

but to do the courageous thing, keep it here and give it to the Jefferson School African-American Heritage Center.

In the capable hands of Dr. Andrea Douglas, the swords into plowshares proposal calls for the statue to be melted down and transformed into a work of art that reflects the values of the community.

The Heritage Center will lead a comprehensive community engagement process, giving priority to the voices of the descendants of those enslaved in this area.

This community engagement will be as important as the resulting physical work of art.

We have the opportunity to be an example for the rest of the country on how to turn racist symbols of oppression and hatred into works of healing and beauty.

This process will give us the opportunity to grapple with the past and use history to understand our presence.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Kimber Hockey.

Ms.

Yes, thank you.

Hi, good evening, Mayor Walker and Council, Kimber Hawkey City resident.

We're asking you to deny the zero NASA up zoning this evening.

Once again, we're witnessing the status quo of a developer coming back after being denied on a previous application and asking this council for more profits by up zoning at the expense and welfare of people.

This is the flood zone and the area will flood in the future.

It has a 10 out of 10 extreme flood risk, according to Flood Factor, a nonpartisan analysis group.

We just saw in August in Western Buckingham residents of Hurley who suffered death and total destruction of their homes from flooding.

I can forward you pictures of that.

Residents weren't covered by insurance and FEMA denied the request for aid, saying it was not of such severity and magnitude despite the total destruction.

What we are seeing if you approve this is a status quo of a faulty process.

There was no meeting with residents about this.

There was no city floodplain expert present at the PC meeting.

Mr. Mitchell deferred to the applicant who's not qualified to explain the floodplain.

She has a financial interest in that as well.

Mr. Mitchell appeared to help the developer and dodged Ms.

Dowell's question regarding the lack of affordable housing by stating, this is not a question of affordable housing.

Thank goodness that Commissioner Dowell had the good sense of responding that all such projects are a question of providing affordable housing.

Commissioner Russell pointed out that this is a sensitive area in the new flum.

There should be more affordable units at deeper levels of affordability.

However, this is not happening here.

The affordable housing issue is important.

Again, this question of a status quo that we witnessed for 20 years of profits over people.

with council handing over higher profits by allowing developers to upzone without any exchange for truly affordable housing.

There's also a strange misnomer here because the owner is listed as Franklin Street Land Trust 3.

However, this is hardly an affordable housing land trust model.

You just upzoned the entire city with a new fund.

So the rationale being we would get more affordable housing in the city.

So this is a chance to put that affordable housing elsewhere instead of the same old, same old.

It appears unethical to put more people in higher density into an environmentally vulnerable area that is guaranteed to flood.

It would seem that it also violates the goal three of the city plan of providing a beautiful and sustainable area, natural area.

This area is not sustainable.

It violates 3.1 stating that

the engagement in a robust and context sensitive urban planning and implementation and quality housing.

This cannot be defined as quality housing.

So we wonder where you will be when all these houses eventually get flooded or destroyed.

We'll all be sitting up high and dry uphill away from such dangers.

And how will these people be bailed out financially?

Thank you.

Our next speaker is John Hossack.

Good evening.

This is John Hossack.

I live in Davis Avenue.

Thank you, Council, for taking time to listen to me.

Now South Street is in the floodplain.

The Army Corps of Engineers following the 1969 havoc in Camille produced a 70-page report that specifically highlighted the flood risk in this particular part of the city.

It produced specific recommendations that no housing development occur within the floodplain.

According to this report, there are major flood events approximately five times per century.

Since the last event was in 1969, this means that we are now living in borrowed time, even before considering climate change related impacts.

Bear in mind that during the flooding

on Nassau in 1969, the water was above head height and there were photographs of boats being used in that street.

I will also note that the county paid attention to the Army Corps report and ban building in the floodplain.

Meanwhile, Charlottesville unwisely chose to ignore Army Corps advice.

Floodfactor.com produces updated flood analysis that accounts for both persistent wet events, i.e.

days long, combined with intense flash flood events of the sort that are projected to become more common and more extreme in coming decades due to climate change.

Floodfactor.com lists flood risk as extreme in this part of Nasu, and actually the entire street, there's an entire line of houses that are impacted

Flood factor indicates that a property in Nassau Street has a 20% chance of seeing floodwaters of 7.5 feet within the next 15 years.

If one looks at houses on Nassau Street, it may be observed that at least some of them are built in stilts to account for anticipated flood events.

Why would the City Council even remotely consider building in such a site with all of these glaring warnings?

If you listen to what I've just said, you will see there's a problem of not a matter of if, but when, and we are actually overdue today.

Reiterating some of what Kimber has just said, during the course of the planning commission meeting, one commission pointed at NASA is actually in a sensitive area on the future land use map, but yet they voted to up zoning without requirement for affordable housing.

These observations above point to questionable decision making on the part of the planning commission.

I'll also note in your consent agenda that you budgeted $307,000 to being allocated to study, flood preparedness and Moores Creek watershed.

Actually, a review of floodfactor.com tells you that today the Moores Creek sewage plant is at extreme risk and is in close proximity to Nassau.

What does it say that affordable housing has been built elsewhere in Nassau?

Are some of these lives less valuable than others?

For all of these reasons, I strongly urge the Council to reject the rezoning and building on this site, and by extension, similar impacted sites throughout the city.

Okay, our next speaker is Marvin Morgan.

Yes, I can hear you.

Thank you very much.

And I want to thank you for all that you do, all of you, for the city of Charlottesville.

I'm Marvin Morgan.

I'm the interim pastor at Sojourners United Church of Christ, and I reside here in Charlottesville.

First of all, I agree wholeheartedly with the comments made earlier

regarding melting down the statues and turning those swords and sword holders into symbols of peace.

That would be a wonderful gesture and a leadership gesture by our city.

Earlier, I mentioned just briefly the Statue of Liberty.

Whether you are aware that chains are lying at the feet of the Statue of Liberty

They can be seen at her right foot and at her left foot with a broken link at the left foot.

There were mixed feelings, feelings when that statue was about to be presented to the United States.

There were mixed feelings even among those in the African-American community because

They knew that the freedoms symbolized by broken chains was not at that point realized.

Even though slavery had technically ended with legislation, they were aware that that freedom was not yet experienced by people of color in this country.

Members of the council, you have an opportunity

Unlike the confusion surrounding the chains at the feet of the Statue of Liberty, you have an opportunity to do something extraordinary.

It is a simple request.

Those two parking spaces that have been identified for you by a wonderful historian, Freeman Hobbs Allen,

Those two parking spaces that are occupying what was once the slave block would prevent the public from seeing whatever sign the Historic Resources Committee chooses to erect and to remember

the devastating institution of slavery that was manifest at Court Square.

We are asking you to take a very simple step while waiting for other decisions to be made by the Historic Resources Committee.

Advise your engineer to move those parking spaces

so the public will be able to honor that space and recognize it for what it is.

Three minutes goes by very fast.

Thank you for this time.

Our next speaker is Anthony Lopez.

Mr. Lopez, can you hear us?

Yes.

Okay, great.

All right.

My name's Anthony Guy Lopez.

I'm an enrolled tribal member of the Crow Creek Sioux Tribe.

I'm a graduate of the University of Virginia.

My residence is in Fairfax, Virginia.

And I'm the co-founder of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Center Initiative at UVA.

And I'm here to appeal to you

to support conveying the Lewis and Clark and Sacagawea statue to the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center.

I actually thought this was a settled matter, that we had come to a consensus of the community and we're working in a very constructive and educational partnership with Sacagawea's family's descendants who are members of the Shoshone tribe.

I thought we had come to an understanding.

And so I'm surprised that this is being relitigated or being considered for anything else.

I was part of the original request back in 2009 when the outcome was a plaque.

that was placed at the base or near the base of the statue.

And I just, this has already been discussed, you know, that city council meetings the last time, but in 2009, we were so far away from tearing down statues or removing statues.

It was all that we could get from the city and from the historic resources committee.

All we could get was a plaque

We would have liked to have removed the statue.

But they were so far away from that idea.

And times are different now.

Now it seems more reasonable and appropriate.

So I know that there's competition for the statue.

There are other tribes.

But what I want to do is support the existing partnership

with the Shoshone representatives that have come to Charlottesville twice already and have brought forth an educational interpretation and understanding.

We've had community dinners.

They gave a workshop at the University of Virginia.

We have a very productive and collaborative partnership

with the Shoshone representatives, Ms.

Rose and Abrahamson and her family.

And the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center is facilitating that.

And I think that's the kind of thing that Charlottesville, that's the direction that I would urge Charlottesville to go.

Our next speaker is Alexandria Searles.

I'm Alexandria Searles, the Executive Director of the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center and applicant for the Lewis, Clark and Sacagawea statue.

We have been told that this process might go from selecting the best contextualization for the statue to a highest bidder situation.

There are many reasons why this shouldn't happen and the main one is that it doesn't live up to the values you've expressed from when the Lemhi Shoshone first came here in 2009 to when they came in 2019 at the public meeting when you voted for the removal and most importantly in the request for proposals that put contextualization as the main requirement.

The Lemhi Shoshone are important.

Representation is important.

The true identity of Sacagawea is important.

We based our work on the values you expressed.

Contextualization can be a successful intervention, a positive and rewarding endeavor.

Let's look at what concerns us the most about the statue, that Black and Indigenous children will look at the statue and will internalize its message of a woman of color being lesser than, that little girls will feel demeaned and disregarded.

As we worked with the statue this year with Black families and homeschool groups, we began to develop contextualization.

These families and groups valued our discussion of the representation of Sacagawea as a way of making their children more visually literate.

Today's children have thousands of images thrown at them every day on the internet, many extremely problematic and related to identity.

As you know, Black little girls in particular are pushed through societal pressure and imagery to lose their childhoods.

It is absolutely vital that children gain visual literacy and begin to address issues of representation as they have been manifested historically and today.

And from what I've seen from children learning about the statue and the difference between the actual Sacagawea and the depiction, they are up to the task.

In particular, two 10-year-old Black girls visiting in two different groups this year impressed me with their ideas and by their references.

As a community we create meaning together.

Continuity is important for all of us who believed in what the city was telling about contextualization and representation for all that we've gone through.

We believe that we have offered the strongest proposal for contextualization.

We ask that you choose according to the values you expressed.

Our next speaker is James Groves.

Yes, I can.

Good evening.

Good evening.

My name is James Groves, and I'm a city resident.

This evening, I ask that you deny the request to rezone zero Nassau Street, and I offer two reasons.

First, climate change puts homes on Nassau Street at extreme flooding risk.

and two, inviting more community members to reside in flood prone areas is incompatible with the equity focus of the city's recently adopted comprehensive plan.

Zero Nassau Street application and review process makes clear that the developer, city staff, and planning commission are aware that this property sits in or immediately adjacent to a federal emergency management agency, a FEMA designated floodplain, yet none of those parties ever acknowledged that FEMA's maps do not consider

the increasingly intense rainfall and flash flooding expected from climate change.

Fortunately, up-to-date flood risk analysis is available from the nonprofit First Street Foundation, which has worked with leading climate change modelers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of California at Berkeley, George Mason University, IBM, and elsewhere to develop predictions of climate change flood risks.

Their floodfactor.com website drills down to individual properties and rates Nassau Street as a 10 out of 10 in terms of flood risk.

Extreme.

First Street estimates that just over 400 out of some 11,000 homes in Charlottesville are at serious or extreme risk of climate change enhanced flooding.

approve this rezoning and you will add to that number.

If you stand in Nassau Street and look up and down the street, you see the roads sloping down towards this property.

If you look across the street toward Reeves Park and beyond to Monticello Road, you see the land sloping down towards this property.

Homes built on Nassau Street will be among the city's most vulnerable to climate change induced river plus flash flooding.

Do not knowingly place more city residents in harm's way.

Vote down this proposal.

Our next speaker is Don Gathers.

Yes.

Good evening, everyone.

Good evening.

Thank you for this.

Just a few points to make.

First of all, I want to thank Mayor Walker for her extraordinary leadership through these most trying and difficult times.

I don't think any of us realize just as of yet just how much that you will be missed.

Secondly, I want to encourage everyone, please, if you have not, go ahead and get your COVID vaccinations.

I unfortunately now can tell you firsthand just how draining and debilitating that it is.

Thank God that I had received the vaccines.

Otherwise, I'm not sure exactly what state I would be in at this point.

Please support, uphold, and vote for the PCRB ordinance that was presented to you.

And also the Lee statute.

Please grant the recommendation and suggestion to give that over to the Jeff School for the Swords and Plowshares project.

Please go ahead and grant the Sagittarius and Lewis and Clark statues over to, excuse me, Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center.

And please, let's just get this off of our plates and our tablets.

This is dangled in front of us for far too long.

and it's time to take some serious and concrete action on it.

Again, please continue to wear your mask, social distance as requested.

Please take care of yourselves and happy holidays to each and everyone.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Andrew Shelton.

Thank you for your time.

I first just wanted to speak in favor of the proposal from the Jefferson School and also in favor of the proposal from the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center.

And also to note that I feel it would be very inappropriate for us to cast aside the work that the Shoshone tribe has put towards a resolution for this.

So I hope that that can happen.

I also wanted to draw attention to an article in Seville Tomorrow from November 22nd about the Charlottesville SWAT team and something that I hadn't noticed in former Chief Brackney's statement where she said that it appears that the police department is looking at reforming the SWAT team and they also uncovered

some command notes from a meeting early in November where it appears that the CPD command is looking to set aside money in their upcoming budget request to fund the SWAT team in the future.

And I think it would be a very serious mistake to

re-enable one of the worst concentrations of just bad police behavior that we've seen in this town.

We all recall the scandal that led to the SWAT team being dissolved in the first place.

I think it would be a very bad mistake to re-enable that prior to getting actual good oversight of that department in place.

Our next speaker is Mary Whittle, Ms.

Whittle, can you hear us?

Hello?

Oh, hi.

I don't know if, I don't have a whole lot to

probably improve on what Mr. Groves and Ms.

Hawkey have already said.

But I just wanted to make a few comments about the proposed development on Nassau Street.

And as the other speakers have said, this doesn't make any sense to me to allow considering development in a high-risk flood zone.

And it just seems irresponsible with regard to future residents and obviously the environment in terms of

and I actually don't in another funny way.

I don't understand why you're considering allowing building in a flood zone at all, considering we just upzoned the entire city.

And one of the rationales that I repeatedly heard from council members was that upzoning was necessary so that developers wouldn't have to build in flood zones.

several times counselors wrote and said, well, the only land left is flood zones and we can't build there.

So I just don't understand why you're now choosing to build in a possibly allow building in a flood zones.

Finally, I found it disappointing kind of along these lines that you're considering upzoning without affordability in an area that your own recently passed future land use map has deemed sensitive.

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increasing trust with the community, which is something else that another council member emphasized to me was important.

It doesn't seem like a step in the right direction.

So thank you for listening.

Our next speaker is Dustina Abramson.

Ms.

Yes, we are here.

Okay.

I am Roseanne Abrahamson, and my daughter, Destina, is here.

We are the familial descendants of Sacagawea.

And I would like to say that I want to clarify my ancestry.

She's my great, great, great aunt.

And I want to address the decision that is going to be made today.

And what I want to say is I feel like we're stepping back in time.

We're making a decision that was made 200 years ago, and we're at it again.

And we all know her history.

We know that Sacagawea's family was massacred, murdered, and as a child, she was kidnapped by the Hidatsa.

who are known as the three affiliated tribes.

And she was sold by them and traded to an abusive white Frenchman, Charbonneau.

And Charbonneau was recorded in Lewis and Scott's history as being very abusive to her until her death.

And the only persons who treated her kindly in her life were the Lewis and Clark expedition members.

and as she was dying the clerk at Fort Manuel Lisa stated that she was a good woman.

I believe that history has many lessons and we have to face what we learned from those lessons today.

You as leaders, the community and we all as a trustee of a legacy we leave for future generations of Virginians and for my family.

Did we make the best decision and did

My family fight hard enough to retain her dignity and history.

As we all know, she is the most famous woman in the history of the United States and worldwide.

Let us ponder on this together as we determine the decision on this decade long struggle for you and we as her descendants.

I would like to say at this time, we'd like to see the statue remain with the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center.

and not be sent in places unknown in purpose and future.

We all know that she was vital to the expedition, but now it is vital that the statue with her image is in a facility dedicated to telling about the expedition, its members and its legacy.

And I believe Meriwether Lewis and William Clark told us what we should do today, 200

200 years ago, Clark stated in 1806, Sacagawea, who accompanied the expedition on a long and fatiguing route to the Pacific Ocean and back, deserved a greater reward for her attention and services than we had in our power to give her.

So we ask that today on December 6th, 2021,

Let us give her her due reward as a dignified catalyst of peace and unity between cultures and place this statue in the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center of Discovery in Charlottesville, Virginia so that we can celebrate this month and this holiday in peace knowing that we made the right decision.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Robin Hoffman.

Yes, I can.

First of all, I want to say thank you very much for having speakers such as that, such as the community members here in the city council and Nikuyah Walker.

Thank you so much.

You've always enabled people to speak.

and I appreciate you.

I want to say that 1976, I was able to go to a community college.

I was living in an apartment that was $80 a month.

I came up through that bicycling and busing to go back and forth and then work full-time on the weekends packing bagels.

Ultimately, I moved through many universities, including Brooklyn College and NYU through different loans and this and that, but became a community activist right away in Brooklyn and then in Manhattan and then finally in Patterson, New Jersey.

Why am I saying all this?

Because right now I have a TV show

that expresses how great PVCC enables people to be able to move up and have choices.

And if we don't support the working people here, we're not going to have services.

We're not going to have community people.

And certainly I was able to afford housing in Brooklyn is why I was able to move forward and be able to work and go to school at the same time.

and certainly community college and supporting the working people through being able to live and affordability is key to making a city run.

And New York City, in fact, has had many, many problems because they gentrified most of New York City.

It's so ridiculous.

I wanted to remind everybody that.

And then also I want to say,

Please get your vaccines.

Please be masked and stop traveling.

If we had stopped traveling in March 2020 for six weeks, as they told us, and it's still going on.

Things are being politicized.

Please hire or vote for people that are not going to be political and that are sticking to the facts.

of the science.

It's been a ridiculous wait for me to get rehab for my ankle and other people, too, because people are just not staying home, but also the kids are just getting vaccinated.

So we have to give this some time, but we have to cooperate.

Next speaker is Grace Softdeer Hayes.

Yes, I can hear you.

Hello, I am a Chickasha woman and live in Charlottesville, raising three children there.

I've spoken before your council on numerous occasions about Lewis and Clark and Sacagawea statue.

I was there in 2009, also in 2019, November 19th, for those delegations.

I've come to stand by and support Sacagawea's familial descendants from the River High Shoshone Nation and also for the city of Charlottesville and for all people.

I've spoken about this repeatedly that

In order for people to come together who have different ways with respect and honor, we both have to be walking toward one another.

We see this family coming to the city of Charlottesville to work in peace and cooperation for a better understanding.

And at that time, on November 19th,

Mayor Walker and the city council members stood by as well.

They showed up, they stood up, they made agreements.

And at that time, like Mr. Lopez and like the family, I thought we had made a decision, an agreement that it would go to the Lewis and Clark Exploratory Center.

Why did we move it?

Because it was harmful to women and girls.

not just women of color, but everyone's girls to see a woman in a position like this.

That statue in some ways, when I look at it, it tells the truth and it tells a lie because you can see the demeaning posture.

This is a trafficked woman, a trafficked child.

And one of the reasons why it is so painful to see it in the public over and over

is because right now while we're sitting here talking about this, sisters and daughters are being taken across this continent.

This began with the first ship.

It has not ended.

And so out of respect for the family and keeping in right relations.

This is what we're doing.

We're keeping in right relations to keep our agreement.

Charlottesville, the city of Charlottesville does not have to continue century old.

So let us show up for one another.

You know, Alexandra Searles at the Exploratory Center has herself shown up in right relations with indigenous people, with descendants, and works hard for experiential learning there.

This is a blessing for the children, you know, so we could tell the whole history of this statute.

I really appreciate your time and I hope you make a decision for continuing right relations.

Thank you.

Next speaker is Mary Bauer.

I can, thank you.

Good evening.

I am here on behalf of the Human Rights Commission, which I currently chair, to make really just two points.

First, the Human Rights Commission wants to echo our strong support for the Jefferson School's proposal with regard to the disposition of the Lee statue by turning it into art.

This proposal best speaks to the values of

equity and racial justice that the Human Rights Commission was created to advance and we urge you to accept that proposal.

Secondly, I wanted to turn to a letter that the Human Rights Commission sent to you all, all counselors on November 9th with regard to

in equities related to city staff of color and particularly black employees.

And I'll just highlight a couple issues from that letter that we pointed out.

In August of 2019, the city council was presented with a report and recommendation from the city manager's advisory on organizational equity.

and that report identified serious issues with compensation and found, quote, that it is clear that Black employees generally earn less than their white colleagues in most roles and in most pay band categories, end quote.

It also found that salary data reveal that white and Asian employees earn above the average salary for city employees, Black employees,

earned less.

The report recommended the city engage in additional professional data analysis to understand the extent of salary inequity more completely and recommended the need for several internal structures to support the city growth and development in this area.

These structures included a standing office and strategic goals around equity.

The committee spent considerable time addressing the concern that these new structures would be insignificant without significant investment in changing the culture internally and went on from there.

The Human Rights Commission urged and urges you to take the following immediate action.

One, prioritize the publication with a sense of urgency of an updated equity report as soon as the Director of Human Resources is in place.

It should outline the steps that have been taken since August 2019 to make the city a good employer for people of color.

We also understand there's funding for compensation and class study that would work on this issue from an internal equity standpoint.

This study has, however, been held up for lack of an HR director.

We urge you to prioritize this study by the incoming HR director.

We made several other recommendations, but I'll leave it at that for this evening.

We are

deeply concerned that the city should be a welcoming and positive place for people of color and particularly for Black employees to work.

Thank you.

And so the other hands that's up, that's our eighth.

We're at our eighth speaker and we've had 16 total.

And so there'll be an opportunity to speak.

at the end of the meeting.

I think a lot of these things we'll get to when we get to our agenda items, but I did want to clarify because I've heard it from multiple people talking about that we have done up zoning.

I realized that as part of the comprehensive plan, there's a future land use map, which I think council has emphasized will likely be in a different form by the time we're done through the zoning, but we have not, there has been not one change in zoning at this point.

Obviously there's a vision that's placed out there and I certainly understand the concerns with how some of these things that are coming before council may be in conflict.

With that vision, I just want to make sure that people are really clear that we have the city as a city has not done any up zoning at this point.

That's a process that we're about to embark upon.

It will be highly engaging with the community and it will probably take 12 to 18 months before we get through that fully.

And I'll just emphasize the 12 to 18 months.

So make sure you're engaged the entire time so that you won't be caught by surprise towards the end.

the process is delayed because of that.

So it's a process that's starting.

So just pay attention throughout the entire process.

Any other comments from counselors?

So I'll thank you to Lisa and Don for the acknowledgement and Mr. Martin the last time even though some of the comments on your that you made I have some questions about but I think that I the

Court Square, the auction block that sold enslaved persons.

I think that has just been something that I just haven't been able to kind of wrap my head around.

I can speak to that real quickly if you'd like.

Sure.

So I sit on the Historic Resources Committee.

I just want to, because this came up earlier and I should have clarified it.

That engagement is underway, and we have a meeting just this Friday, and I'm happy just once we have that meeting to provide a more full update to all of council, given this is a topic that continues to arise, but that is a process that the Historic Resources Committee feels passionately should be followed through on before we make any decisions on this location in the scope of what work might be done there, but they're certainly aware of these requests, but are well underway with an engagement process.

as a committee.

So I just wanted to chime in with that.

No problem.

That's where I thought we were at.

So that's good.

And we're going to get to the statues discussion a little bit later and PCRB.

In terms of the conversations around, there is a comment.

I have the same

question about SWOT, I think I sent an email too, just where we are with that process.

I know there is no new money being allocated, so that was money, I think that was previously in the budget, but, okay, I was trying to find the comments and talk, but Andrew Shelton comments.

But I do think the intention

behind that part of the criticism at that time and has been with the dismantling of Jade and those kind of specialty units was what do you have to kind of work your way up to?

And so...

That is a very important conversation to have because if the desire is more equity and to dismantle the militarization of police departments, particularly ours, then we would not be able to put those type of specialty units back in place for officers to be able to differentiate their

and I think anyone hired that has to be made known to.

So I don't know what the current status is that's centered around training and hopefully reinstituting, but that is something that needs to be addressed.

And the former chief, Dr. Brackney, did send an email, I think specifically addressed to

Counselor Payne, and I don't have that pulled up, so if I'm wrong about that, and maybe some staff members.

Mary's comments about...

you know employees I remember when that equity report was completed that staff thought that that was that that could potentially bring some kind of legal challenges to the city based on how employees have been treated and it is afforded the city

quite a bit of time to attempt to figure things out and in a more equitable manner.

I know the HR director position is going to be key to this.

So I've been, I think I've been patient even though I keep bringing it up, but I haven't been persistent on the fixing of it because I think that with all of our

kind of, you know, the changes in leadership, you know, positions and not hiring having an HR director.

I think since that has focused on this, leave that comment alone.

I think that this is something that we really have to, you know, focus on the damage that has been done with, you

the firing of Chief Brackney.

And I know someone is gonna come later and say with all employees, but I have maintained the position that I've maintained and I would still maintain that position.

But I will say that the standards set there

that it is something that the city is gonna have to do a lot of work on top of the work that it already had to do in terms of when you're talking about just diversity inclusion.

And I hope that you all understand that even though, you know, there has, I don't think you do, but I hope that, and I'm not, I'm talking specifically to counselors right now,

I hope that you all understand that.

All right, the rest of my comments I'll save until tonight.

Counselors, any other comments?

Okay, so it's 8-11, so we will come back at 35, 36 after.

Well, it's been 8-11, so let's just say 37.

You mean 26?

26, yes.

Okay.

So we're all back.

So I'll call this meeting back to order.

Okay.

So as folks know, the PCRB, the present PCRB, which was constituted over a year ago, has been working to develop a draft ordinance that came out of the October 2020 statutes that were passed by the Virginia General Assembly.

And following

Their efforts, which resulted in a draft being approved by them back in August, a little work group, actually, but even before that, a work group had been sort of put together.

That was myself, Michael Payne, PCRB members, Bill Mendez and Jeff Frazier.

And we were trying to work out some differences between

what counselors thought was appropriate and what PCRB members thought was appropriate.

Along the way, Deputy City Manager Ashley Reynolds Marshall joined the city and therefore joined us.

We were glad to have her assistance this fall.

PCRB Executive Director Hansel Aguilar was hired and he brought to us not only his, mainly his experience

both as a member of the Fairfax PCRB and also as an investigator of police misconduct for the city of Washington, D.C.

So lots of different experiences.

We kept working on drafts and trying to revise and refine those drafts even into last week.

And finally, the version that got put out on the website last week

The December 3rd draft was the last draft that we had produced.

After that, or actually around that same time, we had sent an earlier draft to City Attorney Lisa Robertson for her comments.

She has since come back with a number of comments that I'm trying to incorporate into the draft that we had circulated to Council.

virtually everything that she has suggested, I've gotten, I've gone ahead and put into the new version to make the new version.

There's nothing there that I'm rejecting, but obviously there may be one final set of tweaks of the legal language to make sure that I've incorporated things the way she thinks it's appropriate.

Eventually, of course, she as city attorney is sort of the custodian of the city code and it's up to us to make sure we draft something with her assistance that she thinks she's going to be able to implement and ultimately to defend.

So I've submitted a memo in the packet of significant changes between the draft PCOB

calling it PCOB ordinance now because the new name of the organization would be the Police Civilian Oversight Board.

That's the term that is used in the new statute, the PCOB ordinance of August 12, 2021, and the draft of December 3, 2021.

There are not a lot of changes.

We've really worked to

to refine the differences of opinion.

What we've got is, I believe, a very strong model for the PCOB.

It involves parts of the investigative model.

It involves parts of the review-focused model.

It involves parts of the auditor and monitor-focused model.

and the result is that we end up with a board that is able to do virtually all of those things.

They will have the power to review investigations, to consider civilian complaints, to do its own investigations if necessary, to have reports that would comment on the adequacy of the police department's own investigations, would have a robust subpoena power.

The board will have the power to make recommendations to city management about police practices

not just, hey, this is a case we didn't like, but here is a broad pattern that we don't like.

It'll have the power to focus on broad patterns of police conduct.

I will say that the one thing that is not in this ordinance that some people have wanted to have be in this ordinance, the General Assembly authorized us, if we wanted to, we could pass a PCOB ordinance that would

allow for binding disciplinary determinations by the PCOB of police officers.

We felt for a number of reasons, and this is something I developed with just working with counselors, all five counselors told me at various points that you did not favor that.

and I'll just say briefly why.

The first reason is that we still at this point aren't clear on what the PCOB would be allowed to do in terms of Freedom of Information Act, in terms of confidentiality and things like that.

More importantly, we felt that it was important that the police chief be allowed to be the chief of the police and that includes discipline.

The idea of an oversight board is that the board

would oversee, would comment on, perhaps offer recommendations about, but would comment on what the police have already done.

So we did not feel that it was necessary to go to having actual discipline decisions by the board.

One of the things that we wrote into this draft is a provision that says that when the city attorney is comfortable in saying

that we are going to be able to have a PCOB meeting that considers disciplinary matters, that considers looking at confidential files, that considers having confidential discussions and deliberations.

So in other words, basically to be able to preserve confidentiality where appropriate and where justified under the statutes that

Once that certification is given that the General Assembly has now amended FOIA law to make that clear, then without any further action by counsel, there's a disciplinary recommendation process that will kick in.

The idea is that let's have recommendations once you have the ability, once the PCOB has the ability to get accurate, confidential information on

and to be able to deliberate in confidence, obviously still announcing the results at the end of things, but that the deliberations should be able to be done in confidence.

Once that has happened, once that certification is given, then

under the draft we've got here, the discipline power would just sort of be there and would not require further action by council.

One of the discussions that we had, both our little working group and ultimately some conversations back and forth with city attorney Robertson deals with the question of, there was an earlier draft that called for a memorandum of understanding between the police department and the

and the board over access to information and so on.

Ms.

Robertson's advice was not to think of it as a memorandum of understanding, but basically just to have the city manager say, here's the standard operating procedure, here's the way we're going to do it.

And obviously the city manager would work that out with the board and the police department together, since both of them would report to the city manager in a sense.

And so if we do that, the way that I've drafted it, given Ms.

Robertson's comments is simply to say that within 45 days of the enactment of this ordinance, this standard operating procedure would be promulgated and then the board would be able to take the action that it would like to be able to take.

Right now, we're in a situation where the present PCRB has one case.

It has just gotten approval for procedures to move forward with that one hearing.

And once that one hearing is completed under the present rules, the old rules, if you will,

then it would be appropriate I would think to transition to the newer system with broader authority with new operating procedures and newer rules.

In any event, there are a couple of issues that I suggested to people that we needed to think about in sort of broad terms.

The first was this hybrid model.

And I think that I've heard from basically everybody that the hybrid model that we've suggested is acceptable to you.

The second question that I posed to everybody last week

was that the model would allow the board to investigate an incident whether or not there is an individual complainant.

This case would be where something comes to the board's attention from a witness or from community chatter.

or other ways other than an aggrieved citizen filing a complaint.

If you read the ordinance the way it is right now, you will see that there are two sections.

One is the section that refers to receiving a complaint from a member of the public.

any member of the public.

And the second would be where the board would be able to investigate something without there having been a formal complaint made to the board.

And so there is one sort of philosophical question about whether we want to limit

who the member of the public could be.

Would it have to be the aggrieved person or a direct witness of the aggrieved persons having been abused or whatever?

There are some ordinances in some cities, and I'll tell you that I've

personally have read about 50 city ordinances of PCOBs.

And I know Mr. Mendez is probably at least double that number.

But that

The question is, do you want to allow anybody to file and to be a complainant in one of these actions?

Or do you want it to be simply a witness or the person in the aggrieved party, him or herself?

And that's right now, we have no limitation on that.

If you want to have a limitation, we ought to write that in.

This particular draft calls for a relatively low level of

attorney involvement.

It envisions the board and the executive director for the board as the questioners of witnesses at a hearing, for example, no cross-examination for lawyers, the feeling being that you don't want to have this be a proceeding where the victim, so to speak, the complainant is getting mugged the second time, if you will, being violated.

This is a procedure that I'm familiar with from Title IX complaints up at the university.

and it works pretty well.

We've got it built in with a strong subpoena power.

I think everybody was comfortable with that.

I mentioned a bit about dealing with personnel issues when FOIA laws are clear.

The draft includes having a hearing examiner to conduct the hearings.

That's what we approved for the one hearing that will take place under the present procedures.

and we'll see how it goes, but I think that that's the way that makes the most sense.

So my suggestion would be that we discuss the December 3rd draft that I had put in there.

If anybody has questions about any of this or specific issues with any of it, recognize

recognizing that there are still these tweaks from Ms.

Robertson that would have to be made before we would actually enact it.

Does that sound like a reasonable way to proceed at this point?

In terms of the process, I agree.

I guess the next, there will be one more PCRB meeting or PCOB, whatever we're going to be calling it in the interim, before we were to have this formally come before us, like I said, our next meeting.

I didn't have an intention there.

I don't really know what their desire might be.

I look on it as this is our draft.

So I think I would, you know, I've stated before about having the procedures go along with this document.

And I know that there's been a lot of response about why we will be able to do that later.

But I think if we don't know

in terms of staff capacity and dollar amount that will go along with whatever we are proving that that's just a setup in the future for just a disaster.

So I'll just say that again and I've said that before.

And then if you, you know,

I have some other comments I would have liked for Lisa's comments to have been added and for the PCRB members.

And I know we've gotten some feedback through emails, but to have heard that their discussion on it, you know, on it too.

But in terms, I think the main question that I heard there,

I still think that having that the individual file a complaint or participate in the process or, you know, for this PCRB to able to reach out to them for the process.

But I have been kind of leery of that whole anybody can file a complaint at any time.

process every time that it's been discussed.

I understand and I may feel would feel better if I could say honestly, I would bring a complaint forward at this point.

But I still think I mean, we've had, you know, in the past a situation where, you know, there have been

you know complaints for afford on behalf of other individuals and I just think it's better for us to you know get that information you know for the person to that was wrong to have been to participate in the process so I still think that individuals should file the complaint in terms of witness someone there on the scene who may file the complaint but I think there's

Any comments on other issues, Mayor Walker?

Let me say, by the way, you raised an important point that I neglected to comment on, and that was the role of the procedures.

We wanted to have the procedures done at the same time as we would be and that they would be approved by council.

for various reasons of just humans and trying to get things done in November.

It didn't happen.

So we do want to have those procedures in place.

We spent a fair amount of time talking about those procedures.

We haven't finalized the draft.

There was at least one version.

I don't know that this is the current one, but there's at least one version that has said that the things wouldn't actually

Yeah, no, I do understand that.

But part of the issues that I had during the work session was trying to understand the how of all of these things we were discussing.

Sure.

And so I just was bringing that back up.

I'm not going to be here.

And so I

basically voting on something to leave in someone else's hand, but I just think that that is going to be a challenge.

And is there a way if we come to a point where we vote on this ordinance and then it's like, okay, well, maybe that doesn't work or we can't immediately fit into the budget.

or if it's something to where we are committed to dismantling like SWAT specialty units and we're going to take that money and fund PCOB positions, then I get it because we have a plan of funding.

If we don't have those type of conversations and we know that the ED can't do it all, we've had that discussion in the past just about the two positions.

And so I don't want to set up

the future council to not be able to deliver on something that we voted on, or if it's the expectation as it was before for us to fund all the positions at once.

And if that's the case, if we are committing to that, how are we going to do it?

And that would be part of what would come out of, I think, that procedure conversation.

So I guess perhaps the question about the finances, I don't know whether Mr. Aguilar or

Maybe Ms.

Marshall or somebody would have some direct information about that.

My understanding is that there was allocated in the budget $350,000 with relatively little of that actually spent.

Is that right, Ms.

You are correct that for this fiscal year there was an allocation for PCRB

The majority of that funding is allocated for our executive director staff member.

However, one word of caution I would give is the unpredictability of the current board's utilization of their legal counsel.

That is proving to be a pretty heavy cost at this particular point.

And we do realize that that cost allocation and usage can change as the board continues to evolve with their ordinance.

Right now, as I understand it, there is not a specific line item for council fees.

That is correct.

What our budget and finance teams are doing right now, however, is they are moving those expenses into a line item.

But what you'll see when you pull their budget is that there was a lump sum allocation.

And then when the expenses are coming in, they are being labeled as legal fees.

In their upcoming budget, I've actually allocated out in line item things.

Okay.

So is there...

Sure.

So to give a better perspective on that, and Mr. Aguilar, please weigh in as well.

but for the upcoming budgeting process we actually have requested a new consideration to be able to make sure that there's funding for hearing officers for professional development for the board.

And I also believe that investigator pool is in that question.

And so right now, if we stuck with the $350,000 budget

With legal counsel, there's not a ton of wiggle room, again, just because their fee is going to be unpredictable as to what you may need to use them for.

We do monitor it, of course, but it's nothing that you can, you know, not like we need this much paper, for example.

Yes, thank you, and I think just one key word that you used was unpredictability.

Right now, we try to look at the past data of the complaints that have been received by the Internal Affairs and try to do some predictions from there as to how much we could set aside for investigations, for the hearing examiners, for the legal counsel.

and potentially for this new element of mediation.

So we have a range of where it could look like, but the $350,000 budget, I don't think it anticipated or contemplated these different layers of the new ordinance that you have envisioned.

Sure, so that report was pursuant to a resolution that you passed on November 4th when you passed the original ordinance in 2019 that established the board that we have currently and at that time the initial PCRB had recommended some auditing activities for the department and I believe it was your intention, the council's intention then

to allow the executive director to review that a little bit more thoroughly and provide some recommendations on auditing.

So the report provided kind of a background as to where we were then and where we have come since then and what areas of priority that the council and the city should consider

in terms of auditing activities.

I try to model it and guide it with the communications and the discussions that we're having in the city based on the values and what they would like to see and the issues of policing and also the national discussions and the 21st century policing.

So I made some recommendations in the report about auditing, patrolling activities, auditing special teams activities, which you received a comment about it at this meeting today, and activities regarding CPD interactions with mental health, individuals experiencing mental illnesses,

And I don't have the report available, but that's essentially what the essence of the report was to look at some of the very targeted activities of the department, see what we're doing and what we're doing well, where there are areas for improvement.

Thank you.

I didn't mean to put you on the spot.

I just knew that some of that stuff that I had read last week when you said that was just really relevant to this conversation.

And frankly, it got taken out in large part

because, well, two things.

One was the objection from the chief of police and Dr. Brackney didn't like the idea.

Number two, because of this concern that you've got to have, basically, if you're going to have non-professionals, people who are on the PCRB without any particular experience or background,

in the way in which police departments get run.

Why would we want to turn over the discipline power?

Why would the chief of police agree to something where the chief of police's power to run her own department was going to be restricted by people who didn't know as much as she did?

That was a significant part of the discussion.

So that's why we came up with simply the recommendations.

And one of the things to keep in mind is that all of these procedures can be changed.

Okay, so could you or...

Lisa, someone answer.

So getting a subpoena from circuit court, how does that play into the role of whether that officers have some legal protections and may not have to willingly participate or participate at all?

Is that too?

So there are two issues here.

The one issue that is a federal constitutional issue deals, the case is called Garrity.

It's one of the parties went up to the US Supreme Court was named Garrity.

And the issue there was if a police officer is told either you cooperate with this investigation or you get fired.

then that's a statement that is being given under compulsion and that violates the Fifth Amendment.

And so the answer is if police department wants

wants to have a discipline like that where they want to say, if you tell us what happened or you get fired, that statement can't be used against that person in court.

And so that's really the issue.

The statements and what we've written in here is that the statements couldn't be used against them in terms of the discipline either.

I think that's right.

I should check that because we've actually changed that once or twice.

Mr. Aguilar, do you remember, you're more familiar with these issues probably than I am.

Do you recall whether there's been, we've had some progression in the way in which we were handling these kinds of statements.

Do you remember?

Or is my question confusing to you?

It was a lousy question.

It was a lousy question.

Now, what I'm trying to remember

I suppose I should look at it right now.

I think what we wound up saying about the Garrity decision, let's see, I've got a heading that says specifically just Garrity.

The procedures section.

Yeah, the board may not compel a statement from any department employee.

What that means is that the board can't say to somebody, you've got to tell us what happened or else.

And the reason is under Garrity, the board, the only entity, the only person who could make that statement of you've got to tell us or else is somebody in the direct chain of command over that officer.

So let's see what else I have so I can open it up to someone else.

So there were, what is this, page one, like purpose, I thought that it needed to include establish

at the bottom is that the purpose of the board is to increase and maintain trust between and amongst the Shaw'sville Police Department and I think established needs to go there.

I did on page two, I have some questions about three, but I think I'll wait for Lisa's responses for some of these.

Yes, C3.

Yes, that one.

On D3, based on the way Charlottesville works, I think we need to take that out.

Or maybe we don't need to take it out, but I don't know.

Again, this is where I think procedures kind of come in, but

How are you defining that?

Are we basing that just on evidence submitted, like reviewing body cam footage, things like that?

If we go into whether it's just you've written this down and if it's a word of mouth and someone says, and then you, I just don't know how you prove it.

So that's the question I had there.

I had a

about the circuit court subpoenas, I had just what law authorizes it and how and the benefit to the city.

So I had some questions there.

On page 4G, I didn't understand why this is something that would need to go to the

like that you would need to get a subpoena for.

And we're at the point where our executive director and the board is saying that the city manager is withholding information.

There was a question about the voting membership, but it's not on page four, so it's somewhere.

On E, on page six, conflicts of interest, I think that just leaves it open to interpretation, that last line.

Because I'm thinking of last summer and how many people of an incident like that, you know, I don't even want to speak of it.

But incident like that happening, and there are a lot of people who emotions would be attached to that.

So I just think that Let me just say that's something, that paragraph actually is something that I revised fairly extensively after

comments from Ms.

Robertson.

The standard at the beginning, I mean, the standard of that no board member should participate under circumstances in which the objectivity of the board member could reasonably be questioned is a fairly common standard for recusal or self-recusal or if somebody shouldn't be, for example, serve on a jury because their objectivity might reasonably be questioned.

The

putting the word reasonably in there just sort of guarantees that somebody has a frivolous objection.

We don't have to honor that frivolous objection.

But if it's a reasonable objection, that's a different matter.

I think in the procedures that we drafted,

There is a provision in there that says that recusal, if somebody wants a member of the board recused, then they have to say so at the time before the decision gets made, you don't get to object after the decision gets made.

They would read, no board member shall participate in any matter before the board under circumstances in which the objectivity of the board member

could reasonably be questioned, including, without limitation, the consideration of a complaint of someone who is a family member.

Additionally, and for purposes of the Virginia State and Local Government Conflict of Interests Act, the board shall be deemed a governmental agency, and each board member shall be an officer, as those terms are defined in Virginia Code Section 2.2-3101.

All board members shall comply with the requirements of the Virginia State and Local Government Conflict of Interests Act.

As far as the subtleties of that, I'd have to defer to Ms.

Okay.

I had some thoughts around the interview process for board members and the participation of either like board chair or not currently, but the chair of the board and the ED.

I know that opens it up, but that is something that I just had in my notes that I just think

For what we are seeing, we want this board to be able to do, it may just be helpful to include them in that process, even if it's just the initial recommendation, you know, the initial process, and then council makes the final decision, but that they are able to give a recommendation.

Are you referring to board appointments?

And I know that's different than the process, but I'm thinking of what we are asking this board to do that it just may be helpful.

Well, if we think about other boards and commissions, we certainly have cases where the staff would make

Weigh in in a number of ways, like when there's applications, obviously, it's just something for our consideration when we go into deliberations.

Yeah, no, I am.

What I'm describing is they actually sit in on the interview process with the counselors, which is different than we normally do, but just as something for you all.

Yeah.

I know.

I just don't know how we were.

We have been talking about the expertise needed.

I'm thinking about the community members who are appointed.

But again, ponder it, but that's engaging the staff member in this case, Mr. Aguilar, whoever serves in that capacity.

But I it would be I'd be hard pressed to see it working out without any actions in the future for another another appointed board member.

But that's just my you're just I hadn't thought about this before.

Yeah, and that's why I wasn't, I'm just giving my list.

I have some other things, but I think whatever Lisa's response will answer those, so I'm just leaving those out.

And these were just kind of, you know, wording and, you know, big, minor things.

I think minor stuff.

The other thing is I don't think we should mandate ride-alongs.

There were some members who expressed that they were not interested in doing ride-alongs.

This is the initial PCRB and there were some members who were very open to it.

So if that's a part of the training, I do think because not everybody has the same experience with being in a police car and so some community members it may trigger

them and I would not want to do that.

I don't think that the fact that you may have been

like tossed in the back of a van that people had pissed in in the past.

And you may not want to get back into a CPD vehicle.

That means I'm just giving an example that I'm aware of that that doesn't mean that you

shouldn't be able to be on the board.

You just don't know.

We're talking about community members, and I'm speaking specifically of them.

You don't know what their past histories with officers are.

And I know sitting in the front seat is different than sitting in the back seat.

And maybe, but depending on who they are sitting beside, there may be officers on the force that people will be more open to ride-alongs than others.

but I just think mandating it if I think we should have a provision here that people can opt out of.

And I don't think it should exclude them if this is a part of the training and they're not comfortable doing it.

I'll let someone else talk.

So Michael, you were a part of a lot of these discussions.

Are there things that the concerns of yours that we didn't end up addressing?

More just small details.

But overall, I feel like it's in it's in a pretty good place.

In particular, one of the most important things to me was

ensuring that in the hybrid model that the independent investigatory function is maintained and has a real part of the structure.

And I think that is very much a part of it.

And so overall, I mean, I think there are smaller details, including things like, you know, the police ride-arounds, some of the comments that the city attorney made, but big picture in terms of the overall structure, I feel pretty comfortable that it's a very strong and independent

I'm not sure.

You know, I'd be curious to think about that more and have some initial more discussion.

I guess my initial thought is that the

I could see there being opportunities where if someone was able to bring a complaint who wasn't the person who had a negative interaction with CPD, that there are instances where that could be of use.

But quite frankly, I'm not sure what is usually the best practice for other civilian oversight boards across the country on that, or if there's a way to allow it, but limit it so you're not just getting

You know, a flood of complaints if the individual who is subject to that abuse does not actually want that brought forward to the review board.

Okay.

Did I confess I don't know what Ms.

Did I miss Lisa's comments?

Because you just did.

I'm not

Did you all just get them?

She sent them to me and to Michael over the weekend and I was trying to incorporate them during the day today, but I ran out of time.

So it seems like we're actually getting pretty close.

So are we in a situation where

You know, obviously we've had some discussion here.

There's some tweaks.

Obviously, Ms.

Robertson's pieces are coming in.

I should back up a second.

I realize that Vice Mayor McGill actually has told me how she feels on the complainant versus any old person issue.

And she also would like to have it restricted to complainants and direct witnesses.

So...

Anyway, it sounds like we've got three votes in at least in favor of that.

I haven't really decided how I would come down on it, but I could certainly live with that version.

So why don't I go ahead and put that tweak into the draft that we would consider next time.

I note, by the way, that Mr. Mendez is on the call.

Yes.

The only thing I have to say is I'm really delighted at how constructive this process has been.

Counselor Snook and Payne and all the other participants.

I think there's been a real meeting of the minds and a lot of these important

There is currently an item on the agenda that is

entitled status of the ordinance operating procedures.

I think that we're pretty much in sync on this.

I don't think that we're too far apart in any event.

I know Mr. Aguilar sent me a little note saying he had three observations.

Happy to have them.

Thank you.

And I'm sorry if it's too late to be here.

Not a problem.

I just want to give it a fresh review over the weekend and just think practically how these things work.

So for what was the legislative intent behind the juvenile records?

I understand and appreciate the confidentiality, but in terms of there's two reasons why I think that

Ms.

Robertson, is there a particular set of legal requirements that we're addressing there?

A specific legal reason to not

be considering juvenile records.

The state statute that prohibits a law enforcement agency from sharing law enforcement records involving juveniles, except with a list of people that is in the statute.

And in order to get access to those sorts of things,

even a lot of people, you have to go to the juvenile court and get a court order for release.

Okay.

I think for that matter, actually, there's also a provision that says that we can't even share adult criminal records, that there are specific statutes

that allows sharing of adult criminal records only under certain circumstances.

So, for example, I know that I can't get the criminal record of a witness in a particular case.

I can't have it provided to me.

I am allowed to look at it, but I can't receive the piece of paper.

Right.

So there's some statutes that restrict things.

Right now, most of the information we're talking about is information

Okay.

And then that's helpful.

I was just thinking in terms of investigation where you may have an officer that made a decision based on his knowledge of a particular juvenile's record and

and he makes a statement to that effect during the investigation with IA or if it's an independent investigation, how do we corroborate that without seeing what juvenile records the officer may or may not have known about?

We'd have to look at the juvenile court statute, which is the governing statute, but the other thing we can do when you're getting to the procedures or the standard operating procedure about the sharing of records, there may be some way that you may not be able to disclose who the juvenile is or any sort of information that would identify them, but you might be able to share

general information about how an investigation was conducted or how a statement was taken, that sort of thing.

So we can revisit it in looking at the operating procedures.

Thank you.

That'd be helpful.

And then just two quick things with the subpoenas, Councilor Snook and Council and Mayor, what is the, I was just thinking about the practicability and the feasibility, especially if we're, if there's a time limit on these investigations on having to go to the board for them to have a vote on a subpoena, would that potentially delay the

investigation.

How do you see that in practice when a lot of these investigations, they're very time sensitive?

We're not necessarily going to get investigations all the time where somebody files right after the incident.

So if we have to preserve any evidence, do we want to add that extra procedure where the board has to have a meeting to decide whether they want to apply for a subpoena?

Interesting question.

Now, I don't think that's a good idea.

I think that's sort of decision-making outside of FOIA, but we can take a look at whether or not, again, in the operating procedures,

We can take a look at that and decide whether the board wants to generally confer authority on the executive director under a particular set of circumstances.

The operating procedures could say the executive director on behalf of the board can request a subpoena under these circumstances.

And you could list

Timeliness could be a factor, that sort of thing.

Thank you.

And just my last observation was on the annual report.

scheduled for April 15th in the draft, would it be better to be aligned with the departure of the chair?

So that could be the chair's kind of report to the board because I believe they start the rotation in January.

So they potentially submit the report in December as he's leaving his term.

That's just something to consider.

I think you glorify it by referring to it as a thought process.

Candid.

No, I don't know that there is a particular thought saying, gee, we ought to be doing it in April or August or any other time.

The one thought that I had had was simply if we're going to be doing it by calendar year, I mean, you probably ought to wait for the end of the calendar year.

If you're doing a calendar year on everything that happened through December 31st, you can't issue that report on December 15th.

April 15th would simply allow, I mean, we could move it up a little bit if there was a concern about that.

I just figured give everybody enough time to get it done so that it doesn't have to be like, hey, I'm cramming in an exam and a term paper all at the end of the semester and Christmas holidays are here and so on.

If there's a time

that would make better sense if it would be better to be earlier or later than April 15th.

Yeah, keep in mind that also every two years you have rotations on city council.

So if you need to get through the end of the year before you can do an annual report, January may also not be the best month to

present that type of report.

Well, that's something we can think about if folks have opinions one way or the other.

Just from my own experience now, I'll

in the last couple of years, I would be inclined to not ask anybody to do anything before April 15th, if possible, because that's when the budget gets finalized.

So the city activity in general kind of slows down, except for budget activity, it seems to me.

Anyway.

Okay, so...

If there are no other substantive discussions, I guess what I would suggest is, I think that the only real substantive issue we've talked about this evening is this question of who would have standing to file a complaint.

I think we can tweak that language.

Lisa, as I said before, I'm, firstly, everything you've suggested, I've just gone ahead and typed into the version that I'm working with.

And so I suspect that the final analysis you'll find very familiar

and then if we can get the final word from any more comments out of the PCRB then I can finalize it over the weekend.

I would just recommend that counselors review watch the

PCRB meeting to make sure that there's something that we need to think about there.

And if we can get all the material, then that'll, I think, speed up things.

We do.

It's still basically limited to meeting procedures.

And now what has to happen is that since we don't have MLUs, we have to define like information sharing protocols, the procedures for receiving and processing

That would be a draft of what we would suggest to the city manager.

And Bill, I don't know whether you were on when I started talking about all of this, but what Lisa had sent to me was something that basically said, we shouldn't be having MOUs between different sections of the city government, but that that should be regarded as the city manager promulgating standard operating procedures.

So we call it that.

I think that that solves the problem of the city manager and city manager's role and so on.

Yeah.

I just, again, I've said it in email, but I just want to thank, obviously, this work group that has had a heavy lift and, you know, Lloyd and Bill specifically for kind of helping us to kind of wrangle through to get to this point.

I think a lot of tremendous progress has been made this fall as the smaller working group has kind of been working through these details and obviously with Mr. Aguilar joining the organization as well as the support of Ms.

Marshall.

Okay.

I got my marching orders.

Me too.

Next up, we have an ordinance approving the rezoning of land at Zero Nassau Street from R2 U2 Family Residential University to R3 Multifamily Residential Subject to Preferred Development Conditions.

Thank you, Mayor.

Matt Alckley, City Planner, Neighborhood Development Services.

Mayor, City Council, tonight you will hold a discussion in the first reading for proposed rezoning of Zero Nassau Street.

The proposal covers tax map parcels 6100-79600, 6100-79700, and a portion of 6100-7900, and is located on the eastern side of Nassau Street at the intersection of Florence Road.

Justin Schimp,

with Schimp Engineering and Nicole Skro, representing the owner, Franklin Street Land Trust III, has submitted a rezoning application pursuant to city code section 3441, seeking a zoning map amendment to change the zoning district classification of zero Nassau Street.

The applicant proposes to change the zoning classification of the subject property from the existing R2 residential two-family to R3 residential multifamily with proffers

and Development Plan.

The comprehensive land use plan at the time this went to planning commission called for low density residential.

The following key aspects of the development plan include two five unit multifamily buildings, three one bedroom units and two two bedroom units in each building, not more than 10 dwelling units on the site, a central parking between the two buildings, an outdoor recreation area behind the southernmost building,

a greenhouse behind the recreation area and new sidewalks on the south side of Nassau Street.

In addition to the development plan, the applicant has proffered that the design, height, density and other substantive characteristics of the projects will remain essentially the same in all material aspects except where they conflict with city zoning.

The height of the building, the building or structures located on the subject property shall not exceed 35 feet in height and height is to be measured in accordance with city code section 341110.

The permitted uses in the subject property may be used only for the uses listed and they are residential and related uses by right which is residential dwellings at a density of one of

a density of 21 dwelling units per acre, specifically single family dwellings, single family attached dwellings, townhouses, two family dwellings, multi-family dwellings, or residential treatment facilities from one to eight residents are by right.

Accessory buildings, structures and uses are allowed with provisional use permit.

Other uses by right would be utility lines,

and by special use permit utility facilities.

On November 9th, the Planning Commission and City Council held a joint public hearing on this matter.

Floodplain impacts, accessibility of the playground to the community and the size of the units were all discussion points from the Planning Commission and Council.

The Council wanted to ensure the proposed development would meet all floodplain requirements and wanted clarification on who could use the playground and greenhouse.

During the public hearing, two members of the public spoke and expressed the following.

The city should not allow development within the floodplain and should do more to protect the existing trees.

Also, the city needs more housing and this development would benefit the city.

Planning Commission voted seven to zero to recommend approval of the rezoning to city council.

This concludes my report.

The applicant has prepared a short presentation.

After the presentation, staff and the applicant will be available for questions.

I would also like to note that Mr. Tony Edwards, the city's floodplain administrator is also available tonight to answer questions.

Thank you.

And I'll turn over to Ms.

Thanks, Matt.

Should I, okay.

Got it.

So this is going to be a very similar presentation to the Planning Commission public hearing.

So I'm sorry for the counselors who were there.

I'm going to be repeating myself a bit.

I'm Nicole Skrow.

I'm the applicant with Justin Schimp for the SEGA transparency.

I know Justin especially represents other applicants many times before this body.

In this instance, unlike others, he's actually the owner of the property

So the property is located in Belmont.

It's in the Carlton side of Belmont, the Belmont neighborhood, Belmont Carlton neighborhood association.

It's on Nassau street.

This isn't a great picture because a lot has happened on Nassau street as far as new construction goes.

But the site is right where Florence comes out onto Nassau.

This is just a close-up.

So it is, as far as amenities goes, you're right by Reeves Park.

There's a new international school at this site where my mouse is.

I'm going to keep going.

The current zoning is R2.

So by right, you can build three duplexes.

So that's six total units.

So this is an overview of what's been built recently on the property

The Thomas Jefferson Community Land Trust has built two duplexes and Habitat Next Door has also built two duplexes.

So that's right here and here.

So right, this is where Florence comes out.

So this is where the property is and this is where the proposed two five unit structures are.

and Justin is building, they're currently under construction, two duplexes next to the five plexus by right.

Here are the pictures of those, then siding is now on them.

Then when you continue along Nassau towards Linden, you meet some single family detached houses,

And then you meet the project that came before council several years ago.

And then you meet another by right project, an apartment complex that hasn't been built yet, but it's by right.

And then you also continue along Linden Avenue and there are some apartment complexes as well.

So there's a variety of housing types along the street.

and these duplexes that Habitat and the Community Land Trust, Thomas Jefferson Community Land Trust built as well as the two duplexes that are being built by Wright.

So all of the duplexes on the street were part of the same site plan originally that was approved in 2016.

So that site plan is currently still effective and

It envisioned as approved continuing duplexes where we're proposing to put five flexes instead.

So we're going from six units that are approved under the site plan and we're going to 10.

and we're limiting those 10 units, we're limiting their bedroom count.

So there's actually less bedrooms than what could be built by Wright.

We're also, so here's a massing diagram.

So we're also limiting the footprint.

So it's just a little bit wider than the duplexes that are currently under construction here.

Though Habitat is actually, those units are wider other than longer.

Anyway, the footprint is fair, the buildable footprint is fairly similar to what can be put there and built there by Wright.

And not only that, but so there's the site plan that was approved.

And then you also to build in this area, there's a

Floodplain kind of towards the back.

And the next picture probably shows it better.

Yeah.

So the floodplain is this blue line here, it's dotted blue line.

If you look on the FEMA maps, it's kind of difficult to see because it doesn't show you the elevation based on the most recent letter of map revision.

So if you look up the FEMA map, it shows it over here.

But the elevation is actually changed back in 2017, 2016.

And so the elevation is actually 324 to 325 in this area.

And so that's kind of towards the back of the site.

And then in addition to that, there's some fill that will be placed on the property.

And that will bring the lots and the buildings out of the floodplain completely.

And the ability to put that fill there, that dirt, has already been improved.

So that dirt and the disturbance of this area and this building footprint will go there regardless.

It's just a matter of whether that building footprint will include...

Six units or 10.

And the idea behind this was in building the duplexes, kind of came across some increase in construction costs and probably going to hit a rent around 2100.

Isn't terrible for a three bedroom unit, but to get the rents lower, we would like to build one bedroom units that are smaller.

and more of them.

So we can hit rents around 1100 and thinking it through a little bit more in the planning commission, I'd set around like a little bit below 1300.

So we're looking for rents between 1100 and 1300.

So that hits about 60 to 70 area medium income.

There are some amenity requirements by going to R3 rather than having existing R2.

So that's another positive.

We can have a little playground area that's required with R2 amenities and you have to have some sort of weather protected area.

And so that's going to be this greenhouse.

Justin has one on his property in Nelson County.

This is what it looks like, but it isn't exactly his.

And that is all I have.

So Justin's on this call this time.

So we're here to answer any questions you have.

Thank you for your time.

Nicole, could you just back up to the slide that shows the footprint?

And could you just, again, just kind of reiterate?

Yes.

So you'll see this unit right here.

That's the footprint of the duplexes that are under construction.

So the footprint of those are 1536.

So that's the footprint.

The footprint here is 1680.

So it's 300 more gross square footage.

And this is a kind of a massing of it.

And the original plan, if there was three duplexes, then you would just have three of these structures side by side by side.

Yep.

Which would be harmonious with whatever's around it.

I used, so this is, and I took this from, go right to the site, I have it all.

So that's fmr, so, sorry, I was probably playing it around here.

So I took this from HUD, so, and then I took, you know, that's your,

annual salary, of course, what's your monthly salary, and then multiplied it by 0.3, which is, you know, 30% cost for housing.

And that's how I got to family of two or family of one.

Got to the AMI percentages.

And so just to

again point to ponder, but that the 30% ideally includes housing expenses.

It's not.

Well, it's not.

And so my approximation of rents

is a range, and these are new construction, so your utilities will be lower, but you're right, my 1100 to 1300 does not include utilities.

Yeah.

from, you know, this site, there's no, it's just vacant at the moment.

So unlike the other site for the, that was proposed several years ago, there's not any, you know, no displacement is even possible.

That's correct.

And then the second question is, you know, as people brought up, you know, what is the plan and expectation in terms of the, you

Yeah, I mean, I can't say too much about this.

Justin knows much more than I do.

I know that our site kind of conceptual plan does not show some of the mitigation measures that will be required, such as permeable pavers and or a bioswale.

So there'll be some sort of required on-site mitigation, which those habitat units, when you drive

You drive through the drive-through in between the units and then pull over.

They have permeable pavers.

Something like that will be required.

But, Justin, I don't know if you want to speak more to the floodplain and climate change.

I think that's a fair question and concern.

He knows more than I do.

Sure.

Yeah, Justin is shampooing me.

engineering owner of this particular property.

So, yeah, I think you're right.

So what we do is, first of all, the folks we were talking earlier don't take into account that we're going to put what we have on the one set of houses, we will put six or eight feet of dirt.

and where that kind of floodplain area currently is, which basically elevates the structures out of the floodplain.

Let me go a little further and I think I have something like three or four feet of cushions over the floodplain limit.

So as a matter of practice, you know, if the fee minimum is one foot, we would try to go above that by some percentage as a margin of error, not knowing what the future may hold exactly and a little cushion on that.

So we're very close to like a 500 year floodplain elevation, which is

and very, very low flood risk in this particular location.

So essentially it's engineered fill and a study of the maps and the actual flood studies to figure out what a real number is to give us some, not just the minimum, but a cushion above that.

Yeah, that was a great question.

At the time, I wasn't sure if there was some sort of requirement for them to be exclusive to the development.

And I believe Lisa Robertson said that there doesn't need to be any exclusivity.

So we'd be welcome to having that street and that community have access to that greenhouse and that playground.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, so they'll be rented out.

The five unit structures will be rented out and the tenants in those units will certainly have access to the playground, but I guess we'll be managing the playground and the greenhouse so we could also allow access to those amenities.

As the manager, we could allow the habitat and the other units to also access those.

Well, we certainly could have kids in those units regardless.

It is required.

But yeah, we do want people who have kids and are around that area to have access to them.

Just that there will be a playground.

I know Justin's helped with the design of wild rock, which is that nature playscape.

So there's some ideas from that.

But no, right now it is just kind of a designated area.

Felisa, I would want to know how that would be because I don't think that based on one bedroom efficiency style units or whatever that they would have to necessarily I don't know what is required to be in a playground because it's required but I would hope that it is more geared towards the community needs versus who is likely to be in a tenant in a development like this.

Yes, so there's one and two bedrooms.

There's three bedrooms next door, but I think Mayor Walker makes a good point.

You know, there's a lot of families in that community, and so it's not been designed yet, and we would love to engage the community and see what's needed and what's wanted and make sure it's utilized.

So...

But yeah, there are a variety of housing types and sizes along that street.

So you get a wide variety of people and families there, having walked in and knocked on doors a lot there.

Yeah, in terms of how you ensure that specific things are provided, you would

Could I ask some flood related questions?

One thing that concerns me a little bit is that if you build in the floodplain by raising the dirt level underneath your building, you are limiting the size of the channel and you are therefore necessarily raising the level of your flood stage.

and that's one of the problems in development in floodplains overall is that even if you've built your building on an artificially constructed hill that is otherwise in the floodplain, what you've basically done is to push your problem onto everybody else's land.

How do we factor that into

Yeah, so there's actually a pretty, this property is a little unique and that, well, first of all, you're correct, right?

If I'm along a river channel and I place fill, it sort of limits the capacity, the carrying capacity channel and the elevation goes up.

But this particular instance is actually a backwater flood from the Rivanna.

So we actually don't have water coming down to flood this site, should it ever flood, it's coming up.

And so because of that, it's a storage area.

And so the effect of the fill is, I mean,

Correct, right, exactly.

They do.

Okay.

And

Yes, and actually maybe even a little more of it because I have a little less space under the by right towards the habitat lots.

So I might actually place a little more fill.

Yeah, okay.

Because I'll be honest, my only real concern with this is the notion of building in the floodplain.

I mean, Charlottesville, I remember during the time when Hurricane Camille and Agnes came through in the 60s and 70s, and we used to joke

that 100 year floods came once a year and 500 year floods came every five years.

I don't know whether they even use the same terminology in the floodplain maps these days, but the one thing that we can reasonably anticipate with climate change is that floods are going to become more of a problem, not less of a problem.

And so I'm, frankly, that's the thing I'm trying to worry, I'm trying to weigh is whether

the advantage of having more, frankly, more smaller units, which I think is a good thing for the mix in housing in the community as a whole, whether that is outweighed by the difficulties that come from some encroachment into the floodplain.

That's where I am.

And to that end, just because we have to have our staff member here, Mr. Edwards,

Yes.

Justin's correct in the approach that has been taken in the past to elevate these sites out of the 1% or regulated flood elevation, the base flood elevation.

The city goes one step further in its ordinance that we require a one foot free board above that.

And as I understood from their presentation, they're looking to even elevate even higher than that.

One thing we need to keep in mind about floodplains, there's designated sections of floodplain.

One is a floodway, which is the main channel of flow that is required to remain open and free to flow to allow that 1% regulated flood

elevation to be conveyed through that area.

What we're talking about here is development in what I would refer to as a floodway fringe, which is allowed by flood ordinance for the city of Charlottesville.

but it does require a special permit and in that permit review process we look at all of these things that could potentially be obstructions unnecessary obstructions perhaps like all the mechanical equipment and everything that causes that house to function properly has to be elevated as well not just the living space areas.

Yeah, I think that a lot of our questions are around just the difference between what is allowable by right versus what is being proposed here.

Yeah, we would be looking closely at all those elements they mentioned, the playground area, any other structures that would be in that floodway hazard, or not floodway, but the flood hazard area.

So this is a no vote.

Okay.

And I would just ask for these items that may be

The one before now, Jesse, Vice Mayor McGill is not here for us to not place them on consent that we put them back on the agenda in case there's any discussion.

For the PCRB, we're going to have to have more discussion, but if there are any, you know, if she has any comments or questions.

And as for this, if we can make sure that whatever the level of engagement

Next up, we have a resolution approving the request to waive the critical slope requirements of City Coast Section 341120B to allow construction of a duplex at

Coleman Court, Zero Coleman, City Tax Map 49, Parcels 112 and 1112.2.

So thank you, Mayor Walker and members of City Council.

I am Dannen O'Connell, City Planner with NDS.

and tonight I'll be presenting an application from Greater Charlottesville Habitat for Humanity requesting a waiver from section 34-1120B

of the city code, which is the critical slope ordinance to allow for by right construction of a single family attached structure with two residential units, along with supporting infrastructure.

The proposed structure will be located on two lots tax Mac parcel 490-112000 and 490-112200.

These two lots are located at the northeast corner of Coleman Court and Coleman Street and are currently undeveloped.

And I shall note that these lots were previously divided into six lots but essentially been consolidated into two lots with the approval of a boundary line adjustment this year.

The proposed duplex will be located on both lots with a common property line dividing both residential units.

The improvements specific to areas where the critical slopes would be impacted is shown in the critical slope exhibit linked in your packet materials and includes portions of lots one and two, sanitary sewer and water line placement, and a new private driveway for both units.

The proposed duplex will be developed by Wright in line with the established R2 zoning for both parcels.

The proposed building footprint will be almost entirely outside of the critical slope areas, and impacts to the critical slopes will come primarily from the new access easement needed to connect the building site to the street, sanitary sewer and waterline placement, and associated graining on both lots.

Two trees will be removed to accommodate this development.

However, the applicant indicates that stormwater runoff and erosion will not be significantly affected by the development.

Alternative site layouts were unlikely to reduce impact to critical slope areas as the building area for both parcels is almost surrounded by critical slopes, particularly the area nearest to the existing public street corner.

So city staff and city engineer did recommend approval of this with several conditions.

The planning commission's considered this at their November 9th regular meeting and recommended approval with conditions as part of their consent agenda.

With that, I'll be here to take any questions.

I'm just going to say welcome to Mr. O'Connell.

All right.

I move we adapt the resolution approving the request to waive the critical slope requirements of city code section 34-1120B to allow construction of a duplex at zero Coleman Court.

All right.

Ms.

Thomas.

Mayor Walker.

Yes.

Councillor Payne.