City Council Meeting   5/20/2019

Good evening.

Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Ms. Hill?

Here.

Ms. Walker?

Present.

Mr. Signer?

Ms. Galvin?

Are there any announcements?

The welcoming and the thanking.

So first of all, I think we want to welcome Dr. Richardson to the dais this evening.

It's really a pleasure to have you.

Looking forward to this next chapter, but we would be remiss without taking some time to thank our city staff and all the ways that many stepped up during this transition.

This evening we especially have a few folks that we'd like to thank.

Our communications director, Brian Wheeler, who wore countless hats during this transition, most notably that of the interim clerk as well as covering the scope of our assistant clerk while we recruited and onboarded Kena Thomas and Mexicilia Robinson.

Your commitment, Mr. Wheeler, to council during this transition, as well as the continued input on ways that we can further improve our processes, is so appreciative.

Thank you, Brian.

And we have a little something for everyone when we're done.

Assistant City Manager Leslie Beauregard, who provided support to Mr. Murphy throughout this transition, while also leading us through one of the more challenging budget cycles that we have.

Leslie, really appreciate all the ways that you've been here to support this team this year.

Our Director of Human Services and Interim Director of Transit, Kaki Dimmick, who joined the City Manager's Office as Interim Assistant City Manager and also wore and continues to wear multiple hats along the way while also supporting Council's evaluation of the ABRT process.

Thank you for that, Kaki.

And certainly last but not least, Assistant City Manager Mike Murphy, who served the challenging role of Interim City Manager for nine and a half months.

Thank you for your leadership and commitment to this organization.

We've appreciated your efforts to work with us in partnership and look forward to continued collaboration with you, Dr. Richardson, and the staff team as we begin this new chapter.

Let's give them all a round of applause, please.

I think we all should probably go.

And I would just like to thank everyone who participated in the community panels, the staff panels, to select our new city manager.

And like Councilor Hill said, we're looking forward to the future and all that it brings.

All right, good evening everyone.

I have a few other announcements.

In addition to that, I'd like to echo the statements of Mayor Walker as well as Vice Mayor Hill.

Sincere welcome to Mr. Richardson, who I was at the Virginia First Cities convening this week and you are highly respected by city managers across the commonwealth.

Many of them sent their regards and they were very clear that we got a good one.

So we're really looking forward to the work that you're going to do.

However, we can be of assistance to you.

We're here for you.

Appreciate that.

No problem at all, sir.

So I have a couple of announcements.

Bear with me.

I try to do them in chronological order.

It seems like y'all just load me up with all the announcements.

I don't really know how I feel about that.

Councilor Bellamy, could we just, because I don't want, we have a concert that's going to start outside.

Oh, we got a concert.

Oh, y'all going to perform for us?

Oh, okay.

All right, we got the Grandma Granny's here, so y'all like performances.

Green Granny's, my bad.

You had to come to the microphone.

So we have a virtuoso in our midst.

This is Massamba Jope.

Anybody see Black Panther?

This is his music.

He's from Senegal.

And he is visiting Charlottesville High School this week.

He's working with our students.

He's visiting ELL classes.

And we're doing an open drum party at the pavilion from 6.30 to 8.

It's already started.

So we're telling the community about it, so maybe you will come after the meeting.

And so Masamba is giving generously of his time to work with our students of Charlottesville High School.

Man, you might be T'Challa himself.

Take me with you.

The meeting's too long.

And before Dr. Atkins walks out, kudos to her, our superintendent.

Hey, Dr. Atkins, thank you for stopping by.

All right, so announcements, we have a few of them.

That was great.

The first one, so the preservers of the Daughters of the Zion Cemetery cordially invite everyone from the city to attend Decoration Day.

This is at 2 o'clock on Sunday, May 26, 2019.

at the Daughters of Zion Cemetery, which is on the corner of Oak and South First Streets.

Following the ceremony, there will be a gathering for light refreshments at Barrett Early Learning Center, which is at 410 Ridge Street.

So again, any and everyone is invited to come out to decoration day that's Sunday at 2 PM at the Daughters of Zion Cemetery.

So make sure you all come out.

Shout out to everybody who put that together.

Also, we have another announcement from Mrs. Maxine Holland.

Sorry, backtrack.

On Wednesday, there's going to be a social bike ride.

Shout out to my man, Peter Krebs.

We're going to be riding bicycles.

I'm going to be riding bicycles with everybody from the bike clubs,

All across Friendship Court and we're going to do a couple of miles throughout the city, correct?

I think there's going to be some light refreshments or something, like some water at least for everybody.

I know it'll be a little warm.

So come on out, that's Wednesday at 5 o'clock.

If you need more information, you can see Mr. Peter Krebs for that.

It's a bike ride through the city.

Following that, the 19th annual Juneteenth celebration will take place on Friday, June 14th and Saturday, June 15th.

Juneteenth, for those who don't know, dates back to 1865.

And Juneteenth, which is a blend of June and 19th, is the oldest known celebration of the ending of slavery in the United States.

It grew out of a desire to remember the struggle that black people waged to free themselves and save the union.

All of this will take place at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center.

It's going to start again Friday, June 14th at 6 o'clock.

It goes from 6 to 8 and then there's a party on the lawn on Saturday, June 15th.

That starts at 5 o'clock.

Mayor Walker will be there.

They should be saying a few words and I'll be there as well.

Yeah, you.

Yes.

All right, so there is a make sure you come on out to Juneteenth as Miss Parker hands me a lovely calendar for unity days There are a few other items.

All right, so we got a couple things popping here in the city I'm not gonna read them all but make sure you all again come out to on Monday at

The 27th, there's an Irish and enslaved people's history in the railroad in Charlottesville.

Again, this is for the Charlottesville Unity Days that we have going on.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Hill.

Forgive me, let me backtrack.

Tomorrow, Tuesday, the 21st.

There's going to be a presentation on Racial and Ethnic History of Charlottesville.

That will be presented by Ms. Charlene Green of the Human Rights Commission.

That's at the African American Heritage Center at 6 PM.

Again, that's Tuesday the 21st at 6 o'clock tomorrow.

On Thursday the 23rd, Performing History, Sally Hemings in the Artist's Imagination.

That's going to take place at the common house at 5 PM on Friday the 24th.

There's going to be a Monacan History Celebration.

That's going to be put on by Jeff Hantman.

That's at City Space at 7.

And then there are also events on Saturday the 25th, Monticello to Main Street, as well as Sally on West Main Street.

For those, excuse me, Sally on West Main.

For anyone who would like more information about the Unity Days and the committee who's putting everything together, please look online at www.Charlottesville.org backslash Unity Days, all one word.

So again, www.Charlottesville.org Unity Days.

You can also use the hashtag Unity Day Seaville and tag us in your photos and events.

Ms. Parker, you're using hashtags?

It's lit, all right.

Last but not least, we got another announcement.

There's a few of you who have been running with us as we've been running these streets and jogging the city.

So every Monday, Tuesday at 6 o'clock.

Wednesday at 6 30 a.m. and then Friday and Sunday at 6 30 a.m. We are jogging through the community so the group has grown to about 20 people.

Excuse me, we're hoping to get 20 people on Wednesday.

It's got to about 10 to 12 people on a routine basis.

So we jog through all of the traditional African American neighborhoods and historical sites.

It's open to everyone and the culminating event is going to be the Run These Streets 4-Miler.

That's going to take place on Saturday, June 29th at 8 AM, kicking off at the Jefferson School.

So it's open to any and everyone.

We run through the communities.

It's a good way to get your morning started, get the blood flowing, meet some new people.

We got a couple people who've promised me that they're going to run.

with us this week.

Mayor Walker says she's going to run before she kicks off her four-miler.

Ms. Galvin, Vice Mayor Hill, and Dr. Richardson.

Before you signed your contract, you had to come and run these four miles, but you're going to get there, so we hope that you all will join us.

I have an announcement from the voter registration office.

Absentee voting for the June 11th Democratic primary is now underway.

Virginia does not have party registration.

Any qualified voter may vote in a primary.

This primary will decide the Democratic party's nominee for city council, which are three seats in the House of Delicates for the November election.

In Virginia voters must have a reason for voting absentee, for example, if they will be away on election day or have a disability or illness.

Qualified city registered voters may vote absentee in the city voter registration office during office hours of 8.30 AM to 4.30 PM, Monday through Friday, and on Saturday, June 8.

The office is in the city hall annex next to the pavilion.

Curbside service is available for absentee voters who are disabled or who are 65 or older and have a qualifying absentee voting reason.

You must show a photo ID when voting in person, just as on election day.

Voters who do not have an acceptable ID may apply for a free photo ID for voting during office hours in the registered office.

Voters who need a mailed absentee ballot are encouraged to apply now.

to allow time to receive, vote and return the ballot by election day.

I have a proclamation.

So to have a run on anything, you have to have good infrastructure.

So I am very happy to say that this is National Public Works Week.

So with that, whereas public works professionals focus on infrastructure, facilities and services that are of vital importance to sustainable and resilient communities and to the public health, high quality of life and well-being of the people of Charlottesville, and whereas these infrastructure, facilities and services could not be provided without the dedicated efforts

of public works professionals who are responsible for rebuilding, improving and protecting our transportation, water supply, water treatment and solid waste systems, public building and other structures and facilities essential for our citizens and whereas the city is thankful to all of those public works professionals and whereas it is in the public interest for the citizens, civic leaders and children in Charlottesville to gain knowledge of and to maintain a progressive interest

and understanding of the importance of public works and public works programs in our community and whereas the year 2019 marks the 59th annual National Public Works Week sponsored by the American Public Works Association, now therefore we, the City Council of Charlottesville, Virginia, do hereby recognize the week of May 19 to 25, 2019, as National Public Works Week in the City of Charlottesville

and call this observance to the attention of all of our citizens.

Signed and sealed this 20th day of May by Mayor Walker.

Jermaine has been an influencer with the Facility Maintenance Division since September 10, 2012, and we are very, very fortunate to have him.

Okay, any other?

All right, we'll move on to the consent agenda.

May I ask why?

Excuse me, my voice is getting hoarse.

A, minutes April 17, 2019, special meeting.

B, appropriation.

Appropriation of funding for CPA TV for the Ryle Thomas show, LLC, $4,247.50, first of two readings.

C, appropriation 2019 to 2020, community development block grant funding,

$52.82 deferred to the next meeting.

Also, item D is deferred to the next meeting.

Item E.

Appropriation, amendment to community development block grant account, reprogramming of funds for FY 2019 to 2020, $1,900.82, second of two readings.

F, appropriation, local emergency management performance grant, LEMPG, $7,500, second of two readings.

G, appropriation, funding requirements for SAP integration for

Fleet Management Software, $48,000, second of two readings.

H, Appropriation, Virginia Housing Solutions Program Grant Award, $16,500, first of two readings.

Second.

All right.

No?

Do you want me to do these now or after?

Yeah, you can go ahead.

This evening, Council is appointing the following individuals to our boards and commissions.

The Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority, Laura Goldblatt, Michael Osteen.

The Citizen Transportation Advisory Committee, T Donna Chen.

the Community Development Block Grant Task Force, Nancy Carpenter and Howard Evergreen.

We do want to note for everyone out there that we do still have five vacancies representing the Belmont, Ridge, Fifeville, and 10th and Page neighborhoods.

So you can apply for those positions if you would fall in those neighborhoods.

The Community Policy and Management Team, Michael Costanzo, the Historic Resources Committee,

John C. Barron Jr., William L. Clay III, and Martin O'Bryant and Ellen Wagner.

The Jefferson Area Board for the Aging, J. Brian Jackson.

The Minority Business Program Task Force, Anthony Derek LeCount.

The Monticello Area Community Action Agency Board, John C. Gallant.

Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee, Bridget Moss, the Place Design Task Force, Susan Perkins, Michael Stoneking, Andrea Rudy Trimble, Frederick Wolf, Emily Wright, the Region 10 Community Services Board, Linda Hansen and John Kronstein, the Retirement Commission, Al Elias,

The Sister City Commission, Joan Clark, Amanda Folsom, Kate Kogie, Dave Norris, and James Potter.

The Towing Advisory Board, Edward Wayne Haslet.

The Tree Commission, Brian Paul Menard, and the Vendor Appeals Board, Al Elias.

Thank you.

So I move that we adopt these appointments except for Mr. Costanzo.

Second.

So before we vote, may I have a quick discussion?

Just something I'd like to say very briefly.

For the Housing Authority specifically, we had an open application and the information had been posted on the city's website.

I just want to say that maybe we as a city need to do a better job of getting the information out that these applications or that these board positions are up.

or we have to do a better job of encouraging folks to actually apply.

We only had two applicants for the Housing Authority Board in which basically makes the decisions for what's going on for one of the hottest topics in our community.

And the fact that we only had two applicants to me personally was rather disappointing.

We've seen this also similarly when we had issues come up with the Civilian Review Board in which we initially started with over 20 applications and that number dwindled down to I think 12 or 13 and then it went down some more.

I think that we as a community, we do a great deal of talking about we want to be involved, we want to be engaged, we want to be in the decision making process, but when the opportunity comes forth for you to actually join the boards and commissions, we need you to apply

be engaged and then possibly serve.

So we're ready to vote.

All right, that carries four to zero.

And now I move that we appoint Michael Costanzo to the Community Policy and Management Team.

And I will abstain, but I hit the red button, right?

I don't know any.

All right, that carries three to zero.

You know what?

I didn't read out the youth council people.

They're on the third page.

Sorry.

I'm hopefully a point.

Hans Bay, Olivia Bowers, Caroline Jaffe, and Sabrina Hendricks to the Youth Council.

Second.

All right, please vote.

There's three pages to that.

All right, that carries four to zero.

All right.

All right, now we need to go again.

Okay.

We have to vote again.

All right, please vote.

Thank you Madam Mayor, Member of City Council.

I also just want to say before I do get started to say thank you to the public for all your time and due diligence throughout the interview process and thank you for your kind words of encouragement as well as welcoming me to the city of Charlottesville once again, so thank you.

Moving on to the city manager's response to community matters.

One of the ones that many of you got emails and phone calls in as I want to tell the folks from the Downtown Business Association that I tried to call everyone back as I could as well as email many of you back who emailed me pertaining to the route change along West South Street.

and down Second Street Southwest.

My understanding based upon the history of this is that there's already been a 14-day notice for a parking change as well as a discussion pertaining to it being a pilot project.

Now, I just want to be clear with the Council.

Is this something you want to move forward with and move it to a future agenda in terms of having further discussion?

I guess my concern is that there hasn't been

Mayor Wolk, I just have a comment to make.

As I understand it, the point of a pilot is to do the investigation, to research it, to see what the implications are for both ridership as well as impacts on parking.

And we can't find out that kind of information exactly until we do it because ridership and parking, in my mind, are both public goods.

So we've got to figure out

whether or not this is really going to be something that benefits our riders and I can't see how that can be done without a pilot.

The pilot is going to be then identified as an end time in six months and then at that time if we see that it really didn't have any impact, positive impact on ridership

And then also we figured out a way to accommodate parking because that was one thing I want to look into.

Would there be a way to put additional parking spaces on Water Street, for example, in the areas?

Is there some way to put more spaces in that area to accommodate what was taken off of South Street?

So to me, those are the questions that need to be answered in a pilot.

So I'm not sure if I'm missing something about the whole purpose of a pilot is to test out something.

And if there is harm done, we won't do it.

But we don't know yet until we try it out.

So we're moving forward.

All right.

Thank you, counsel.

Moving on, another item that I have is comments from Mr. Well, from Ms. Hudson about Rose Hill parking.

We did go ahead and make a change from our last time in terms of parking.

Our traffic engineer today actually went out there and put up a 14 day notice for a parking change over there in that area because it's impacting neighborhood business.

So we did do that today.

Moving on with another comment from Mr. Foley.

I want to make sure that I pronounce his name right, Mr. Foley.

Alright, got it.

One of the questions pertaining to can people do community service to work off fines?

Yes, that currently is the case.

Excuse me, I'm sorry.

All right, well, I'm just going to relay the information so you can get back to Mr. Koontz, right?

All right.

Just making sure.

But one of the things is that the judge currently, he does that on a case-by-case basis.

What he ends up doing is making sure that someone can verify the performance of those individuals and that they can certify the work that they've done.

He approves that plan, such as a probation officer or someone like that, that can verify it.

And then secondly

the incarcerated folks they're able to do work but that's verified by our circuit court judge who basically takes it by hour by hour and their fines are reduced based upon a minimum wage rate so that is being done.

One other item that I do have is to talk about the climate vulnerability assessment

Currently, staff is pursuing a climate hazard vulnerability assessment.

This has been supported by UVA, the county, as well as the city.

The core methodology for this effort is to identify, consider, and estimate.

When I talk about identify, I talk about identifying climate hazard specifics to our particular area, as well as considering how they are projected to change.

And the last piece of that is estimating the level of impact that those changes will have on our core community.

These results will feed into our climate adaptation planning.

And the other thing, the last thing I want to mention to the council, based upon bike month, I know that you do have a report within your packet.

We will come back at a later date to basically identify our achievements with that.

All right.

Thank you.

And now we'll move on to our community matters.

Hi, Walt Heinecky, 1521 Amherst Street.

Mayor Walker, Members of Council, Dr. Richardson, welcome.

Very nice to see you here.

First of all, that was a great opening for Council.

That was so upbeat.

Can we pull that off again?

Because that was very nice.

I wanted to talk about something that's on the agenda today.

It's the ABRT process.

And before I say that, before I say anything, first of all, I'll repeat what I said at the work session, which are, there are really, there are a lot of very fine

Non-profits in this town doing really hard work, and I'm not talking tonight about any one specific non-profit.

I'm talking about the system in general, so keep that in mind when I make my comments.

I think if we get this right, it's going to be a major cap, a major feather in the city's

Equity Cap at the end of the year.

As I've mentioned before, on August 11th and 12th, when the reporters come back, they're going to ask, what have we accomplished since 2017 in terms of an equity agenda?

And I think this potential for reforming the ABRT toward equity is one of those opportunities for the city to grab and to actually make good on those promises.

I think if we get this right, and I don't think we've got it right in the packet, the proposal tonight I think needs some work.

I do think we could use UVA's priority groups that are already established as ways to organize our priorities for ABRT reform.

They have jobs and wages, affordable housing, public health and education.

as categories that they prioritize, we could do the same thing and then organize our nonprofits under those headings and get to work on those particular nonprofits and make a dent in creating those.

We could also create work groups around those priorities made up of a majority of low-income clients to get their perspectives heard when we do the reform process for ABRT.

I think most importantly it's how it's staffed.

I think you need to hire an independent facilitator with two skills.

Critical race or multicultural skills and an evaluator who can guide what success looks like.

In other words, somebody who's facile at creating goals and indicators and report cards and who has measurement skills.

So I'm not arguing that we use UVA.

You might use some professors from UVA, but I don't think we should use them as an institution to do this.

I think we need to focus on the experience and the solutions of our most vulnerable clients in the city.

I think independent staffing is critical for this review and reform.

The ABRT is part of a culture of Charlottesville and regular insiders and staff can't see what they can't see.

So I also think that Dr. Bellamy at the last work session talked about a group called the Nonprofit Leaders of Color and I think they could be useful in terms of creating an advisory board and help with the work groups.

Thank you.

Good evening, Council.

Welcome Dr. Richards.

I'm so happy to have you on board.

Tonight you'll receive a written, I'm Peter Krebs from Piedmont Environmental Council by the way and city resident.

Tonight you will receive a written update from city staff about progress on bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure.

Every year we see more people out on bikes and healthy walks and runs.

including all of you, in fact, which is awesome.

And there have been some notable successes during the past year, including, for example, the pedestrian bridge in McIntire Park.

Staff should be commended for their hard work, and yet I think we can all agree that a lot of work still needs to be done as well.

The report mentions one item that merits a conversation of its own.

The recently completed Jefferson Area Bicycle and Pedestrian Plan lays out a comprehensive network of bike lanes, sidewalks, and shared use paths throughout the combined Charlottesville and Albemarle area, the urban area of Albemarle specifically.

It envisions a connected community and emphasizes opportunities for shared wins for the city and the county.

Imagine going for a run on the Saunders Monticello Trail without getting in your car, commuting across the Rivanna River on a pedestrian bridge, taking your family for a safe and enjoyable bike ride that goes on for miles and miles instead of mile, and creating linear parks and spots that are currently forgotten and unloved spaces.

In addition to providing improved quality of life for today's residents, these connections also encourage investment, lower household travel costs, promote health and equity, and lower our climate footprint and so much more.

For the past two years, thanks to the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation, we've had many conversations with stakeholders from across the community.

We've worked closely with health professionals, university, activists of all stripes,

local state officials and residents throughout both the city and the county.

We have found nearly unanimous support for this vision of active transportation and recreation that is truly available for all.

We look forward to continuing to lead these conversations.

Both the city and the county have done great work, made significant commitments, and you must move forward together.

The Jefferson area plan is a pathway to doing so, and city council really should hear a presentation from the planning district about this at some later date, perhaps this summer.

In the meantime, you can learn more about the plan and sign our community letter of support by visiting PECVA.org slash Seaville Greenways.

Thank you.

Peter, really quick.

We talk about when that may happen.

If you think there's like a natural point in time where there may be just, I think this kind of got prompted because it's bike month and we're recognizing that.

Yeah, so I think there's sort of two natural factors at play.

Number one is that the plan is recently completed, so it's timely.

We don't want to wait forever.

One of my deals working with the community is I don't speak for other stakeholders.

I only know what I've heard.

And I believe that the county is hearing the issue this summer.

Thank you.

Good evening.

I'm a resident of Fry's Pink's neighborhood and I'm also a member of the HAC.

So I've been thinking a lot about affordable housing recently and an interesting experience this last weekend with running my house on Airbnb for a ridiculous amount of money to somebody from California.

I went on to go look at the website, though, for the city on how I could, again, pay my tax or register my house in order to, again, make sure the city was getting what it needs and found that it's a very bureaucratic, multiple forms.

I would have to start remitting a tax payment every month, even though, let's say, I just rented my house for once or twice during the year.

I then kind of was like okay well this is interesting and also I don't think a lot of my neighbors who are doing this are registered and so all of a sudden we're missing a lot of potential money.

In addition to having potential rental housing stock being used just for Airbnb 100% of the time instead of residents in Charlottesville using it.

I didn't know, kind of going around and exploring then, I was like, okay, why didn't just Airbnb take the seven percent, lodging tax directly out of the money, it's being remitted to me.

They don't, which is kind of surprising again, but in the cities of Blacksburg and Alexandria, they do.

So this can be done.

I also noted then when I was digging around a little bit that Airbnb claimed that the city of Charlottesville during the UVA football season, or not the city, but Charlottesville in general, did 1.1 million dollars of rentals for like five months.

Now that of course is maybe a bunch of bachelorette parties and other things going on, other wine tastings, but if that's 7% lodging that's another 70k.

that can be used to, again, potentially support rental vouchers, et cetera.

So I'm sending my check-in to the treasurer remitting my money that I owe.

But I do suggest that I know we were, of course, only a couple months ago having a very interesting discussion on raising taxes and finding taxes and money to, again, support affordable housing.

I know the affordable housing rental voucher program is

is funded, but we could always use more money to, again, because we're having problems trying to incentivize landlords to take the vouchers, economics of that and increasing that, you know, could help on that.

So I would suggest, of course, the staff figure out how to Airbnb, B&B, to remit the money directly, you know, and charge it, take it directly out of the

the money that's being, again, charged.

Additionally, you know, I would hope that that money can be specifically allocated to, again, rentals, supporting the rental program.

And finally, I would suggest the staff look at how you increase the rate, specifically the short-term rentals, from like, say, 7 percent to 15 or 20 percent, because I don't think we necessarily want in our housing stock used for Airbnb rentals full-time.

Emile Walker, may I say something?

Yeah, thank you.

I would just like to

ask Mr. or City Manager Richardson that we look into the process of paying taxes and whether or not Blacksburg and I guess it was Alexandria are better models.

I also think that the differential in rate is an interesting idea because the other thing that was discovered in the April 2018 housing needs assessment was that about 250 housing

units were lost to short-term rentals, which in a city like ours, which is really desperately in need of affordable housing, that was a shock to read that.

So if we can both get revenue from it more directly and not encourage people to go under the table with it, and then secondly make it a little bit harder to do it, we might be able to get kind of a nice sweet spot.

One can only hope.

That's all I need to say.

And one aspect of the speaker's point is Blacksburg did enter into, there is an ability for localities to enter into agreements for Airbnb to directly collect the tax per their site and remit it back to the locality.

You know, I don't know their agreement but that might be part of

Okay.

All right.

Thank you.

Ray Masters.

Ray Masters.

All right.

Mary Carey.

Like, what is that?

Where is it?

Okay.

Dr. Richardson.

Thank you.

Mary Curry, city resident.

About the pilot.

Thank you, Ms. Gavin.

Mayor Walker.

Ms. Bellamy.

because I'm trying to figure out what's going on here.

If you can't approve a pilot for two parking spaces, free parking spaces on a one-way street and you got two parking lots down there and a parking garage and somebody that's building

Something on Water Street that got special permits to change parking anytime they get good and ready.

What's up with that?

Okay, last night, I called Charlottesville police non-emergency number because, like I said, the person that's building over there on Water Street, he seems to want a bill anytime he get ready.

He had that thing clinging and banging at 1.30 this morning.

Started off at 5.30 Sunday morning.

So finally when I got to the dispatcher, Chief Brackney, the officer went over and called me and told me that the man showed him a permit, a special permit that he can build, he can do construction, especially on Sundays.

Anytime.

So I don't know who getting money where under the table, around the barn, wherever, but y'all better give it back because this man is not going to stay over there a midway man and curl like this anytime he get ready.

This is the fifth time since the first of the year he's done this on a weekend.

and he does it anytime he gets ready.

On Sunday mornings, he comes in there like 5.30 in the morning and clang and bang all day long.

Every day he starts construction at 5.30 and 6 o'clock in the morning.

That's on weekdays.

I don't know if he's trying to make up time or what.

But as far as the trolley coming downtown, I've talked to several university students that the trolley do go down Altman Road, that don't even come downtown, would appreciate riding it.

And to the merchants downtown in Charlottesville, y'all need all the business y'all can get.

Thank you.

Harold Foley Hey, before I start, I want to say that the People's Coalition is not here to destroy anybody.

or make anybody look bad, right?

We're here to destroy systems and bring them back together, right?

For so long African American men have been target in Charlottesville.

How you doing?

I was at a neighborhood association meeting, Fifeville, because I live over there.

And there was an officer there.

So I have had an interaction with this officer before, so I asked him a few questions.

regarding his interaction with African American males.

And it isn't good.

So I asked him why is it whenever his name comes up in a conversation involving African American males, it's negative.

And it always is negative.

And he became very defensive, which I expected of him to do.

So I'm going to let these ladies who were present

to say something about that.

It's to my understanding that there was a letter written and I don't know if the Chief got it or not, but there was a letter written complaining about this officer's behavior that evening.

Which was good because in my opinion, if that had been a group of black people talking about him and he had been there and we had complained about it, nothing would have happened.

But because it was white people that wrote the complaint and sent it in, it was addressed.

So we're going to address it tonight, I hope.

And if not, I'm hoping that someone will be getting in touch with me to address it again.

Olivia Patton, city resident.

I was also at the neighborhood association meeting that night.

I hate that I have to be up here to validate a black woman's word because it would not be taken as seriously as mine.

I was there.

I got there that night.

The officer came in.

It was one of the first warm days of the spring.

We were at Don Starr Park.

It's filled with people.

Everyone's having a good time.

People are playing music, basketball, out on the benches.

As soon as he gets out of his car, tension, palpable tension falls upon the park.

Everybody gets back in their car and leaves.

People get off the

Playground like people grab their children and I mean it's visible.

I just was there we immediately remarked on it We're like who is that guy who just got out of that and then we realized which officer it was we get in there Another officer was supposed to be speaking apologetically going over he's confronted about

his interactions with black men and black people in general and there's nothing aggressive about it, just objective facts and storytelling and he immediately gets very defensive, he starts gritting his teeth saying he's not a racist, yelling, like clenching his fist, banging on his thing, rolling out his eyes, it's just like an insane interaction and everybody in the room is kind of like, what's going on?

Why are you acting this way?

It finally gets stopped, there's back and forth of him yelling, saying I'm not a racist, I didn't do this,

completely invalidating her stories that he says nobody else feels this way even though I just watched the whole park remove itself as a reaction to his presence only because a white man spoke up and said hey you've been acting like a jerk you could have stopped this whole interaction 20 minutes ago but instead you've been defensive and finally he sat down and moved on

Well, someone did contact me by email, but they have my information.

So, Ms. Johnson, I'm not clear.

Okay, so you want another follow up?

Don't you think I need a follow-up?

I'm not saying you don't.

I don't think you need to ask me that, Wes.

It's very clear that this should be looked into.

And that's what I'm saying.

So there was a complaint filed.

Yes, there was.

Thank you.

Good evening.

You may welcome members of the city council.

My name is Paul Long.

I live at 100 Ridge Street here in the city.

Dr. Richardson, I want to welcome you to the city as a new manager.

I hear you have an excellent reputation.

And I want to talk about the last city council meeting that was called to order at 6 30 in the evening.

It wasn't adjourned until ten minutes after one.

When I realized that there was a lot of city business to conduct, but I think that by and large, and I realize that not every meeting lasts that long, but a lot of meetings sometimes last four, four and a half hours.

And I think an effort should be made to conduct the meetings within a two and a half to three hour time frame.

You know, and I don't want to necessarily judge Charlottesville by other big cities, but when I was living in Philadelphia, and I've been living in Charlottesville for 21 years, as Philadelphia City Council has 17 members, and I've never attended a Philadelphia City Council meeting that lasted over two and a half hours.

You know, there's got to be a way to condense the meeting to a more reasonable time frame.

Thank you.

Chantelle Bingham, 1648 Brady Wine Drive.

So I stand before you today to give a brief update on the food equity initiative and the progress that remains so far in cultivating food equity in the city.

For some time now, a group of 30 nonprofit organizations known as the Charlottesville Food Justice Network have worked to envision a food system that truly works for all.

We realize that our food system does not serve everyone equally and that hunger, food insecurity, and poverty are entrenched problems for our city and also historical ones.

The Food Equity Initiative is about grounding ourselves in the reality of race and health inequities in Charlottesville.

It challenges us to consider the root causes of unequal access to healthy, nutritious food based on an individual's demographic background.

It demands us to heal the disparities we see across race, class, age, and gender as it relates to food access in Charlottesville.

Since the passing of the Food Equity Initiative on October 15, 2018,

More than 40 nonprofit organizations, 10 city departments, 5 healthcare institutions, and 4 foundations have actively collaborated to better understand the root causes of food insecurity in Charlottesville.

This high engagement process, thanks to the Charlottesville City Council for passing that, has encouraged many partners to not only consider short-term interventions which meet the needs of our residents today, to begin visioning long-term solutions to build self-sufficient families of tomorrow.

The six-month narrative shift, which you guys will find a handout that we left with you at the beginning of the meeting, has already produced short-term city-wide benefits for planning.

I just want to list those out for you today.

Number one, it started to cultivate trusting relationships between city departments and nonprofits to tackle systemic issues of racial inequity in our food system together.

Two, directly increased alignment between city staff and community needs through a food equity lens.

Three, city department leadership has demonstrated an increased awareness of the role their sector plays in cultivating food equity.

Four, it's also elevated cross-sector understanding and community planning around affordable housing, climate change and food security as an integral piece to building self-sufficient citizens at all ages.

So overall, the city's food equity initiative has sparked a new era

of community engagement, collaboration and collective problem solving.

So I really want to thank you all for passing that.

It's enabled our community to leverage the expertise we have to collectively solve the problems that lie ahead.

As a community, we've already highlighted five areas of advocacy that we really need to strengthen.

And those are healthy school meals with the school district in which 55% of the student body qualifies for free and reduced lunch and breakfast.

85% at three different schools that each learner receives a nourishing plate.

It shouldn't be on that mom or father to provide that meal to that student.

Second is strengthening transportation systems.

Our city, where we have a city where grocery stores are now cast to the outskirts of our urban ring, families are finding it more and more hard to make it out there to Food Lion or wherever it is.

It's important that we start to develop a strong transportation system.

Affordable housing, as we consider developing affordable housing, that meets the middle demand as well as the demand for those living at 30% AMI.

We need to start thinking about food access as well.

It's great that people will have a shelter over their head, but if they don't have a place to eat, then what is there to live in the city for?

Four is urban agriculture and five is neighborhood access and markets.

I know I've gone over my time.

I want to leave you with that and just remind you all that the city of Charlottesville and the Charlottesville Food Justice Network has been selected for a national award.

In 2014, the mob administration started Local Food, Local Places, and it's geared to do just what we're trying to do with the food equity initiative.

So I really want to push you guys to save the dates of July 16th and 17th.

We'll have a herd of federal employees around Charlottesville visiting different housing sites, different food access points as well, and collaborating with 30 organizations, hopefully 30 residents, to really envision what that plan would look like.

I have a question.

It's actually been pretty great.

I wanted to open up with a quote from Alex Iacufana, who's a Department of Development Services head.

A lot of those conversations or interviews really have been open forum.

We're aware that a lot of city departments don't really know what food access means.

They don't know what food equity means.

So we've been very open with how those interviews are structured and it gives us a time to go back and forth on explaining what food equity, food justices, what food access may look like for neighborhood development services.

So some of the things that come out of those meetings, Alex at the end of it, here's a quote from him.

He said, we need food to survive and most importantly,

Access to food, quality and nutritious food is very critical for our lowest income residents.

That's the aspect that Neighborhood Development Services believes that we need to take care of.

That will include recognition of that need and the policies of the city comprehensive plan.

We know that food was not mentioned at all in any chapter before, so now Neighborhood Development Services is actively aware of that.

He wants to rewrite the zoning ordinances to accommodate the need and make it easier for people to have urban agriculture.

also supporting, protecting and preserving that space as redevelopment takes place.

So that's just a snippet.

There's also a couple of other, in the footnote, I'll try to be brief, but in the footnote of your, the memo, it also talks about economic development services increased awareness, so they've reached out

Because our meetings with the Food Equity Initiative, they reached out to Human Services and referred a funding opportunity through the Virginia Community Capital for Fresh Food Loan Fund, which seeks to support localities' pursuits of thoughtful food retail projects such as co-ops.

In the city of Richmond, that was one of the loan

things that they use to start the market on 25th.

I don't know if you guys have seen anything about that.

But the state of Virginia is also recognizing that food deserts, food access is an issue and starting to create more pockets of money for that at the level.

And what about vending machines?

Is there a vending machine?

So we've had conversations with

Human Resources for the City of Charlottesville.

We're going through all those notes, but that is something that came up.

That's something that we want to come from city departments, not from the collaborative ourselves.

So some of those ideas around vending machines, also some ideas around like a food court and things like that for city staff.

Human Services is more focused on how

We can work within the city departments to make people know about all the benefits that are available through Aetna.

Apparently you guys have a very robust Aetna program.

All right, thank you.

You know, Walker, I have some questions.

Thank you so much for this.

And it does make me think that maybe this should have been an agenda item for Council to look at as an update, because as I remember, our memo and when we passed it in October, we wanted to get updates.

And so I really appreciate that you took the initiative to give us an update, even though we didn't put on the calendar.

Absolutely we do we've already started to envision that and when we say public asks we really want to hone down that we're talking about cross-sectoral collaborations so it

food access and transportation as an intersection.

So it would be asked for the transportation department, food access and affordable housing.

So there's different sectors that intersect with food access.

Education is one of those.

So we're trying to be as robust as possible.

We do intend to just kind of write you guys a food chapter for the city comprehensive plan as well, because that stuff is already laid the groundwork for that.

Thank you.

And the earlier the better.

Thank you.

Good evening, all.

I just have a couple of things.

I want to talk about the police on a summer day.

Why do they feel that they have to over police the black neighborhoods?

I don't understand that.

Two, I don't understand why some of these police officers are being promoted and the things that I have seen aren't well with the agenda of the people because the pictures that we've seen and the actions that I saw is very disturbing.

Also, one of your lieutenants

We're trying to have transparency with the CRB, but we can't have transparency if the officer is still going off with something that was said or done months ago.

So you can't have transparency in that, which plays also a part in trying to make the CRB go forward.

Also, there was a gentleman, he was supposed to be here with me tonight, but he didn't show up, but his name is Cyrus Toliver, and he's a homeless veteran, and he wants to have an understanding of why the two officers passed by him when he was on his knees, when the knife was to his throat.

and he also, and this was on the downtown mall, he also wants to know why haven't any charges been brought against this man?

Why hasn't he been going to court?

And also the officers were supposed to let him know when the man had got out.

The man had been out within maybe three days and he was not in fear of his life, but the point of walking around Charlottesville without knowing that this man

was out, so he wants to know about that.

Also, too, the light in the tunnel of 8th Street has not been done, and that's a very dangerous tunnel as you come through there, so we need lighting.

And I'm still going to go back to 8th Street and Main.

If we can't get any lights,

until six months.

Can we least get a reflector, which is already a reflector there, but it's dented up.

You cannot see it with the silver reflection on both sides of the street.

But I think that may be it.

So I'm not going to give it to y'all too hard this evening.

I'd just like to echo the comments, the latter part of the comments from Ms. Parker once again about the need for not only the reflector but in my personal opinion more that's needed on 8th and West Main.

We've belabored this point a great deal but I think we'll just have to continue saying it.

I know we're supposed to discuss it in the upcoming agenda.

but I want it to be known again as prior councils have simply stated that we need to change the streets.

Thank you, Mayor Walker.

Welcome, Dr. Richardson, city councilors, city attorney John Blair, Keena Thompson, Thomas our clerk.

I am John Edward Hall of the Fry Spring neighborhood here in Charlotte City, Virginia, I say.

Charlotte, past queen of England.

who our city is named for, so honored yesterday.

By public petition backing, I wish to direct our city planners and councilors to vote to include funds to lower the road at the intersection of 14th Street, West Main, and University Avenue five feet so that trucks can pass under the railroad overpass in that location.

My initial thoughts were to suggest a $50,000 appropriation for the FY 2021 budget CIP cycle.

to do this, but today I met with Tony Edwards, NDS manager, on the street and he told me that the dangerous cast iron gas line correction will soon occur from JPA to follow West Main and

under this overpass that I'm talking about at 14th Street, West Main, and University Avenue.

All the way to Rugby Road, such gas line correction needs are also being implemented from the Sacajawea Lewis and Clark monument along West Main to JPA.

Over this information, I suggest

Given this information I suggest we as people of Charlotte City, Virginia address water lines and sewer pipes problems to alleviate flooding and ponding of water and heavy rains and be proactive in bundling media cable in one fell swoop to best manage our public money promoting efficiency and lean government spending.

I'm in the process of approaching the CSX Railroad, who is the overpass and rail owner for funding, the Corner Merchants Association for funding help, and we'll talk to area construction and engineering firms to further vet and refine my approach and civil engineering draft drawings.

All that said, here are my drawings to share with the audience.

This one right here prepared by me and Ron Cook as part of Public Works.

Public Works, we honor today, chose the area.

Mayor Walker, if I may ask a question of Dr. Richardson.

So the very points that Mr. Hall has made about bundling utilities and replacing gas lines and sewer lines and water lines is all a major impetus as to why we even started looking at the West Main Improvement Plan.

But my understanding is that that

that improvement plan ends right at the fork between JP extended and then when it continues before it gets into and under that overpass, that train trestle.

So it might be very timely to look at that particular solution or at least look at that particular problem because we will be moving forward with those improvements just as you say because bundling all those utilities lets us

Declutter the sidewalk so that there's more people to walk, more space for people to walk.

If we could just at least talk to, I guess it would be NDS to see where we are at possibly coordinating these two solutions.

Because that is a serious clearance problem.

All right.

Hi, I'm Cherry Henley.

Good evening.

So I wanted to address something that I was unable to address last city council meeting due to time.

I find it very interesting that we were able to just bypass the fact that there was a promotion of a police officer who was photographed with an actual white supremacist.

and nobody has batted an eye.

That's a problem for me and many other people.

I would like to have an investigation into his connection with white supremacy.

I mean, it's on social media.

You can use my phone.

I'll give it to you for now.

But there's a thread here along with the person who that particular officer

So there's an actual photo that's been on social media and there's a thread along with that regarding the two individuals that this particular police officer is associated with online.

You can scroll up.

if you want to get the information that you need.

I find that it's a problem that with the police department saying they want to be transparent, they've neglected the fact that there is an actual photograph of this particular officer with white supremacists.

Who are here and have been charged in the city of Charlottesville?

So that's a problem.

Another problem is the actual promotion, which I find, you know, the disregard, you know,

surrounding August 12th, August 11th, two separate days, very tragic incidents, right?

And then for, I'm not bashing anybody, but there's a lot of bashing that needs to be done, but I'm not gonna do it today.

I just want to make sure that there is an investigation that takes place regarding this particular police officer.

and that personal friendships and camaraderie does not affect that investigation.

I also think that it was

for the promotion to even go as far as it, you know, to actually have a promotion of this person knowing that these photos exist and those relationships are there, that he was still promoted.

That's a problem.

That's a very big problem in this community.

And so I just wanted to address that.

Oh yes, I would like an investigation.

How can you have an actual white supremacist standing next to you?

Do you take photos with white supremacists on a regular basis?

Yeah, I mean there's a whole thread there.

I mean, come on.

If you want to right the wrongs in this community, you don't promote people who actually engaged in the suppression of our community.

Don't do that.

You don't do that.

So at the end, the very long meeting that Paul Long just referenced, at the end of that, yeah.

Jelaine Smith was still here to discuss this very issue, so at the end we did.

Because the majority of the community are like, why has this white supremacist sympathizer been promoted in the police department?

Even if you don't agree with the policies of the police department, even if you don't agree with police surveillance, even if you don't believe in any of those things, or if you do, this was not the right move to show that you are here to support the community and oppress people, marginalized individuals within our community.

It's not the right way to do it.

It's like every single time we give the benefit of the doubt, right?

We take three steps backwards, right?

Okay, well, a photo surfaced of this man and now he gets a promotion two days later.

Seriously?

What are we doing here?

What kind of progress are we making if we're going to talk about progress?

So we did have conversations and I did express that the last meeting when it was brought up also and you've now talked to Dr. Richardson about it so I'm assuming that we will get some feedback in between.

All right.

Katrina Turner First, I want to say that on May the 3rd,

Ms. Lolita Cookie Smith passed away.

And usually when somebody passes away in the neighborhood that we get a moment of silence at city council, but we didn't get a moment of silence for Ms. Cookie at city council after she passed away.

So I'd like to ask for a moment of silence for Ms. Lolita Cookie Smith.

Hold on for just a second.

Thank you.

And I just have a message for Nae'Nashale that she wanted to tell me that she's very disappointed with City Council that not one person mentioned Ms. Cookie's name and not one person

came to her

for three years that I came forward to you about.

He's one of the officers who assaulted my son and now still three years later he's out here and he's still harassing the black citizens out here.

When are we going to be heard?

When is anything going to be done with these officers out here?

That's what I want to know.

This is one of the officers on my complaint that Ms. Johnson just complained about.

And I'm still not finished complaining about him.

And I want to share the rest of my time with Ms. Kayla.

I'm Kayla, and I was a victim of an incident that happened to where Officer Pedro

grabbed me by my arm.

It was hard, like a rough grab.

He manhandled me and I was innocent.

With that being said, I called the police and the corresponding officer came.

Instead of asking me what happened or checking to see if I was okay, he instantly ran my name and everything like that.

I went to file a complaint and the same officer that came to the incident he was basically telling me that there was nothing I could do because they're automatically going to take his side because he's a police officer.

I ended up filing my complaint and ever since then every like so often I get

Consistent letters from the police department saying that the investigation is still ongoing for 30 days It's been a year and I've gotten Seven letters saying 30 days.

I got my last letter last month I met with

The Commonwealth Attorney, Platano, and he agreed to where that it shouldn't have taken this long.

I first met with Lieutenant Sanders and then I understand she had her health concerns.

This happened a year ago like

Here, thank you.

Thank you.

So can we get an update?

Elliott Harding, I live in the city.

I know that she just recognized the passing of Ms. Smith.

I want to recognize somebody who did something.

He's still with us, and thankfully he's coming back to us.

That's an ambassador from the city of Charlottesville who's been a real prominent figure in the United States using his platform for educational equity and early education literacy and access, bringing clean water to East Africa and Tanzania.

and fighting for criminal justice reform and he announced his retirement two days ago and that is Chris Long.

Chris Long is a Charlottesville, something that we sent out into the world and now he's coming back to us and I think that that's something that we should recognize here in the city as something positive and recognize people that, you know, are an ambassador of the city of Charlottesville and what we stand for to take it at a national platform.

For me, he was always an inspiration.

I've known him since I was 12 years old.

I was friends with his younger brothers, and to me, he was like an older brother.

I'm going to talk a little bit about his football career, but then about his humanitarian career, because that's what he's bringing back to the city as a resident.

At St. Ann's, Bellfield, he wasn't just recognized as being a talent, but he was recognized for his work ethic, his leadership, and being a strong teammate.

So much so that he led my alma mater to an undefeated state championship.

And in 2008, they created the Chris Long Award for the football program who went to pretty strong football alumni themselves.

In UVA, he chose to go there where he could have gone elsewhere.

He could have gone to Ohio State, LSU, plenty of other large programs in the U.S., but he decided to stay home.

And there he served as an inspiration for all of Central Virginia young men and young women.

athletes all around Virginia with a positive work ethic and a positive attitude.

He became a first team unanimous All-American, won the Hendricks Award for best defensive end in the country, finished 10th in the Heisman voting as a defensive player, and then he became the number two overall draft pick in 2008.

He played for eight years in St. Louis where he worked with not just his teammates but off the field to try to draw attention to homelessness in St. Louis, to criminal justice reform issues in St. Louis.

And then ultimately he joined the Patriots in 2016, won a Super Bowl, 2017 won a Super Bowl, donated his entire salary to funding scholarship and early education access for education.

and then in 2018 became the Walter Payton Man of the Year for his humanitarian efforts off the field and two days ago he announced his retirement and so what is the Philadelphia and Boston and St. Louis

Thanks.

Thank you.

So we have John and I'm not, I can't, the last name is not clear at all.

No?

All right.

Today, I would like to bring forth an issue that's a bit of a confusing conundrum within our police department, or at least police departments in general.

Within the city of Charlottesville, there is no legal definition of misconduct.

And although officers can be fired for misconduct, the misconduct won't show up on the

information given to their next employer, and this can be a very large problem for officers getting fired for misconduct in one district moving to another.

They don't lose their certification for getting fired for misconduct, so they can continue their service as a police officer with their same certification.

I think that it would be beneficial for the council to work with the CRB and the police department to enact a city-wide definition for misconduct and to make it so that officers do not, well it could be and or, but I would like to suggest that it be made a

It's the kind of thing that really erodes trust of our police department and I think after what we saw in 2017 there.

is not a very large sentiment in favor of police department with respect to trust.

And I think as we see with the amount of people that have come before you today with concerns about police, I think that this issue is certainly serious.

And I think this could be one step to amending that.

Thank you.

Hi, I'm Mike Kelly.

I'm a property owner on West South Street.

I actually came here to voice my disapproval of the plan to put a trolley stop on our street.

But you guys have already made that decision, it seems.

So I'll

I'd like to talk about the process.

I think there's a pretense here that the residents on our street were notified that this was going to happen.

I don't think any of my neighbors, the few that are here, there was no 14-day notice, there was no mailing, no nothing.

There's been no opportunity to voice public

Comment on this, you guys have already made up your mind and I wonder what happens after the six month pilot program whether you just make up your mind again and what's the process?

How do you decide where these things go?

Does anybody that wants a trolley stop in their front yard, do they get one?

Is there a process for determining this?

Generally when something is intrusive, if this happens, there's a notification that goes out.

It happens with all the building, any building development, there's a notification process that goes out.

I don't know yet.

I don't know what you all are doing.

Nobody knows.

So we've had every conversation about this has been public.

Where do I have to go to find, where do I have to go to find the, do I have to read the minutes of the city council?

I mean, normally other processes, you guys send out letters when something like this is going to affect a street or a neighborhood.

So that's what I'm asking so that they can take note of how

We have seven permitted parking spaces on our street.

We lose three of them.

We know we lose almost 50% of our parking.

But you're not losing three parking spaces.

We don't know.

Again, what's the process?

Why don't we know what you're doing?

You had reservations about the process yourself.

I do.

So no, his time is over so you have to wait.

Well, you had reservations yourself about the process.

I agree, I think we need to be consistent and when we have zoning changes or anything's notified there is a mailing that goes out and it was my understanding based on feedback we were getting from both residents and business owners that there was not that notification.

Yes, there are people who come to these meetings and we're aware of this happening, but I think it's unfair for us to assume that everyone is watching every council meeting and reading the minutes.

Well, that's not what I was assuming.

I'm just saying we were not having private meetings.

There was a statement about transparency and we have had open conversations about the topics.

Sure.

I guess my time is done.

It is clearly the case that when there are any changes to anyone's property, private property, that there are notifications, and there are notifications of the area.

But this is, may I please continue what I am going to say?

This, however, is a public right of way.

and it is something that is related to what the city uses to use its public transportation line.

We had changes of routes in the past and individual property owners were not notified of the changes.

There were public discussions about the changes of the routes.

So this is a public right of way with a public bus system and it is a pilot to test out whether this change will

will benefit the residents of Midway Manor, which is a senior citizen facility.

It's also going to look at what the implications for parking.

So that is what the point of the pilot is.

What my understanding is that before the pilot begins, these notifications will take place.

And there will be ample opportunity for people to have the conversations to understand impacts.

But that said, this is a public right of way, and we are going to be doing everything we can to make this a transparent process.

The process is to understand how we can have a win-win situation for the residents of the entire area.

not only individual properties.

So that's my understanding of this process and that's how we've discussed it in public meetings in the past.

And I'll just underscore Dr. Richardson, please just make sure everybody that's impacted is invited to these public meetings, these engagement sessions about

How the pilot's going to be implemented, what it's going to study, and then when it gets down to the point where we're going to have the end of the pilot, what is the next step there?

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

All right, we have two additional slots.

You can come up after.

Dr. Richardson, thank you for the bill.

You didn't attend Armstrong or Walker, did you?

No.

That's fortunate for you.

Richmond.

Mainly I'm here tonight to follow up from my visit earlier in the month.

I mentioned to you that some of our petitions had not come in and today I received petitions from one of the individuals

that was solicited to them over in the West Haven neighborhood.

So both of these pages are signed from residents of West Haven.

However, since I'm here and I still have a few minutes,

Charlottesville is in turmoil.

This morning, I received a call from Waste Management.

And it was at a time when I was trying to figure out how I'm going to pay these high taxes that are due in June.

So maybe part of this conversation was due to my feelings related to that.

However, it appears to me that there are a number of city workers that think they don't work for their citizens.

There's a way that you can certainly be malleable in talking with residents.

And I didn't feel that that occurred this morning with my conversation with the Waste Management.

He pointed out that the hole in the street was coming from my housing as it related to Waste Management and that the repair would be on me as a resident to take care of.

which is, if that's the way it is, that's the way it is.

However, he also pointed out to me that other residents have been asked to pay this fee for repair and maybe they have, which is no big deal with me.

We all are being asked to do things, but I didn't see where he needed to bring that to my attention.

So I guess really what I'm saying, my time is up.

There are so many employees with the city that are quite malleable and considerate, but then there are others that you heard from this evening that are not.

Then I read in the paper, I heard on the radio, and maybe I didn't hear correctly, that one of the candidates for city office is saying that we could be bused in to work and we wouldn't have to have so much housing constructed.

But maybe I didn't get that correctly.

Then we talk about parking.

I have friends that live up

close to Rubber Avenue.

And the university employees are taking away the parking, and they can't even park in front of their residence.

And lastly, but since I'm here, are slot machines legal in the city?

Maybe these aren't slot machines.

And lastly, we were recognizing by a minute of silence

Many of the residents of the city that are passed on.

And I'd just like to mention two names that have not been mentioned.

One being Mrs. Roberts, who worked for the police department for a number of years.

And secondly, Norman Goins,

who worked at Martha Jellison Hospital for a number of years and was a waiter in the city of Charlottesville during the time that he lived.

So those are just some of the concerns I wanted to raise and I heard the city manager mentioning

responding to problems that were brought before council at the last meeting, but I didn't hear mention anything as related to the request for the signal lights at 10th and Page and 8th and Main.

Thank you very kindly.

Engineers to look at those and get back with us.

So that's what we're waiting for.

Yeah, we should have it back by the next meeting.

We talked about it earlier, but we didn't get a chance to get to it.

So we should have it back by the next meeting.

Oh, thanks.

There are three murders that have occurred in Charlottesville over the past 15 or 20 years.

All of them being African Americans.

One being a gentleman that was murdered down near Lane High School.

A second one being a gentleman that walked the tracks from the university to Ivy.

He worked at the White Spot

And it's been the third one over in the Prospect area.

And I haven't heard anything related to the follow up or any follow up relating to that, but maybe something is being looked into as it relates to it.

I'm Joan Fenton.

I wanted to comment on the bus route and the process.

Going back historically when the mall crossing came in, purposely the two streets went in different directions on Second Street because there was a fear of through traffic coming through.

and

In terms of delaying traffic on South Street, the crossing of the mall, whether you need to have a lit crosswalk there.

There used to be lit crosswalks all across the mall.

We have one that doesn't function, not across the mall, but across Water Street.

But if you're going to have a bus there, you need to do something to make that be a safer intersection.

Council appointed a parking committee a year ago.

I'm on that committee.

We were never notified of any of this or other changes that were going to happen to parking downtown.

And I think anything like that should go through that committee or what's the point of the committee?

Nobody has done an adequate study of the impact of the bus on traffic.

So prior to doing this, I would time how long it takes the bus to get

to the intersection, how long it's going to take to go on South Street.

Nobody's looked at traffic on South Street on Saturday during market and what is the impact.

Nobody's looked at the impact at five o'clock during rush hour.

Nobody's looked at what is going to be the difference of trying to get into the parking lot on Second Street.

So all of those issues have never been addressed.

It's not that the bus is a bad or a good idea.

but you have not done due diligence and doing a six months experiment to find out whether or not this might work seems to be really foolhardy.

This should be done

in the proper process of figuring out, does this really work?

It's not simply an experiment for six months.

And you have a flawed process of, I can ask for a parking spot anywhere in the city.

And if nobody reads the notice, I get it churned into a 15 minute spot or a loading zone or whatever.

and I think going forward you need to look at the process of everybody in that neighborhood should get written notification so that you don't wake up one morning and find out that your spot where you parked every day in front of your house is no longer available to you because somebody else wanted it for a loading zone and there's businesses that do that, there's residential areas that do that and I think again the parking committee should be looking at an overall process on how decisions are made about parking

So what I'm saying is this system is flawed and also those residents were told you should have been out there and read this sign that's posted and if you've ever looked at downtown and the number of signs that are posted on a street every week would get the no parking

This is happening.

That's happening.

None of them knew.

So when you say they had 14 days to respond, they were also told they would have a meeting with city staff and then have time to respond.

Madam Mayor, if I may, about an earlier question I've been researching.

They're actually, when talking about law enforcement officers, the State Department of Criminal Justice Services is responsible for certification and decertification?

Thank you.

Hold on just a second, please.

So I'm assuming you took those notes.

I would just like to add the very things that have been brought up are the very things that are going to be studied on a pilot.

That is what I don't, the only way you can understand a traffic pattern change is to test it out.

So I think we, and certainly the bringing up the parking committee, that they need to be certainly included in this

and this pilot.

And certainly all the engineers and all the traffic analysis and before and after so we can understand the benefits and the costs of this change.

That's what the pilot was intended to do.

Theodore Johnson, a lifelong member of the neighborhood.

I grew up in Gary Street.

I stayed there from 48 until 1970.

Then I moved to Grady Avenue.

I was married and I moved uptown.

I'm located now at 305 10th Street, northwest of Charlottesville.

Now I have three parking spaces in front of my house, but I can't park.

because at university people take them.

I have a back alley that I can open my gate up and I can park in my backyard.

I can tell my daughter, come around the back, I can let you in the back because it came parked in front of my house.

I've been down here to the city on the second floor down here, talked to somebody last year and I said I would have to buy a permit to park.

I was told by, cause I've been raised, I'm saying, ain't gonna say what's on my mind.

They park in front of my door, they'll park on the front and they'll come back on a Sunday night.

But I can't say anything because they say they have a sticker on the car.

I've been there five years.

I say park in UVA, real folk time, but they can park and they find the black neighborhoods to talk.

Even the people that work there in the morning time at University, because they have to pay University to park, they'll come down 10th Street, 11th Street, 10 and a half, and pull right in there and park.

Because they have that sticker so they can park there.

On the street they can't park if you have a handicap.

They see that handicap.

And that's not right to us, who pay rent.

Also, I have something right here.

I'm not going to be on the police department, but I got it.

I was going to talk to her about it.

I was sick on the 31st of March and I came from the hospital.

I was laying down and this was a black person.

He came to my door and I was laying down Sunday.

Didn't even go to church.

And I heard some knocking in my door, and I opened the door.

So he said, my girlfriend in your house.

I said, no girlfriend here, man.

So he tried to push by me.

But I pushed him back, and I pulled my door together.

He stood on the porch.

He said, he's coming in.

I said, I will advise you not to.

I had gotten out a little rough.

You're not going to come in my door if I tell you not to.

So I called the police.

And they came.

He wrote it.

This is his name right here.

and I asked, I gave, I said give me some information.

What?

The person.

His name right here, I got it wrote down.

The police?

No, the police.

Carl Lee Thomas.

So the police knew who he was because he went next door.

And at that time I put on some clothes and I said, he went next door.

So the police said, are you sure you saw him?

I said, I'm standing right here looking.

Yes, I seen him.

I said, I don't want to get myself back in control.

He was intimidating me but kept on asking me, did you see him?

Did you see him?

Did you see him?

Two of the chairs got broke off the porch because he slammed them.

They were chairs.

So he insisted, he said, well, you got to go to the magistrate office.

I said, I got to go to the magistrate office?

He said, why can't you arrest him right here and take my word for it?

He said, we can't do this.

We can't, you have to go.

Now I can remember when, right on Water Street, the magistrate office was right there.

because I used to get in trouble too by the drunken public.

They used to come, the magistrate officers were right there behind the hardware store.

They were, you go in there, that was the city of Charlottesville.

I don't know why this new thing came to y'all, not y'all, but somebody changed it.

With Albemarle, the city of Charlottesville and the County of Albemarle, once we crossed that bridge that stuck, that bottomed in it, going up the hill, we're in Albemarle County.

We need a magistrate office right back here.

At night time, the police department, 10 o'clock or so, they locked up.

You can't get in there to get nobody.

And they've had 24 hours all night long.

Something wrong with this picture.

So 30 years ago, I was 30, because I'm 70 now, around.

30 years ago, we were young people.

We are the older generation now.

And so I feel that something should be done.

The police department, you could have a magistrate office right in the city of Charlottesville.

Because not only me, but a lot of older people, older than me and maybe younger than me, that do not have transportation to get to the magistrate office.

The police don't take us anywhere.

We used to call, go down there if they was arrested on Water Street.

The magistrate would be there.

They would take us to the public, take us to the complex.

She would call.

They would bring us back.

Then we would sign ourselves out.

We were back in town.

But now you have to walk.

If they take you out there at 10 o'clock, they don't let you out till maybe 3, 3 or 4 o'clock in the morning.

It's pitch black dog.

It's no sidewalk.

You're walking in the middle of the street.

And I used to take my belt and walk like this because they have the dogs and everything is loose.

You can get hit.

That's one thing you need to look into.

I don't see why we can't.

We pay taxes.

That's what my concern.

I'm not being smart, but I've been sitting there listening to that.

People want it.

I'm going to say it because I am the oldest one that lived in the garage.

I heard a lot of stuff about I know all the areas in garage street because I was one of the three.

And the neighborhood association all that came from the garage street.

I hear you always talk about Pinnacle Hill.

I was waiting for it to hit Guard Street.

But thank you.

Thank you all for your time.

Mayor Walker, I'm sorry.

Just really briefly, I am perplexed.

Thank you for your comments.

One of the things I am confused about, because we've heard this for a great deal, I'm not quite sure how it works.

So how can the employees at UVA get stickers to park in the community, especially as you just described, leaving their car there on Friday, and they don't have to come and pick it up until Sunday.

Dr. Richardson, I don't know if that's something we can look into.

Yeah, when I was talking to families over in the area, I don't think they have passes.

They are just parking and they are leaving the cars over.

Only if there's a permitted street.

If it's not permitted street, it's open to anyone.

So the street has to agree, everyone on the street has to agree to have permitted parking and then those residents get a permit where they can park and guarantee it and it will prevent others.

Yeah.

If I may, Mayor Walker, please.

That this area has been has undertaken a study for permit parking already.

And I think the stumbling block has always been the permit fee.

But there has been already on the books and I believe it's an NDS.

There has been the study that

So I think we should look into that, but I think it also is a matter of policy as to whether or not we will waive the parking fee or if we've had an ongoing challenge with the University of Virginia and employee parking, we've talked about this as part of the working group solution of having

payment in lieu of taxes with UVA, there could be some arrangement worked out where they pay for the permit fee.

Right, we can waive the fee.

Understood.

But from my perspective, I think that UVA, whether the employees, whether it's the students, whomever, they'll find a way to get around paying the parking fees or having to get the permit in some regards.

If it's a permitted street, UVA employees or students can't just park there.

They have to have the card.

The other stumbling block, which has happened for some residents, is some people really advocate for having permitted parking on the street, even if the fees are waived.

But some other residents don't want to have it.

So there is a lot of restrictions around how many residents have to agree.

So we can look up the records and see what those streets were?

Just please don't ask us to create a party for the House.

Are you all ready?

Okay, hello everyone.

Hi, I know most of you all.

My name is Daniel Fairley, I'm the Youth Opportunity Coordinator.

I get to focus on black male achievement as well as be the advisor for youth council.

I co-advised with Gretchen Ellis as well as Charlene Green.

So I just wanted to say thank you all because my budget and funding of my position actually comes through you all as city council.

So thank you for making my dreams come true.

This is an amazing position, getting to work with kids every day, and so I have you all to thank for that.

First of all, Youth Council's focus has been largely focused on equity the past couple of years.

Just last year, even before the You Are Still Black Charlottesville Racial Divide hinders students article that came out in the New York Times.

We actually had a youth dialogue on race that came out in February of 2018 just kind of focusing

on what equity issues that students saw inside of the city schools.

So we had that focus in February 2018 and then after the article came out in October, we actually were able to work with youth council and even get the school board

to request just some youth information.

Kind of like we want to know, we've heard from parents, we've heard from teachers, we've heard from general committee members and community members, we want to hear from the youth what does equity look like inside of Charlottesville City Schools.

And so the city schools and requested that from youth council.

Youth council then went out and conducted over 30 different focus groups across two days.

Myself, Charlene, as well as Gretchen were there just as note takers, but the Youth Council was really the people that were able to come in and just kind of talk about their experiences and head up the focus groups.

And so it was really amazing to watch them head up these focus groups.

And then while we took notes, they then took notes that we had

came up with suggestions as to not just what the equity issues are inside of the city schools but also what the suggestion should be for moving forward.

And so I'm here just to introduce them just as a proud partner with Youth Council and to just let them go through and talk about their suggestions and we're ready for any questions you all may have afterwards.

Greetings council members, I'm Ben Yates, I'm a sophomore at Shrestville High School and I'm just going to read to you guys the different topics we have and then introduce a couple of the first ones.

So all of our topics are a strong focus on four-year colleges being a negative aspect and then a lack of course knowledge and registration, the lunches on the school's demystifying college admissions, lack of diversity in advanced courses,

The Standard Diploma vs Advanced Diploma, Standardized Testing, the ESL Student Experience, Quest Program, Algebra Functions and Data Analysis course, and then the Black Student Union Demands.

So our first topic is a strong focus on four year colleges.

A lot of students don't really know that we have an advisor for people who aren't going to college after high school and don't know that resources there.

And then also for like teachers and most people just kind of assume that you're going to college and so kids who

aren't, or that's just not the right thing for them, don't really have a lot of resources, don't have a lot of people supporting them after high school.

And so our suggestions for that, just advertising and letting students know and making that resource more readily available to students, the advisor for after high school people who aren't going to college for more trade-oriented jobs.

and then also increase the number of CATEC options available at CHS.

So it just makes it easier for students who aren't going to college and aren't going to go into trades after high school to take those classes.

Our next topic is course knowledge and registration.

So we had four big complaints about that.

The first one was the lack of knowledge of available courses, just an overall kind of vagueness of all the courses you can take and all the electives and the requirements and prerequisites for those courses.

No long-term planning in middle school or high school, so really it's just a year-by-year plan.

So if you kind of have your goals that you want to meet by middle high school, there's no space where you can really sit down and set out a plan to achieve those goals.

So a lot of people, you know, don't really know what they need to do to reach those goals and rather than slip through cracks.

And then also teacher recommendations are too hard to change, so you know students who may want to challenge themselves are not able to because of teacher recommendations and therefore aren't allowed to excel as far as they as they want to.

And then just in general students, especially in lower level classes and more academic level classes are not encouraged to challenge themselves at all.

So they're actually told not to take harder classes even if they want to and are trying to seek help outside of school to be able to take those challenging courses.

So our suggestions for that were

to create an individualized course plan for all students that's revisited each year and then adjusted according to changing goals or kind of where you are in that plan so that every student can basically set a goal and then have an actual plan to meet that and hopefully that will increase the number of students who are successful and have jobs or go to college outside of high school.

and then survey parents to find the best way to communicate potential course options.

You know, a lot of that starts at the younger age with parents just not really knowing what kind of things students need to take or what classes they need to take, what they need to do to be prepared for those higher level classes.

It's just to figure out the best way to communicate that to parents.

and then decrease the barriers to override teacher designation just makes it so that's not as hard as steadfast because you know especially people who have whose parents can't call in and override those there's really nothing they can do you know people whose families whose parents don't have to work as much and have more time can just call in and get those changed but kids who don't really have that available it's a lot harder for them to change their classes

and then increase support academically for students who are trying to challenge themselves to increase tutoring, increase outside of class help so that people who do want to challenge themselves are able to and have support to do that.

And then the last one is possibly train, it's what we linked through at Shuffle High School is a freshman mentoring program, so train those people to kind of facilitate that four-year plan.

And then our next topic is the school lunches.

And so are different issues where some students don't eat long during lunch because there are only pork options left.

So people who have religious diets, a lot of times, you know, there's pepperoni and salads, there's pepperoni and pizzas, just increase the options that meet religious diets so that those students don't feel like they can't eat.

and then also the second one is along the same line and then there's also a perception that people who are on free and reduced lunch can only get pizza and so that's all they get and that's not necessarily always what they would prefer and so just make that to increase the labeling on the food so that

People are aware of what they're actually allowed to eat.

And then just in general, this has been a big complaint, but, you know, increased nutrition and calories in the school lunches.

You know, people who have played sports and are very active, there's not very feeling it, so it's kind of hard to be able to compete at a high level when you're functioning on low levels of nutrition and calories.

So our suggestions were to have water as an option for lunch, not just milk, going back to the Halada students who can't have dairy meat in the same meal, make more cheese pizzas and non-pork options, so take the pepperonis out of salads, label the food ingredients, make lunches more filling and nutritious, and survey students on what they actually want to eat, so send out surveys and figure out what kind of food students would prefer and would be most filling for them, and then clearly label what costs money and what doesn't.

Hi, I'm Eve Kiesecker.

I'm a freshman at CHS, and I'm going to talk about demystifying college admissions.

So the college application process is really hard and confusing, as I found out this year when my sister was applying to college.

So she went in for a lot of visits with school counselors, and people have already applied to college.

But some of the school counselors were not always made aware of changes to college admissions.

completely up to date on how much an ACT is going to be weighed into your application or how much, what ACT or AP scores are accepted at certain colleges.

Also at CHS we have a weighted GPA but colleges look at your unweighted core GPA and it's really hard to find that out to put on college board.

Also another problem is that the essay writing which is usually a pretty big part of your college application process is

It's difficult and a lot of students struggle with it because it's like your chance to represent yourself through your writing but if you don't have a good example or you don't have a good teacher who doesn't quite teach that subject then it's difficult.

So our suggestions were to have an admission counselor from some local schools or even some out of state schools come in and talk to school counselors and avid teachers to keep them up to date on admission guidelines yearly and to also have former or current admission counselors

come in to talk about the behind the scenes college admissions process to students.

My other topic that I'm going to talk about is the lack of diversity in advanced classes.

So the perception at CHS is that many white students that were in quest are in advanced classes and people of color that weren't in quests are not.

And so the way it is right now at CHS is that there's kind of two pathways.

And if you're in Quest in elementary school, you go to honors, to AP or DE classes, to the advanced diploma, and then you go to college.

And if you're in non-Quest, then you go to academic classes, and then you get a standard diploma, and then you go to

whatever's next.

And so there's a lot of issues with that that we'll discuss later but it starts in elementary school, students take the same courses with the same kids starting in Quest K through 12 and then that meets them at

Segregation by class and they don't want to go outside of their comfort zone to meet students who are in academic classes or AP classes because they just don't have class with them, so they don't know them.

And there's little academic support for students who are taking AP or Honors classes for the first time from teachers and peers.

So our suggestions were to allow for more students to try AP classes by creating a pathway into advanced classes, so like a

A test run basically where a student could have an AP class and also take academic classes at the same time so they get the best of both worlds.

And teachers, we'd like them to encourage everyone to take at least one honors class in each subject just to see what they like, what they don't like and where their potential can lead them.

and to take away the standalone honors classes to help diversify classes.

We've done this with English and it works pretty well.

And to hire AP tutors and peer navigators for each subject with office hours so you don't necessarily have to go see your teacher in case you have track practice or soccer or something after school.

You can also go visit a classmate who might be a little bit more understanding of schedule conflicts and all that.

I'm Harrison Greenhoe and I'm a freshman in CHS and the first topic I'm doing is the standard diploma versus the advanced diploma.

Students and parents have a lot of questions around the difference between these diplomas.

Can you get accepted into a college with a standard diploma instead of an advanced and also what is required to get an advanced diploma?

And a lot of people also wonder, do colleges care what diploma you receive?

Our suggestions for this are that the school board should advocate at the General Assembly to eliminate the diplomas because it creates an unnecessary binary and we also suggest that we explain the differences between the two diplomas to Buford students and parents so they're ready when they get to high school to know what to do and we also suggest that everyone gets an individualized plan with passways to each diploma and the requirements that they need and this can be done during your

when you choose your classes at the beginning of the year and when you're a freshman coming to school.

And then the next topic is standardized testing.

There are two main issues in this.

The first is that some teachers only teach to the SOL and the students learn less critical thinking skills in those classes because the teacher only teaches what they need to pass the test.

And then the other issue is that there are no free PSAT, SAT, ACT or AP prep courses provided by the school so a lot of times students aren't ready for those tests.

Our suggestions are to advocate for the elimination of SOLs on the state and federal level.

We would also suggest to provide free classes to help students get ready for these big tests and to create a school-wide slash division-wide mantra about critical thinking by incorporating these ideas into teacher trainings.

The next topic is the ESL student experience.

So many students that don't speak English as their first language don't feel respected or heard by admin and teachers.

And they also are very separate from the rest of the students at CHS.

are suggestions that I have cultural sensitivity training for admin and teachers and also to raise awareness of phone translation services so these students can communicate with the rest of the school.

We would also suggest to have an in-person translators for these students and big occasions like class registration, counselor meetings, orientation and tours.

And our last suggestion would be to find creative ways for ESL students to integrate with other students in a meaningful way which is not just walking through the same halls with them and seeing them every day.

Hello, I am Noelle Morris and I'm going to talk about the Quest program.

So here's some issues.

The Quest program is based toward like wealthy and white students.

Quest leads to a separate pathway for wealthy and white students through the CCS system.

Quest was created after desegregation in order to separate white students from kids of color.

Here's some suggestions.

Eliminate the program.

It doesn't measure giftedness.

You can buy books to pass the test.

It creates a pipeline to honors and AP.

It separates students and minimizes integration through classes.

Raise awareness for the Quest program to parents and stop testing in first grade.

Have ongoing tests for Quest for all students with the prep materials for the test available through the library.

Next I'm going to talk about the Algebra Functions and Data Analysis course.

AFDA can place students a year behind in math courses, which can inhibit their ability to be on track for college.

So there's no verified credits for taking this class.

Here's some suggestions.

Make AFDA a free summer course so students won't be behind for the school year.

And provide tutoring services for students when they get to Algebra II instead of in addition to recommending AFDA.

and here are some of the black student union demands.

So Charlottesville city schools and Charlottesville should denounce and call out racism against black and brown students.

African American history class to like hold the same way as like an honors history course, like not like just like an elective.

Hire more black teachers, especially in core class, honors, AP,

Extend resources in addition to AVID for future black and brown first generation college students.

Discipline reform and the excessive suspending and policing of black middle and high school students by creating a diverse governing board of staff, students, and parents to oversee equitable and effective discipline.

So test every student for Quest.

Apply mental health practices that are culturally relevant and racially aware.

A high standard for programming associated with black history.

No one should have the opportunity to opt out of it.

Racial bias and cultural sensitivity training for all school resource officers.

And lastly, implement the same locked door and buzzer

I have a question.

Yes, yes.

They already presented it to the school board.

And I think it's important to make sure that city officials along with the school board

that we all are aware of the direction that you all will like.

And I just want to say thank you.

I love, this gets me really excited because it's very important that we hear from you all about what we need to do to make the environment that you all spend a significant amount of time in daily work for you.

And so that, I know you were at the equity meeting presenting some of this, so we have a lot of work to do and

You all continue to hold us accountable to make sure that we get it done.

Yeah, has everyone seen the letter that they are referencing when they're talking about Quest and the creation of it after desegregation?

So if you haven't, that's very important.

And I don't have a copy of it.

I'm sure it's somewhere.

It's important for us as a community to understand why a program like that was created to make sure that even if we have to desegregate schools that then within the schools can we create segregated spaces and for us to really talk about how intentional that was.

So if you haven't seen the letter,

I'm sure someone can make sure that you get a copy of it.

All right, so what do we have next?

So we have Greenstone on Fifth Corporation sponsorship agreement for enhanced police coverage.

First of two readings.

I might list Captain Hatter, but Madam Mayor, I could summarize if you'd like.

Greenstone on 5th did enter into an agreement with the police department dated August 1st, 2018, and it terminated this year, January 31st.

They made a donation of $41,092 to the City of Charlottesville for enhanced police coverage near Greenstone and 5th Apartments.

This is, in effect, the action you're being asked to take

is an appropriation to accept that money and appropriate it.

So to my understanding, the services have been rendered.

Yes.

But are they asking for the service to continue?

OK.

Thank you.

So any additional questions from counsel?

All right.

All right, so the consent agenda for the next meeting.

Good evening Mayor Walker, Councillors, welcome Dr. Richardson.

This request seeks City Council's approval to implement a design build resolution and procedures that allow the city to pursue design build projects.

I think the more immediate driver is for energy performance contracting, but this has broad use across the city and is appropriate for certain types of construction projects.

With design-build, the locality contracts with a contractor that provides both design-build services for the project as a team as opposed to the city's traditional

procurement process for construction which is design, then bid, and then build.

I'm glad to elaborate further if you would like.

So the Public Procurement Act, the standard method of procurement is exactly what you said.

That is the design, bid, build.

But there is enabling legislation in the Public Procurement Act that allows an alternate method if the locality adopts a resolution and procedures that are in accordance with the Secretary of Administrations.

and so there is that enabling legislation.

So if council approves that, this is not fitting for every type of construction project.

I gave some examples in my summary, but we ... valuation criteria.

But you could just determine that you could

It is heavily qualifications based as is professional services in general.

So if firms are qualified, if they meet the qualifications of the pre-qualification process,

and then it goes to the next phase where we're looking at their technical proposal.

I mean, certainly a local firm could be successful and it's not just low bid.

I'd be very interested in that if there's any opportunity for a local hiring clause in doing a design-build approach.

I think it would be

extremely beneficial for the local economy and for local employment.

I know that Section 3 is a huge driver, but that's just one thing I've been trying to get happen ever since I've been on council, and it's just like I've beaten my head against the law because of state procurement law.

It's not, I wouldn't consider it a way around it.

I mean, we're not, this is not just low bid, it is qualifications based and it is a team.

But I know you're specifically asking questions about local hiring.

You know, if we were looking at a HUD project, as I mentioned, and looking at section three, yes.

If we were looking at something for the Federal Transit Administration under those guidelines, I can't immediately off the top of my head think of a way to do that.

If we were looking at Department of Transportation,

funding like for VDOT projects.

I can't immediately think of a way to do that.

I know that the scope of the minority business program, the city's minority business program, there are requirements at both the state level and the federal level.

for inclusion of certified businesses under the city's minority business program.

When it gets down to the local hiring level, I know that section three is the only law that I'm, or it's the only scope that I'm immediately aware of that we could do something like that.

But I do think that, you know, contracting with certified businesses, I mean, that also keeps money in Charlottesville, right?

And my question would be just a conversation around looking at city business through the equity lens and just how you're handling that in your office and especially when there's no longer the process for three bids to come in, even if it may not have

Thank you for that question.

Like if the time delay could prompt the service or the development to be more costly versus whether it's a lower bid.

I mean, is there a situation that prompted this change other than that other localities were doing it?

Is there a city?

For the city, so the enabling legislation has been in place for a while.

For the city, this is also something we've been looking at for quite a while.

Our more immediate driver is for the city to be able to participate in the state's energy performance contracting.

It's a state program that's administered by the Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy.

and we're interested for that.

I also think it may be good for some of our bridge projects and we have some other projects that it may be a good approach to use.

So the projects will use a two-step process.

One is a request for qualifications that will be advertised on the city's website.

and we'll do other advertising.

There will be direct invitation for that as well.

We will be looking at certified businesses that are part of our minority business program.

So minority owned, woman owned, small businesses, service disabled, veteran owned businesses.

And so in addition to direct invite, we will be publicly advertising and we will short list from there.

Our procedures say approximately three to five qualified

firms to then compete in the next step and then that next step will be broken out into two pieces where we're looking at the technical proposal and then once we narrow down the top from the technical proposals we'll get into the price proposals in that process.

The opportunities will be advertised and we'll be making a decision on a procurement by procurement basis on when we would use this method.

No, I just wanted to thank you for all the hard work you've been putting in.

And also kudos to you as well as Ms. Holly Lee for the great time we had at the Minority Business Appreciation Board.

Yeah, but I mean she's here so let's give her some flowers while they're still here.

Is there a motion?

I move we adopt the resolution approving procedures to govern the competitive procurement of design-build contracts.

All right, any further discussion?

All right, please vote.

And it carries four to one.

Because this is the appropriate time.

And there are flowers, plants up here that the schoolyard garden brought before people start leaving if you want to pick up one.

Good evening.

Good evening.

I do have the Mike Murphy with me and Ryan Davidson from budget in case there are questions.

And a staff was asked today to identify a couple of alternative scenarios and so we did that and so I want to pass these out.

So just a quick recap.

A work group established last year met multiple occasions to identify improvements both in terms of process and potential impact for the agency budget review team, which is the city's funding process for nonprofits.

Those recommendations were presented to council

I think initially last fall and then a formal meeting was set up with the potential of a resolution in January, so we met January 22nd.

Council considered the resolution which was primarily focused on revising the agency budget review team process into four buckets of funding and establishing a priority setting commission to identify

community needs and then to use the city's funds to support meeting those needs with larger grants, multi-year grants, as opposed to a more generalized approach that has been used in the past.

Council requested a work session, which was May 6th, for additional conversation and then at that work session, Council made recommendations, asked questions and then requested additional time for follow-up.

So the memo included some recommendations from staff about moving forward and then there were some community comments that came over the weekend and then council requested based on those comments an alternative scenario.

that would not include deferring another year of funding to establish changes in the process.

And so that's what's in front of you here.

So how would you like me to proceed in terms of sharing the information?

Give you a second to look at the scenario or walk through it?

So the alternative scenario was a suggestion by a couple of community members, including Erica Vexillia, who is the co-chair of the UVA's working group, who is here to answer questions about the UVA process if you'd like at some point, and Christine Nardi from the Center for Nonprofit Excellence, and there may have been other community members who weighed in with similar suggestions.

The suggestion is to, instead of setting a priority setting work group, instead create a work group that would identify solutions and measurements or metrics related to the four priority areas identified by UVA's working group, which include jobs, wages,

Affordable Housing, Public Health Care and Education.

So the suggestion would be that instead of suspending the process another year that we create two sort of funding mechanisms.

One for grants over $25,000 that would be focused on meeting needs in the areas identified by the EVA's working group and then the other would be a simplified process for grant requests under $25,000 that would be

where priority would be given to those organizations that can demonstrate that they're meeting the needs of marginalized community members but not necessarily meeting or providing any solutions to the four priority areas.

So sort of two paths.

Both application processes would be modified so that they're simpler for non-profits.

It's one of the process improvements we heard pretty consistently across the board was making this an easier access and easier

A mechanism to improve smaller non-profits, particularly grassroots non-profits, ability to seek this money successfully.

So we would then suggest that we establish a measurements and solutions group that would be formally appointed by council to identify appropriate measurements, benchmarks, solutions, and metrics for the four priority areas, doing some best practice research, but more importantly, holding community meetings and engaging in robust community engagement to understand the kinds of solutions that community members want in these areas.

We acknowledged both staff and council and community members acknowledged in the work session that one of the pieces of feedback that we wish that we had the most was what people would like to see in their community, sort of more specifically in terms of solutions.

What would work for you, not just what does the national data say will work, but what will work for you in your community or in your neighborhood.

and intentionally engaging the nonprofit leaders of color and community engagement listed above but also in other recommended ways of hearing from those voices that are not traditionally heard in our collective processes.

Reviewing recommended measurements, benchmark solutions and metrics and then reporting out to city council in May 2020 to influence the fiscal year 2022 nonprofit funding cycle.

So we would

established the group and also set the priorities for the current cycle based on the UVA working group, so parallel process.

We would additionally support nonprofit capacity building by inviting nonprofits to apply for grants under $10,000 to build organizational capacity.

It's one of the most sort of robust conversations I think we had at the work group was trying to help nonprofits improve their overall internal infrastructure.

We would prioritize those applications that requested funds for equity analysis or action planning.

Those would be our highest priority.

Strategic planning, financial protocols or development planning, leadership development, data collection and evaluation.

We would also permit applications for capacity building activities that we haven't imagined already that are identified by the non-profits.

as something that they need.

We would recommend deferring the decision to set aside funds for arts and culture for a variety of reasons.

In terms of the timing, we would suggest that there's some opportunities coming up with new leadership in place of the CACVB.

and also more arts specific representation on that board that might influence a decision that council might want to make about arts and culture funding and that we would encourage collaboration among arts organizations prior to final decision making.

I know there have been a number of starts and stops for collaboration among arts organizations and without the formal infrastructure of Piedmont Council for the Arts it's been difficult for the arts organizations to have a collective voice but this might

Be an opportunity for council to say we'd like to hear from them about how they would like that money to be, what criteria that they would recommend, those kinds of things before we move forward.

But we would defer that process for another year.

We would make the specific process improvements, simplified application process, diversify technical assistance is one of the most consistent pieces of feedback we got as well about process, establish a new application review team, create and implement robust training, including conflict of interest, power dynamics and bias training for those members, conduct site visits for all of the applications.

We heard pretty consistently that the inconsistent application of site visits was confusing to nonprofits.

We would change the name, this is one of the things we've talked about for several years, to city nonprofit partnership funding.

Do we create the mission statement that the work group had identified, which is city nonprofit partnership funding addresses significant and urgent community needs to improve the lives of marginalized community members by funding holistic strategies with the greatest potential to work.

and we would create a web page on funding process on the city website so that nonprofits would know how to apply and what the process looked like and didn't just have to be on a listserv list.

So the name, because we've been talking about the name, that's definitely one area I would like just looking at this briefly and just getting it.

If the name, the conversation around the name change was to make sure that it was

It discussed the hopefully holistic practice, client-centered.

And so just for me looking at this, seeing city nonprofit partnership, when I think it needs to be something along the lines of this holistic attempt to make sure that the services that individuals are receiving

enabled them in some way for their lives to get better as a result of the services they are receiving.

So while the money is taxpayer money and the non-profits will be providing the service, it's neither about, you know, neither of those entities should be the primary focus.

So if we could just look at that.

Also, just getting this, I had a brief conversation right before this.

I would like some time to look over it some more, but I do like the plan to not freeze the money and to move forward with that.

the working group and those is not even if you go back further because I spent some time and we had talked about all the studies in that meeting and I just want to say again for people who did not hear that yes I did put the group together and this was a platform but I want to just say again some of the people who were on that group so and then I drew a complete blank

But Andrea Douglas, Joy Johnson, Dr. Leah Henry, Sally Hudson, Ryan Davidson, Kaki Demick.

Denise.

Yeah, I was pointing to you first.

But Denise Johnson.

Diane.

Lisa.

Huh?

Lisa Wolfall.

Diane McNeil, myself, Heather, Holly Hatcher started out with us too.

Am I leaving anyone?

Dolly Joseph.

So when you walk into city, and I've said this before, primarily you usually see all white group of people, any room.

And I am saying it out loud, but you can just walk in these rooms and you can see for yourself.

So it was the most diverse group that I've been a part of since I've been and no one had any interest in terms of the money coming to them and so that's what moving forward I think that we should and you know whatever this commission look like if it's someone that has the potential to apply for funding because there's enough people in the community that have these expertise have been former

You know, directors, staff on non-profit boards, but, and this is one of the conversations I've been having with council about the HAC too.

If there are people on there who are receiving some of this funding, I think we should definitely make that part of the

We had, when it was identified as the priority setting commission, we had identified six slots that would be for non-profits, two from sort of small grassroots non-profits, two from mid-size and two from large.

But moving to a solutions platform, particularly a platform that's focused on hearing from people we don't traditionally hear from, the Constitution changed to include

Two community members, two members with professional data analysis experience including a background in economic, social science, public policy are similar.

Two members with community organizing experience so that we can take advantage of people's expertise to get out there in ways that we haven't been able to engage community in the past.

Two out large members and then the council member.

Yeah, that looks good.

I do have a question.

Because the comments that we got from Ms. Piccio and Ms. Nardi did also include the reference to the UVA working group.

And again, I'm just reading this very quickly.

I think primarily it's about adopting the same priority areas.

I think that we are not sure, not just we, but the community and the working group, UVA, is not clear on how they'll be using the priority areas that have been identified.

And I just want to say I like the evolution or almost like the complete revolution of originally being focused on a commission to set priorities to one that's

One of the things we most consistently hear is that our community members have told us what's wrong for a long time and they either are frustrated by no action or the wrong kind of action so I think we have to be listening with different ears and that sort of getting to this place allows us to engage differently and also listen differently so that we can say we're interested in these four broad areas but we are not sure

And my only concern is that this hasn't been posted publicly.

So I don't feel comfortable voting on this tonight.

I would like to get it in the next NF Future Council agenda.

where it's posted and then we go through the regular process of adopting the resolution.

But right now, I like the direction this has gone in a lot, but that's just my opinion right now.

No, I agree.

My main thing is just the timeline that staff will have because it was clear that I expressed it during my city manager check in.

I just was freezing for another year, just seems like a lot.

And I just feel like I want to make sure that we're giving other non-profits a chance to kind of involve themselves.

We just need to, I think, do this relatively quickly in terms of getting it back on so that staff has the appropriate time.

Even if it's a simplified application process, we're on a compressed timeline just to get back to our normal cycle.

But although we did say that we might have a little more wiggle room than maybe we had in the past.

And I have another question that kind of begs is, when we get to this point and we have adopted it, what is our communication going to be with the county?

I know that the Board of Supervisors is considering this in early June at their meeting to talk about their process for going forward and they know that we're doing this tonight and potentially at another time.

So we've agreed, staff have agreed to share communication as we're going.

And we have a joint meeting coming up in June.

Even thinking directionally, we can get something to them sooner versus later just to noodle on.

June 3rd is our next one.

No, I'm not trying to be funny.

100%.

That was good.

But I'm just wondering for us to provide the recommendations and the feedback that staff needs, and then for us to turn it around quick enough to be prepared for the meeting with the county on the 6th.

But if staff says it's fine, I mean, it's fine with me.

Which meetings are we talking about?

And the third is council meeting June 6th.

That's your joint meeting on June 17th.

That's what I mean.

For us to provide feedback to staff.

Yes.

Oh, okay.

I just wanted to be clear.

No, I just wanted to hear from staff, specifically Ms. Demick, if that was okay.

If I get feedback by the end of the week and it's not in opposition to each other, right?

Yeah.

Excellent.

Please, no he's.

And thank you for the nimbleness.

Oh we talked about that the entire work group.

Like, you know, too.

I mean, these conversations have been, the people have been having them since before I was born.

Same, I know that because they told me, not because I was there.

But I did have a question around arts and culture for this next coming fiscal year.

They could just apply for anything less than $25,000.

Unless they were going to take some action within those four broad categories, then they could apply for something more than $25,000.

And if I may, as the council rep on the CACBB, as soon as we get that worked out and there's been some proposal about what we're going to be carving out by way of an arts fund for the CACBB, I'm not even sure if that's the right way to phrase it, we are going to be getting an arts representative, but there is a strong intention on the part of the CACBB to be funding

Arts and Culture Programming.

Where it's in the process of still hiring an executive director, right?