City Council Meeting   4/2/2012

A number of proclamations and announcements, which we will do first.

I am very pleased to read a proclamation on behalf of Fair Housing Month for 2012, whereas April is Fair Housing Month and marks the 44th anniversary of the passage of the Federal Fair Housing Act, Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968, as amended by the Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988.

and whereas the Fair Housing Act provides that no person shall be subjected to discrimination because of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, disability or familial status in the rental, sale, financing or advertising of housing and the Virginia Fair Housing Law also prohibits housing discrimination based on elderliness and whereas the Fair Housing Act supports equal housing opportunity throughout the United States and whereas fair housing creates healthy communities and housing discrimination harms us all

Now, therefore, we, the City Council of Charlottesville, hereby supports equal housing opportunity and seeks to affirmatively further fair housing, not only during Fair Housing Month in April, but throughout the year.

Good evening.

Thank you for recognizing the importance of fair housing.

Every April we do commemorate this important civil rights legislation and I would like to thank city council for doing this again this year.

I want to give one message to you and the community and that is for people who are unaware the law protects all of us from housing discrimination and at Piedmont Housing Alliance we work year-round to make sure that people understand that there's a law and there's a place to call with questions concerns or complaints and I want to thank all of our community partners for helping us with the community outreach and as well City Council for your support.

Yes, thank you.

The number to call with questions about housing discrimination or fair housing is 817-2436.

Okay, thank you, Mr. Mayor.

The following is a resolution we will consider during our consent agenda, requesting that the Environmental Protection Agency administrator fully employ and enforce the Clean Air Act to reduce industrial carbon pollution.

Whereas the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that climate change will cause negative public health impacts from direct temperature effects, extreme weather events, climate sensitive diseases,

Dr. Michael Kochis,

Deaths from cardiovascular and respiratory causes increase.

More people visit hospital emergency rooms for asthma, pneumonia, and upper respiratory infections.

And more adults miss work and more children miss school due to illness.

And whereas the American Lung Association says nearly half of all Americans, 48 percent,

still live in areas with unhealthy levels of smog pollution and whereas the city of Charlottesville had three unhealthy air days from ground level ozone pollution above 75 parts per billion in an eight hour period in 2010

and whereas for four decades the Clean Air Act has protected the air we breathe through a proven comprehensive successful system of pollution control that saves lives and creates economic benefits exceeding its cost by many times and whereas between 1970 and 1990 the six main pollutants covered by the Clean Air Act were reduced by between 47 and

and 93% in airborne lead was virtually eliminated and whereas the Clean Air Act has produced economic benefits valued at 2 trillion or 30 times the cost of regulation and whereas the US Supreme Court

ruled in Massachusetts versus the EPA in 2007 that greenhouse gases are air pollutants as defined by the Clean Air Act and the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate them and whereas the Clean Air Act can work immediately to curb greenhouse gas pollution

without new climate legislation or in conjunction with new climate legislation and whereas in 2006 Charlottesville Mayor David Brown with the endorsement of the City Council signed the Mayor's Climate Protection Agreement which has now been signed by more than 1,000 U.S. mayors and whereas in 2007 the City Council adopted a 2025

vision statement for the city, which incorporated goals for a green city, including a goal for clean air.

Be it resolved by the Council of the City of Charlottesville, State of Virginia, Section 1, that the Council respectfully request the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Lisa P. Jackson, and President Barack Obama, to fully employ and enforce the Clean Air Act to do our part

to reduce carbon in our atmosphere to more than 350 parts per million and section 2 that a copy of this resolution be sent to Lisa P. Jackson, Administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mayor Huja.

Community Forgiveness Day.

Whereas the world today is complex, chaotic, and prone to violence, war, and hatred, which affects our families, our children, our neighbors, our work, our community, and ourselves.

Whereas no one religion, gender, race, person, or culture is responsible for terrorism, hatred, and bullying.

Whereas the practice of forgiveness and compassion is universal and can build bridges among people of all ages, abilities, races, religion, and gender.

Whereas we are a community of people, deeply rooted in the founding of Jeffersonian democracy, which itself is based on conflict resolution.

Whereas the city of Charlottesville is home to many talented, brilliant, educated and enlightened people who live together in one community and want to help the world become a better place.

whereas practicing forgiveness and compassion can heal, uplift and transform our community to become a positive example for other communities that also want to resolve conflict whereas mutual appreciation for the diversity of people from all backgrounds and cultures is central to every local healthy community and crucial for the common good of our state, national and international communities

Now, therefore, I, Satyendra Singh Huja, Mayor of Charlottesville, encourage the citizens of Charlottesville to join with the citizens from around the world to celebrate compassionate forgiveness.

on the first international community forgiveness day on Saturday, April 21st.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mayor Huja and members of the council.

On behalf of Synchronicity Foundation and Master Charles Cannon, it's a great honor to accept this proclamation and to say that we acknowledge the council for a very life affirmative action in a world that's very negative.

In 2008, synchronicity in

Mumbai, India showed the world that there really is an alternative to reacting to violence with more violence.

And this year a major publication from Master Charles Cannon entitled Forgiving the Unforgivable describes this experience and has reached an international audience to be an international bestseller and is definitely continuing the conversation on forgiveness.

And I happened to be in Mumbai in 2008.

and I have a colleague, Kia Sher, who was in our picture a moment ago, who lost her family in Mumbai.

And we both agreed that forgiveness is a choice that one can make.

And when that choice is made, it breaks the cycle of violence.

So we acknowledge the council for your support of this proclamation and we clearly

see that it's a strong statement to the values of this community and we also acknowledge that it encourages everyone in the community to take personal responsibility for our choices.

Thank you very much.

Last Proclamations is a challenge

It's called Wayland May's Challenge for Water Conservation.

As you know, we've talked about water conservation quite a bit and this is a competition between the cities and we are hoping to take part in that challenge and all of you will have the opportunity to participate.

So I'm hoping that after I've finished dealing with a brief of this, you will take some action on water conservation.

It's an important part of our community efforts.

whereas the city of Charlottesville continues to explore ways to manage residential consumption of water and power and inspires residents to take care of natural resources where the city can engage in efforts to inspire their own communities as well as their neighboring communities to become better environmental stewards.

Weyland's Mayonnaise Challenge, Association of Mayonnaise Foundation, EPA, Forest Services, Toyota, Waterpik, Rainbird and Healthy Health Profit Competition for Cleaner Communities in the World.

to reduce pollution, whereas residents may register their participation in their series channel online by making simple pledge to decrease their water use and reduce pollution for the period of one year, thereby assisting their communities to apply state and federal conservation strategies in meeting targeted reductions.

So now this is where comes your job, your part of the role.

who has from March 30th to April 30th, the city of Charlottesville wishes to inspire its citizens and its neighboring communities to take the Wayland Mayors Challenge for water conservation by making a series of online pledges.

You can go to www.mywaterpledge.com, let me repeat, www.mywaterpledge.com to reduce the impact on the environment.

Now, therefore, we the City Council of Charlottesville, Virginia, we hereby support Mayor's May Challenge for Water Conservation and encourage all residents to participate in this conservation challenge from March 30th to April 30th, saying the second day of April.

So I will encourage you to go to mywaterpledge.com

and Pledge.

So if you pledge, we can win.

It's a very long situation.

It protects the environment.

It gives victory to ourselves as well as saves you some money.

like who's ahead now in the challenge and we were in first place I also did the same thing and I was very happy to be in first place and I hope it's up to you guys even if you do not live in the city of Charlottesville the living community is also eligible as long as your address says Charlottesville you're eligible and so please make sure that you make a pledge I have a few announcements to make besides the proclamations I hope you'll be patient with me

On Tuesday April 13th at 2pm, there will be a very happy open house on 3-term L.A. Street.

The entire house is open by Habitat.

So if you are interested in housing, please come and join us.

Again on Tuesday April 10th at 10am, there will be a very happy grand opening.

It's called SRO Crossings.

I hope you all take part in and all the members of the Council, especially Dave Norris, should deserve special credit for this and I hope you'll be there at 10 o'clock on Tuesday, April 10th.

I also want to announce that on budget work sessions, tomorrow there is a budget work session from 5 to 7 in the Basement Conference Room and you are welcome to come and make comments.

The public hearing is today.

On Tuesday, April 10th, City Council will adopt the budget.

Another announcement, the City Hall will be closed on Friday, April 13th for Thomas Jefferson's birthday.

I hope you guys have a big party for him.

Bake a cake.

Bake a cake, yeah.

I would be happy to come up and join you for that.

Next, last announcement I want to make is

Playing District 10 has been designated as the America's best intergovernmental community.

I think PDC 10 deserves, this was from best, five communities were selected and region 10 was one of the community, which includes city of Charlottesville and surrounding communities.

So congratulations to them.

I have one.

The city is going to be having a workshop selling to the city.

The city buys a lot of things from flowers to brick laying to lots of other things.

This is a workshop for City of Charlottesville businesses.

Any business located within city limits can attend free.

They can bring one to two representatives per business.

There will be free parking in the Market Street garage and a light continental breakfast will be served, but registration is required.

The topics of the workshop include selling to the City of Charlottesville, Section 3 eligibility and certification, vendor resources, and city buyer's roundtable.

This is on Thursday, April 5th, this Thursday, from 8.30 a.m. until 12.30 p.m. and to register

Actually, may I, did anybody mention the City Market movie?

Oh, you should.

Yes, I actually just saw this.

The City Market will kick off its new season this Saturday.

April 7th at 7 a.m. the City Market offers fresh produce, herbs, plants, grass-fed meats, crafts and baked goods from local vendors every Saturday from 7 a.m. till noon, April through October.

And every Saturday in November and December from 8 a.m. to 1.

Great!

Thank you.

If that, we're going to go to public comments.

There are a few government rules which I'd like to share with you because there are a lot of people who wish to speak.

First half of the hour we'll have up to 12 speakers and there's a set of lists which I'll follow.

Please limit your comments to three minutes and I'll have this timer there so I hope I don't have to remind you too much.

So please feel free to comment on anything you like except if there's an item already on the agenda, for example, public hearing and city council budget.

If you have comments on the budget, wait till then and not in just half an hour, okay?

I'm here to speak against continuing fluoride.

It is later on your agenda.

May I speak on it now?

Yes.

All right.

I'm in favor of ending water fluoridation because of the health risk that it poses.

Also, it's been shown that its protective action in preventing tooth decay is topical, not systemic.

and Dr.

Peek provided a memo and I will respond to some of those points that she made.

There are health effects that come from ingesting fluoridated water.

The National Research Council report in 2006, which she cites, identified three clinical conditions caused by excess fluoride, severe skeletal fluorosis, dental fluorosis, and bone fractures.

Excess fluoride causes other health problems, but these were the three that they focused on.

Additionally, the

Virginia Department of Dental Health received in 2010 $150,000 for community fluoridation.

Of that $150,000, a certain portion is used to educate on the benefits of fluoridation.

Because fluoridation is a medication, it's put in the water to treat the person.

you must also disclose the risk and the health adverse effects from the medication.

I don't believe that's been done because I don't believe mothers have been told with bottle fed babies not to make your formulas with fluoridated water.

Has that education been done?

I don't think so.

And so informed consent to be medicated is missing.

I did not give my consent to be medicated because I am aware of the health risk of fluoridated water.

But many people aren't even aware that there is a risk.

Additionally, Dr.

Peek mentioned that fortifying water is similar to vitamin C, iodine and table salt.

It's not, because it's not a vitamin.

It's not anything that your body needs.

It's not a food, so it's not similar.

Good evening, Mayor Huja and city councilors.

My name is Bethany Hurley and I live in Charlottesville at 414 Oak Street.

I'm a member of the Charlottesville Chapter of Virginia Organizing, which works on issues of justice and fairness throughout the state of Virginia and is also part of the Charlottesville Albemarle Criminal Justice Coalition.

One of my fellow Virginia organizing members will speak tonight about minority representation in supervisory

and managerial positions in the city of Charlottesville, I am here to address another issue of great concern to us, disproportionate minority contact with the criminal justice system.

According to data published by the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services, African American youth represent 36% of the youth population in Charlottesville.

However, they account for 70% of arrests, 69% of juvenile court intake referrals,

77% of detention placements, 78% of probation placements, and 83% of cases resulting in confinement.

In July 2009, the Task Force on Race Disparity and Disproportionality in Youth Services convened by the Charlottesville Albemarle Commission on Children and Families found that, taking into account all risk factors, Caucasian youth in Charlottesville are four times more likely to be diverted

from the juvenile justice system.

These statistics substantially demonstrate the need to reduce disproportionate minority contact with the criminal justice system in our area.

But even beyond these numbers, we must also consider the real impact this biased approach has on human lives and our local community.

This inherent unfairness and inequality in the administration of justice leads to mistrust and a lack of confidence in systems that are meant to be impartial.

I urge city council to consider the proposal submitted by the Charlottesville Albemarle Criminal Justice Coalition requesting the establishment of a task force on disproportionate minority contact with the criminal justice system.

Such a task force need not work in isolation as there are already organizations from the local to the national level working on related issues.

Numerous resources and recommendations are available and the timing is very appropriate considering the city's recent application to participate in the racial and ethnic disparities reduction project.

The task force's mandate could involve identifying what resources already exist in our community and encouraging collaboration among relevant organizations and agencies in order to ensure progress.

In demonstrating a commitment to reducing disproportionate minority contact,

City Council could make great strides towards fulfilling the idea in its own vision statement that, quote, Charlottesville is committed to racial and cultural diversity, inclusion, racial reconciliation, economic justice, and equity.

I therefore urge you to consider establishing a task force to study and address this significant problem in the Charlottesville community.

Jordan McNish, 1800 Jefferson Park Ave. Hello Mayor Huja, Councillors.

Most of you already know that I'm here to present a resolution against the war on drugs, specifically marijuana.

It should be in your email.

When I came to council a few meetings ago, I was pleasantly surprised to hear that most people on this council were sympathetic to the cause of marijuana decriminalization.

I immediately started working on a resolution and have had input from marijuana advocacy groups, concerned citizens, and even input from you.

I'm here today to ask Mayor Huja to put it on Council's agenda.

I'll take this opportunity to ask everyone here that supports this resolution to stand.

Here's the text of the resolution.

Calling on the Governor and Virginia General Assembly to revisit laws regarding cannabis.

Whereas scientific and medical studies have repeatedly found that any effect marijuana has on users and those around them is significantly more benign than the effects of alcohol.

And whereas any adverse effects of marijuana are greatly overshadowed by the adverse effects of current Virginia marijuana laws and penalties.

and whereas Virginia made 19,764 marijuana-related arrests in 2009 alone, the Virginia taxpayers have burdened annually with the cost of resultant prosecutions, supervisions, and incarcerations.

And whereas public opinion has steadily shifted in favor of marijuana decriminalization or legalization, and for the first time there are more Americans who support marijuana law reform than there are those who favor keeping it illegal.

and whereas in Virginia, recreational smokers found with one half ounce of marijuana or more may be erroneously charged with intent to distribute without any evidence that marijuana was intended for distribution and whereas the Dillon Rule limits the ability of Charlottesville City Council to enact an ordinance regarding marijuana possession

Now, therefore, let it be resolved that Charlottesville City Council recognizes that marijuana offenses in which cannabis is intended for adult personal use and intoxicated driving is not involved should be Charlottesville's lowest law enforcement priority.

Law enforcement should perform all other duties before using valuable time and resources pursuing possible marijuana violations.

Those limited resources should be directed primarily toward violent and serious crime rather than nonviolent cannabis users.

When citizens are found in violation of state marijuana laws, viable alternatives to incarceration should be implemented whenever possible and should receive adequate funding.

My name is Thomasine Wilson.

I live in 4080 Cypress Point Drive.

and I'm here representing Virginia Organizing and I have one question.

I'm following up on something I had presented to you in February and I think it was brought before you in September and it's based on the hiring practice of minorities in the city of Charlottesville and we're supposed to be having a work session and I was told there would be a work session coming up real soon and we have yet to have a work session come to pass and my question to you, when and where and how soon?

You need to make your comments.

We'll respond to later on.

You're not going to hear us right now after the meeting.

Okay.

I was told there would be a work session coming up, and they had promised to do one right after February.

It's March, now we're into April.

Thank you.

Good evening.

I'm Ed McCann.

I live in Lynchburg, but I'm here representing Virginia Normal.

We're a statewide group dedicated to legalizing marijuana in Virginia.

I just have a few points about the lowest priority resolution you have in front of you.

Other cities across the country have done this, so it's not unfamiliar territory.

Seattle, Denver, Fayetteville, Arkansas, a number of localities, Missoula County, Montana.

and I looked, in Seattle they implemented a citizen oversight committee which had representatives from public health, mental health services, police, youth services, that sort of thing and members of the public and advocates for cannabis users and they had published their findings over four years there was no increase in youth marijuana use there was no increase in crime there was no adverse effect on public health

Fewer adults were being involved in criminal justice system from the personal use of marijuana and there was a small reduction in resources dedicated to marijuana possession cases and a slight increase in resources for other priorities.

Like most cities, as a percentage of arrests, it's not that high.

But we believe that any arrests are inappropriate to deal with a use of this substance, as has been pointed out, is safer than alcohol, which we regulate effectively, more or less.

A previous speaker also mentioned disproportionate minority impact in the criminal justice system.

Nothing more than the war on drugs impacts minorities more and more harmfully.

and this is evident in communities across Virginia.

Arrest rates for blacks are two to three to six times higher for marijuana than they are for whites, even though whites use it more.

And we're dedicated to ending this practice.

And I just urge you to support the resolution.

Good evening.

Brandon Collins, 536 Meade Avenue.

Lived in Charlottesville my entire life.

I have a teenage daughter who's lived here her entire life as well.

First I'm going to speak on behalf of my health and self after hearing a few of the commenters before me.

This council, I think, has been presented tonight and certainly in the past with all kinds of ideas of how to approach racism and the war on drugs and it's time that you all get serious about it.

You know, when they had the book panel discussion on the New Jim Crow and mass incarceration, some of you are here and you're all kind of nodding in agreement and

You know, what is going on right now in our city and across the country, you can do something about that.

And I think deprioritizing the drug war, deprioritizing marijuana,

attempting to deal with discrimination, looking at the juvenile justice things.

These are all things that you can do something about and if you firmly believe that you want to have a city that is not supporting racism, that is actually moving forward in a good direction, that you think about these things long and hard and work to make them a reality, you can do it and it's not going to cost you much.

That said,

Speaking on behalf of FAR, Public Housing Association of Residents, one of the most important groups here in Charlottesville, certainly the only group that organizes collectively to empower residents in public housing.

I wanted to remind you of our platform items that we presented to you a while back.

Some of this includes funding, so I won't talk about it until the budget hearing, but I did want to remind you of this stuff.

give you another copy of that.

So these things include expanding and supporting the clinics at West Haven and Crescent Halls where you have quite a few elderly people, a whole lot of folks with disabilities and the staff that are working there are doing an amazing job and they're much needed and I hope you'll continue to support them and expand your support for them.

Community policing, again, when we're looking at ways to confront mass incarceration and things like that, there's another way besides just locking people up or just having a heavy hand and that is involving the community.

seeing what it is they want and having them work with police instead of having the police work against people.

After school programs are much needed and particularly at the 6th Street Community Center where there is no after school program and there are a lot of children there at the 6th Street development there and you know, it's not going to cost a lot of money.

South First Street as well, there is a small program there but it doesn't last very long and we would love to see that expand.

and get some computers in these places.

So my time's up, but also reentry for ex-offenders.

I know you all support it.

Hi, my name is DJ Bickers, and I'm a dentist in town.

I'm from Charlottesville, raised in Charlottesville, and I'm here tonight as a dentist but also as a concerned parent.

I've been treating families and kids in Charlottesville for 15 years, and I want to talk to you about the benefits of fluoride in the water system.

The benefits are it's been proven to be safe, ethical, and effective.

I've done a lot of research.

I've looked through studies from the CDC, the AMA, the Academy of Pediatrics, the World Health Organization, the ADA.

The CDC claims that the fluoridation of community water is one of the 10 great public health achievements of the 20th century.

I was going to provide a lot of stats and a lot of studies, but I realized that

What matters is the people, the health of the people.

And as dentists, we want what's best for the public.

And besides, both sides have lots of statistics, which you'll hear.

So I just wanted to touch on it.

I mean, what is community fluoridation?

It is just basically adding fluoride that naturally occurs in our groundwater to an optimal level.

The optimal level that's been proven to make teeth stronger and more resistant to cavities.

It is 0.7 parts per million.

It was very difficult for me to conceptualize that, so this may help.

It's similar to one inch in 16 miles, one minute in 12 years, or one cent in $10,000.

and it's a very small amount.

In order to reach toxicity, a 155 pound man has to drink 10,000 cups of water in one sitting to become toxic of our community water fluoridation.

The opposition has compelling propaganda.

I was swayed.

I went on, I researched and I, so I did some more research because I was like, wow, you know.

And so I asked pediatricians, I asked biologists, I asked respected toxicologists and emergency room doctors what their take was.

Every one of them said that it's safe and it helps.

They've seen the results of what happens when

from rural areas, children and patients coming in without fluoridation.

So I wanted to say who needs it?

It's basically who needs it the most is not the educated and the people that take responsibility to go to work and

That sounded terrible.

I'm sorry.

It's the people that need it the most are kids, I think.

I think it's kids and the at-risk part of the society.

because they don't have access to dental care.

I'm on the board of the Children's Dental Center and one of the most difficult things that we do is try to get these children into this facility and get the help they need.

Topical fluoride application is a wonderful thing but it's all about getting it out to the community.

Okay, okay.

I'm wrapping it up.

Basically, the community fluoridation helps prevent cavities.

If cavities are left untreated, they can result in loss of work, loss of school, loss of money to the taxpayers because we end up paying for their care.

It can result in death.

Thank you.

I'm not sure if you can hear what it is.

I brought you some pictures.

Oh, by the way, my name is David Rennig, and I'm at 609 East Market Street, and I've come to talk to you against the Floridean.

it uh... from an engineering point of view uh... the floor of Dean is uh... floor main is uh... this is the first time I've done this so uh... breathe, that's it

It causes problems from an engineering point of view because you remember how we used to all put something in the back of our toilet to put a lot more chlorine in and then we discovered that putting all that chlorine in made the rubber parts disappear and after a while we all decided not to do that.

This product is very effective at staying in the water, and that's the reason that we're supposed to be using it.

So instead of using chlorine, we will be using chloramine, and that will stay in the water longer.

Well, what it does is it makes the parts in our toilet go bad, it makes the parts in our water heaters, etc., and all the appliances we have in the house.

There's an EPA document out about how you can use this to leach lead out of minerals or out of rock and also you can use it to leach gold out but the EPA doesn't recommend it because it's too toxic to use.

There's been instances in McLean

here in Virginia where there was a water pipe that broke open and it killed all the fish that were in a local stream.

So it's a very toxic substance that stays in the water quite a long time.

We expect that it will take thousands more dollars to repair all the equipment in the house over time.

So what you're doing is if you do decide to use this less expensive product, what it does is in effect it transfers the cost from the water supply to the homeowner.

Now, if you decide that you want to filter it, it's almost impossible to filter.

You cannot filter it in your shower because it has to lay in a bed of charcoal, active charcoal, to get rid of all the chloramine.

For high flow users, like showering and bathing, a whole house filter system would be needed.

A whole house filtration system costs between 10

and $15,000 with about $1200 of maintenance per year.

So there's other costs that as homeowners, if we wanted to get rid of this, we would have to provide.

You know the water filters that we all have on our home faucets, they'll never work anymore.

You won't be able to take the taste or the chemical out of the water.

So I strongly recommend that we rethink this.

Joni Freeman, 609 East Market Street, across the street.

And thank you for letting me talk with you again about chloramine.

Charlottesville is a beautiful place.

I'm concerned about a lot of the health and the cost factor, but also about the environment.

And chloramine's effects on our environment are very different than chlorine.

Water containing concentrations of

Chloramine is deadly to aquatic life, the fish, the frogs, and the invertebrate.

The same is true of chlorine.

However, there is a huge difference here.

Chlorine dissipates quickly and chloramine stays weeks before it dissipates.

So if water main, as Dave just mentioned, breaks,

leaking out into our natural resources.

It stays in the water for weeks and in turn will kill fish or any of the invertebrate.

It takes a long time to dissipate and even in a minor spill in a local waterway can result in a serious fish kill.

In central Virginia, trout fishing is a big sport.

So if we start killing off our trout, we're cutting off a economic factor to our community.

McLean, as Dave mentioned, had one of these spills.

The Pimitt Run River goes through McLean.

And according to an article on April 2nd, 2008, the addition of the Fairfax County Times,

A water main broke, leaking hundreds of gallons of chloramine water into the Pimitt Run and killed 90% of the fish.

And the spill even killed earthworms.

This is according to Ed Pickens of the Fairfax Trails and Streams.

The article went on to state that this happened over several miles, so it wasn't just a little area that got infected.

So there are concerns how chlorine will affect agriculture and our economics.

It will affect hydroponics and we have a wonderful farm down south of us that produces hydroponic vegetables that are brought into our city market.

Aquaculture, we have a CSF in our farmer's market that is aquaculture.

Mushroom growing will be affected.

bermaculture and composting all needing water that is chlorine free.

Chlorine will dissipate, chloramine won't.

So I also am asking you to really seriously look into and you're gonna be getting a packet of information even though other communities are using this as a cheap way to filter our water.

We need to use our heads, we need to research this a little more thoroughly so we don't make a hazardous decision.

Thank you.

Hello, good evening.

I'm Laurie Delahanty and I brought presents.

I happened to read the memo from Thomas Frederick to the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority about the summary on chloramines in the water supply and I saw that it was actually the cheap way out of this and this is clearly a case of being penny wise and pound foolish and I would like to speak about the possible health effects of using chloramine in the water.

And first of all, I would like to highlight a study done by Virginia Tech that was done in Washington DC on the water, on the lead levels because chloramine leaches lead from plumbing so much more efficiently than chlorine does.

In fact, the combination of fluoridated water and chloramine act synergistically to pull

so much more lead out of the water than either chemical alone.

And the study that Virginia Tech did stated that the, and I quote, the number of babies and toddlers with elevated lead levels in their bloodstream increased by more than four times since their decision to change disinfectants from free chlorine to chloramine.

and it's four times.

There are other health effects caused by chloramine and people that are immunocompromised, it turns out chloramine cannot kill the pathogens as well as chlorine does.

People who are immunocompromised, that is these are cancer chemotherapy patients,

HIV patients, organ transplant recipients, they still have to boil their water 10 minutes before drinking it because chloramine is not as effective a killer of pathogens as chlorine is.

Chloramine causes and aggravates respiratory problems.

It causes increases in asthma, especially in children.

The kidney dialysis patients cannot use chlorinated water in their dialysis machines because it will cause hemolytic anemia, which is a life-threatening condition.

Chloramine is very reactive to hemoglobin in the blood, it oxidizes hemoglobin, it causes all the red cells to rupture.

and I don't think Thomas Frederick had even approached either Martha Jefferson Hospital or UVA Medical Center about possible effects on its patients, especially those that are on dialysis and those that are on chemotherapy.

Chlorine you can easily get out of the system.

Chloramine, you can't filter it out.

You just can't filter it out easily and this is definitely going to have an effect on our community.

Good evening, my name is Sarah Knapp.

I'm here to speak to you guys in regards to a petition that we're starting in regards to chloramine, which we've been speaking about.

And if I may, if I could go ahead and just read the petition to you, I think that that sums it up nicely.

It's entitled, RWSA, do not use chloramines in our drinking water.

We undersign are greatly concerned about the RWSA's proposed use of chlorobines as a secondary water treatment chemical for Charlottesville and the surrounding area.

Given the reported levels of chlorine byproducts in our drinking water and the RWSA's targets for the chlorine byproducts reported in the Hazan and Sawyer Executive Summary Report provided by RWSA, we don't understand why it's necessary.

to change secondary treatment methods and call on the RWSA to clarify the reasoning for changing the water treatment method.

Furthermore, we are strongly opposed to the use of chloramines in our water supply for the following reasons.

The EPA's own reports on chloramine indicate that there has been little study on the effect of water treated with chloramines on human health and natural ecosystems.

There is evidence that bioproducts formed during the use of mono-chloramine

as a disinfectant may be mutagenic and carcinogenic.

Use of chloramines has also been associated with numerous health problems including respiratory health issues.

There's strong evidence that drinking water treated with chloramines kills fish and amphibians if released into the aquatic environment, as you heard.

It has been well demonstrated during the lead scandal in Washington, D.C. that the use of chloramines in drinking water causes increased leaching of lead and copper from copper piping.

This can cause very high lead levels in drinking water and is a major threat to human health.

For these reasons, we urge the board of supervisors

City Council and the RWSA to re-evaluate the need for new water treatment method.

If needed, a new treatment method is required.

We strongly urge the Board of Supervisors, Council and RWSA to utilize a safer water treatment

Method to Preserve Human Health and the Health of Our Streams.

I'm a new member.

I'm a new resident to Charlottesville.

And to be honest, I was kind of, I was surprised that this was even an issue here.

And that's why I quickly got on board to help out and to see what we can do.

I believe that the members of Charlottesville, the citizens of Charlottesville are on board.

And we've gathered in less than a month over 200 signatures.

I know this momentum is going to grow.

So I look forward into presenting the final numbers when that time comes.

Hello, my name is Thomas Silverstein.

I live at 210 Sunset Avenue in the city of Charlottesville.

I'm a second year law student at the University of Virginia School of Law, and I'm also the chairman of the board of directors of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, which is a national nonprofit organization that represents over 200 chapters around the world.

of student activist organizations that are working to end the war on drugs and believe that education rather than incarceration is the linchpin of a sound drug policy.

I've come before you today to speak in favor of the lowest law enforcement priority policy that has been proposed tonight.

I believe that marijuana arrests and convictions pose a problem for this community and others like it.

that is more serious than we often think at first blush.

The reason is this.

The consequences of a marijuana conviction are not just the brief time in jail that a person might spend because of it.

They reach access to public benefits, access to federal financial aid, and employability.

People with marijuana convictions face widespread employment discrimination.

limited educational choices and limited economic opportunity.

Because of this wide range of collateral consequences, people with marijuana convictions are sometimes unable to participate in the community as full citizens.

And that fact undermines the basic intent of our drug laws, which presumably is to advance the public interest and public safety by marginalizing large numbers of our community

Thank you.

Those are all the people who have signed for these comments.

I would allow one or two more if there are anybody who didn't sign and would like to speak.

We are running late today.

All right, this is on the, oh, I'm Rose Purdy, at the moment, homeless.

I quit smoking weed with no support to save my friends and for fear of jail.

Not only did I experience a kind of withdrawal, but I've also dealt with the full brunt of the diseases that I was medicating.

The only other options for treatment of manic depression, anxiety, anger, and ADHD are drugs such as Lithium, Paxil, and Ritalin.

These drugs are often released on the market without enough testing, and this leaves them with known undesirable side effects as well as unknown side effects.

This makes me extremely hesitant to take them, especially when marijuana is so effective in treating all the problems at once with minimal side effects.

Not to mention that I'm in that poor bracket where I can't afford a doctor to prescribe and assist me in experimenting with designer drugs anyway.

I'm choosing drug court over jail because it is the obvious choice.

The people at OAR and Region 10 refuse to acknowledge these problems.

They do not offer vouchers to the poor for things like anger management classes, psychiatric evaluations, doctor's appointments, or the ensuing prescriptions.

In fact, the opposite occurs, exacting restitution from the poorest and charging for these services.

They take up massive amounts of my time while offering no help at all.

They even require you to work 35 hours a week.

However, they will not make schedule allowances so that you can actually do so.

We want you to succeed, they say to me, and in part this is honest because being an arm of the law, they do not want me to choose jail.

This would take even more of our taxes.

Nor do they want me to resume what they consider criminal behavior, as that would likely end in the same result.

So in that sense, they are honest.

They want me to complete the program.

However, there's no care or desire for my well-being behind it.

There is no intention for me to become a member of society, and I would like this to change.

I propose that OAR and Region 10 be replaced by free and voluntary clinics, complete with the health care services they now lack.

Quitting has actually not been all bad for me.

I have remembered that I have all these issues that need to be addressed, medical and mental and whatnot.

Previously I addressed them alone and I'm completely uneducated in these things.

I discovered within myself an inner strength I did not know I possessed in having to go it alone.

I realized that I was overmedicating, a problem that clinics and decriminalization would probably alleviate.

I'm in the position I am today because I feel a complete lack of resources, and if I had access to resources, I would be happy to take full advantage of them.

and so far I've only spoken to personal experience but in dealing with politics, revenue is often loud or heard so I must speak to that as well before I'm done.

I am done.

I find it a gross waste of our tax money that drug addicts are in prisons next to violent offenders and I've witnessed our peace officers' energies also sorely misdirected in the same regard.

And as I've already mentioned, OAR could pay the same number of people and be much more productive.

And all this money is wasted on the war on drugs.

And the war is thoroughly lost.

Let us tear down the system and rebuild it with a humanitarian attitude.

Thank you.

This is the annual summons period.

I'll start.

I know we're going to be talking about chloramines later and fluoride and some of the other issues that came up but I do want to thank everybody who spoke on those issues and I think there's a lot of concerns that are shared at least among some of us on some of those fronts.

I do want to thank in particular the speakers who talked about disproportionate minority contact with the criminal justice system.

I know the proposal has come forward to create a task force.

I believe it's going to be on our next agenda, is that right?

That's correct.

And I strongly support an effort to get our arms around that issue.

It's a very troubling issue and I'm glad to hear it's on our agenda for our next meeting for discussion.

I am in full support of adding the resolution, Mr. McNish's resolution to an upcoming council agenda I'll go ahead and tell you now that I'm planning to vote for it if we do get it onto an agenda I do think the amount of resources that we devote to

Well said Dave.

Yes and thank you all for coming and we will have a lively discussion I think about both fluoride and chloramines and wanted to ditto Dave's

for addressing the disproportionate minority contact.

And thank you everybody who came about the marijuana issue.

It is a really serious one.

And Rose, thank you particularly for your honesty and well said, very nicely said.

Yes, again, thank you for coming and all the information about the chloramines has been extremely helpful and again I look forward to the discussion later on this evening and I do appreciate the different viewpoints on fluoride.

It's what we do in a free society to talk about both sides of every issue and it's very, very much appreciated.

Concerning the legalization of marijuana,

As I said at the previous council meeting, I'm very, very, very concerned about the way we sentence and that we are looking at drugs as if they are purely a crime instead of something that needs to be dealt with seriously as a disease, as something that as some of our speakers have said tonight that are masking other issues, other very serious issues.

Because I see this as a very serious issue, I do not have the information right now to say that I am going to unequivocally endorse any one statement that was made tonight.

I'm going to be meeting with Mr. Tom Van Hemert on Thursday, who is the criminal justice planner for the Community Criminal Justice Board.

And I think that that might be something that we can look into very seriously and ask them if they would be going to participate in helping us find the right solution for this very complex problem.

What I can say is that I am very, very supportive of our revisiting the Sentencing Guidelines.

For all drugs, including marijuana, be it for simple possession or intent to distribute, I do believe we need to emphasize diversion and treatment for all drug-related crimes over long terms of incarceration to reduce crime, lessen prison overcrowding, and hasten positive re-entry back into the community.

I do believe we need to carefully study the costs and benefits of decriminalizing, legalizing, or regulating marijuana like alcohol.

It is a drug, however, and the younger people use it, they can become mentally, psychologically addicted to it.

So I would very much want to be a party to any legislative reforms that we could discover in working with the CCJB.

First of all I appreciate all the people coming and talking about different issues and I have learned a great deal in the information you have brought and we will hope to discuss this later part of the meeting.

As to the question of marijuana, I have certain concerns that I am going to study it and I am not sure where I am going to land, but I am going to at least explore the possibility.

I agree with all of that.

I'd also like to just sort of go back to Ms. Wilson's request.

It's already on the list.

I would like to underline that as well, especially in light of the fact that we have discovered that 77% of our employees do not live in the city.

Maybe you could schedule a work session and then we can discuss these issues.

Sure.

And then I also, I would like to beg the public's mercy for a moment.

I have my own statement that I'd like to make.

You can pretend I'm standing down there.

and it has to do with the fact that I'm a city councilor, which is why I'm bringing it up tonight.

On March 23rd, historian Ed Ayers spoke at the Festival of the Book Luncheon.

It was a fascinating talk, a perspective on the Civil War that I sure didn't hear growing up in Mississippi, at least not in school.

Like any good talk about books and history, it got me thinking.

My thoughts turned to how the Civil War and more generally history is portrayed in our public life in Charlottesville.

Like most southern cities, our downtown public spaces are dominated by statues of Civil War generals and icons.

Johnny Reb and his cannons outside the courthouse, Generals Jackson and Lee in their respective parks.

These are the only visible monuments in our entire downtown, and they commemorate a five year period in our 250 year history that many might argue was not our finest hour.

And I began thinking, as I have often thought, about what that says about how we view ourselves today and about how we present ourselves to the world.

So when the time came for questions after Dr. Ayer's talk, I asked one.

I asked, is it time to begin having a conversation about whether we want to be portrayed publicly by such a one-sided representation of our history?

Did he think it was time to talk about moving or removing these statues or to balance them out with other representations of our historical tapestry?

By the gasps around me, you would have thought I'd asked if it was okay to torture puppies.

But Dr. Ayers agreed that such conversations are absolutely overdue and that he personally, as an historian, would lean toward adding new images rather than removing the old.

Well, I expected that my question would ruffle some feathers, and I expected it would start some conversations, which is exactly what I was hoping for.

What I did not expect, though perhaps I should have, was the firestorm of vitriol and hatred ignited by my comments and the news stories they engendered.

Tell your mother, one caller told one of my kids on the phone, that she's an effing whore and to get her effing hands off our heritage.

Effing is not the word he used.

In emails and phone calls and hundreds of comments on the daily progress in NBC 29 sites, I was called many things that I can't repeat here, including a host of anti-black and anti-Jewish epithets.

Told that I had stirred up disharmony between the races by my comments.

and warned that violence would ensue if I dared suggest that the statues be torn down.

I was told that I didn't understand Southern heritage and that these statues stand for all that is good and noble and proud in the South.

And then there were the many thoughtful comments by people who, like Mr. Ayers, felt that the statue should stay because they record an important moment in our history, as well as another important moment when wealthy white Southerners across the South, like Mr. Paul McIntyre, felt compelled to erect these monuments at a time when the South was feeling the first stirrings of the NAACP and the struggle for civil rights.

One woman even commented on the NBC site, I came here to say that the statues are part of the history of the community and there is no need to take them down since they clearly are historical and have no other meaning.

But after reading the bigotry and some of the other comments, I realize the statues may still represent something hateful to a small but vocal subset of our community.

If it turns out this is true and these are not just internet trolls, I would be amenable to moving the statues to a new specific historical and educational setting and replacing them in our municipal parks with something that represents the community we live in today.

Now, I don't think that most of the worst comments came from people in Charlottesville.

There was a post on an Aryan Nation's website about it that generated a lot of them.

But if my childhood in Tougaloo, Mississippi taught me one thing, it is that the kind of hate-filled bigotry evidenced in the comments and calls I've received is not meaningless, nor is it irrelevant.

I believe it represents a far smaller group of people than it once did.

But it's not so long ago that my father was beaten senseless by a group of white men in Jackson saying those exact same things.

Or that my mother was spit on by society ladies for being involved with the civil rights movement.

Or that her neighbor's house was bombed by the KKK and their daughter killed.

The South does have a proud heritage.

The heritage of those like my parents and others who fought for equal rights in the 1960s and still do today.

The heritage of countless enslaved parents who taught their children to believe in themselves in a society that considered them property.

the heritage of people who farmed and loved this land before the Europeans came, the 21st century entrepreneurs who are spurring a high-tech economic renaissance in our region.

I'm proud of our southern heritage, so proud that it saddens me to see it reduced to two Confederate generals and a myth of the superiority of a proud, noble, slave-holding South in which only a few held power.

Women, of course, couldn't vote, nor could slaves or anyone who didn't own property.

So yes, I believe that we should be having this conversation, especially now in light of our 250th anniversary and the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.

I'd like to know what you think about it, but please do me a favor.

Thank you.

I will move to our agenda.

Are there any classroom responses before we move to the question agenda?

Item A, minutes from March 19th, March 21st and March 22nd.

Item B, an appropriation, Albemarle County reimbursement for Preston Morris building envelope restoration, $1,426.28, second of two readings.

Item C, an appropriation, Albemarle County reimbursement for CATEC monument sign, $2,301.50, second of two readings.

Item D, an appropriation for the Albemarle County reimbursement for Gordon, Avenue, Library, Elevator and Restroom, $25,232.84, second of two readings.

Item E, an appropriation for the Albemarle County reimbursement for CATEC Bus Loop, $6,541.22, second of two readings.

Item F, an appropriation for the Albemarle County reimbursement for Central Library McIntire Room, $487.50, second of two readings.

Item G, an appropriation for the Albemarle County reimbursement, Gordon Avenue Library building envelope masonry, $1,368.78, second of two readings.

Item H, an appropriation for the 2011 Juvenile Accountability Block Grant, $14,169, second of two readings.

Item I, an appropriation for state assistance for spay and neuter program at the SPCA, $853.42, second of two readings.

Item J, an appropriation for the Virginia Department of Health special nutrition programs, $95,000, first of two readings.

Item K, an appropriation for domestic violence services coordinator grant, $47,548, first of two readings.

Item L, a resolution for EPA, Clean Air Act Request, first of one reading.

Item M, a resolution for Sal's Restaurant Cafe Square footage, first of one reading.

Thank you.

Are there any items on the consent agenda which anybody has to wish to comment on?

Second.

Second.

All those in favor?

Next item is a public hearing of City Council proposed 2013 budget.

Mr. Mayor, Members of Council, thank you.

We have several items for consideration tonight regarding the budget for this year.

We have our public hearing followed by the first reading of our annual tax levy and the first reading of our budget appropriation for the City Council.

We are now in the home stretch of our budget process for fiscal year 2013.

This evening we'll have Ms. Beauregard come up and speak in just a moment as we lead into our public hearing for this evening.

We have made a couple of changes, amendments to the city manager's budget.

for your consideration this evening.

We also have a few items that we'll need to discuss at tomorrow evening's work session that will finish up the business portion of our budget and then of course we'll have the vote on April 10th.

Thank you.

This is going to be a really quick PowerPoint just to kind of go over some administrative amendments that have been made to the city manager's budget.

Council is still wrapping up their budget so we've got a little bit more work yet to do.

On the revenue side, we have a few amendments to make.

We are increasing revenues.

School Community Service Officers contract, this is a contract that the schools have with us each year to provide CSO services in the schools.

It's increasing $10,609 and that was just an error made as part of the proposed budget.

So that's the actual increase that the contract should be for next fiscal year.

Sales and use tax, we're projecting to increase by another $204,000 based on some new trend information that we've looked at.

Lodging tax, same thing, increasing by another $25,500.

First-T revenue, again, this is just a, I didn't put this correctly in the proposed budget, so that should be an increase of $2,000.

in the adopted budget and miscellaneous revenues is going up by 2091.

On the side that's decreasing revenues, again, recreation revenue was overstated by $95,000, so I've had to bring that down slightly.

Tax on bank stock, we looked at some new data and that's going to also decrease by $100,000.

And utility services consumer tax, the same thing.

And what's affecting that right now is the warm weather we've been having.

That is the tax on your water and your gas and your electric bills.

So total revenue amendments, a decrease of $50,000 from the city manager's proposed budget for a total budget right now of $146.1 million.

On the expenditure side, at one of Council's previous budget work sessions, they wanted staff to look at during the year, we didn't really determine this yet, living wage adjustments to be determined, and we've set aside $50,000 for that.

In turn, we took $50,000 out of the 3% employee bonus pool, which I said we could handle and still do the 3% bonus.

on top of that.

And then debt service, we're saving another $50,000.

We're actually refinancing some bonds.

It's going to save us a million dollars over the life of that, so that helps on that end.

So, same with revenues.

Expenditures are going down $50,000 for a total budget of $146.1 million.

On the capital budget side, we increased the bond issuance by $850,000.

and you'll see on the expenditure side a corresponding $850,000 expenditure for a fire apparatus replacement.

This is replacing an 18-year-old piece of equipment that obviously has lived its life.

Other changes on the expenditure side, undergrounding utilities is going down by $100,000.

This in the original budget was for three projects, only two of which are going to be happening in the next fiscal year.

and we also decreased the Charlottesville Housing Fund unallocated pool by $100,000.

On the increased capital expenditure side, you'll see an increase of $100,000 that's going to be dedicated to the housing authority, the fire truck apparatus I mentioned before, and bicycle infrastructure is increasing by $100,000.

So the total CIP is going to increase by $850,000 in fiscal year 13 to $17.2 million.

So at last week's council budget work session, council discussed several programs.

That was the work session focusing on non-profit and outside agencies.

And the items discussed that we're going to kind of put this in a whole package tomorrow night.

So that's why the budget tonight doesn't really reflect these yet, but they will once council kind of completes the budget picture tomorrow night.

And they can amend the budget at that time.

Literacy volunteers.

$9,463, this fully funds their request for 13.

Commission on Children and Families, a $10,500 increase.

FAR Internship Program, $25,000.

The DOJ Grant for City of Promise match, this represents part of the local match that wasn't set aside but will need to be allocated if we receive the second year of funding, $15,000.

The Bank On Initiative, $35,000 in seed money.

Excuse me, the point is OAR, who is coming home?

OAR is Offenders Aid and Restoration.

It's an agency dedicated to people who are leaving jail, who come out of jail and want to re-enter society.

Yes ma'am.

To get jobs, to get employment, to gain workforce experience.

Items Council wants to revisit tomorrow night, that they indicated they wanted to revisit, the Parent Out Theater, their arts education program,

the Music Resource Center funding the municipal band and the First Tee program.

So remaining events obviously tonight is our final public hearing and the first reading of the budget.

Tomorrow evening from five to seven in the basement conference room we'll have a budget work session to wrap up the budget.

And next week on the 10th council will approve the budget 5.30 p.m. in the second floor conference room.

Council, I'd also like to add that there are two other issues that I think Council raised that were raised at the last budget work session.

I think Council has an interest in at least discussing tomorrow evening, and that's a proposal by the female perspective that we received just the other day, and also a thorough discussion of the FAR platform.

Which one?

I'm sorry.

Are there any clarifications, questions the Council would like to ask before we open public hearing?

Okay.

So now is the opportunity for citizens to comment on the 2013 budget.

Please come forward, identify yourself, we have so much to speak, and come forward.

I have people signed up, let me go over the list first.

I'm Councilman Dick Gibson, 1431 Grove Road, and I'm the chairman of JABBA, and I'm here tonight to advocate on behalf of JABBA for the citizens that we house at Mountainside.

As you all know this is a partnership between Java and the city and the county and essentially we are seeking an additional $7,653 which we in our own calculations deem as the city's portion of our operating budget deficit.

We are providing affordable housing for seniors in our community.

We are scraping together revenue from many sources in order to be able to do that.

It has been a very difficult task.

The city and the county were most generous to us in the beginning, but the generosity I would say is perhaps dwindling somewhat, but the needs are still as great as they were and the cost to address those needs are greater than they were.

So we would be, and also I should mention we sent a letter to City Council Gordon Walker

and I. Gordon could not be here this evening, but we sent a letter to city council explaining in more detail the reasons for this request, but we would very much appreciate it if you would reconsider this request and honor the additional $7,653 request.

Also, I want to speak briefly on adult care center.

At Java we have an adult care center.

There are 12 city residents who attend on a regular basis and the United Way has determined that it will no longer offer scholarships for people who attend our adult care center.

This is a tremendous benefit not only for the people that attend but for their caregivers because it provides the caregivers with the respite

many of whom have no other alternative than to bring their loved ones to the care center.

where they're well taken care of while they are able to get a breather, so to speak.

And what we are asking for in respect to the adult care center is an appropriation of $12,000 to replace the scholarship fund that is no longer available from United Way.

Thank you all very much for your time.

And we greatly appreciate what you do to us.

Even though we always come back and ask for a little bit more, we appreciate every dollar that you do provide for us.

Good evening to the mayor and the members of the city council.

My name is Vivian and I work at Mountainside Senior Living.

Today we are here on behalf of all those residents who are unable to speak for themselves.

Money is being invested in roads, new shopping malls, but not in seniors and the disabled.

We have 14 veterans from previous wars that gave so much to this country.

They would not have a place to live if it wasn't for Jabba and Mountainside senior living.

We have school teachers, nurses who contribute to the education and well-being of our citizens living at Mountainside.

We have one retired CIA who served our country.

Not to mention the farmers, factory workers, steel and railroad workers and housewives who took care of the families while their husbands were at war living at Mountainside.

Residents are at Mountainside because of auxiliary grants, yet they have no money for eyeglasses,

Dentists or hearing aids.

We also have residents with stage four cancer, stroke victims, amputees, and others with health problems.

These residents who have lived in our city would have no place to live if it weren't for the grant money and funds we get from the city of Charlottesville.

We are asking you to support Mountainside Senior Living with funds so our residents will have a place to live.

Please do not fail as seniors.

It will be your family members or perhaps you one day.

My name is Solly Blose.

I live in Mt.

Solly.

I've been living there for six years.

I have been diagnosed with cerebral palsy at my very young age, as well as I have gotten development information.

My husband and I live in the basement in my in-laws

Home, until my husband died.

This is untrue.

I had left me without no place to live.

My mother died, except a different time.

I had moved in my other in-laws.

They was a family, just poor people, which

put me to find another living representative.

I had no place else to go.

My parents had passed and no other family would take care of me.

I had to contend with Charlottesville Social Service and Social Center then

to contact the mountainside to find me a place to the mountainside.

I have moved to the fan center and I have come to Akerman into military and activity.

I have a crochet, I need a point, and I make animals for the residents.

and all the volunteers, Logan DeCari, Siftor and Lita Wingo were the residents.

Then I seen the people, the new people visit our people, the tenants.

I love here, this is my home.

I was too

I want to tell the story of my life because there are so many like me living at the facility.

Mayor, ladies and gentlemen of the city council.

I'm 94 years old.

I moved into Charlottesville in 1936 when I went into school of nursing.

I paid taxes from 1947, my husband and I, on a property on Druid Avenue.

I sold my house in 2006 after my husband's death and went to a mountainside.

I'm a very lucky person because I grew up in the Depression.

I knew how to save and I had a horror of debt.

So, I saved.

And when I saw my house, I was able to go to Mountainside.

And knowing that, my son has an illness.

He used to die 13 years before it ever became Mountainside.

I won't go into the conditions before Mountainside came over.

That's history.

As she has told you, the resident's on Medicaid and he is on Medicaid because he spent all his savings and everything on hospitalizations before he ever got on Medicaid.

And I'm the person who meets his general bills.

They take his social security.

The last time I saw a city statement, y'all sent him $235 to pay on his room.

I don't know what you're paying right now, but it doesn't meet what Mountainside has to pay for history.

And I take care of the things that Medicare does not pay, like his dental bills, his co-pay on his drugs,

all the rest of the things because they don't cover eye care, glasses, all this.

So he's lucky he has me.

But there are many people up there that do not have family.

They have no family members.

I'm speaking for them, not for my son.

But for the others up there, I've gotten to know them.

I've been there six years.

And being a trained nurse, I look at things differently for the rest of the residents.

What can you help seeing what they need and what they don't have?

And there's nothing I can do to help them except appeal to you all.

And I got my taxes the other day.

Since 2009, due to no fun around, I have $7,000 and something less a year to live on for my investment.

I still have time for the sector.

and I have to live to the Lord will let me get out of this world.

And at 94 I'm ready to go any day.

I garden up there.

We all volunteer.

We help with fundraising.

I'm a good gardener.

I propagate plants.

If they can't be divided, I root them.

I take them to Choice is Nice on Preston Avenue and they sell them.

And I make money from that.

We all do what we can do to help.

We are citizens, we vote, and Charlottesville needs to take care of its own.

And I don't feel too strongly about it.

And downtown side is the only place I would live, and I recommend it to everybody.

You come and visit us.

Look at our gardens.

Look at what food we eat.

and get to know us.

Thank you.

I'm Kathy Von Stork, Education Coordinator at the Paramount Theater.

And I'm speaking on behalf of the Paramount Board, the Arts Education Committee, and our community supporters, some of whom are in the audience tonight.

You may stand, raise your hands.

To advocate for arts education program funding.

Believing that a firm grounding in the arts is critical to the personal growth and academic success of children

Each year the Paramount presents 8 to 10 live educational performances shown during the school day to area school children.

The Paramount is committed to making its educational performances accessible to all students regardless of means and thus reaches out to schools with high free and reduced lunch percentages, Title I schools as well as community agencies serving children and families in need.

This year alone out of over 12,000 students attending education performances, 1,500 from the city, we provided free and deeply discounted tickets to 2,100 students, 500 from the city, whose average free and reduced lunch percentage exceeded 70%.

The Paramount is also committed to making sure that each live performance complements school curriculum by thoroughly researching Virginia SOL connections and making those connections available to teachers.

Each performance is also accompanied by an intensive study guide for teachers to use for pre and post performance instruction.

This is an example of a study guide for the recent performance of Sacagawea and the Lewis and Clark expedition.

I'll leave it for you to look at.

We have received hundreds and hundreds of thank you letters over the years from students and teachers coming to the Paramount conveying to us the impact that such live performing arts experiences have had on students academically, socially, and culturally.

Here's one such letter that I'd like to read on behalf of Walker and Buford's ESOL teacher Renata Germino, who could not be here tonight due to spring break.

My reading of this letter has been edited due to time constraints.

Dear City Council, I'm writing to ask you to please not cut the Arts and Education program at the Paramount.

This year, ESOL students from Walker and Buford were exposed to Sakajawea, Lewis and Clark, Thomas Jefferson, Harriet Tubman, Addison White, and Abraham Lincoln.

These names and the corresponding historical context would mean absolutely nothing to them if it were not for the Paramount's Arts Education Program.

The shows are educational and enthralling and teach our students vital academic content knowledge and expose them to a wide variety of musical and artistic experiences.

This program provides excellent study guides to prepare the students for the shows.

The shows are well designed, well organized, and brilliant.

Through the shows, the Paramount is helping our students feel more connected to American history and to Charlottesville.

The students decided that their favorite show from this season was the Freedom Bound show, a musical devoted to teaching about the Underground Railroad.

At the conclusion of the performance, one of our fifth graders exclaimed,

Now I understand what the Underground Railroad is.

Now I know there were no trains, but helpful houses.

That realization is key to our students gaining an appreciation and understanding of our country's history.

Please continue to support this terrific organization.

Thank you Renate and Germino.

And I just want to take these last few seconds to read a few quotes from some students, teachers and principals, and some of the directors of our community agencies which have attended performances at the Paramount.

This one is from Community Attention, a social worker, Liz Ramirez Weaver.

Your donation inspires the children in our program to develop an appreciation of theater, promotes creativity and imagination as vehicles for learning.

The children and families who attended the Civil War Voices performances described their experience as one that made us feel like we are a family.

And one last one.

This is from a teacher at Jackson Via Elementary School, 4th grade, Carol Tenney.

High quality field trips like this one help students to integrate their school learning with real life experience.

You certainly helped to further inspire a group of young minds about the power of words.

And these are many, many examples of many, many comments that we get from the students and teachers who have this wonderful experience at the Paramount.

So we appreciate your consideration of our proposal.

Betty Phelan Good evening, Mayor Huja and City Council.

I am Betty Phelan, first of all, a member of the Education Committee of the Paramount Theater and have been for quite a few years.

I'm here in substitute for Katie Whithauer Murrah.

She's the gifted specialist at Clark Elementary School.

She arranged for Clark students to attend several arts education performances this past season at the Paramount and she couldn't be here this evening.

So, here I am to read her comments.

Dear City Council, we are so appreciative of the educational outreach program at the Paramount for their financial support of Clark students.

If it was not for the scholarships they provide, our students would not be able to attend these marvelous productions.

The students at Clark have been fortunate to be able to attend musicals, dance performances, and theater company productions every year because of the generous scholarship money the Paramount provides.

A school visit to the Paramount is the first opportunity for many of our students to see a live production.

For some students, a trip to the Paramount may be the only opportunity that they will have to see a theatrical performance.

It's always thrilling as a teacher to see the excitement on our students' faces as they see the characters from the books they've read come to life on the stage.

Students are enthralled by the performances and talk about the show for years afterward.

This year, our first grade students were able to see the stage adaptation of Twinkle Twinkle.

And our third and fourth graders were able to see a production of Frindle.

After each of these performances, the students spent weeks discussing the characters, describing which parts of the performance they enjoyed most, and discussing the differences between the book and the musical.

These performances obviously make a huge impact in the lives of our children.

In addition, these performances give students a chance to extend their thinking in class.

Seeing a live production adds depth and authenticity to our classroom book studies.

To see a story acted out live allows students to examine the characters from a new perspective, as well as helping students make a connection between the literary elements in the book and their real lives.

The Paramount's performances also inspire our students to try out their acting skills.

Many students are initially unsure how to approach an oral language activity like a reader's theater or a book talk.

After seeing a production of the Paramount, students gained confidence to perform in the classroom.

We are grateful to the Paramount for providing opportunities for our students to be exposed to the magic of live theater.

The experience of watching these larger-than-life characters tell a story through music and dance is a rich part of our culture and the Charlottesville community and should not be missed by anyone, especially our children.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Mr. Huja and members of council,

Mr. Jones and staff, it's been a long time since I stood in this spot.

But I am here speaking on behalf of the Arts Education Program at the Paramount Theater.

You have just heard how important the program is in the school setting and what it means to the learning of the children.

And I come before you speaking as voice of the children and to personalize the program and what it means to them.

and I will do that by citing comments from one of the students privileged to attend the program.

But as an aside, as a retired educator and more recently as a three-year AmeriCorps volunteer in one of the public housing complexes, I know full well what additional experiences mean to children.

and we received a letter from a second grader at Clark Elementary School and in her letter she thanked us for a ticket to the show.

She wrote a couple of sentences telling us what she liked about what she had seen on the stage and then she added these words, the place was beautiful with gold.

and my seat was so and she had about five O's added onto that so and my seat was so soft.

I was touched by her two-folded experience, her enjoyment of what she saw on the stage and her sense of having her heart and soul fed.

And because of that, I made it my business to find that child and introduce myself to her.

And I said to her, if you stay in school, study hard, mind your teachers, one day you might be at the Paramount Theater helping to seat other children.

Again, it's clear what your contribution would make to the education of the children attending performances at the theater.

Thank you.

Brandon Collins, 536 Meade Avenue.

I'm still speaking on behalf of FAR, Public Housing Association of Residents, and wanted to thank you all for taking a look at our funding request and getting that into your budget for consideration.

Of course, we'd all like to see a little more than $25,000 in there.

35,000 seems like a good thing for you all to consider and I hope you will still consider that.

But we do very much appreciate you taking a look at that money for our internship program.

I thought maybe I'd explain a little more about what the internship program does.

One of the most important things that FAR does as a whole is give voice to residents in public housing.

And this is something that HUD actually requires

that local housing authorities listen to the residents and that the residents have a right to, not only a right, but kind of a responsibility to organize and express themselves to the housing authority and this makes for a better community.

It saves housing authorities money over the long run and a whole bunch of other things.

Through this intern program, we build community leaders who go out and

bring information from as many residents as possible and bring that to the housing authority.

Beyond that, you know, folks will set personal goals and the interns themselves, they get a lot out of it but the entire community really gets a lot out of that intern program and we've had folks come out of that who've not only sort of furthered their own goals of

maybe going to PVCC or getting a GED, but also gone out to sit on the housing authority or who are part of the section three steering committee or the dialogue on race and who go back to their neighborhoods and organize with their resident, their neighbors and give voice to things.

So one thing that the intern program, and we reached every single unit in Charlottesville, every single public housing home,

with information about the intern program.

We've got a ton of applicants.

They were so amazing.

We still are trying to decide who those folks are, but it's a very diverse group of people, wide range of ages, a wide range of life experiences.

And one of the things that they're going to have to do is look at a policy that the housing authority is going to be looking at.

And they are, as interns, going to have to get out there and do some hard work right off the bat and get information about a policy concerning no trespassing in public housing, sometimes called barment and unbarment.

The thing is the Housing Authority has given three different policies for the public to consider and they're required to get input from residents of public housing and so this is something that the interns themselves really need to go out and work at and with the contribution from the city we're really going to make this happen, we're going to get a policy

and we're going to get resident input that's completely meaningful.

On this other stuff, and I'm probably out of time, I'm really glad to hear you'll be looking at our platform at your work session.

I hope you will take it all very seriously, especially the after school programs.

I would ask if you want, contact me tomorrow if you like.

Call or email or whatever you've got to do.

If you have questions, I'd be happy to work with you.

and I did have one question about the funding that you included for the coming home program and if that was the same as the home to work program and if so if that's an expansion.

Thank you.

Good evening everyone.

I'm the founder and executive director for The Female Perspective.

We are a community development, social service based organization that serves the city of Charlottesville and surrounding counties.

Our express purpose is to break the chains of system, cyclical, social, cultural, political,

economic barriers that work towards disenfranchising all human beings.

We do this by providing culturally relevant educational socioeconomic programs, interventions, and services to reduce risk factors that plague youth and individuals.

Last year, we were before council about this time and I did not speak.

Instead, our program participants

came up and shared with council what we were working on.

We wanted to demonstrate to you what could be done in our ladies and gentlemen's after school program that took place on Wednesdays and Thursdays at Charlottesville High School.

The unique aspect about that particular program is that we were able to bring general study students as well as advanced study students together in the same room to work on a common goal.

One of their goals was to collaborate on an event promoting the dialogue on race initiative.

It was called Black and White, where they wanted to bring black children with white children and children of other cultures together and celebrate their uniqueness.

We also organized over the past two years a group

that was called And What Media Productions.

It was a team of young people whom we taught media literacy to and we tied their academic performance into the development of two broadcast programs where they learned to produce, research, brand and market

their television shows.

One of them was an interview with local professionals who were reflective of them.

The second production was called, and is called, Is Jail Cool?

We chose the second program because we had learned that young people were talking about which types of crimes they wanted to commit in order to become institutionalized.

So we thought we would use the media platform to bring about that awareness.

that program had been airing on Charlottesville Public Access Television Station on Channel 13.

We also organized two gender-specific groups.

One was called W.O.O.M., Women Organizing with Men in the Birth Hood, as well as E.M.A.L., lowercase e, standing for Emasculation of Males.

We had adult men coming together as we had adult women coming together talking about what manhood is, what it looks like, what being a female looks like, and how

the two genders could come together and strategize and develop a plan to take back our community.

We also developed a youth and adult community leadership curriculum model.

Last year we proposed a solution for a problem occurring on the downtown mall with regard to our youth and them not having something to do with idle time during breaks as well as over the summer that we hope that you will also revisit.

We would like to request this year, unlike last year, that you consider funding our programs.

The reason we are making that request now is because we have been able to successfully demonstrate what could be done with no funding.

We were able to accomplish all that we've set out to accomplish through volunteerism and private donors over the past two years.

I'd like to highlight a few of our accomplishments with no funding.

We have the production of the In What Media production team, which consisted of 8-12 young people who met every Saturday, void of holidays and some school breaks, from anywhere between 9am and 2pm to learn broadcasting skills

to produce the two shows I just shared with you.

We were very skillful in bringing youth together to particularly youth from vulnerable communities to come and speak before the media, before council at various events that took place throughout the city.

We secured housing for a woman with four children who had recently been released from serving an eight month jail sentence and in doing so was successful in assisting her with not having her children be placed out of the home due to the fact that she was homeless.

And there are another array of successes that we've had throughout the process.

Thank you.

Hello Mayor Huja and Members of Council.

I haven't seen y'all in a long time, but I was a resident of Danville and moved here and decided that Charlottesville was the city for me.

At that time, former Mayor Norris had organized the re-entry summit with other city officials and it was great.

And I also became a member of the female perspective.

I cannot say enough

what that organization has done for me other than the fact that I am an ex-offender and I am a part of the success that that organization has made.

There have been children that have called me and said, Miss Debbie, I need you to come get me and reach out to me because they were in a troubling situation with other teenagers or other youth and we went and got them.

You know, I don't know of another organization in any other area that I've ever lived in that does this.

So as Ms. Bates said, we did all this with no funding.

This community is reaching out, the youth and the families are reaching out for help and there has to be an organization that can be funded through the City of Charlottesville that will help them.

otherwise it's just going to keep getting where you have a cycle of chain events where the mothers go to jail then the kids go to jail or the fathers go to jail then you know it's just it's not a good situation for anyone and if there's people that are willing to come together and I think that the whole community and the city area agency should come together

and work with these communities to help them know that we're here.

And I think the City of Charlottesville, you all have the power to say, you know what, we'll help you to help them.

and with that being said, I just want to reiterate that the female perspective has done everything to help me regain my self-esteem and feel needed in the community.

They have helped me to be able to help others and know that even though I was an offender, I'm not a bad person and I know what people need to hear when they're getting ready to go and mess up.

I know what the youth needs to hear when they're getting ready to go and do something and they're crying out, you know, what do I do?

You don't say, oh, don't do it, just don't do it.

You give them reasons why not to do it because it changes your whole life once you get that first felony.

Everything changes.

Thank you.

Good evening City Councilors and Mayor Huja and thank you very much for the opportunity to speak.

My name is Sibley Johns and I'm the Executive Director of the Music Resource Center, an after school music education center serving hundreds of students in Charlottesville and Albemarle County.

We have been very fortunate to be funded generously by the city for the past 14 years.

Our primary mission is to provide educational after school activities for middle and high school students, especially those students with significant economic challenges.

In the Charlottesville community, as in the United States, statistics show strongly that teenagers get in the most trouble.

It costs our community a lot.

$90,739 per year currently to incarcerate one juvenile at our local Blue Ridge juvenile center.

Music is central to the life of teenagers.

Research shows that students value music making and perceive it as a central aspect of their identities.

Research on our program by Dr. Megan Davis has shown that our members benefit from behavioral and social competencies

positive bonding with others, self-determination, beliefs in the future, and a positive identity.

Our parent surveys indicate at the 100% level that parents see positive changes in self-confidence in their children, increases in musical skill, and that they are pleased with their child's behavior since joining the Music Resource Center.

In the proposed budget, the city is considering cutting 25% of our funding over $11,000.

One concern that has been raised is that we are serving less low income students than in the past.

This is simply not true.

In fiscal year 2008, we served 239 students who were low income.

In fiscal year 2011, we served 341, almost 100 more free or reduced lunch eligible children.

And that's almost 60% of the total of 627 students that we served total.

And 276 of those students were city children.

There is additional concern that we are serving more affluent students.

Out of our 627 students served, only 38 attended private schools and only 23 have a household income of more than $75,000.

Our program provides services to almost every low-income program serving middle and high school students in our community.

The Boys and Girls Club, Computers for Kids, Upward Bound, Teens Give, Community Attention, and many more.

We use your funding wisely to bring affordable and fantastic music education services to young people who might otherwise be hanging out on our streets and getting into trouble.

Good evening.

Hi everybody.

My name is Maxine Harlan and I'm here to support Sylvia Johns and the Music Resource Center.

I live in Albemarle County, however my son was a member of the Music Resource Center throughout the time he was in high school.

and I was really impressed at the amazing job that Sibley and her staff are doing with the young people.

I noticed an improved level in competence.

They go to the Music Resource Center and as a result they learn how to do something and that's the reason I'm saying they are competent and as you know it is difficult today to find young people that will stand up and say I can't actually do something and do it well.

As a result of attending the program at the Music Resource Center, I noticed that they are able to learn how to play an instrument, dance, and that instruments, believe it or not, include playing the piano, drums, violin, and the guitar, and at an affordable rate, and under the auspices of people who know exactly what they are doing.

And that's so important when young people are outperforming

or participating in a program, it is necessary to have people there that's going to guide them to help them improve their character, improve their confidence, and on top of that, improve their character.

And I see all of that happening under the music resource auspices, and I encourage you to continue to support this needed program.

It also serves as a safe house, a place where young people can go and

have that guidance that they may not have reached at home or they may not have reached while they're in school.

And after all, they don't live in the classroom and it's so wonderful for them to have a place beyond the classroom that they can go and learn and learn how to conduct themselves and learn how to do something and that's very, very important.

Again, I encourage you to

Good evening Mr. Mayor and Councillors Colette Hall 101 Robertson Lane in the city I feel like a preacher who must preach on the same bible study each year but tries to give a fresh slant or a new insight into its meaning However, the fact of the matter is clear and two-fold nor is it new 1.

The city must budget to its needs and not its wants

In today's Daily Progress, I am quoted as saying, quote, why would we find money for the arts when people are saying public safety is the most important issue, end quote.

Actually, public safety came in second on the city survey, but arts and culture came in last.

Here is a perfect example of a want over a need.

This has got to stop.

It reminds me of the reason a counselor gave when I complained about a lack of need to build a sundial in front of City Hall.

She responded with, quote, is a quality of life issue.

My response is, whose quality of life?

Please, no quality of life response.

I am too old and too experienced for that type of an answer.

Second, the school budget is out of control and is not merely the fact that the state is decreasing its aid to localities.

Aid from the state should be icing on the cake and not the meat of school budget planning.

This is not new, nor is it the fault of the current sitting school board or current superintendent.

The school board has been slack in budgeting for the 23 years I have lived here.

It has always expected the city general fund to ballot out when the school board cannot come up with a balanced budget.

The council has always obliged and now it finds itself finally facing the reality that the school system must run a tighter ship.

School systems in Central Virginia and the Valley are facing the same budget dilemma and they are doing the difficult and unwanted but necessary task of laying off personnel.

As unfortunate as it may be, perhaps a local school may also need to close.

Finally, as the preacher would conclude, so what we need here is discernment.

Good evening, sorry I came a little late, too late to sign up.

My name is Maurice Cox and I'm at 702 Ridge Street and I am here to ask that you might consider the full funding requests of the Music Resource Center and your budget and we're talking about $11,000.

Firstly, I certainly have been where you are at least eight times and juggling incredibly limited resources and trying to balance the needs of this community and fund them in a way that reflects this community's values.

I ask that you put our youth

at the center of your budgetary priorities and really above all else.

I often go around the country and brag on Charlottesville as a community that reserves its best buildings for young people.

If you just think of the live arts building or the Boys and Girls Club or Mount Zion Baptist, the former Mount Zion Baptist Church.

But the Music Resource Center is really more than an old historic building that houses it.

As it's been said, it's a safe haven.

It's a place where teens can go to explore their passion for music.

They are mentored by some incredibly caring adults.

They actually do a little homework and they hang in, most importantly more than hanging out.

There is the perception that I've seen growing that the Music Resource Center as it's succeeded is serving kids that are not low income and I think as the executive director mentioned it couldn't be further from the truth.

The Music Resource Center is serving our kids

These are kids who may not have fit into the band or the orchestra programs.

They serve kids who are at risk and they're mostly low income.

But they're also kids who are middle class and we all know

that all our kids need a safe haven and the socialization that they get often in a place like Music Resource Center they cross paths with young people that they might not otherwise ever encounter in their school day.

So I ask that you kind of look beyond the perceptions and look at the facts, look at the numbers, the majority of the kids who

still are served by this program are low income and they are our kids.

So I hope that you won't penalize them.

I know the process by which these recommendations come forward to you and I would ask that if the process itself has some adjustments that need to be made so that you can

The Music Resource Center doesn't have a powerful community board like some arts organizations in this community.

It doesn't even have an angel funder contrary to popular belief who come in and step in for any shortfall.

What they have are passionate people who care deeply about our kids and I hope that you will prioritize kids in your budgetary decisions and fully fund them.

Good evening.

I'm Nancy Carpenter.

I live in Albemarle County, so maybe I don't have a whole lot of skin in this game, but I know you'll have a tough decision to make in the next few weeks about where to put money and how to put money and who not to put money towards.

And unfortunately, I think it is a quality of life issue.

When I talk about that I live in Charlottesville now, people would say, oh, you mean where the university is, or oh, where there's a good music scene, or oh, where you have that film festival that I've heard about.

Nobody says, oh, because it's a safe place to live.

So I really think that there are a lot of good programs in this city that you all have done well by in the past.

I don't like to politicize it, but I really think that the things that you are grappling with and the things that Albemarle is grappling with really have to go back to the fact that we have a lot of people in the state and federal government that worry more about what the banksters want or worry more about having a car elevator or worry more about private morality than they do about ending funding for needless wars and taking back

putting people in jail for what they did.

and that would allow you all to have more leeway I think to have available funds to be able to fund all these worthwhile programs that I've heard tonight and you know good luck for whatever decisions you make but you know there are you know a lot of reasons up and above your level that you have that cause you to have these tough decisions and I think that we need to if these if these quality of life choices are important to this community as we the people then we need to step up

and tell our representatives that we don't like the way they're voting if that's how we really feel or we want them to vote certain ways so we really have to work it from the top down as well as the bottom up.

so that the county and the city can keep funding these initiatives that uplift our children, that uplift our seniors.

I mean, you know, those ladies that were here, I can see myself there.

I really, really can, and the tough choices they have to make every day.

So thank you.

Is there anyone else who would like to speak?

Public Hearing is closed.

Discussion from city council members.

I want to thank everybody who came to speak tonight.

A lot of people are very passionate about the causes that they're working towards and working on.

I had a few questions, more factual questions, that I want to get some clarity on either tonight or by the time of our work session tomorrow.

And partly it's for our clarity and also for the public's clarity.

For instance, there were several comments made about cutting arts funding through the – arts education funding through the Paramount.

I was under the impression from our work session last week that we're actually not cutting funding for arts education at the Paramount.

In fact, it's level funding, net funding from what they had last year.

Well, Ms. Berger can speak to this as well.

Last year, the funding that we had was dedicated to help the Paramount to do two things.

One, to help cover the costs of the taxes paid on the Paramount, and two, for outreach programs.

They are now tax exempt, so that's $64,000 that they're no longer having to pay.

So they've come to us with a request for $37,500.

They went through the ABRT process.

So technically, this is not a cut to that program.

If you combine that $37,500 with the $64,000, it actually would be

over $100,000 that would be dedicated towards the types of programs, outreach programs that they had been advocating for and doing in past years.

So they're asking for an increase of 37.5.

It's a new program request.

Net increase of 37.5, essentially.

I'm just trying to cut to the chase here.

Sure.

So we originally for this fiscal year gave them $64,000 which was equivalent to their tax bill.

When they became tax-exempt we had sent them $32,000 in July.

We did not send them the second

payment on that for this current fiscal year when they received notice that they were tax exempt.

So they received about $32,000 this current fiscal year and they're requesting $37,500 for that program.

So does that answer your question?

But this is on time for next fiscal year.

This is for 13, right.

Right, I mean they were running this program and we were supplementing them for their relocate tax bills and they were already running this program so now they're getting tax relief

plus they're requesting funds for the program.

It's a great program.

So who funded the program before?

I think it's been a combination, as Mr. Jones said, of real estate tax relief and some funding for their youth initiatives that they're proposing right now.

And I fully support the Arts Education Program at the Paramount.

I think it's a great program.

I don't want to leave anybody with the impression that

Right, and that would not be approved for 13.

Thank you.

Okay, also I do want to clarify for Mr. Collins sake you asked about whether the coming home program is the same as the home, that's the same program.

Coming home to work.

Coming home to work program, same program.

I do have a question for Ms. Bates on your proposal for the weekends and the park program at Tonsler which I think

is a program that we discussed last year and I regret that we didn't make it happen last summer because I think that more so than increased policing on the mall is really the answer.

The answer isn't, I mean the answer is how do we get proactive about providing better opportunities for young people.

It's not that there will be just seven people participating in the program.

There will be seven residents from the community who will benefit from being part of the management of that program during that time frame.

So that's what that number is.

So are you implying staff?

Oh, okay.

That's very helpful.

Point of clarification.

How many kids?

I'm sorry?

How many kids?

to come visit Tesla Park over the weekend.

Do you have an estimate of how many kids you expect to participate on any given weekend?

I'll be happy to provide it tomorrow.

And then on Music Resource Center, just again for the sake of clarity, the proposal was to cut the city funding by 25%.

No, Councillors, not at all.

It has not declined at all.

As I cited in my figures, and I believe I've provided the information and the answers to the staff and the budget recommendations, we are in fact serving more low-income students than we ever have.

Yeah, I just wanted to counter the perception.

I mean, I think there is a perception that you're serving more county kids, which is probably true, but I didn't want to leave the impression that that means you're serving fewer city kids.

Okay, thank you.

And then one last question for Mr. Jones, not for Music Resource Center.

For Mr. Jones,

This is in response to the issue of downtown policing.

You mentioned that we were going to be able to provide an enhanced level of coverage without going to the full extent that was proposed.

Somebody asked me today if that

enhanced level of coverage includes the temporary kiosk, if you will, that's been in place the last couple weeks, which people seem to really appreciate.

I'd just like to note that, I mean I continue to support FAR's proposal.

We do have later in our agenda the CDBG funds which address some of the same requests that FAR, including computer labs, clinics, the reentry program.

I don't know how much that overlaps with

Thank you everybody.

Everything is very compelling.

I know as a new counselor I'm trying to be careful not to step on a process that was

very carefully developed, but how to have input in it without insulting the decisions that were made.

Thank you all for coming.

I'll give it a shot.

My main concern throughout this whole ABRT process is that

We have a process and I know that Mr. Kochis pointed out that it may be that we need to tweak that process and I'll take that as something that's worth thinking about.

But I think that my concern is that if we have a process that we approved

and it came before us in some detail and we hashed it out and worked on it and approved it.

And then all of the folks that we have, mostly volunteers who spent countless hours implementing it and asking for real indicators, like not just what you do but what effect it has and what changes it makes on the things that we need changed in our community and the priorities that we've made.

When they make recommendations based on their ranking of how programs did based on their applications, I feel like that we'd better have a really good reason when we don't take their advice.

Not that we never shouldn't, because I think that there are times when there are things that come to light after the application process.

There may be just something that council feels particularly strongly about and wants to

to allocate additional funding to and that's fine.

But I'm a little concerned that if the process every year is we have this process and we put everybody jumping through the 52 hoops of doing the application and filling out all the forms and looking at their indicators and doing all their data collection and putting it to the process and all the volunteers spend all the hours

And then we give more money to whoever yells the loudest that we're just sort of inviting people to come and yell louder every year and ignore the process and then why are we doing it.

So I'm moved by the woman who's

at Mountainside and her son is on an auxiliary grant.

My daughter is on an auxiliary grant.

I know how hard those are to get and I know how little they cover.

I'm moved by the kids who are at the Music Resource Center as a musician.

I know that that's what saved me when I was that age.

I was not headed down any good roads and music is largely what kept me sane.

And the program that you do, the female perspective, I've been so impressed with the kids who've come to us and really speaking out for themselves in ways that I'm just really excited by.

And so it's not that I doubt the validity of any of these programs, but I really

I'm sort of being dragged kicking and screaming into any consideration of them, which isn't to say I won't, but I'm not ready tonight to commit to any of them, but I understand why they're all good.

You have a chance tomorrow.

Well, just again, it's so valuable to have the flesh on the bones.

It's one thing to look at numbers on a page and then to see people come to the podium and explain and talk and have their life experiences just on full view.

So it is quite moving and it is very compelling.

And I've been saying repeatedly we have got to work on getting more sustained revenue streams.

That's a big discussion we're going to have in the future.

Whether that means growing, whether that means looking at how we look at our development fees, whatever.

But this community does want and need a lot.

So we have limits at this point in time in this budget and having said that I do appreciate having an objective review process.

and I do agree that we do need to understand when to make a deviation for innovation for looking at this review process critically itself.

But I do think we need to really know when we're deviating and why and then have very, very clear expectations of the parties that we're bending the rules for because everyone is expecting to have the same rules.

So having said that, the other big overarching thing we've been talking about in our budget work sessions, and it's been brought up by members of the public as well, is we do want to move away from maintaining poverty.

We want to move people out of poverty.

We want to enrich children.

We want to empower adults.

We've got a big chunk in the middle, though, of people in desperate crises.

And that's still where most of our resources go.

And we need to push ourselves to get to the other places.

And that's often where, when you get that innovative program coming in that's not quite fitting all the rules, you've got to think, maybe that is the one we need to look at this time, at least as a pilot.

First of all, I appreciate many people bringing new information.

I must say I am a little, not so bound by the recommendations of our process.

It is helpful, but I think we got some new information, new ideas also.

I would be open to considering variations from those in light of the new information.

as well as in light of new ideas we have brought.

For example, we wanted to fund for people who are coming out of prison $85,000 to help them with jobs.

It was not recommended by any process.

Still, it was the objective of the council, I think.

So I'm very appreciative of the review, but I don't feel totally bound by those reviews.

Okay, so... What time is the... We should remind everybody.

Is it 5 p.m. tomorrow in the basement conference room?

So, we have a few actions to take.

There is a need for a text levy.

Motion for the other thing we need?

Yes, sir.

We also made the first annual budget appropriation frustrating.

Yes, we're not proposing an increase at all on our tax levy.

It's 95 cents per $100 of assessed value.

I do have one question though about the energy efficiency tax.

I was curious about it and I thought the lower tax for energy efficient buildings, who qualifies for that?

Really?

I thought it was fascinating.

You did, you did, and I only got to glance at it.

I think it might just be a one time.

That's what I wondered.

Right, 30%.

You don't need a second reading, we had a second reading on 10th, so we had a first reading, you don't need to vote on that is my understanding, right?

Excuse me?

This is it.

Just first and the second.

Okay, thank you.

Well, I don't know what we can do today.

Next item is public hearing of CDBG funding.

I'm here speaking on behalf of Melissa Thaxton who is at home with her newborn baby, which we're very excited for her, but we're taking the reins on our CDBG and home budget to make sure things flow in her absence.

Tonight you have the CDBG budget coming before you for a public hearing.

We had a public hearing in April and we didn't have enough members of council present so we're having another public hearing but it's always good to have

additional opportunities for public comment.

I wanted to give you all a few highlights and allow you all to ask any questions and I will do the best I can to answer those.

The CDBG program has about $441,000 available.

The majority of that is in the entitlement grant that we receive as an entitlement city through HUD.

and some of it is program income.

Housing, the CDBG task force is tasked with reviewing proposals and putting forth a budget of programs for both Planning Commission and Council to review.

and Planning Commission reviewed it at their last meeting and decided to move forward the recommendation of the CDBG task force.

A number of projects with housing items were moved forward, which was Housing Rehab, Building Goodness in April, which is a program through the Darden School that does rehab projects, Habitat for Humanity and

The Fifeville neighborhood which is the priority neighborhood for streetscaping.

There are also social programs that can be funded through this grant and those are different

a number of different programs including CRHA, Charlottesville Housing Authority programs, PACEM, OAR, which you all heard more about this evening, and community attention.

There's an administration and planning portion of this grant which has been decreased significantly because only 20% of the grant can go towards this fund.

We had to decrease that to get to our 20%, so we have enough to fund our grants coordinator at this moment.

The home funds, I know you all received a memo on that, and that is still in flux.

We found that we cannot use it for what the task force had recommended, well actually,

The task force didn't recommend that.

That had been set in the budget beforehand for tenant-based vouchers, but we're going through a process of taking care of making sure things are funded and making sure that we use our home funds for an eligible activity.

So we're currently in the process of deliberating with the task force and plan to have home budget before you at the May meeting so that we can meet our May 15th HUD deadline.

So we've got tight windows there, but we're progressing forward.

very expeditiously.

Staff recommends approval of the CDBG budget that's before you.

The Planning Commission didn't have any additional notes to add to that so there's no additional comments from them.

And also we recommend approval of the appropriations which includes the CDBG appropriation and the reprogramming appropriation that's before you as well.

I had a question, I'm not sure.

Nobody signed up, but I'll open public hearing for comments.

Is there anybody here who wishes to speak on the CDBG program?

If not, public hearing is closed.

I do have one question, maybe comment.

Money, the $12,000 for a down payment assistance in the Habitat project at Sunrise.

It will have to go to a city resident because the CDBG funds go directly to city residents.

That is a requirement of our funding.

So the person who would be receiving that would have to verify that they are currently a resident before they move on.

Before they are in the house because they will be a resident.

I understand.

Any other questions?

I so move.

Second.

There is a resolution on reprogramming funds.

Yes.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

Okay.

Move forward.

Next item on the agenda is Fluoridation of Water.

Good evening, Mr. Huja, city councilors.

Thank you for inviting us tonight.

I was asked to come and give some information about community water fluoridation.

So I've asked some experts to join me, and if you all would please come up.

I've asked Dr. David Kuhn, the president of the Charlottesville Albemarle Dental Society, and Ellen Toby, the executive director of the nonprofit Community Dental Center, to help address

some questions and to give some information.

And I've also asked two experts from the Virginia Department of Health's Office of Drinking Water, Jim Moore and Steve Quebec, to be able to answer questions.

And so we're here.

And I'm going to start with just a little bit of background information.

First of all, fluoride is the ion of the element fluorine.

It is almost universally found in soil and water, so it's naturally occurring, but it's generally at low levels.

It can be at very high levels, and that is variable.

So although other fluoride-containing products are available, water fluoridation remains the most equitable and cost-effective method of delivering fluoride to all members of the community.

The Virginia Board of Health recommends that all public water systems in Virginia be optimally fluoridated, so finding that level, adjusting to that level,

because this is the most effective public health measure to prevent tooth decay.

According to the Virginia Department of Health's Division of Dental Health, an estimated 5.7 million Virginians benefit from fluoridated drinking water, and that represents 93.8% of the population that's served by public water systems.

So most public water systems are fluoridated.

The hypothesis that dental cavities could be prevented by adjusting the fluoride level of community water dates all the way back to 1945.

At that time, a several year study was conducted and it showed that cavities were reduced by 50 to 70% among children in communities with fluoridated systems.

Since that time, there's been a number of studies, many, many excellent studies that have been done to ensure that community water fluoridation is safe and effective.

It continues to be recommended today by almost every expert panel, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Dental Association, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, many others.

The prevalence of dental cavities has declined in both communities with and communities without fluoridated water in the United States, and this can cause some confusion, but this trend has been attributed largely to the diffusion of fluoridation or fluoridated water to areas without fluoridated water through bottling and processing of foods and beverages in areas with fluoridated water and also with the use of fluoride toothpaste.

Water fluoridation is especially beneficial for communities of low economic socio-status.

These communities have a disproportionate burden of dental disease and have less access than higher income communities to dental care services and other sources of fluoride.

So water fluoridation may help reduce such dental health disparities.

Water fluoridation reduces direct healthcare expenditures through primary prevention of dental cavities and avoidance of restorative care.

One economic analysis estimated that prevention of dental cavities largely attributed to fluoridation and fluoride containing products saved $39 billion 1990 dollars in dental care expenditures in the US from 1979 to 1989.

The only known risk associated with drinking fluoridated water is mild forms of enamel fluorosis.

And those are white spots or streaks that can appear on the teeth.

These spots do not have effect on tooth function.

And the goal is to get the level of fluoridation so that you get maximal protection against cavities and the least risk of fluorosis.

Studies have shown that the recommended 0.7 milligrams per liter provides enough fluoride to prevent tooth decay in children and adults while limiting the possibility of children developing dental fluorosis.

So, results of water fluoridation over the past 60 years have led us to where we are now, where tooth loss is no longer considered inevitable.

And increasingly, adults in the United States are retaining most of their teeth for a lifetime.

The percentage of persons aged 45 to 54 years old who had lost all their permanent teeth decreased from 20% and that's 45 to 54 year olds in 1960 to 62 down to 9.1% in 1988 to 94.

So we're making, we've made a lot of progress through community water fluoridation.

We strongly recommend that we continue.

Good evening, Mayor Huja and members of the city council.

My name is Dr. David Kuhn.

I want to thank the members of the council and the community members present for their time and commitment to public health and safety.

As the current president of the Charlottesville Albemarle Dental Society and as an endodontist who has practiced in Charlottesville for almost six years, I feel strongly that the presence of fluoride in our water is a safe and effective way to prevent tooth decay and to promote good oral health

which is a critical component to overall health, quality of life and well-being.

Our Dental Association stands in agreement with the memorandum submitted by the Thomas Jefferson Health District offering sound scientific and economic evidence to the benefits of continued water fluoridation.

Now a little bit on the science.

I had to taper this one down quite a bit.

I wanted to talk for about an hour on this one.

The purpose of fluoride in respect to dentistry is to strengthen the outer layer of the tooth called the enamel.

As dentists we advocate the daily use of fluoride toothpaste as well as the fluoride treatment

that's administered when your dentist does a dental cleaning.

These topical applications of fluoride help strengthen and protect the enamel by making it more resistant to the harmful acids that are produced by cavity causing bacteria.

Systemic fluorides, like the ones being discussed, the fluoride in our drinking water, become incorporated with the enamel in developing teeth

The systemic fluorides are also secreted in the saliva along with other minerals like calcium and phosphate ions which help make the teeth in both children and adults more resistant to the demineralization caused by these cavity-causing bacteria.

Water fluoridation is a time-tested community health measure that benefits citizens of all ages, income levels, and ethnicities.

It offers a special level of protection to some of our most vulnerable residents, including children living below the poverty level.

Many of these children do not receive regular dental care and often do not have access to other methods of preventive care, such as dental sealants.

Poor children suffer disproportionately more cavities than middle and upper income children.

When fluoride was discontinued in certain communities, there were large increases in the incidence of tooth decay, especially in children.

In my practice as a root canal specialist, I see firsthand the effects of tooth decay, pain, infection, loss work and wages, and sometimes the loss of teeth that cannot be restored.

Many of these patients are adults who did not have access to fluoridated water as children, and they speak to the fact that their own children who grew up with fluoridated water have much healthier teeth as a result.

While water fluoridation does not eradicate tooth decay, it has been proven to be a safe and effective way to promote good dental health in our community.

It's going to be hard to follow those two experts.

My name is Ellen Toby and I thank you all for spending this time this evening

listening to this long agenda and also taking time to listen to the important matter that we're discussing now.

I'm the Executive Director of the Nonprofit Community Dental Center.

As of January 2012, the Dental Center has treated more than 11,000 indigent children from five counties.

My organization is deeply concerned about the health of children in our community and wants appropriate public policy in place to ensure the best possible health outcomes.

I also want to express my understanding that some members of our community have a sincere concern about fluoridation of the municipal water supply and everyone has a right to their opinion.

Fluoride applied in appropriate doses is beneficial to the overall oral health of children and adults, and this has been shown to be true over the course of many years.

One of the arguments made by opponents of fluoridation is that other countries have found ways to ensure access to fluoride for its populations through other means rather than the municipal water supply.

Fluoridated salt, fluoridated milk, and naturally fluoridated water supplies that reach optimal levels benefit many Europeans.

The Pew Center on the States has an excellent fact sheet outlining the pros and cons of fluoridation in water supplies and alternative products that deliver beneficial levels of fluoridation to citizens.

In my work at the Dental Center, we observe the benefits of fluoridated water.

The benefits from water fluoridation build on those from fluoride and toothpaste.

According to the Pew Center on the State study, communities that fluoridated water in the years after fluoridated toothpaste became widely available have shown a much lower rate of tooth decay than communities without fluoridated water.

Community water fluoridation is the most efficient way to prevent one of the most common childhood diseases, dental decay.

Dental decay is five times more common than asthma, seven times more common than hay fever in children age five to seven years old.

It is one of the most prevalent childhood diseases that we battle today.

Our observation is that our water supply has appropriate amounts of fluoridation, not too much and not too little.

It is important to look at peer-reviewed scientific evidence and consider the weight of all the evidence, not just one study.

Evidence-based reviews not only consider results but also consider the quality of the studies leading to those results.

Every expert panel that has considered the issue of water fluoridation has come to the same conclusion.

It is safe and it's an effective public health practice.

That's all we've prepared.

I have a couple just really basic questions.

and you spoke to it and thank you.

That was great information.

I particularly like the science.

And I guess it's, I have no doubt that fluoride does everything you said.

You know, that it strengthens teeth.

I am in the enamel on teeth and developing teeth.

My question is really what the difference is between topical applications and systemic applications, developmentally.

It is still, do you want to comment?

No, please.

You fill in.

Okay.

So I think it's just the delivery.

So it is important to get, the fluoride is what you're trying to get.

So it sort of comes up through the saliva as opposed to, I mean those are such different delivery methods.

Is one more effective than the other if you had to choose?

I would say there have been some studies that have shown that topical fluoride is more effective, but just like Dr.

Peek was saying, it's all about the delivery.

Some people do not effectively apply the fluoride, whether it's through rinses or brushing their teeth effectively or visiting the dentist.

So as far as a public health measure of delivering the fluoride,

It is an effective way of getting fluoride to the people that possibly don't get it through other means.

As far as studies that have shown topical versus systemic, I'd have to look more into that and provide you with that information.

It is effective for children with developing teeth where you can't apply the topical fluoride because it may be beneath the gum line and so it becomes more incorporated with the enamel as it's developing below the gums.

So I get the sense that the fluoridated water has sort of a critical but small sort of time advantage, developmental advantage as the teeth are developing.

But after that, the topical could at least be a better delivery or at least as good a delivery method if used properly.

If paid for.

Is your assumption that perhaps intake of fluoridated water for an adult is harmful?

No, it wasn't actually.

the different type of application.

One goes with the other.

So the biggest advantage of having fluoride in the water system is that it's available equally to everyone.

There is no disadvantage of having fluoride in the water system.

If you move to a system where water is unfloridated,

Are you seeing differences even across the economic... Yeah, it makes no difference what the socioeconomic background is.

If a child does not have access to fluoridated water, if their family does not have access to fluoridated water, the health of their overall oral health and their overall general health is impacted in a negative manner.

and you see that.

There's lots of studies that show that and the two other things is even if you're using fluorinated toothpaste and other fluoride products, there's still a benefit to having, you still get benefit from having the fluoride through the water as well.

So it isn't like, you know, do I get enough through my tooth, since I'm using fluorinated toothpaste, I'm not going to get any benefit from having it in the water.

No, you still will get benefit.

And another science question is I understand that the fluoride compound in toothpaste is simple salt and yet what's in the water is a silicated kind of chemicals are very different compounds or no?

I'm Jim Moore with the Office of Drinking Water.

I can't speak to the fluoride compound in toothpaste.

I don't know what it is.

There's various chemicals that are used in drinking water.

Sodium silk fluoride acid and sodium fluoride.

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority uses both of those.

I have a couple more questions.

Any other questions?

I'm not aware of it, I mean there's water works all over the country,

that fluoridate and feed chloramines.

There's 30 plus systems in Virginia that I know of right off that are feeding both of those chemicals.

And I was, I did look on the EPA website.

Yes, ma'am.

And they did a lot of investigation.

But again, this is bleeding into the next presentation.

Okay.

Thank you.

Well, actually, and this is, I realize where I got the lead thing.

The silicated compound actually is a corrosive acid, apparently.

When you talk about lead leaching and distribution systems, one of the factors that impact that is how corrosive the water is.

Now when we feed chemicals to drinking water, you can affect the acidity of the water.

Chlorine does this chlorine gas, forms an acid, fluoride is an acid.

We're feeding such small amounts, it really doesn't impact the pH.

And in addition to that, the water treatment plants are adjusting the pH as part of their corrosion control efforts

to prevent lead leaching in the system.

So the acidity of the water is adjusted and they do that whether they feed fluoride or not.

Most water utilities, particularly surface water plants like Rivanna, are adjusting the acidity or the pH of the water to make it non-corrosive.

But that said, we're feeding such a small amount of the chlorine it really doesn't impact the pH that much, or fluoride also.

Okay, any other questions on that?

Can I ask one more question, Mr. Frederick?

Can I finish?

I feel that it is a good policy to fluoride the water, good public policy.

I apologize for interrupting.

There was one email we were forwarded.

Is it difficult to regulate how much fluoride is in

day to day.

I'm actually thinking about Mr. Frederick here.

Or is that not true?

That the, if you're going, oh, maybe you can talk to that.

One of the primary roles of the Office of Drinking Water is to work with utilities that feed fluoride.

And one of the things that we stress more than anything else is maintaining constant, the proper level of fluoride, 0.7 milligrams per liter all the time.

The Rivanna water treatment staff does an excellent job doing it.

They have constant monitors at their two largest plants.

They monitor the fluoride concentration all the time.

It's online.

It continuously monitors.

At the smaller plants, they test the concentration several times a day.

In addition to that, we do split samples once a month.

We take one sample of water.

The water plant

monitors the fluoride concentration.

That same water is sent to a private laboratory.

They monitor, test the concentration, send all the results to the office and we monitor that.

So we're making sure they test it frequently.

We're making sure that their testing procedures are accurate.

Steve Quebec is a district engineer.

Steve does inspections of the water plants, works with the operators to make sure we're feeding that optimal.

I won't name his name, but my denizens is an old hippie.

I really like the guy in part because he's really strong in alternative healing and holistic health.

I'm known to be a man of great integrity and great wisdom.

I just happened to have my six month shag up a couple of weeks ago and he saw me in the

And he said, I want you to vote against keeping fluoride in the water.

I want you to defluoridate the water.

And I have to say I wasn't completely surprised to hear him say it because he is very sort of alternative.

and I said, okay, tell me why.

He says, because I need a new boat.

And he says, if the moment you defluorate the water, I'm going to see more patients than ever before with worse dental health than ever and it's going to increase my business substantially.

He was.

He was being quite

So one of the questions is going to that.

I want to thank you and your colleagues to come and help us in this understanding.

Thank you very much.

We appreciate the help and information.

Thank you.

Next item is Lodger and Meals Tax Report.

I'm Lee Richards.

I'm Commissioner of Revenue.

I was here tonight speaking on changes to the meals and lodgings tax.

Back in January 1st of 1983, when the meals tax went into effect, there was a lot of opposition to it.

We had about two weeks in December to get an ordinance, get things out on the street.

And so the assessment date was set for the end of the month.

So for example, your January assessment, you had until the end of February to pay it.

And over the years, we've watched as other localities have moved back

to the 20th of the month so that it coincides with the payment of Virginia sales tax.

Virginia sales tax is due on the 20th of the month and there's really no reason now why the meals and lodging tax could not be changed to assess it on the 20th of the month.

This would give council, as you probably know, a one-time windfall at the end of the year to pick up some extra money.

I've talked with some of the restaurants in town in regards to change.

People don't like change.

But with corporate accounts, there's never a problem.

For some of the mom and pops, sometimes they feel like, you know, that it's kind of jamming up on them.

But as I remind them, the money is held in trust.

It's supposed to be there anyway.

So

Maybe I could ask a question to you before I ask the members of the council.

One question came in your report that apparently now it's 5% interest and now you're proposing 10% interest.

Now it's 5% penalty and 10% interest.

and the 10% interest has been there for some time.

This has got to change.

The only change would be the 10% penalty.

So you'd have 10% penalty against the tax and then 10% interest.

So for example...

So what has changed?

What change are you proposing?

Well, you're moving the penalty to 10% and you're still doing 10% interest.

Why?

This is the question.

It's kind of...

trying to bring it in line with some of the other localities.

We're looking at

More because you changed the penalty a percentage?

No, no, that's just for the entire year.

That's what I'm asking.

According to the projections on the meals tax you'd get for this fiscal year, you'd get $229,000 for the

Okay.

No, I understand that.

And that was all very well explained why the change to the 20th and that makes perfect sense to me.

My question is what the change is from the percentage.

Thank you.

So did you calculate how much more that would cost restaurants?

in the coming year if they had to pay?

Like how many are likely to be laid?