City Council Meeting   11/4/2009

Sure.

Yes.

I do have something I want to add under other business and I don't have an announcement but I do want to acknowledge the Charlottesville Black Knights.

They played their last home football game on Friday and I attended the game so I want to acknowledge all the seniors that we recognize

at the football game in the Black Knights.

Thank you.

Very well said.

I'd like to talk about adding a youth to the Race Dialogue Student Committee.

We've talked about it in previous meetings.

Any other announcements or items?

Thank you, Dr. Brown.

Okay, we have a couple of awards we would like to announce tonight.

First of all, I'm very pleased to announce on behalf of our Communications Department, this is from the City County Communications and Marketing Association, otherwise known as 3CMA,

This year our communications department won the SAVI award from 3CMA, the highest honor in the category for public service announcement.

This is a public service announcement that our communications department put together on speeding reduction in the city.

It's called the breakup.

We used city staff as extras so there was no cost to the taxpayer in putting together this announcement.

And because it won the highest honor, highest

Award in the country for public service announcements.

We wanted to give you a chance to see this announcement, this ad.

Sorry I'm late.

Traffic was a mess.

I must have raced through every neighborhood just to get here.

Listen, there's something I've been meaning to talk to you about.

I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but lately I've been feeling really, well, confined in this relationship.

This may sound selfish, but I'm still young and I want to go places with no limitations and at my own pace.

I have to go.

Listen, it's not you.

We've got some very clever people working our communications department.

At the same event, the city won several other awards, Silver Circle Award, second place for issue specific website for shopsharlisle.org, another Silver Circle Award for best use of promotional items, Flicker the Flame Club giveaways, Flicker the Flame interactive ads and public service announcement communications, and also our own Rick Berwick was elected to the board of directors for 3CMA, replacing the director of communications from Beverly Hills, California.

So, we're moving up in the world.

One other award that we want to announce, we do have Flicker the Flame, who is an occasional visitor here to our chambers.

And Flicker the Flame has won a number of awards over the years, but this one is a very special award.

This is the very first time that the State Corporation Commission has awarded this particular award, a safety award, to a municipality.

And I'm going to ask

I'm not sure who wants to speak to this.

This is the first award the State Corporation Commission has given to a municipality in the state of Virginia.

Flicker to Flame has been a busy flame spreading the news of gas safety and the misutility message to the school children in our community.

and the school children take that home and teach their parents.

And also the gas team down at Public Utilities have been very busy also spreading the gas safety message and as a result our third party damage to gas facilities in our system is at an all time low and is 46% lower than last year at this time.

So Flipper's been very busy.

Mr. Mayor, can I make another announcement?

Sure.

I also wanted to point out to people that one of my favorite events in Charlottesville is occurring next weekend, which is the Virginia Film Festival.

It's going to be Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

And there are a couple of really interesting films, just to point out the type of things this festival has.

On Thursday night, at 7 o'clock, there's a movie called Marching Band, in which a French director

look at the way in which Barack Obama excited young people by following two marching bands, one the University of Virginia Marching Band and second the Virginia State University Marching Band.

And I think it's a really interesting way of trying to see what a couple of different slices of American youth thought, you know, how they were inspired by Barack Obama.

On Saturday night, afternoon, at 5 o'clock, there's a movie, for example, a documentary on massive resistance in Virginia.

So there's some very interesting things in this year's film festival and I thought it'd bring it to people's attention.

Good point.

We are now going to move on with matters by the public and as always when you come forward please limit your remarks to three minutes and give us your name and address.

Hi Mayor Norris, Members of Council, good evening.

My name is Jeff Greer and I live at 2708 Jefferson Park Avenue.

I come to you this evening in my role as Chair of the Citizens Advisory Committee of the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority and I need your help.

Many of our committee members eagerly participated in public hearings on the Solid Waste Strategic Plan, but regarding that plan, nothing substantive has been achieved for two years.

At present work on the plan has been reduced to a debate on the future of the IV transfer station with no real consideration being given as to how we're going to build an effective and sustainable program for recycling and solid waste in the face of continued growth.

In addition, the work of our committee is overshadowed by an impending expiration of the master agreement between the City, County and RSWA.

Time is running out to set a clear path forward for city-county collaboration on solid waste collection and infrastructure.

In the meantime, despite the fact that RSWA's suit against VDL recycling shows no sign of being resolved, the private sector has steadily built an operation in Zion Crossroads.

In due time, Peter Van Der Linde expects to receive a license to process municipal solid waste.

I've organized two tours of the VDL facility and I plan to organize a third when it receives its MSW license.

This evening I ask each of you to tell us three things.

One.

how the Citizens Advisory Committee can help refocus the strategic plan debate so that we address how to build an effective and sustainable program for recycling and solid waste in the face of continued growth.

Two, what are your expectations of our committee between now and June 2010 when the master agreement expires?

And three, how the continued legal action against VDL makes sense in light of the major positive role it could play in our regional solid waste strategy.

This last question is especially critical in light of former council member Kevin Lynch's assertion that from its inception, the service contribution fee is anti-competitive and unfair, and the fact that Tom Frederick has said many times that the fee is an unsustainable component of our SWA's business model.

The lawsuit creates the appearance that our public officials are blocking a positive and viable initiative, private initiative, in favor of vested interests in a system that is failing and costly to fix.

I and the other members of the Citizens Advisory Committee of RSWA serve out of a deep concern about the future of waste management in the region.

We believe that issues critical to a sustainable and cost-effective waste management strategy are currently being brushed aside by unproductive disputes and failure to set up a clear framework for city-county collaboration.

Hello, my name is Peter Castiglione.

I reside at 1516 Chesapeake Street.

I own Myer Restaurant and I'm a property owner at 633 West Main.

I'm here to speak on behalf of the Midtown Association.

Our goal is to combine our resources as merchants, property owners, residents and consumers along the West Main Street corridor in order to improve street quality, encourage business and plan collectively for future growth in commerce.

Midtown is a thriving business and residential center and West Main Street is becoming a major thoroughfare for automotive, city transit and pedestrian alternative transportation.

The current state of West Main Street is failing all involved as West Main Street grows, changes and develops, which is happening rapidly.

There are many needs and improvements which need to be addressed.

We, the Midtown Association, bring the following items to the city of Charlottesville in hopes of a cooperative effort to catalyze positive change.

Please accept the following list of needs and concerns to give great import and value to the future of Midtown.

We respectfully request city assistance.

Branding.

We hope to brand the West Main corridor as Midtown.

West Main Street is currently labeled as a way to get to and from the historic downtown mall and university corner.

All signage directs locals and tourists alike in one direction or the other.

City maps, tourist search engines, transit center literature and the like should establish the businesses and residents within the proposed parameters as a focused destination to be known as Midtown and we propose the following builders.

I've submitted a map, a Google Earth map for everyone to look at.

Street maintenance, development and policing.

General maintenance of the West Main Street and the surrounding side streets has been severely neglected.

Signage, sidewalk repair, street cleaning, street lighting and landscaping have been all but non-existent.

Crime is on the rise in our area and the need for a more focused and regular police presence is requested.

Signage.

Appropriate signage designating Midtown and the merchants and residents therein needs to be established, posted and maintained.

Sidewalks.

We realize that there was a recent effort to replace the dilapidated and unrepaired sidewalks.

We appreciate that.

We ask that the city finish what they have started and see these repairs through.

Street cleaning, all their public works informed us that the street sweeper is scheduled to clean West Main every Monday and Friday.

The execution of this city service has not been concurrent with said schedule.

Street lighting, what happened?

The street lights made their way over the bridge to the Amtrak station from the west and stopped.

The lighting from 7th Street Northwest to the Lewis and Clark statue is inadequate.

But few lights exist, you're not reliable.

This is not so much an aesthetic issue, but one of safety.

And the many employees, residents and pedestrians that travel West Main on a regular basis are literally in the dark after sunset.

Yes, sir?

If you could wrap up your time.

Go off.

Do you want to wrap up real quick?

Sure, in a final moment, the Guadalupe parking lot adjacent to the Amtrak station

This is the most grave concern.

The negative impact on this gravel parking lot and the environment, the health and the economy of West Main is remarkable.

The particulates that rise from this lot are broadening the midtown landscape, a health hazard to all within, environmental travesty and a very real economic burden on the surrounding businesses and residents.

The fact that this functional parking lot has remained undeveloped and poorly maintained without consequence is an absurd reality.

The history of this situation between the city and the property

Otis Booders, I'm in municipal negligence and professional responsibility.

Something has to be done.

We realize that our needs and concerns are part of the larger city plan.

We realize that our agenda could easily be tabled and considered without effect, and we ask that the City of Charlottesville respect and deliberate the immediate nature of our request.

We look forward to the culmination of our efforts and positive results, and we would like to thank neighborhood development and Jim Tolbert for their efforts of late to enlighten us to possibilities and for working with us to make this happen.

Very quickly, Mr. Mayor, it's been just about exactly 20 years since we had the Charlottesville Downtown Charette, which was an effort that actually involved almost a thousand people.

And the law was started and at that time, there were consultants to be hired and we actually decided that the people in Charlottesville could create the ideas, not the positions, not the opinions, the ideas that actually could reshape Charlottesville.

We would like to do that again, Midtown.

I'd like to point out

Just briefly, the Charette Committee back then had Sheldon Anderson, Grace Carpenter, Michael Osteen, and Kay Slaughter.

Our Blue Ribbon Committee had Joe Bosterman, Hank Brown, Alicia Lugo, Gary Oakland.

Some of our team leaders were David Brown, Pepe Linden, Nancy O'Bann, Betty Singer, Stan Tatum, and Kathy Tran.

Yeah, this was a very good program.

Mr. Huja was here.

He helped us through the process.

There was no arguing.

It wasn't positions.

It wasn't political.

It was just idea generation.

It was very helpful.

Sounds good.

Peter Vanderland.

Mayor Morris, members of the Charlottesville City Council and staff, my name is Peter Vanderland.

I live at 2820 Hydraulic Road.

I'd like to take this opportunity to distribute to the Council and staff the first of several memorandums relevant to RSWA's lawsuit against Vanderlinden Recycling.

I've attempted to keep the content factual and objective.

In addition to the City Council and staff, my memorandum is available to other interested parties.

Extra copies are available on a chair at the back of the room.

I appreciate the Council's consideration of the information presented in this memorandum.

It remains my hope that RSWA and Vanderlinden Recycling will redirect our collective energy and monetary resources toward exploring ways to combine our strengths to provide the maximum benefit to the citizens of Charlottesville.

My name is John Sheppard.

I live at 112 Village Court in the Johnson Village neighborhood.

I'm here today on behalf of the residents of the neighborhoods surrounding Shawmock Road and both the Fry's Spring neighborhood and the Johnson Village neighborhood.

to submit a petition asking for much-needed pedestrian and traffic improvements to Sharnock Road and the associated rail crossing.

This petition has been endorsed by the Fry's Spring Neighborhood Association, which is represented tonight by President Peter Hedlund, and the Johnson Village Neighborhood Association, represented tonight by Julie Basick, its past president, and by the Alliance of Neighborhoods.

I would like to deliver a set of petitions and cover letters from members of council that document the feeling on the part of residents in these neighborhoods that are affected by the substandard state of Shamrock Road, particularly between Sherry and JPA and its sidewalks around the rail crossing near Jefferson Park Avenue.

The petition identifies the dangerous situation of the rail crossing for pedestrian and traffic safety and ongoing problems that will be aggravated by the increase in traffic on Sean Rock that will be diverted from JPA when the JPA bridge comes down in Spring 2010.

Photographs documenting the state of the rail crossing and the lack of sidewalks were also provided as part of that cover letter package.

We expect city council to take immediate action to direct the city traffic engineer and other relevant city officials to propose remedies for the problems of pedestrian and traffic safety in Cheyney.

We ask that baseline traffic studies be initiated immediately and followed up when the bridge comes down.

We also ask that discussions with CSX Railway begin immediately.

and our expectations that city council should follow up and monitor the progress that the traffic engineer and city staff make towards proposing and implementing remedies for this problem.

The letter outlines a number of remedies, widening the road, breaking sidewalks, installation of lighting, active enforcement of traffic regulations,

and restrictions, also active enforcement and signage with respect to speed limits.

We ask that the traffic engineer and other planning agencies present the proposed remedies to a neighborhood meeting to be held as early as December and no later than January in advance of the taking down of the bridge on JPA.

and that both the Fry's Spring Neighborhood Association and the Johnson Village Neighborhood Association be involved in the calling of that meeting.

Thank you, Mr. Shepherd.

Good evening, I'm Jay Ware.

I'm the Executive Vice President of the Blue Ridge Home Builders Association.

Later tonight on your agenda, there's an item that will be presented regarding the next steps in advancing the LEAP program, the Local Energy Alliance program.

As I think many of you know, the Blue Ridge Home Builders Association has been very active in green building, trying to

to produce a future housing stock that is energy efficient and stable, etc.

Lots of those houses are now starting to get a lot of good public attention.

The LEED program is the next step.

We've been involved in supporting this program before it began as part of the application process.

We look forward to its role in this community in helping to

Thank you very much Mr. Willard.

I am a gentleman on Bob Fenwick, 901 East Jefferson Street.

And no, this is not my Chia Pet.

This is the latest edition of the Dredge Report.

Now this, four weeks ago I appeared in front of this committee, in front of the council and I showed you the muck and the dried out muck that came out of Rivanna Reservoir.

After that meeting I went home and I was curious as to if it would grow anything.

So this is the grass seed that I put into this mixture.

This is a salable commodity that comes out of Rivanna Reservoir.

Now, this is not political grandstanding.

This is a serious proposal which will pay for dredging and possibly can make up for any revenue shortfall that our city would have because of the national recession we are in.

The second thing is I'm here to support Peter Vanderlinde in his efforts to establish a groundbreaking recycling operation that will benefit not only the city, but our community.

Thank you, Mr. Fehmer.

Good evening, Councillors.

Kevin Lynch, 609 Locust Avenue.

I was surprised to watch the last city council meeting when the Rivanna executive director, Tom Frederick, stood right here in front of you and made the outrageous claim that repairing the Wagon Mountain Dam could possibly cost more than building a new dam, particularly in light of the facts that we now know that the new dam costs are triple what they were intended to be and could well approach $100 million.

I appreciate the fact that some of you on council were skeptical of that.

Having heard a lot of hand waving and frankly, untruths from Rivanna before, I'm glad to hear you all being skeptical.

Unfortunately, the press was not as skeptical and the next day, the headline in the Daily Progress was, New Damn Estimate.

Is it Oz with the O estimate?

So I'm here to set the record straight.

There is no new dam estimate.

There has not been a new dam estimate.

This is simply conjecture that was pulled out of the air by Mr. Frederick.

And I think if the Daily Progress reporter had done the homework, that's what the headline would have been.

It would have been Rivanna executive makes unfounded statement completely at odds with all documentation that's ever been done on the project.

And to demonstrate that, I brought a few things that I think you really need to see.

This is a study that was done on the Paramedem.

It was done in 2003.

It's a fairly recent study.

We, when I was on council, appropriated $100,000 for Rivanna to do this study.

and I don't know if they actually got what they kept within that budget, they rarely do, but that's how much they were given.

And they came back and after extensive engineering work said, yeah you can repair it, you have four different options for repairing it.

They recommended one that would last for a hundred years and would cost three and a half million dollars.

Three and a half million dollars as opposed to a hundred million dollars.

Now, two years later, and I'll leave this with you, we asked, could that be extended?

Could you go even further trend that's existing, having to go 13 feet?

And they looked at it and said, yes, you can.

And it would cost you to get that extra 13 feet and about another 2 million gallons a day of storage, $11 million.

So where is this new estimate?

It doesn't exist.

We filed a FOIA report for Rivanna and then members of our group went to the Rivanna meeting to ask them.

It's just a yes.

Yes, it might be more expensive.

You know what else might happen?

They might strike gold when they dig this new reservoir.

And then it will pay for itself.

But would you accept that as a plan for going forward?

I think it's time to really re-evaluate whether the people that are doing this work

deserve the faith that you've put in them.

This hand-raider has happened before, when we started to ask, did dredging make sense?

Remember, that was back in 2007, and all of a sudden, Mr. Fredericks back and forth, you say, not only is dredging expensive, but it's even more expensive than you thought.

The price went from $150 million to $225 million.

You wouldn't spend your own money this way.

So I've got to ask you,

Why is the city continuing to keep the same cast of incompetent characters in charge of the city's infrastructure plants?

Thank you Mr. Blank.

Dee Dee Smith, 2652 Jefferson Park Circle.

Good evening.

I was at that meeting last time, and it truly was amazing to listen to all of the amazing, what we call red herrings that came out when Mr. Frederick spoke to you.

My favorite one was, if you want to know, in response to a question, what the comparative cost between the South Fork New Pipeline and the Sugarhologist,

Look at how long they are.

South Fork is shorter than the Sugar Hollow, so clearly it will be cheaper.

I mean this is so amazingly ridiculous.

What they tell you and what they don't tell you is just getting so inferior and getting more and more bizarre.

In fact, it's so bizarre that we have made a list.

We call them red herrings.

Red herrings are statements that are meant to deceive.

And so we have a red herring report.

It's on our website.

We are up to 49.

and what we have are the red herrings.

We've categorized them by category.

We have the myth of environmental benefit.

We have the myth of demand.

We have the permitting or the permitting misinformation that, but anyway, so we grouped them to make it easier.

And then we have followed each one with factual information because that is our goal.

is to provide factual information.

As we have always done in the Citizens for Sustainable Water Plan, we back up what we tell you with either primary documentation or

and some kind of factual documentation.

It's linked.

It's a very long web page.

Seevillewater.info, home page you can get to the red herring report up front and center.

my name is Betty Mooney and I live at 201 Sunset Avenue and I do appreciate all of you for the last two years listening to us but I'll tell you this is I'm getting fatigued by all this and I need more help from all of you because month after month we go to these rooms and we listen to these outrageous statements and as DeeDee says and Kevin Lynch they're getting more and more bizarre

statements about the dam, but now you've allocated $25,000 with the county to look at the cost of this new pipeline.

Well, at the latest meeting we were told by Mr. Frederick, and this is a quote, that it's not necessary to have a route for this pipeline.

Excuse me?

You want cost for this pipeline, but Mr. Frederick said it is not necessary at this time to have any route.

How can you continue working with these people?

I ask you, someone

Please become more engaged in this.

We need someone to protect the city.

We are wasting and throwing away now millions of dollars on this.

At some point, you've got to see what's happening.

Look at our red herring report.

49 lies, misrepresentations, deceptions.

How many more do we need to document?

They are all documented for the public to see.

The public gets it.

They need this council to provide stronger leadership, to say we need to protect the city.

Yes, we need to protect

Co-operate

You've got to support her.

Come to the meetings.

Mr. Fenwick is coming to the meetings.

See for yourself what's happening here.

See what they do to Ms. Edwards.

It's embarrassing.

She's buried.

What is happening?

This is $300 million of assets.

We're about to give up to the county and have to buy into $200 million of new infrastructure.

Our debt will go up to $250 million and we're going to lose $300 million.

How can this council

stand for this.

At some point I ask you, you've got to look at this with clear eyes.

Don't say, I've got to support what we did in the past.

Say, I have new information.

I can join the CRPD.

I can say we've got to look at this again.

My name is Paul Long, I live at 1410 Grady Avenue, and unlike Councilman Brown, I am a candidate for public office tomorrow.

I wanted to make a few remarks about public housing, and I was shocked when I read an article in the Daily Progress that most of our members of the Charlottesville police force cannot afford to own a house in the city, and I think that's outrageous.

about this small rally outside the city hall prior to the meeting tonight expressing my shock at that.

And I think this leads to a bigger problem over and above the members of the Philadelphia, Charlottesville police force.

And that is the fact that most of the housing, at least from what I can gather, is extraordinarily high.

and I'm talking about the William Taylor Plaza project and I want to thank Councilor Edwards for voting against it.

I think it's outrageous when I read in the article in the daily progress that the economy nominated for most of the housing units is $246,000.

There's got to be a bigger mix of more affordable housing for the residents of our city.

There's a lot of people who are hard workers.

There's no way they're going to get a mortgage for a $246,000 housing unit.

Councillor Brown and I had a very useful discussion and I called for half the housing units to be offered at $80,000 or less.

Councillor Brown told me that's illegal, we can't do that.

If we can't have some kind of a bigger rate, more affordable rate, then I think City Council should reject all housing units that come before it.

If the housing units are not willing to enter into negotiations for a higher percentage of more reasonable rates of units, then any further projects that are coming for city council should be rejected until they're willing to come to the U.S.

I'm tired and I've been very busy.

It's just that this is a disgrace to the city and something has to be done about it.

And I realize that part of that is on a national level, but it's a shock and it's a disgrace that the hundreds of people in this city cannot get a mortgage and cannot afford to buy a house.

It's just a disgrace to this city.

Good evening, Mayor Norris and members of Council.

My name is Kristin Smith-Bain of 4539 Stony Point Road and I'm the President of the Board of Directors of the Charlottesville Albemarle SPCA.

On behalf of the Board of Directors of the Charlottesville Albemarle SPCA, I'd like to thank you for your support, goodwill and positive progress in connection with our contract with the City of Charlottesville to provide town services.

Due to recent news stories, I believe it's necessary to clarify certain matters related to that contract.

As I believe all of you know and will acknowledge, historically, the pound services provided by the SPCA to the city far exceed the amounts paid to the SPCA for such services by the city.

In other words, if the city were to operate its own pound as it's required to under Virginia law, the cost to the city would far exceed the current payment to the SPCA.

In fact, the payments from the city and the county of Albemarle to the SPCA presently comprise 8% of our overall budget, but yet approximately 67% of our animals are taken in as a result of such pound services.

Thus, there is no doubt that a disconnect between the payment received and the services provided exists.

This paradigm has served to exacerbate the financial struggles of the SPCA in this challenging economic time.

Ironically, if the city were to operate its own pound, the cost to the city would exceed even the anticipated payments to the SPCA under the proposed contract.

Accordingly, it appears that the historic underfunding of the SPCA has created an illusion that the current proposed contract is in some way a boom for the SPCA.

While in reality, it is still very difficult financial times for the SPCA and it is merely fair compensation for services provided.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Jim Moore, 1213 Hazel Street.

I just want to speak briefly about the Forest Hills Park land gift that's under consideration for first reading tonight.

I apologize, I didn't have an opportunity this afternoon to check the staff report on this issue, so I just wanted to propose that

Based on the information that was published this afternoon by Charlottesville Tomorrow, it appears that this land, which was part of a PUD development, would

If the gifts were not accepted this thing would pretty much have to stay as is regardless of ownership and that probably even trees couldn't be removed or any sort of development under the PUD requirements could be done.

Also, private landowners are being currently asked to provide access to our trail systems without any tax breaks being offered for those and that's, you know, I understand there's a trail access issue with this property.

So, anyway, there's, according to Charlottesville-Pomaro, the city will be

losing $1700 a year in today's dollars in perpetuity from this gift and also of course take responsibility for the maintenance of this acre and a half land.

That is all fine and good and I may be a very strong supporter of this once

I've reviewed it.

Unfortunately, in the past, it's not been standard processed by the council to do a fiscal impact statement on these types of transactions.

Thank you.

Good evening, counselors.

My name is Mary Ellen Dreher.

My address is 208 Robertson Avenue.

I am co-president of Voices for Animals, and I'm here as both a citizen of Charlottesville and as co-president of Voices for Animals.

I'd like to express my support for the increased funding for the Charlottesville Animal SPCO.

I know that this funding is vital for them to carry out the mission of caring for the city's unwanted animals.

My organization runs a spay-neuter program for free roaming cats in the city and county.

We provide spay-neuter surgeries for more than 1,000 cats per year.

And with the SPCA's assistance,

We've been able to increase the spay-neuter services we provide.

This has been done through a series of free spay-neuter clinics.

We're hoping that we can increase these services and we're hoping that the increased funding to the SPCA to help them simply care for the animals that come to the shelter will free up some of their other resources to expand spay-neuter efforts in our community.

We recognize that prevention, reducing the number of homeless animals in our community is the most important thing in terms of building a humane community.

I'd like the council members to consider the cost savings to the city of investing in expanded spay and neuter services and particularly

among the free roaming cat population.

A large percentage of the animals that the SPCA houses are what are called feral or undomesticated cats.

These cats are not adoptable.

My organization would like to see a few of these animals ending up at the shelter.

The best way to do that is to prevent the births of these animals.

I'm hoping that the city, the SPCN force is going to work together to make this happen.

Thank you, Ms. Jordan.

That concludes matters by the public for this evening.

I appreciate everybody coming forward as always and now we'll open it up to council member responses to matters by the public.

Dr. Brown?

I'm never shy.

First of all, I'd like to

I'd like to thank Mr. Shepherd from Shamrock for calling to our attention how important it is that we plan well for closing the bridge on JPA by anticipating where people are going to have to walk or drive in response to that.

know well enough the issues here to be able to look through a list of things in the petition and agree or disagree with them, but I'd like to see the city look quickly and seriously into these issues and keep council apprised of it.

There's also another way, another road that PAC people are going to take, which is Stribling Avenue, which gets kind of bad, but people are certainly going to walk it or drive it, and I think we also need to look at what the impacts there are going to be when Stribling is closed.

Mr. Castelloni, when my CATEC office was on most Main Street I was president of the Starr Hill Neighborhood Association which represented businesses and

residents and I'm really excited to see a group step forward to try to advocate for that part of the city and I really look forward to trying to, I'd love to see at the next meeting invite city councilors.

I'd like to come really hear from all the businesses and some of the residents about the issues involved there.

I also do represent the city on the Solid Waste Authority, which is currently

suing Mr. Van der Linde.

And a comment I'll make on that is the issue there is whether Mr. Van der Linde intentionally evaded paying the service contribution fee to the tune of perhaps a million dollars.

You know, I think whether the service contribution fee was something everybody liked, Mr. Lynch or myself and we were aware of it, that it was a funny mechanism

it was rules of the game and the city had to pay it, other haulers had to pay it and I don't think that we should simply wipe that slate clean if it was intentionally evaded and I think that's what the court case is designed to figure out is whether, you know, having looked at what's been made public, I think there's a compelling argument that there was

I would love to see a resolution that didn't involve the courts.

I think the obvious resolution is, how much would he vote?

Can he just go ahead and agree to pay it?

Apparently those documents

perhaps were destroyed.

We're getting into the area.

I mean, all I know is what I've read and what court, what documents have been provided in the court.

But I'd love to see it resolved.

But for me personally, I don't think the solution is to allow someone to avoid paying a million dollars to the public and to the slightly clean because they happen to have a

Good business now, and I admire it.

I think it's great recycling business.

Anybody back there?

I suppose I have two comments.

First, to follow with Smith Street Midtown,

I would, I think it is really good that there is a community there who is interested in the studies and we should cooperate with them in the way we can, including the chariot.

I also have a specific question as to the parking lot on Trevor Station and I had never understood why the parking site was not finished, required to be finished.

I would like staff to look into that.

There is no reason, at least I know here, so I was planning directly.

We did require site plan approved.

I would just say also on the west main corridor that it's a real link between the downtown mall and the university area and I do think to some extent it's been neglected.

and I'm glad Mr. Huja mentioned the parking lot because the parking lot I think is a disgrace frankly.

I won't park my car in there because you have an inch of dust on when you get ready to leave and you know if I can't find a place on the street I don't, I'm not going to park down there on account of that.

I think it's pretty bad and I don't know what the entire situation is with that but

It appears that we need to take a look at that.

I just think it's disgraceful.

On the rail crossing on Shamrock, I think it's a safety issue.

It's been a safety issue for a long time, as long as I can remember.

I think it is something that we should certainly take a look at from the standpoint of auto and pedestrian safety.

I'd like to echo the concerns about the parking lot, Shamrock, to the Midtown Association.

I'd like to know when those meetings are taking place as well because there's the redevelopment of public housing that's taking place right in that same area also.

So we'd like to hear from as many people as we can because that will be revitalizing the entire neighborhood.

and also in the comments about Rivanna, invite either to attend the Rivanna meetings on the fourth Tuesday of every month at two o'clock and it's so important to get involved and to be a part of the environmental machine that's running the city and just to be aware of all the things that are going on and then you get a chance to decide what's right and

and what needs to be changed and how you can be a part of that whole process.

To Paul Long, I did see your rally and as always you verbalized great concerns about housing and I found it so interesting that we required by law to operate a pound

and I do believe that you can't judge a society by the way it treats its animals and if the direction that we're going with the SPCA is an indication then we need to also think about how we can by a moral law provide better housing for the people that live and work in our community.

I'm intrigued by

Jim Moore's fiscal impact statement.

Thank you, Ms. Edwards.

A few comments on my own.

First of all, I agree with the comments that have been made about West Main Street.

I actually, Mr. Taliaferro, I did park my car there recently, took the Northeast Regional train out of town so the weekend came back and my car did have an inch of dust on it.

It is a major issue.

I agree with Mr. Shepherd on we need to address the safety issues at the crossing.

I was over there myself recently and took a look at that railroad crossing on Schammark Road.

It is a safety hazard for anybody who's walking or pushing a stroller.

There's no way to cross the railroad tracks there without sharing the road with cars.

That is a major safety hazard, so thank you for bringing that to our attention.

And we will get to work on that.

Thank you for coming forward and thank you for your continued support for energy efficiency and for the LEAP program.

Jeff Greer, we have talked informally about the idea of having a council work session specifically focused on the future of solid waste in our community and your comments tonight I think really reinforced the need to move beyond just talking about it and actually making it happen so that we can get to the questions that you, the very real and legitimate questions that you asked of us tonight.

So thank you for coming forward.

Mr. Lynch, you know as well as I do that it's not the reporters at The Daily Progress who write the headlines, so I think that was a little bit of a cheap shot against the reporter, but I think you're right in that the article did not accurately portray, the headline at least, did not accurately portray

the issue.

And Paul Long, as always, you know, we talk about a lot of issues here and I dust on our cards that really pale in comparison to the issue that you talked about tonight, which is the fact that so many people are struggling in this community for lack of affordable housing and I appreciate you bringing that to our attention.

We will now move on to our business agenda tonight.

We're going to start with some appointments to boards and commissions.

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to move the following appointments to our boards and commissions.

First, to the Board of Architectural Review, William Adams, Fax Ayers, and Frederick Wolf,

to the city position on the Charlottesville-Albemarle Airport Commission, Gregory Edwards and Jeffrey Yupov, to the dialogue on race steering committee, Gloria Maria Rockhold, to the housing advisory committee, Susan Plice and Anthony Waterfield, to Jaunt, Philip Jones,

Thank you, Dr. Brunswick.

Second to those nominations?

Second.

Any discussion?

If not, please indicate your vote.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, as always, to everyone who applied.

These decisions are never easy.

We often have many more people apply than we have nominations available, and we appreciate everybody's interest in serving this community.

We're going to now move on to our consent agenda.

Item A, approving minutes of September 8th and 29th, October 5th and 16th.

Item B is an appropriation of $55,942, justice assistance grant, second of two readings.

Item C is an appropriation of $8,319, reimbursement from CPC for signage, first of two readings.

Item D is an appropriation of $3,317 PVCC contribution for bus shelter, first of two meetings.

Item E is an appropriation of $10,850 regional jail grant, first of two meetings.

Item F is an appropriation of $4,750 bulletproof partnership grant, first of two meetings.

Item G, a resolution accepting donation of 1.5 acres of land to add to Forest Hills Park, first of one meeting.

Item H is a resolution authorizing purchase of land near Holmes Avenue for Greenbelt Trail expansion, first of one reading.

Item I is an ordinance rezoning seven parcels located on the corner of Cherry Avenue and Ridge Street to PUD, William Taylor Plaza, second of two readings.

Item J is an ordinance adding immediate centers to mixed-use matrix, highway, corridor, district, first of two readings.

And item K is an ordinance rezoning 1012 Midland Street, 1106 and 1410 Carlton Avenue.

and 504 reached straight from R2, B2 and B3 to PUD with proffers, first of two readings.

Okay, we will add that at the end of tonight's agenda.

Duly noted.

Any other comments, questions?

I want to just publicly thank, I don't know if they're here tonight, our friends from Southern Development.

Today we announced the donation of

It's the largest private donation of parkland to the citizens of Charlottesville since 1974, which we're approving on our consent agenda tonight.

Largest expansion of City Park since 1987.

So we're very grateful for your support and your generosity.

Is there a motion to approve the remaining items on the consent agenda?

So moved.

Please indicate your vote.

Thank you very much.

The first item in our regular business today is an issue that is near and dear to me and to many of us regarding a proposal from our sister city commission, which recently formally recommended to city council to approve our Charlottesville's fourth sister city.

We currently have three sister cities.

One is in Bulgaria, Plovin.

One is in France, called Besançon.

One is in Italy, Peugeot, Caiano.

and for the first time we are considering tonight a sister city outside of Europe.

We created the Sister City Commission about a year ago, I believe, to try to bring more transparency and generate more community support for the Sister City program.

which creates linkages between our citizens and citizens of other countries.

The Sister City Commission has adopted guidelines, a very thorough process, for considering new sister cities.

The city that we're considering tonight, the city on the west coast of Africa called Winneba in the country of Ghana.

And I'm going to invite forward Nana Achampangarti who has personally led the effort going back

a number of years to have his hometown of Winneba

adopted as a sister city for the city of Charlottesville.

And after Mr. Garthi speaks, we have a very special surprise guest here tonight who came all the way from Winneba, who happens to be the chair of the Sister City Commission in Winneba, who is here tonight.

And I'm going to invite him.

Actually, if you would come forward now and let us receive you and we'll have you speak after Mr. Garthi.

This is Mr. Joe Baume.

Let's give him a big round of applause.

Thanks for watching!

So the way this is going to work is Mr. Garde is going to speak briefly about how we got to this point.

Mr. Shobami is going to speak a little bit about Winneba and about what their sister city commission has done to prepare us for this partnership.

We have a video, which I think Mr. Garde will explain, which we're going to show you after they speak, and then we're going to have a public hearing and an official vote.

Good evening.

My name is Nana Achampongate.

As a matter of fact, if you see my name spelled on paper, it's very difficult to pronounce.

So many of my colleagues in town call me Nana from Ghana.

Yeah, I arrived in Charlottesville February 24th, 1998.

and from Columbus, Ohio.

As a matter of fact, I was looking for a very warm, nice, cozy city to dwell in with my wife and my children and somebody recommended Charlottesville for me.

So I arrived here on February 24th, 1998 and

Ever since I arrived, I've never regretted being in this wonderful city.

The first thing I noticed when I arrived in this city was that this city looks almost like my own hometown called Winneba in Ghana.

If you are confused with the spelling, you see Winnebago just removed the G-O.

So I decided to do a little bit of research into what Charlottesville is all about.

I realize it is an invested town.

When the industry is on session, the whole town is bustling.

When the students go on holidays, the city is

I sleep a little bit and I realize that it is the same thing with Winneba.

Winneba is also a University town.

As a matter of fact, the University of Education is in Winneba.

It trains almost all the teachers in Ghana.

and then I also realized that there are so many people in Charlottesville who are already relating to Ghana.

I was invited by so many churches almost every year to go and talk to them about Ghana and they seem to be making trips

There, interestingly, the Queen of the Council has been to maybe that.

And there are, Reverend Dr. Dave Johnson has been there more than 8 times, right?

7?

12?

and there was a lady who was teaching at Walker Apple Elementary School and decided that, no, I want to go to Ghana.

And so she ended up in Geneva, as a matter of fact, taught a school in Geneva for six months.

There was some natural relationship going on.

So I decided, okay, why don't we officially get these two cities together so that we can move on with a very nice and positive relationship.

So I made a formal request to this council some time ago.

As a matter of fact, it has gone through about

Four, five mayors that have gone through about five mayors and finally it was possible that I spoke to the Queen and the Queen said, we will see how we can handle it.

He spoke to the mayor and the mayor said, I think it's a good idea.

Let's explore it.

So finally, in April this year, there was a delegation from Charlottesville to Williamsburg.

Before that, the chairman of the Williamsburg Sister City Commission had already visited Charlottesville to meet with the city manager to discuss how things could be done.

and so we left Charlottesville.

I went first before the delegation came.

A representative of the Chamber of Commerce and the faith group, a representative of the youth and other members left Charlottesville and came to Winneba and you couldn't believe it.

the reception that was given to them.

In Winnebago, we have everybody who comes from Winnebago belongs to two groups which are the warrior groups.

We call them the Asafo Companies.

These people came out in their numbers with drumming and dancing to meet the delegation from Charlottesville.

As a matter of fact, we were so surprised that there was a banner, a big banner which said

Charlottesville, Willy Bell loves you.

And it was so encouraging.

To the extent that our mayor was honored with the title of Field Marshal, which is the warrior groups gave that title to every mayor who comes from Charlottesville.

He's called Osahine, Osahine meaning the fake mashah of all the warrior groups.

And so hopefully from now on all the mayors, their names will start with Osahine.

and so I usually address our mayor, Osagie Norris.

And there were a whole lot of meetings, business meetings, faith groups, schools,

and all that.

The pastors and others have started already communicating with each other.

The University has already started communicating with the University.

As a matter of fact, the semester at sea was at Minnebant only about a month ago.

to explore the University of Education to the Semester at Sea program.

I don't want to go on and on and on.

I can give you a little bit of

Good things about this relationship.

I want you to watch the video and see to yourself how our people from Charlottesville was received.

Interestingly, he is my uncle.

He is an architect by profession.

The present constitution of Ghana was, he was part of the group that wrote our present constitution for Ghana.

He's a member of the royal family of Winneba.

And he is also the chairman of the Sister City Commission.

of Geneva.

He intentionally surprised everybody by his presence here today.

Mr. Mayor, Honourable Councillors, distinguished ladies and gentlemen,

Indeed, I am greatly honored to be in front of you, addressing you this evening.

And I feel so proud to be part of this gathering.

I believe history is in the making.

And I want to thank those of you who have sown the seed to bring communities together

to unite societies to break boundaries and bonds and to see the world, to give meaning to the world globalization.

I say thank you for making me part of this body that hopefully is going to nurture this little seed that we are sowing this evening.

and I see a big tree growing out of this little thing that you are doing this evening.

So once again I say thank you.

Nana has given you a litany of activities or the genesis of this whole expedition that we are taking that I do not want to bore you by going through it.

But suffice to say that

since the last visit of the delegation from Charlottesville led by Osagie and Dave Norris.

When the bar was turned upside down, we grasped the idea of the sister city relationship.

Indeed, let me confess that it was new to us, but we thought we saw the wisdom in it,

We explored it and so when the group came, we sat down with them, we analyzed the situation and we found that we had so much in common.

We shared our history from the colonial times and as Nana said, in terms of functionability, we were both university towns and we seemed to perform on the same basis.

We are lively when the students are around and literally dead when they are on vacation.

A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then and Nana mentioned the visit of the semester at sea.

That group was very, very well received and the university is feverishly preparing

for the next trip because they were promised that it's very likely members of the University in Ghana, in Winneba, will participate in the next trip which is in January.

It's such a good news that we could not sleep over it.

This is one of the reasons which pushed me to travel across the Atlantic to be part of this august body and to take this decision hopefully

to push the boat over the horizon.

I do not want to again attempt to tell you the benefits that both communities will derive from this union.

It speaks for itself.

So what I will say is that if there are any doubting promises, I would want to assure them that it's a good deal.

Vote for it.

Go for it.

As Nona mentioned, the delegation that went over in April, the end of April, included a youth representative.

We had a young man who lived in public housing, West Haven, who's a very active member of the Lighthouse Studio, which is a teen filmmaking studio here in Charlottesville.

Thanks to the generosity of the Dave Matthews Band, he was able to come with us along with his Lighthouse mentor.

they produced a brief documentary about this journey and about his experiences.

It's the first time he had ever left this country and I think it's quite a moving piece.

We're going to show you that documentary here.

It is about, I believe about 15 minutes long, but I think you'll enjoy it.

So if we could ask the, did you have a comment?

Which is,

Absolutely.

So after the video, then we'll open it up for factual questions, then we'll have the public hearing, then we'll bring it up to a vote.

Fifeville,

I ask that you protect my son as he travels on this journey Lord God only you can protect him Lord God for you to ordain this for your Lord God I hope that he gets the experience that you have for him to receive Lord God I ask that you protect

the Mayor, Pastor, and everybody else that's traveling Lord God that you will give us safety on the plane and how they transport Lord God.

I just ask you today to have an amazing journey Lord God that you will show them something different today to bring back to us Lord God to give us a different way of life Lord God that we can have a different experience Lord God I just thank you for this journey I thank you for everything that is to come I thank you for inviting me on Lord God in Jesus name I pray, Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Hello world, my name is Quentin Franklin, a free spirit from birth.

I was born and raised in what my friends would call the slums of Washington, D.C. By the time I reached the eighth grade, my sisters and I had attended over eight different schools, a pretty nomadic family I would say.

In March of 2005, my family and I moved to a small city that I've never heard of, located in Central Virginia named Charleston.

When we first moved here, I disliked it very much, but my mother always said that people are placed in weird places for specific reasons, and it was here where I discovered my passion for film.

Now in 2009, my graduating year from high school and three years after creating my award-winning documentary, So What, I'm traveling to Atlanta-Bagana to document a chance at a lifetime.

I'll be traveling alongside Mayor Dave Norris of Charlottesville and four other Charlottesville residents.

The mission is to try and establish a sister city and explore possibilities that may arise to benefit both cities and to build strong connections between our two communities.

I'm expecting to be enlightened and become a little wiser.

I'm eager to learn more about the motherland and my ancestors because not knowing your ancestors is like having to chew your thumb roots.

Today is the day of the expedition and reality has finally set in.

I can't believe that I'm going to Africa.

I'm starting to feel nervous.

I've never been outside the country.

So many feelings and thoughts are running through my head that it's become overwhelming.

Our flight is very long, but after 22 intense hours of traveling, I'm ready to get off in some intense heat in Africa.

At the airport, a party of locals greets us.

I'm trying to figure out where exactly I can get.

A bottle of water gets really high.

And we are arranging it tonight in a church hospitality bed and breakfast.

Very anxious about tomorrow, what a day looks like.

Well, it feels great to be here and it's been a long journey.

How long have we been on the road, Danielle?

I think it's a nice cool breeze and people have been very friendly.

I'm glad to be here.

It's about 9.30 here in O'clock.

We're about to, we just had breakfast and we're about to go to the U.S. Embassy to speak with the Ambassador.

We may not be able to take cameras in there.

Hopefully something will be worked out, but if not, then, guess I'll have to tell you about it.

Day one in Accra, we have loads of meetings to attend.

We go to the U.S. Embassy to meet with Ambassador Bridgewater, where no cameras are allowed.

I have to come to the main issue.

And of course, since you are the mother of the umbrella organization under which all these activities are organized, you thought it appropriate that to send the idea, they should pay you the CATEC call, introduce themselves, and then finally do few things for themselves.

And then from then on,

The time traveling from Accra to Innova is about an hour.

On my ride I witnessed vast poverty.

I don't see any people who are high class and it seems that living in these impoverished conditions is part of the culture.

The feeling that I experience I'm not really able to explain, but I can definitely relate to these people being that my family and I were homeless for a long period of time.

Finally, we arrived in Winnebago.

Children dress in costumes and mask, flood our bus, and take us to be led by an enormous welcoming party that consists of chiefs and elders of the town.

Once we arrive, we shake about 50 plus hands.

Women perform rituals and dance.

Following the rituals, the locals return to respect by walking by and shaking our hands.

Our crew is very tired and exhausted, and we are being excused from the ceremony when a man creates chaos by demanding we stay and enjoy the festivities.

We are in Wendover for the biggest event of the year, the Aborte Festival, which is known as the Deer-Catching Festival.

will display their spiritual powers in the streets of the town to the admiration of everybody to show how powerful they are.

They actually, during the olden times, they depended upon these deities to go to war,

to go to war, helps them to defeat the enemy and all that.

They use the same concept.

for this festival because it is a dangerous adventure.

The most important day of the festival is when the two warrior groups, team one and team two, go into the bush and catch a deer with their bare hands.

They then bring it back to town to be blessed before being slaughtered.

The first team to return with the dare to get blessed wins.

Afterwards, they celebrate with the parade where I met a lot of new people.

But out of them all, there is a kid who attends the University of Education in Wendover.

His name is Kwasi.

In Ghana, I belong to two families.

They are standing in the nuclear family.

The nuclear family of Edson, the name of Marco, and the standing family of Williams and Marco and coming together.

It's a very big family.

Life in Winnebuhr, should I say, can be categorized into two.

If you have money, you need to work so hard to pay bills, screw free and all that.

If you work hard and get your money, then you're winnable.

Just like all of Audible, if you have money, you can buy what you want, you can get whatever you want.

That's what I can say.

I know I don't work.

I'm a student.

I'm a social science student.

What's your major?

My major in history.

Yeah, with geography as my minor.

The school is interesting.

We have a lot of quizzes to write, a lot of assignments to do.

And for me, being in this team, it's so great because even a lot of people with different

You know, character, different and interesting, different areas.

You know, languages and you just do your best and then you get along with everybody.

So it's really so great and I enjoy being in school and listening to these people.

After conversing with Quasi, my whole perception of Africa is completely redefined.

He explained to me that his perception of the US is that everyone is rich and live happy lives.

I explained my life story and where I stand in life now.

The look on his face was speechless and he then apologized.

Once the parade begins, I see the tremendous pride Ghanaians have in their country.

Ghanaians believe in peace and hospitality.

There's a lot of chaos going on, which is the time of the festival.

They say there's a lot of chaos that goes on.

And the police have been tasering people and they've been scattered like roaches.

Today we are traveling to Cape Coast, Ghana, where we meet the Minister of the Region and visit the slave castles.

So I think the post region in particular is a very interesting way where tourism opportunities are planned.

You know we have the slave castles and the ports.

We also have the slave goods.

The Amina Slave Castle played a major part in American history, being that it is the last place slaves spent their lives on the African continent before being shipped off to America in the transatlantic slave trade.

I feel honored and privileged to have this opportunity to trace back and learn more about my ancestors.

The castle smells like iron, copper and stone and is gigantic in size.

Seeing the dungeons makes me appreciate life more.

This story behind the tour guide was the very last exit for African slaves headed for America.

Their lives left behind.

In some areas of the castle, when I'm alone, I think in my mind the horrifying things that went on and I get unexplainable vibes.

Being an African American, I feel my ancestors have passed through this very castle.

I feel it's my duty to inform our generation and the people of America that our ancestors have suffered and paved the way for us today and it's our responsibility to learn our history and use it as our motivation and guide to change and unify the world.

Now that I returned from Africa to the States, I have learned that I should cherish my life every day and not take my possessions for granted.

In Ghana, the children who are getting an education really cherish the opportunity and work hard to progress.

They are very thirsty for knowledge.

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It seems that no matter what a Canadian is doing, they are happy and take pride in it.

And I believe people here in the U.S. can really benefit from that.

I sincerely believe that accepting one of a Charlottesville sister city will allow both communities to benefit from each other.

Charlottesville has a lot to offer Winnebuh, and I feel that Winnebuh will return the love by offering any and everything possible.

I actually got a scholarship to attend University, a full scholarship to attend Virginia Commonwealth University

where he is studying film and so he is studying tonight and doing his schoolwork so we thank him for this effort.

The beautiful thing about this the trip that we took back in April and this film is that it was entirely supported by the community.

by private donations.

As I mentioned, our friends in the Dave Matthews Band were very generous in supporting this trip.

Some of us paid a little bit out of pocket.

The Chamber of Commerce kicked in some money.

A variety of groups came forward to support this delegation.

There were no tax dollars involved.

It was entirely supported by the community, and that's the motto I think we'd like to see for all of our sister cities, that they're really owned by the community and supported by the community.

We'll open it up now for any questions and we'll have a public hearing soon.

Do they have a chief, a mayor, or a queen?

They have both.

They have traditional authorities and they have a chief royal family and they also have civil authorities.

They have a mayor

who I'm in regular email touch with.

They have a district assembly, is that what it's called, district assembly, which is their version of the city council.

In essence, they have their assistant city manager, their equivalent to Mr. Jones, who is our guide, Ms. Betty Ademse, I pronounce her last name, Ademse.

who was our guide the whole week.

So they have civil authorities and they have the traditional authorities as well.

And it's fascinating to see how the two enter and relate.

And how large is Winneba?

Winneba has a population, I believe, about 70,000.

And how large is their council?

The district assembly has how many members?

Do you remember?

Mr. Joe Bonnie?

The representation is based on the Nebahic and various communities.

And so tonight we have a resolution for force?

That's correct.

Is that something that's been distributed?

Basically what we're looking for tonight is an official approval of the recommendation by the Sister City Commission to adopt Winneba.

And then the next steps would be is that each of the sister cities that we have, we have representatives from those

One thing I'd like to see happen, I mean I think it's a great idea, but is I think something important like this should have a ceremony.

You know and hopefully should have

the appropriate representatives from Winneba coming here, being welcomed, being introduced to the community, having time with the council so they can be

How that's going to happen and when that's exactly what we're intending to do next is we wanted to bring it forward to council tonight to see if council is going to approve this and then we would invite Winneba to send an official delegation.

We haven't talked to them about the scheduling for that yet but hopefully very early in the coming year.

and we could have exactly the kind of ceremony they're talking about.

In fact, we've already received a very special gift from the people of Winnebago, which we're going to bring forward at that ceremony, which is a ceremonial stool that they've bestowed upon the people of Charlottesville.

And can I ask, you know, with the other Sister City relationships, do we

It's more of an order of, you know, how to, we don't want to invite that to happen tonight and then invite them to ratify publicly.

Currently there is the African Lula Sister City Foundation, which is now the umbrella body that oversees all the activities of the African Sister City Relationships.

And they have laid out a format

It is only when the memorandum of understanding is ready to be signed that the formalities begin.

Okay.

And so, there will be a resolution at some point that we'll take a look at, but tonight you're asking us to be in favor of having a sister city, which I

And that will initiate the memorandum of understanding that will formalize the, spell out the terms of the relationship.

That's all the questions I had.

Any other questions before we open the public hearing?

Okay, we're now going to open the public hearing.

As always, when you come forward, please state your name and address and keep your comments to three minutes.

Hello, my name is Lily Williams.

I am part of the African American Festival here in Charlottesville and also a member of CHIHAMA, which is a non-profit dance and drum company.

And I'm so excited I can't stand it.

It's hard to contain myself, just the thought of it.

I tell Nana, you know, I can't even

I can't even talk about it sometime.

So as we talk about public support, today right now I'd like to give you this.

At the last African American Festival we had here this last July, we had people come up and we had little pieces of paper and we talked about one of our people coming in, Sister City of Charlottesville, and these are petitions that they, and this is just a small part of the people who support this in Charlottesville.

Osahinee Norris and Councillors.

My name is Karen Waters.

I live at 1014 St. Charles Avenue in the city and I'm the Executive Director of the Quality Community Council.

We are an organization that celebrates diversity and we recognize that it takes all of us to make a world-class city.

We are very

We were there when Bulgaria became a sister city.

We are pleased to be here to see the first African sister city and just want to congratulate the council and encourage acceptance of this resolution because it does take a global community to make our city and our communities have the quality of life that we want.

So thank you.

Good evening, I'm Peter Klayman, I live at 407 Head Street in the city, and I couldn't be more delighted to support an effort with the city of Charlottesville in welcoming Winneba to the family of Charlottesville.

We can share in some really meaningful interactions.

I'm not opposed to some of our tax dollars going to support some of the efforts of exchange and certainly throw in a few of my own personal dollars as well.

And I would be just excited to participate in some event and I would look forward to seeing myself wandering through the streets of Winnebau someday.

I do hope that some of the members of the community in Winneba will feel welcome here and come here and join us in sharing music and dance and culture and education and other things that we all find very important about our community and our relationship to the world.

So I strongly urge council to adopt this resolution and welcome Winneba to the city of Charlottesville's sister city program.

Is there anybody else from the public who would like to speak?

Danielle Fitzhugh, I don't have a Charlottesville address but I do work here in Charlottesville with the Chamber of Commerce and I was very fortunate to have the opportunity to be part of the exploratory committee that went to Winnebago this past April and when you talk about sister-city relationships you think about sisters or brothers and what that connection is and how to have longevity.

A few of the things that I want you guys to keep in mind

is other than things that have been mentioned like the university connective, the university connection.

It's the tourist community there.

The festival that you saw on the film, they do an additional 35 festivals per year in that one small community.

We would be hard pressed in this community, have level of hospitality.

That was exhibited to us when we visited.

Each place, each meeting, we took part in.

We were treated as though we were royalty throughout the entire week.

Entrepreneurial spirit.

The number one workforce there are those that they derive from themselves.

That is the level of entrepreneurial spirit that we have right here in the Charlottesville community.

We're one of the number one places to do business and start your own business right here.

And that's the level of connectivity that we have and share with the people of Winnebaugh.

We talked about the judicial systems, traditional and civil governments, and the similarities that they cross that can find common ground to run the city of Winnebago.

There are things that we can learn from them.

Their level of support for sister city connection,

They had their MP rep with us all week.

Mr. Joe Bonnie was with us all week, making sure we had the level of support that we needed to come back and report to the community the interest in becoming a Sister City.

I encourage the Mayor and other City Council members to approve a resolution for future Sister City with Winnebago.

Thank you, Ms. Vitie.

Anybody else from the public like to speak?

Thank you, Mayor Norris and to the City Council.

My name is Reverend Dr. Dale Johnson and I was part of the delegation going to Winnebago, Ghana in April.

I have traveled to Ghana many, many times and I must say that this opportunity to collaborate with one about Ghana is very blessed.

opportunity.

I served and met with the faith and cultural component of the meetings that we attended and at this moment the pastors in that area have already met and are writing a proposal in hopes that the City Council will adopt this resolution for the Sister City for Ghana, the one about Ghana.

We've talked about a pastor exchange program, which the pastors from this area will be able to exchange with the pastors in Winneba and to learn about the different cultural contexts.

They were very excited with the opportunity that that would happen.

I have found that when you go to another country, you're able to learn and also share in that country with the participants, those individuals who live there.

We've already identified pastors in Winneba who are willing to work with the pastors here.

I know it would be a great opportunity.

And as far as the cultural exchange, as far as working with artisans there in Winneba, you see in front of you, you see a weaving from Winneba says greetings from Winneba.

There's handicrafts, there's a lot of revenue that can be made on the part of Winnebago citizenship but also on the parts of the citizens of Charlottesville.

I encourage you to consider what has already been presented to you and I know that you will benefit from it as well as the citizens of Winnebago, Ghana.

Anybody else?

My name is Augustine Arthur.

I live at 913 Anderson Street, Charlottesville.

I thank you for making this effort to bridge a gap between Charlottesville and Winneba.

There was one thing that I forgot to say.

Winneba is in the central region of Ghana and Charlottesville is in central Virginia.

So I'm also looking forward that this effort will come to the food.

Any last comments?

Okay, thank you very much.

I like the idea of Sister Cities, period, and I really think it kind of

is highly appropriate that we have a relationship with Ghana, with Winneba.

I think the movie we saw really shows how valuable it can be for someone to travel, especially travel to another country that's a part of a lot of our residents' heritage.

and I also agree with two other comments.

One is I also think when we talk about other sister cities there hadn't been the amount of conversation among the community and the amount of support that we see for this sister city and I think that's important.

And I also agree with Mr. Kleeman that we shouldn't rule out using tax dollars to support our investments in our sister cities.

I think that

You know, as a country and as a city, we tend to be very parochial.

We often don't learn languages, other languages.

I'm an example of that.

We often don't travel abroad.

We expect people to come see us, and I think having sister cities is a step towards making us world citizens.

I think it's important that we do so.

I'd like to make a motion.

Second.

Any further discussion?

I don't remember that.

Okay.

If there's no further discussion, please indicate your vote.

Mayor Norris and particularly Councillor Holly Edwards, I just want to thank you for your leadership in making this historic moment happen in terms of Charlottesville's first non-European sister city.

Thank you, Ms. Morris.

I appreciate that.

All right, thank you very much.

I appreciate all of you.

I know a lot of you are here for other business and I appreciate you sticking with us.

This is a very special moment for us and we wanted to give it some time.

We will now move on to other items on our agenda tonight.

Next is a report from Assistant City Manager Maurice Jones on our dialogue on race.

Mr. Mayor, Members of Council, it's not every day that I get a chance to follow a future Academy Award-winning filmmaker, Mr. Franklin, so thank you for that honor today.

We are here tonight to provide you with an update on the Dialogue on Race initiative.

As you know, the Dialogue is one of many efforts that the city is undertaking to address longstanding issues of race in our community.

And this model is based on the Study Circle model of Dialogue.

Each study circle will include up to 12 area residents from different backgrounds and will be moderated by two trained volunteer facilitators.

Dialogue participants and facilitators are being asked to make a commitment of six meetings of about two hours each time during a three month period beginning in January of 2010.

They will be given an assignment to learn about each other, identify tensions that still persist here in our community that pertain to race,

and to develop solutions to those issues.

Each group will present their findings back to the dialogue on race steering committee by the end of March.

From there, the committee will prioritize the findings, present back to the community and begin the action phase of the initiative in May.

The group of facilitators will be comprised of local volunteers who will be trained by our facilitation training expert, Gwendolyn Writing, who is here this evening, and will take your questions when I'm done with my presentation.

Ms.

Writing is an expert in this field.

She's worked both in Virginia, nationally and internationally, on the issue of waste relations and providing facilitation training for those discussions.

The first training session will take place on November 14th with several more to follow in the near future.

The City Council appointed a steering committee of 19 area residents to help lead this effort.

A number of the committee members are here this evening and I would ask them to please stand and be recognized for your work.

The committee has met on seven occasions with a host of subcommittee meetings providing some supplemental support to the project.

During the last five months, the steering committee has chosen a consultant for facilitation training, developed a marketing plan for recruitment of participants and facilitators.

They've begun planning for a December 5th kickoff event and held a pilot study circle of their own to gain a better understanding of the dialogues process.

The two-hour kickoff event, as I mentioned, is scheduled to take place on December 5th from 10 a.m. to noon at the Martin Luther King Jr.

Performing Arts Center at Charlottesville High School.

It will be designed to inform the public about the process and also provide a little inspiration as the Study Circle participants prepare for their sessions in January.

To date, over 100 people have registered for the dialogue on race with a significant portion of our marketing and recruitment efforts still to come.

We continue to make connections with local organizations to help get the word out.

In addition, we are developing a door-to-door canvassing plan as well.

If area residents are interested in becoming a participant or a facilitator in this dialogue, they can go to our website at charlottesville.org slash dialogue.

They can call the city manager's office at 970-3101 or they can stop by the city manager's office here at City Hall and they can pick up a registration form.

The most important message that I think we can pass along to the community at this point is that they have to participate in order to make a difference.

Twelve hours of one's life over a three month period of time can change the course of race relations here in Charlottesville forever.

We firmly believe that.

The steering committee firmly believes that.

We can continue to heal wounds, address current concerns, and move forward united in embracing the great diversity that we have here in our great city.

It is not going to be easy.

We know that.

There's still a lot of work to be done.

But we have great confidence in the people of this community to accept this challenge head on.

And we have great confidence in the steering committee as well.

So I thank you for this opportunity to come before you and present an update on the dialogue.

Thank you, Mr. Jones.

I appreciate all your efforts on this very important initiative.

Sure.

The registration period is open now.

It will be continuously open throughout the project.

We have a kickoff on December 5th.

and we hope to begin the study circles, the first round of study circles in January, first or second, probably the second week in January.

And then we're asking folks to make a commitment of six sessions over a three month period of time so that they'll come back to us at the end of March.

Each one of these groups will come back with their recommendations that will be presented back to the steering committee and then the steering committee will prioritize all of the recommendations that have come forward

Other questions for Mr. Jones?

Comments?

I think you're doing a wonderful job.

Thank you very much.

We now have a presentation or report on a very important initiative that affects many many families in our community having to do with

re-entry of ex-offenders into our community and the kind of support that we can be offering and should be offering to them to reduce recidivism.

And here to present is Pat Smith from Offender Aid and Restoration, Colonel Matthews, Ronald Matthews from Albemarle Charlottesville Regional Jail.

First, I'd like to thank you for inviting us.

It's past my big time, but it's okay.

I think we're going to do a very quick... You don't have to turn around, I don't think, too much because I'm going to be saying basically what's up there.

Basically, we're here to talk to you a little bit about reentry and the work that we've been doing in partnership in this community.

Dave and Holly have been involved with our partnership a little bit.

One of the things that we have, this came about several years ago because the governor of Virginia, it was Governor Warner then.

and Governor Cain continued, they chose people, pilot programs across the state of Virginia to participate in re-entry efforts.

And we have a steering committee and Carol Matthews and I are both on that and so are the city of Charlottesville's Department of Social Service, both Kochs and also Kathy Ralston from the county of Albemarle.

So we're working together because we know what we're trying to do is get an environment that works.

for all of us for people coming out of the jails.

And our focus is the regional jail, not just prison, I mean prison but really the local jail.

Basically, one of the things we're looking, one of the things we want to do is educate the public because we have a need for mentors, we want people to get involved, we have needs for having more welcoming environments, we have a need for

Low-income housing, I heard that talked about a lot tonight and you can only imagine what it's like for someone coming out of jail and trying to find housing.

We also have needs for jobs for motivated ex-offenders and we all know that there are, that's a tough issue as well with the barriers that there are.

So one of the things our council is doing is we have a structure.

We have a re-entry council that is very large from all members of the community.

But then we have a steering committee that, like I said, is represented about six agencies are joined together.

And we oversee the committees.

And that's really where the work is being done, the committees.

There's four of them.

One deals with financial obligations, housing.

and Community Resources.

What that's about is looking at exactly what we said.

Maybe they have courts and fines, they have obligations when they get out, and that's helping make that an easier process.

And making them more aware of it, that's what the goal is.

That's one of the subcommittees.

Another subcommittee is Employment and Education.

That kind of speaks for itself.

What that's about is helping people get the education and focus on employment.

And we've been working with employers, we've had job fairs, we've joined with the

at PVCC, Virginia Employment Commission, a number of agencies in the community to look at what kinds of employment services there can be for the ex-offender because what we found is many of the people do come out with minimal education.

Most don't have their GEDs and or high school education and most have

Obviously have a record.

It's very hard to come out and get a job.

And so one of the things we're trying to do is build a group of employers who are willing to give people a chance.

The other subcommittee, Social Reintegration, that's all about mentoring and building families.

And that group is working on a mentoring program.

Again, we're looking for mentors in this community.

to work with us so that we can be positive role models and work with people and help them through all the hoops they have to jump through when they get out.

The last committee is on health, mental health, and substance abuse, and that, again, is sort of self-explanatory, but I actually chaired that committee, and what that's looking at is access to these services.

A lot of people, we're very fortunate here in our community to have a jail, regional jail,

and a jail administration that supports programs.

There's a lot of jails that don't have that.

In this area we do.

And so a lot of people are in our jails who have mental health issues, substance abuse issues and other health issues.

And it costs the jail, I don't know how much, but I know it's a lot every year when the people are in the jail.

Then they're coming out and what they're finding is they're falling through

They're falling in the holes when they come out because medication is a problem for both for health and mental health and one of the things we've been working on is quicker access.

We're working with Region 10, we're working with the benefits.

People while they're in jail lose their benefits.

and that they may be in disability, they may be getting any kind of benefit, food stamps, whatever it may be and what happens is they are suspended and it doesn't, they can't just get out and get a break back and one of the things we're working on is making sure they can get their medication.

We found that it was taking anywhere from two months to three months to get out and that's not good because then what happens it's a vicious cycle and people are ending back up in the jail and that's not what we want to say.

So one of the things that we focus on is having better skilled people when they get out.

Having them have positive role models to support them.

Having our community help them by giving them jobs and giving them a chance.

Working with groups like OAR and the jail.

Also just supporting low income housing.

You heard us say that.

I don't know what the answer to that is, but I do know that people

You heard about the firemen and the police that can't live in our community.

I have staff who can't live in our community in Albemarle or Charlottesville.

And so you can only imagine what it's like for the people that come out and don't have jobs and have public housing, doesn't accept felons.

I mean, there's a number of barriers that everybody faces when they come out.

And so what we're trying to do, I think we all benefit when people don't

Go back to jail.

We all benefit.

It costs all of you guys a lot of money to have people in our jail, and it costs all of us as citizens a lot to keep people out.

I mean, we want them out, we want to keep them working, have them contributing.

We heard a lot about low income tonight, and it was very interesting to now come to city council very often.

It's very interesting.

I think this fits right in with what we're trying to accomplish.

One of the things that happened after going through this process is that a few of us got together and Rick was part of that and Lee from the community, we had a part, Mayor Norris and Councilman Edwards

and also Mr. and Mrs. John Clooney were involved in it and we wanted to try to figure out an idea how we were going to approach this, give this information out to the citizenship because what has to happen is this community has to change the way that it thinks about incarcerated people, which are ex-offenders.

Society says that if you commit a crime, then here's your punishment.

You're sentenced to a year, you do that year, but that's not what's happening.

What's happening is once an individual comes out, they're still being punished.

And what I mean by

that is, they're ostracized, they're not accepted back into the community, we don't give them employment, we don't provide housing, we don't give them assistance, but we want you to behave yourself, we don't want you to go back to jail, but we put all these barriers in front of these individuals, but we're getting the same results that we've gotten year after year after year.

So if we want to change that cycle, then the community has to change the way that it looks at inmates, or say ex-offenders.

And sometimes it can be kind of hard, especially if you're a victim of a crime, but if we don't, right now, jail

Operating capacity is sitting at about 525 right now.

States say that we should have 329.

So if we don't change what we're doing, we're going to wind up spending money to build another jail or add on to the current facility.

and it's going to wind up costing us maybe 20, 30 million dollars to do that.

So it's actually cheaper for us to do it this way.

So what we've done is we've gone around to different organizations and we're talking to them, just putting out the message that we're trying to get across.

And part of that message is like with business owners, just think what would happen if every business hires one ex-offender.

Not asking you to do a whole lot, but just hire one ex-offender.

Take a chance on helping somebody to succeed.

What happens when these individuals come back to the community, instead of everybody shunning them and moving away, we have a small group that actually welcomes them back to the community.

Let them know that we know they're going to have a difficult role, but the community is here to provide assistance to help them.

It's a different way of thinking about that, but if we're going to change the way that we do things and change the criminal justice system and not keep having the recidivism rate continue to grow, then we have to change the way that we do things, and that involves all of us.

The jail, the government, and the citizenship.

One of the things that, if you read the newspaper recently, we had a survey done by the University of Virginia.

Dr. Ann Loper from the Curry School of Education did a study for us.

And what they did is they looked at three separate groups of individuals.

One group received

the eight week reentry program that we had established in the jail and then we had a group that received services from OAR and then we had a group that received none and what we found out is the group that received no intervention, their return rate during that six month period was 31%.

31% of the people that they studied returned back to jail.

But as you can see, even ones that received, say, transitional services, their number went down because there were assistance that were provided to them and that rate was 20%.

The ones that actually went through the 8-week program, which is a, not a strenuous program,

a program system that they go through where they receive different services, the rate was cut in half.

So if you can see what that eight week program would do that with the acceptance of a community of those individuals returning to the community, we can even reduce those numbers even more by providing those services that are needed in order for those individuals to be successful.

I wanted to say just to make sure that everybody does understand that the city council has been very supportive of OAR and our program, supports our re-entry program and does through the block grant funding CBG

And one other thing is we just want to get the message out that we need the assistance of everybody.

We need the council's support in getting this message out to the community.

We need the community to

I have a question for Colonel Matthews.

Very expensive.

And like I say, if you take on top of that, you have to build a new facility in order to house them.

That's what I was saying.

It is.

And the biggest issue is just changing the way that we

to deal with incarcerated people.

I had a couple of questions.

Can you give me an example of what the financial obligations could look like in terms of the accumulation of funds, court costs, restitution?

What's the

I mean the problem is people have a variety of obligations the very vicious cycle about the financial obligations especially fines and costs is that if you have fines and costs and you are getting out of jail and you don't have a job you can't get a driver's license because you haven't paid your fines and costs so how are you going to get a job if you can't get your driver's license

You mentioned the employers and hiring felons.

Give me a sense from the community that more employers are willing to give people an opportunity.

Some employers are willing to hire

offenders and some are not.

And one of the things that we're trying to do is make sure that we work with the offender as they come out on job skills, training, getting their GEDs, getting the education necessary, and then giving them a chance while we're providing support and other services.

Because it isn't, you know, I don't know if I was an employer, if somebody was just walking out the door with no skills or anything, that's not part of it.

The part of it is us helping them build

We need to hear more about the success stories.

We know people are working hard and people are doing well, but we don't hear that often enough.

And that's the message that we need to reinforce as well.

the local jail and the work that you're doing.

Federal or state?

I was approached by an inmate in our system because he was seeing what was happening with the other people and he wanted to become part of that and I told him that I would get in touch with the U.S.

Marshals Services to see if they would be interested in providing those services.

Well, this focus is on jail return, inmates returning from the jail.

However, LAR provides a lot of assistance to people who are coming out of the state system.

In fact, it's a very interesting thing.

We're located next to state probation.

and they drive up in their little van and they're shackled and they're being released and they release them and say, see you later.

And so probation, state probation kind of depends on us to help them with a lot of services, you know with IDs, you know birth certificates, clothing, shelter, you name it.

And we do a DOC re-entry program that's run by the state.

And matter of fact, what happened when we developed the local re-entry program, eventually we wind up combining both of them.

and I just have a couple other questions.

One of the housing issues, at least for the felons, involves their ability to live in public housing.

It's a federal law.

It's not local, okay.

And secondly, I know you attended the legal aids program recently, which was really important in educating, certainly educated me,

about the degree to which our criminal justice system has non-violent offenders and offenses related to drugs.

Yeah.

We have, how you say, non-violent drug offenses.

And those are individuals that may have possession, use-type charges.

And it doesn't involve anybody else, just them.

And those individuals are

and usually it has to happen more than once before they come in but we do have those individuals and the perception is instead of being in jail these individuals ought to be in treatment and it probably would be cheaper to put them in treatment than it would to put them in jail but if you look at removing those individuals from the criminal justice system you're talking I would say probably a 20

25% decrease in the number of individuals that's in the criminal justice system.

But that's one of the initiatives that's being looked at by Senator Webb in the effort that he has going with the U.S. Congress.

We haven't seen anything on that yet because it's just getting started.

I think a lot of the initiatives that we're doing here were things that have been developed over the last five years as we've looked at what's needed for the community.

And we've just taken the initiative to go ahead and do these things.

They're the right things to do.

A lot of the issues that they talked about with the incarceration nation are things that we do so that those things don't happen.

Developing programs, making sure that the medical care is there because that's where a lot of lawsuits come from and I would say probably in the five years that I've been there, they've

Not so much on the re-entry, but you do know this is a community that deals with a lot of options before they go to the jail as well, about drug offenders, the drug court, and we do provide alternatives at OAR and state probation, rather than have them go to jail, because obviously if you can get people on the front end, they're not going to go in, and then they're not going to come back out.

I think another statistic from that program, the incarceration issue program, that really struck me was when Senator Webb was saying how we incarcerate five times as many of our citizens as any other developed nation, which, as he says, either means we have the most evil people on earth,

I think you're right.

In addition to the substance abuse issue that Dr. Brown mentioned, the other one was the mental health population where we have a lot of people cycling in and out of our prisons and jails because of mental illness-related concerns.

The criminal justice system in Virginia is the largest mental health hospital in the state of Virginia.

There are more people, mentally ill people incarcerated than there are in state hospitals.

I would say that I've been on the jail board for a couple of years.

I continue to be impressed by the colonel and some of the innovative things he's trying to do.

And I guess one of the most important things is that

It will be momentarily.

I'm going to get this started and then turn it over to some folks.

This issue that's before you tonight is first a presentation by the VDOT and the consultants about the 29 Carters Study.

It's been presented at the NPO last month.

Unfortunately, scheduling glitches, we hadn't been able to get it before you.

We're kind of last minute here.

The CTB is set to take it up in just a matter of days and we wanted you to have an opportunity to see a brief overview of the presentation.

Because of some concerns we've had, we've shared with y'all, there's actually a letter prepared, a draft letter in your packet that if you are concerned about this, we need to get our comments in to VDOT immediately and there's a resolution authorizing the mayor to sign this letter or a modification of the letter if you see fit.

Again, we're concerned about the roadway realizing that the issues along 29 between Danville and Gainesville are obviously significant.

There are concerns, but as a staff we felt concerned that the solution at 29-250 is one

would not be in the best interest of our city.

So that's one reason we wanted to get it before you tonight.

Charlie Raznick with VDOT is here.

Welcome.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and members of the Council.

My name is Charlie Raznick.

I'm VDOT's project manager for the

We've been working for several months on the corridor plan.

It's 219 miles and we certainly want to thank you for allowing us time on your agenda to

present an alternative to the interchange area of 29 and Route 250.

I can assure you it's not going to be in our final report unless the city chooses to support it.

With that I'd like to introduce Joe Springer who is going to give you just a little bit of an overview.

It's not a full presentation of everything we're doing along the entire corridor.

Nonetheless, we're trying to give you some background on what we looked at when we came up with this alternative and what you choose to do with it is okay.

We will move forward with the previous recommendations from the 29H250 study if you choose not to do anything with it.

Thank you for the opportunity to give you a little bit of background on the recommendation.

As Charlie mentioned, this is a study that extends 219 miles, so we are looking at bushes throughout the entire corridor.

And I'm going to focus a little bit just on the specifics of this particular area.

One other aspect of our study was that

We were looking at other studies.

29 is obviously a very important highway through central Virginia.

It has been studied at various levels throughout the 219 miles.

In this particular region, the most recent and most comprehensive study is the Places 29 recommendations.

So one of the things we did, as we did throughout the corridor, was really look at some of the recommendations from these other studies and identify what those recommendations, how they affected the overall corridor throughout the state.

In terms of looking at the Places 29 recommendations in general, we believe that those recommendations do provide additional capacity.

It would help both the local region as well as the state as a whole.

However, we did find that we do believe that in the area between Hydraulic Road and 250, that is an existing major choke point and it is a choke point, we believe, even with some of the recommendations coming out of the Places 29.

The other aspect in this particular area,

is that we do believe based on sort of the change in events over the past 20 years since the western bypass was originally brought up and has been studied over the years that it really is not an effective option to serve corridor-wide trips although it may be a way to serve sort of more local and regional trips

In terms again about the Places 29 recommendations, we do believe that a priority from those recommendations for this region to both assist local and corridor-wide travel would be to prioritize the Berkmar Drive bridge over the south fork of the Rivanna River, as well as interchange improvements at both hydraulic and rail roads.

There's the project to add additional lane southbound between hydraulic road and going on to extending onto the 250 bypass to Barracks Road.

We do believe that is needed but it doesn't adequately address long-term needs.

It will shortly address some short-term and mid-term needs but over the long-term we don't believe it really fully addresses the long-term needs in this particular part of the corridor.

Based on that assessment, again, we do, in most cases, fully support the recommendations out of the places, 29 recommendations, but we do have a couple of things that we put out there that we took to the public meetings that we had last month.

One of them was extending the concept of parallel roads.

essentially a distributed network that's in the place of 29 from the logical terminus of 250 in this case we were talking about the location where Leonard Sandridge Road comes in extending that north perhaps using portions of the western bypass that's no longer

being looked at based on some of the feedback we had at the public meetings.

The other aspect of that recommendation to extend and address the issue in this area was to modify what's been talked about, the interchange at 29 and Hydraulic Road, really to extend it so it comes down to, again, a more logical term, I believe, at 250 to address that issue between Hydraulic Road and 250 itself.

The other aspect that went into our thinking to perhaps put this out as an alternative for consideration is that the property bounded by 29 hydraulic and 250 over the long term we believe has the potential to be redeveloped and we felt like we could put this concept out to present it to you all and perhaps think as this property redevelops some other ways to look at both the land use side and the transportation side in this particular part of the corridor.

This is a drawing of the recommendation that we're suggesting.

Basically, you see 29 going north-south at this point, 250 going across the bottom of the screen, and the hydraulic load would be off the sketch here.

The idea is that this is a four-lane roadway that extends, comes from 250 going

in this case heading towards the east and extending up over some of these properties and then going a little bit further crossing over Hydraulic Road in this particular drawing so that it essentially replaces the interchange at Hydraulic Road and extends it further just as overpass at this location really takes care of the interaction between 29 and Hydraulic Road

To give you an idea a little bit more, this is a rendering of what it would look like, also combined with the idea that perhaps you're redeveloping this particular area.

We feel like this provides, obviously it's a large project, substantial impacts, and we do believe that it provides some benefits both in terms of land use and in terms of being able to perhaps allow you to downgrade the existing structure 29 and make it perhaps a more livable

A more walkable community, perhaps with bike lanes and those kinds of things on it.

And then perhaps, as I said, you could perhaps integrate this particular roadway into the redevelopment of that particular area.

A couple of additional drawings just to show, again, some of the preliminary thinking that we had.

This is a shot of 29 looking to the east from the median.

and just north of 250.

This is a drawing that shows perhaps what that roadway would look like behind, basically it's a city block back behind existing Route 29 and then the idea is as time as this becomes redeveloped as perhaps a town center type development becomes

some of that roadway can be back behind gives you the opportunity of showing here a bike lane perhaps narrowing the existing 29 and then ultimately perhaps making it as I said the traffic itself we believe is a barrier on existing 29 if there's an option to take some of that traffic away it does provide a potential opportunity clearly some benefits and some disadvantages to this

It does, we did some analysis, it does reduce your travel time in a horizon year of 2035 by about 30% through this particular area.

It does obviously remove traffic from existing 29 between 250 and hydraulic and potentially allows you to downgrade this section of the roadway including the intersection at 29 and 250.

It really is something that may perhaps work again in terms of redevelopment, that particular area.

Some disadvantages, obviously a much larger project than a simple interchange at the hydraulic in 29.

We estimate about twice the cost for this project, 60 million versus 120 million, but we do believe that the 60 million really doesn't address the issue for the long term.

Construction impacts, again, because of the much larger side of the project, you're impacting traffic not only on 29, but also traffic on 250.

And clearly, this particular concept really is dependent.

We understand it really is dependent on the idea over the long term that perhaps those properties in that area redevelop, and perhaps a project like this could be integrated into some of that redevelopment thinking.

That's just a brief summary of this particular recommendation on the Colorado study.

I just have a comment and I'll start off with a question.

Yes sir, we did and that's why we said that it would have to be a long-range concept.

It would take many years to

Well I guess that, you know, more a problem, I understand the issue of the choke point, but the issue of the choke point has been created by lack of action to build a bypass and to build connector roads in this area and it seems to me like a rather short-sighted solution to send this through the city, more or less a band-aid approach I guess to try to

We felt that without a Leonard Sanders extension this would not function the way it should either.

So unless you have both

working in conjunction with one another.

You've got a lot of local traffic that needs to be pulled out of that intersection.

It bottles up in the city in the afternoons.

There's a lot of congestion within the city because of it.

And our feeling was that you need to have both of them working together.

We're not going to be able to do that with the alternatives to the West and recognizing that this is in the city.

We don't do anything inside of the city unless it's requested.

Excuse me, requested.

It has been taken out, yes sir.

Why?

Well, we've reviewed it with our administration and they feel that there's no support for it and so they've asked us not to have it in the final report.

I have a couple questions.

Former sea counselor Kevin Lynch gave a lot, he was on the NPO for a number of years and he was full of ideas.

He's an engineer and one of his ideas was to create like a smaller version of what you described here and have it be in the roadway.

So in other words,

If you're traveling south on 29, you would be in the left hand lane, so it would be a through lane that would become a flyover and connect on to 50 going west.

We've looked at several things that have been reviewed in the past.

I don't know that that's one of them.

I guess my question is did you think instead of having I mean your flyover goes the entirety of from where the existing 250 is past the hydraulic intersection to dump cars off that's a long way and I think the problem I have thinking about it is who would want to redevelop property that has a big busy road

Up above it.

I mean that kind of doesn't really sound walkable and attractive particularly.

I think either way you've got, I mean, that concept is fine, but it takes existing 29 and makes it even more of a barrier.

I think there's a trade-off, I mean, the cars need to go somewhere.

We felt like if you could put it into, you know, this concept did not even come into

thinking unless you consider the idea that perhaps that property could be redeveloped.

You could put that road in there, you could put parking structures next to the roadway so that you shield it some.

I mean there are things you can do to start thinking about that and then the payoff is an existing 29 really becomes a much smaller roadway.

So you can reclaim that one as opposed to widening it and putting something over on top on existing 29.

I have a question on another topic entirely, which is one of the recommendations in your study was to have the recommendations of this bigger document become part of the comprehensive plans of each locality.

Well the concept is pretty simple and that is that as part of the comprehensive planning process that we would ask the localities and we're still going to ask the localities to consider the recommendations that are in the final report for inclusion in their comprehensive plans so that before development occurs, developers understand what the concept is for the facility and the county understands that

This is the type of facility that we can afford.

I guess the part I read didn't say that it would ask the localities to consider including it.

Do I read that wrong?

Other questions, comments?

I had a couple of questions.

Ms. Edwards, did you have anything you wanted to add?

In terms of the process, how is it that a proposal like this can end up in a major plan of this nature without, I mean, this is officially the first time we're seeing it.

There's been very little public vetting of this project.

As Mr. Taliaferro said, a lot of city

businesses and property owners that would be affected.

Our Planning Commission, I don't believe, has seen this.

They haven't seen this.

It's not in plan yet.

It's part of our

Review of previous plans providing what we thought were preliminary recommendations based upon those plans.

We were charged by the Commonwealth Transportation Board to look at the entire corridor.

I realize that there's three cities in the job where it does run through three cities and we have no jurisdiction on the arterial system within those cities.

Nevertheless, we needed to look at where the choke points were and the recommendations were preliminary recommendations from us as a team.

For a commuter that's traveling from Gainesville, Virginia down to, let's say, Lynchburg, how much time would they save if we were to make this proposed improvement here?

In terms of time... How much, you said it would reduce the waiting time 30% in this particular... Yeah, just as a spot location.

I think this is part of the entire, you know, place is 29 instead of recommendations.

For each individual motors.

Well, I have a hard time believing that.

You're also talking about 70,000 vehicles a day in 2035.

I mean, it's typical for a project.

If you measure it by an individual car traveling through there, the numbers are never terribly impressive, but you can add it up to it.

All of the evidence that starts.

Alright, so, I don't know if Mr. Tolbert wants to address a specific proposal that we have before us tonight and that we have a letter before us.

Do you want to outline what's in that?

Thank you, gentlemen, very much.

Again, basically the letter just makes several points that

to the Commonwealth Transportation Board stating that one of the recommendations made in the study is that any design solution will be context-sensitive.

We don't believe this is context-sensitive in Charlottesville.

The editor points out that it just seems like this one intersection is being

Singlevale has been a major source of the problem and we believe that the adding of all the traffic signals north of Charlottesville in particular has done more to delay traffic than this one intersection.

Concerned about the $140 million price tag and what that cost especially as compared to

Page 29-250 plan that's already been approved.

Concerned that right now it looks at just a very preliminary and general look that the businesses that would be impacted are seven parcels, ten businesses, almost $900,000 a year in current tax dollars.

Maybe there could be redevelopment or not, but as you saw from the drawing, it obliterates quite a few of our businesses if it goes in.

And just stating a concern that if adopted, there is language in the presentations that this would be the primary mechanism for funding for future road improvements in the area.

and concern that this is not the approach we want to take.

I have a question for the consultants.

If this proposal is not adopted by the city council, would

Is this idea not adopted by the city council?

But originally there was a plan to improve the intersection with 250 bypass.

Those are currently what are in our adopted long range transportation plan and so they would be the guiding factors at this point, those recommendations in the H29-250.

Mr. President, writing the letter only, I think, makes greater sense.

This is the very last sentence.

Up to you all.

And I was wondering if we could add a sentence.

I met with some people from the Southern Environmental Law Center just to kind of

I spent a lot of time looking at this and didn't have a chance to really update us all.

But one of the suggestions that's been made, and I think it's a good one, is to make sure we emphasize how we want to see that section of road improve.

And so they suggested, and I think it's a great idea, is to add a sentence.

If we look at the sample letter written here, it's on page 2, the second bullet.

to add a sentence at the end that says, we would be more than happy to work with officials from VDOT and Albemarle County to explore effective improvements to this area that minimize impacts to city and county residents and businesses.

Yeah, I will.

All right, so we'll include that sentence.

I kind of liked it on the phone.

I'm finally immune, but I'm... That's right.

Okay, so we'll leave it as is, except for the sentence that Dr. Brown suggested adding to the second bullet on page two.

We have a resolution before us authorizing the mayor to sign the attached letter as amended.

Is there a motion to approve the resolution?

So moved.

Is there a second?

Second.

Any further discussion?

If not, please indicate your vote.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, gentlemen.

Appreciate your being here tonight.

Next item on our agenda is a resolution proving numerating of understanding for the SIA grant, Southeastern Energy Alliance, regarding our new, our exciting new, local energy alliance program, LEAP.

Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, Members of Council, in January of 2009, city and county staff along with Mayor Morris and David Brown from the city and David Slutsky from the county started to meet along with the director of Virginia

Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy, Steve Waltz, to talk about a very exciting program to implement a comprehensive community-based energy efficiency program.

From the very beginning, we envisioned that

There will be a possible creation of a new nonprofit entity to act as the operating company to carry out the grant's purposes.

Over this time, since January, we've gone through many iterations of this, and we're finally here tonight with a memorandum of understanding.

And Cynthia Adams, our climate protection program coordinator,

is going to quickly walk you through this program.

I will say, for those of you that may not have seen Cynthia before, she just celebrated her one year anniversary here with the city.

And if we can ever look at a city employee who's made a real impact in one year, I think she's one that we can really look to.

Hello everyone.

It is with much pride and anticipation that I stand here before you tonight to discuss the progress that staff and other community members have made with respect to manifesting the dream that is our local energy alliance.

As you know, in May of 2009, the city and county submitted a joint proposal in response to an RFP from the Southeast Energy Efficiency Alliance.

That proposal was to develop a local energy alliance program to facilitate energy efficiency in our community at scale.

The goals were for a 20-40% efficiency gain and 30-50% of our structures in a 5-7 year window.

It was announced in June that we had won the competitive grant of $500,000 to stand this program up.

Since the announcement, we have been exploring the legal ramifications and limitations with respect to forming the entity that will be our local energy alliance program, or LEAP as we're calling it.

Outside Legal Counsel was engaged as a result of a Blue Moon grant, and the process was coordinated by the Virginia Energy Project.

City and county lawyers met with this outside legal counsel as part of the review process, and the MOU will present to you this night as a direct result of that process.

The Memorandum of Understanding establishes the following.

First, that SIA will redirect the grant to a local operating company, provided that SIA determines that such company meets the criteria outlined in Section 3 of the MOU.

And second, that SIA will agree to perform all due diligence to ensure that the local operating company meets the criteria enumerated in the proposed MOU.

As stated in the MOU, the local operating company must be a non-profit charitable organization.

Its purposes and vision should speak to those outlined by SIA's grant.

The governance board of the company must broadly represent our local community.

And the company must be willing to enter into its own MOU with the city and county on the implementation of energy efficiency and renewable energy programs in our municipality.

The MOU before you will be presented to the Albemarle County's Board of Supervisors on Wednesday and assuming that it is signed, see where we direct the grant funds to an operating company which meets the criteria that I just discussed.

With respect to such an operating company working in our community, we are very pleased to announce

that such a non-profit does now exist.

A group of stakeholders who have been involved in this process has come together to form the governance board for LEAP.

They had their first meeting last week, and it included Charlie Carter, the construction academy program coordinator from PVCC, and Professor Paxton Marshall from UVA School of Engineering, who you might know from the governance board from CCDC SPARC program, which was our own local energy efficiency public education program.

Charlie has worked closely with staff on workforce development and training issues and Paxton, again, has been working with the public education component.

LEAP's governance board has engaged a registered agent to follow their 501c3 paperwork and a lawyer who is also working on their IRS tax exempt status.

In the meantime, the LEAP transition team made up of staff from city and county continue to collaborate with CEA, community stakeholders, our local building trades, and PVCC to better define how such an alliance will work.

In other words, how it will self-sustain, how it will ensure quality and safety in the work it advocates and will fund, and how it will get the message out to our community.

In short, how it will save money, save energy, and create jobs.

I have a question over the board of new agency.

The city and the county, I believe, have been issued, well I know, I've seen the email, an invitation to join the governance board.

I was going to bring that up, actually, in a minute, which is that they have asked us to essentially have the mayor of the city serve in an ex officio manner on the board of directors as the city's liaison to the board.

Right, it was voting, right?

And so I was going to add that to our business tonight is to ratify that so that we have an official representation on the board.

That would be great.

I didn't want to accept on behalf of all future mayors, I think it was important that we

I think this is moving along splendidly and I really commend you and others that have been involved in this effort.

It's a tremendous potential for our community.

Okay.

I would just add as an amendment, as a friendly amendment, that we would designate the mayor as an ex officio and or his or her, sorry, the mayor or his or her designee

as an ex officio member of the board.

Move it as amended.

Is there any further discussion?

If not please indicate your vote.

Good evening, everybody.

Let's do a brief overview.

What's before you tonight is a revised contract for Pound Services and it sets forth the terms, conditions and compensation for this.

This does not include provisions for spay and neutering, just to make that clear, and that will be followed up with a measure once this contract is approved.

This agreement was developed in partnership with the county, Albemarle County and the SPCA.

There is a new funding formula.

Starting July 1, 2010, which is the fiscal year 2011 that we're planning for right now.

That will be based on city population multiplied by $4 and $11, $5, and $12, and then it will be multiplied by CPI factor after that.

For $11, this is roughly $166,000.

For the current fiscal year, the city has appropriated $46,650 with the SPCA plus an additional $39,350 once this contract is put into place.

There are a couple of conditions, one being the contract, another was a review of their financials which that has all been fulfilled.

The County Board of Supervisors will consider this agreement on Wednesday, this upcoming Wednesday, for their consideration and approval.

I'm here for questions.

Rich Harris from the City Attorney's Office is here for questions and we have several folks from the SPCA as well.

Just to reiterate, you mentioned the spay-neuter agreement.

So we had a meeting on Friday and Ms. Kovik from SPCA and Ms. Dunham and Mr. Eyre and myself and you met and basically they committed, SPCA committed to working with our regional partners with the county and the city.

Voices for Animals, other groups on an auxiliary agreement regarding increase in support for spay-neuter and for feral cat.

That's the word I'm looking for.

Measures to reduce the feral cat population and manage the feral cat population humanely.

So that will be a follow-up measure that we've all agreed to pursue and there will be a formal agreement along those lines coming next.

Questions, comments from Miss Beauregard?

I have a comment, a question and a comment.

This idea of a $4 per capita or $5 per capita, where did that, I know the answer to this, but where did that number come from and can you give us a sense of even if we were to go to $5 per capita, we heard some comment to this effect earlier, but how would that compare to the actual costs of providing pound services?

The foreign $5 per capita originally came from a study that was done several years ago through ICMA on the cost of animal control.