City Council Meeting   8/15/2016

Please do the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Mr. Bellamy?

Here.

Ms. Szakos?

Here.

Ms. Galvin?

We're going to proceed with awards and recognitions and proclamations.

I'm going to begin with, sort of take the Chair's privilege, begin with a proclamation that I feel very proud of to deliver today.

And I'm going to,

It's a proclamation honoring Kezer and Ghazala Khan who are with us here today.

Before I read it, I would like to know if any of my colleagues have anything they would like to say in the beginning.

I think it's important for us all to recognize and make sure that we let you know just how proud we are of you to not only be from our community but your courage that you've shown

the bravery in which you've displayed throughout these past couple of weeks as well as honoring your son who bravely and heroically gave his life for this country.

Thank you so much for standing tall.

Thank you so much for letting everyone know that the city of Charlottesville is a welcoming place, that we may not be perfect but we are working to get to where we need to be and you are shining stars and indeed a golden family.

Thank you, again welcome and I know that this has been a very probably arduous journey for you that because of your courage you have now become very public people and that can take a toll so just we would just like to acknowledge that and to thank you for coming one more time into a public venue to let us honor you

But thank you for your courage.

And again, you are a real model for us all.

And your son gave the last full measure for his country.

And again, as a Gold Star family, like all Gold Star families, you deserve much praise and honor.

So thank you for coming.

And I won't belabor the point except to say that I agree with what my colleagues have said.

I actually helped to write the proclamation.

This is something that I feel very strongly about, that as a city, as a nation of immigrants, as a city of immigrants, that it's important to us to have people in our community sort of being that light to show who we are.

And Mr. and Mrs. Kahn, thank you for coming this evening.

I know it's very difficult for you to live this over and over.

My boy served in Afghanistan.

I know how difficult it is.

I know about not reading papers and not watching television.

So thank you for sharing with this community the memory of your son.

I would have been proud to have him in any unit I was in.

Okay, I'll read the proclamation now.

A proclamation honoring Kazir and Ghazala Khan, whereas on October 5, 2015, Charlottesville City Council unanimously declared Charlottesville to be a welcoming city, stating that all people, including recent immigrants, are welcome, accepted, and integrated, and, quote, policies that negate opportunities for contributions to our community,

In the fullest capacity hinder Charlottesville's prosperity and compromise our commitment to the American values here stated.

And whereas on June 8, 2004, Captain Humayun Khan of the United States Army, a graduate of the University of Virginia, perished during Operation Enduring Freedom in Iraq,

when approaching a suicide car bomb after ordering his subordinates to move away from the vehicle, an act of bravery for which he was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star Medal and the Purple Heart.

And whereas Captain Khan's parents, Khizr and Ghazala Khan, were born in Pakistan and ultimately emigrated to the United States, whereupon they became American citizens and currently reside in the Charlottesville area.

And whereas Charlottesville proudly describes itself as a world-class city,

and strives to fonder a community-building environment that embraces opportunity for all.

And whereas the Charlottesville area is the historical home of Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, and James Madison, the architect of the U.S. Constitution, and proudly upholds constitutional values today, including the freedom of speech and religion, separation of powers, equal protection of laws, and the separation of church and state.

And whereas Khizr and Ghazala Khan have recently highlighted their commitment to the U.S. Constitution and have honored their son's memory by bravely countering

Anti-Muslim rhetoric through a patriotic and profound dedication in the United States of America into the Constitution that guides our traditions of pluralism and tolerance.

And whereas the Khans are a Gold Star family, which entitles them, like all Gold Star families, in the words of the U.S. Army,

to our respect, gratitude, and the very best support we can provide.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Charlottesville City Council hereby declares our appreciation and support for Charlottesville area residents, Kizzer and Ghazala Khan, in recognition of their sacrifice, patriotism, and commitment to our constitutional values and traditions, signed and sealed this 15th day of August 2016.

I will walk up and give this to you, but I also wanted to let you know, and we're going to ask you to make comments if you're so willing.

I have also chosen to make a gift to you of a copy of my book on James Madison with the following inscription for Kizzer and Ghazala Khan from one Virginian to two others.

with gratitude for your courage in adding another chapter to the epic story of constitutionalism in America and with a humble plea that in the years ahead when you think of Thomas Jefferson you also remember his oft overlooked but equally brilliant colleague James Madison.

Thank you.

So I'm going to give this to you now and then hopefully you'll make remarks.

Mr. Mayor, honorable member of the council, and our honorable guests, thank you for inviting us, thank you for honoring us.

You're the stewards of Thomas Jefferson's city.

I get emotional just thinking of that, that you make this city so proud that from Monticello, he looks down and he said, what a wonderful people.

The people that live in this city make it a great city.

I am just so honored and so emotional.

Our love affair with Thomas Jefferson didn't start today or this year.

It was when we first moved to this country.

The very first place, and Vazala will testify to that, we went to visit was Thomas Jefferson Memorial.

And the inscriptions in his writings at his memorial caught our attention.

And those writings were

One of the deciding factor that we wanted to make this country our home, the generosity, the care, the kindness.

We are embodiment of what is good of this country.

And I am so honored to be standing before you.

And yeah, this is the same constitution that I carry it in my pocket all the time because of my

and it has all of my markings and notes and all that and when I run out of paper I write on it.

So I'm going to read a couple of lines from Thomas Jefferson who was a lawyer and our first Secretary of State and he writes, Building a just and solid government at home would be the way

United States would serve as an example to the world.

So true the world looks at us, at our democracy, at its institution, at your leadership, the cities, states, and federal government with envy to emulate us.

The political discourse in this election season has gotten too

too rough has gotten too uncivil and hope that with this participation of our and participation of all of the citizens of Charlottesville would shed some positive light that there are better ways

to resolve our political differences than maligning the institution of this country.

The world looks at our elections with envy.

They want to emulate every aspects of it.

For a candidate to get up and say, I don't mean to be too political, but it's so dear to me because I have visited other parts of the world.

They ask the question, how does election is conducted so well in United States?

What can we learn from it?

for a candidate to get up and say that it is a corrupt system or the fourth and the most important part of the democracy which is the press, the role of press, calling the press names and doubting their sincerity.

Of course, there are difference of opinions and in political process you have difference of opinions but the discourse shouldn't be this uncivil.

and that is the concern.

I am just so honored.

To the rest of the folks, I'm sure it means living in Charlottesville, living in Jefferson City and under the leadership of these wonderful patriots sitting here.

But for us, it's very emotional every time.

I drive by the road that goes up

I think of Declaration of Independence and I implore everybody to read it one more time.

You will see that how we have gotten where we are today, how precious this liberty, this freedom is for everybody.

So it's a fateful day for us that love that started so many years ago today comes full circle and we appreciate your kindness, your thoughtfulness

and God bless you.

And thank you for being the stewards of Thomas Jefferson City.

Thank you very much.

My daughter made these for the whole community.

We found out in France, after what happened in France, that the police wanted to reach out to Muslims.

And the colored green and all of these went throughout the whole community and these little children came.

You're so beautiful.

We'll now move on to some other matters of important business at the top of our meeting, some announcements.

We have a first, another proclamation, which Ms. Galvin, you were going to read.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

This is a very amazing day, a momentous day for us all.

And it's also with great honor that we remember another important milestone, and that's Women's Equality Day.

Whereas this year is the 96th anniversary of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, giving women the right to vote in 1920.

And whereas in 1848, 168 years ago in Seneca Falls, the need was recognized and proclaimed.

But after great effort, there is still no reliable protection in the United States Constitution for women against sex discrimination in general.

and whereas in the past years, laws and policies in the Commonwealth of Virginia have unjustly discriminated against girls,

and women in general, such as in matters of reproductive rights, sexual assault, marital property and sexual harassment.

And although some laws and policies have been somewhat eased, such improvements can be, have been, and are being reversed.

And whereas some institutional policies, whether overtly discriminatory or facially neutral in public, voluntary, and in private institutions, still have inequitable effects on women,

Policies such as those dealing with insurance, pension, family medical leave from employment, job promotions, occupational choice, recreational opportunities, and access to medical care and stereotypes still exist that limit women's roles

and activities.

And whereas young girls and adult women still must contend with unwanted touching sexual, physical and verbal assault and rape and being viewed by men as objects to use, thus illustrating that many stereotypes are still operating that reinforce unjust assumptions.

And whereas most of the care of the young, the disabled and the elderly is still provided primarily by women, many of whom through economic necessity must also work,

and whereas in many other ways the tasks of providing equal opportunities to women and men and the tasks of removing burdens that fall unjustly on women as compared with men remain uncompleted, now there be it resolved that the City Council of Charlottesville, Virginia does hereby proclaim

August 26, 2016 as Women's Equality Day in remembrance of all those women and men who have worked to develop a more equitable community which acknowledges both the real similarities and the important differences between women and men with liberty and justice for all.

and be it further resolved that the City Council urges all citizens to treat all distinctions and classifications according to gender as initially suspect and to be questioned until they are justified by an equitable and compelling interest of the community, the institution or the individuals affected and to require that the burden of justification for any distinction according to gender be borne by those who wish to discriminate against women as compared with men

and to examine all facially neutral criteria such as physical stature requirements, occupational qualifications, childcare assistance opportunities, home maintenance responsibilities, elder care benefits and disability benefits to determine whether they have disparate impact on women and to protect affirmative

Action in the public, voluntary, and private sectors in order to overcome the effects of caste discrimination and stereotyping, which have limited the life chances of women and girls as compared with men and boys, and to eliminate all unjust discrimination and prejudice against women and ensure equality of rights, privileges, and responsibilities under equitable principles and practices for all women and men.

I'm here today with Sharon Utz and Donna Price and also with Rachel Beatrice.

First, I want to say thank you very much for your support over the years.

You know, it took 70 years before women got the right to vote.

And in four more years, it will be 100 years since they got the right to vote.

but also in particular I want to thank you for recognizing about discrimination and that it's something that you call all citizens and yourselves to work on and it's something that

always has to be initially suspect and always has to have a burden of the person making those distinctions about difference to have to justify that it's equitable for all parties, for our community, for the institution, for the individual affected.

And we always are working on having things being more equal in terms of benefits and equitable in terms of responsibility.

I'm not sure if there's anybody here who has the details, but on my calendar on August 23rd, there is a Women's Equality Day event at the library.

Does anybody who's here know about that?

Ms. Hoffman, can you just give a quick update, maybe run back up here?

I just wanted to make sure that that got announced.

Yeah, the Charlottesville National Organization for Women is having a reception at 5 o'clock at the library on Market Street, up on that entire room.

And anyone who would like to come is welcome.

And we will be celebrating that women got the vote.

and also presenting some books to the library to expand their collection.

I have two announcements.

One is if in your basement or workroom

You have cans of paint that you've been afraid to throw away because they say do not discard toxic materials.

You have now a chance to do something about it.

The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority's Ivy Materials Utilization Center is now offering free paint collection to city and county residents on a daily basis.

Latex and oil-based paints in their original containers, one, five, or quarter-gallon containers, are accepted.

The Ivy Materials Utilization Center will not accept other paint-related products or non-original containers.

For complete details, go to RSWA's paint collection page at www.rivanna.org slash paint-collection.

The Rivanna Solid Waste Authority Board approved this change on June 28, 2016, and collections began the first week in August.

No, I will be availing myself of that service.

The second is that on August 25th, next Thursday, is the next Our Town meeting where Charlottesville City Council takes its show on the road.

We will have at six o'clock free dinner.

There will be free childcare.

The meeting itself will be all public comment without time limits.

Thank you.

Sure.

I have three announcements to provide.

As a reminder, tomorrow will be the second installment of the Black Male Town Hall Summit, which will take place tomorrow, 7 p.m. at City Space.

We are asking for all brothers, no matter your race, ethnicity, creed, religion, whatever, to come out.

We will be presenting our second step.

in terms of our action plan, which includes integrating brothers back into the community, political visibility, as well as our new initiative for the Circle of Brotherhood.

This initiative is a part of the Charlottesville Alliance of Black Male Achievement in which I serve as the co-chair along with Mr. Sarad Davenport.

At our last meeting, we had 67 men in attendance.

Tomorrow, we are hoping to see the same, if not more.

If you are concerned with the lives of African-American males within this community,

and if you have been noticing what has been transpiring within our community in the recent tragedies of Mr. Denzel Morton as well as others being severely affected by violence and crime, we need you to be present.

It is time for us to stand up and stand together.

Again, that is tomorrow, 7 p.m. at City Space on the downtown mall.

Moving forward, Sounds of Summer.

So join friends and neighbors for an evening of live music, food, and fun at Tonsco Park on August 20th from 6 to 8 p.m.

Soul Transit will be playing this free event and it's also sponsored by Bama Works.

Another successful summer has come to a close for the Community Attention Youth Internship Program.

Mr. Ben Seitz and Ms. Devonee Watson are here to speak about their experiences with CATEC.

And I would like to invite Ms. T. Graves forward as well as Ben and Devonee to tell us about their fun summer.

So thank you Council for inviting us to speak today and celebrating the end of our summer.

We just wrapped up an incredible summer session on August 5th and I just came to give a recap of the program and then I'm going to hand it over to these fine folks here to

We had a great opportunity to continue City Council's vision for offering meaningful work opportunities for youth in the community to help them build their skills.

and so we expected them to work for six weeks this summer, 20 hours a week, attend a workplace readiness class, and then meet with their CATEC counselor who was kind of there to help process and support them and help them reflect on their experience.

So we asked a lot of them.

They did a fantastic job.

We were able to accept 148 youth into the program.

and we recently graduated 91% successfully from the program.

So I'm going to hand it off to Ben first to share his experience to give an actual account of what you guys are able to help us continue.

Hi, I'm Ben Steece.

I'm 17 years old and in about a week I will be a senior at Charlottesville High School.

I first heard about the program back around maybe April earlier this year when two people came around to our lunch time and asked if anyone needed a job over the summer or an internship.

And knowing that a few of my friends have had trouble getting jobs over the summer in the past, I immediately thought, okay, this would be a great idea and I should do it.

I quickly got in contact with Misty and everyone at the program and it was, I had a really really great time getting to know them and then I actually worked right down this hall in the communications office with Joe Rice, Miriam Declare, Cal Tate and David Dillahunt They were all fantastic mentors as soon as the first day I got there I had just the best day I actually got to work alongside the police department who were helping load up a trailer to go to West Virginia

for some flooding that happened about a month and a half ago.

Throughout the program I learned a lot about stuff I was really interested in.

I got to film actually two meetings in this, you know, council hall, CRHA and planning commission.

I got to work with cameras.

I helped out CalTate.

process videos, go on different local television stations and actually I was able to go on a ride along with the police department with Officer Gary Hauschins I believe and that was phenomenal.

I've been interested in CAPE since my freshman year of high school, but I've never been able to work up enough courage to actually go through with it.

But now, since I'm a senior v. junior, I now know that I should have done this a long time ago.

During my six weeks this summer, I was placed as an intern at the Bridge Progressive Arts Initiative, and it had been my first year, it had been their first year taking on interns with the CATEC program.

And I was nervous meeting my supervisors, just to say we're nervous on meeting their interns for the first time.

But upon meeting Matthew and Lisa, I knew it was going to be like the perfect workplace for me.

And throughout my six weeks, we've been out surveying local residents in the Belmont neighborhood for their BCville project that focuses on participatory budgeting.

and we've even been able to lead and organize a community development named SEVO Galaxy.

That'll be in September the 10th at X. I'm super happy with all the skills that I've learned, especially about event organizing, which will probably help me out throughout.

It's pretty inspiring to hear directly from these folks.

I know that several of you guys have had an opportunity to come and speak and welcome and congratulate our folks over the years.

10 years is a pretty special accomplishment, I think.

And we continue to have city council support to further our mission.

And I really appreciate Devony and Ben taking time out to really put thought and intention into their words.

I know that they did a fantastic job

and they do a great job of representing their peers, the other 148 folks that participated in the program and the neat organizations that they work for, the businesses and other agencies that partner with us in order to carry it out.

You guys are terrific.

Thank you so much.

We're very proud to support this program.

Thank you.

Mr. Fenwick?

Okay.

National Citizen Survey.

The city of Charlottesville is one of many jurisdictions in the United States to participate in the National Citizen Survey in 2016.

Starting Tuesday, July 19th, which is past, pre-notification postcards were mailed to a random sample of 1,800 Charlottesville households, which is 600 more households than sampled for the 2014 survey.

informing them that a questionnaire will follow asking for feedback on the quality and usefulness of city services.

Now at this point if I had gotten one I would hold it up and show you what it looked like, but apparently I'm not random enough.

So, the results will be included in a final report that city officials and residents will use to guide future strategic plan setting processes and budgeting decisions.

The National Citizen Survey is sponsored by the International City-County Management Association in cooperation with National Research Center Incorporated.

The questionnaire and survey procedure were designed based on the experience of hundreds of local governments ranging in size from small to large.

Scientific sampling and weighting of the responses in each jurisdiction ensure accurate and reliable results.

Because each city's survey is developed using a standard template and many citizens can be surveyed at one time, the National Citizen Survey is a very efficient way to measure citizen opinion.

We hope, should you receive a survey in the mail, that you return it and share your opinion.

That's it.

I have one more announcement that I forgot to mention, and that is this Wednesday at the Shostel Albemarle Technical Education Center, also known as CATEC, there's going to be a ribbon cutting ceremony for their new Information and Engineering Technology Academy.

It's a really important change for CATEC to get into that kind of

Industry.

And I hope you all consider coming out and supporting the school.

It will be from 5 to 7 p.m. this Wednesday, August 17.

Both Dr. Rosa Adkins and Pam Moran will be there for the school divisions.

Frank Friedman, the president of PVCC, Piedmont Virginia Community College will be there.

And myself and Anne Malik, we are both members of the Piedmont Workforce Network Council.

We will also be there, and everybody's going to be giving remarks of some kind or other, but then mainly getting a tour of the laboratory.

So it's really important, a big event for this community, and a big event for CATEC.

Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, let me, if I could add.

I forgot to mention the date of the next Blue Ribbon Commission on monuments and public spaces, and there's a fellow in the audience who's going to help me with the date, I hope.

Melvin, the 24th of August, and I assume City Space, 6 to 8 is what it usually is, but right now they're starting to get into the real meat of the Commission.

So far it's been one of the most amazing history lessons of our community and Central Virginia's community that I've ever heard.

Thank you.

We now move on to the portion of the meeting which is responses by the city manager to matters raised during the last city council meeting that go to staff response.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Ms. Naomi Roberts raised her concerns about the size of some new homes that were built in her neighborhood.

She's asked for a rezoning there.

Neighborhood Development Services will be taking up this issue citywide as part of the code audit.

Staff will be providing a report on next steps for the code audit to the city council at our next meeting, which is scheduled for September 6.

Mr. Michael Rody raised concerns about the amplified music that was played on the downtown mall on July 15th.

Assistant City Manager Mike Murphy has worked with the police department to ensure performances like the one described by Mr. Rody, which did violate

our noise ordinance are addressed as soon as possible when they occur.

Thank you.

We now move on to matters by the public.

I'll read what we read at the meetings.

We welcome public comment.

It's an important part of our meeting.

Time is reserved near the beginning at the end of each regular city council meeting for matters by the public.

Please follow these guidelines.

If you're here to speak for a public hearing, please wait to speak on that matter until the report for that item has been presented and the public hearing has been open.

We have one of those tonight on the first item on the agenda about the Dominion utility right away.

Each speaker has three minutes to speak.

Please do not interrupt speakers whether or not you agree with them.

Please refrain from using obscenities, and if you cannot follow these guidelines, you'll be escorted from City Council chambers and not permitted to re-enter.

This three minutes to speak, it starts with green, it goes to yellow.

As you get to 15 seconds, some red is when your time is up and a chime will tone.

If you're from Crescent Halls, can you please stand up?

Or raise your hand if you don't.

I think they said they want to stand.

If you live at Crescent Halls and you're willing to open up your home the next week to Mr. Fenwick, Mr. Bellamy, Mr. Jones, Mr. Signer, Ms. Szakos, Mr. Galvin, Mr. Brown, stay standing.

Thank you, that's all.

Thank you.

Good evening, thank you for your time.

My name is Michael DeRoso.

I speak tonight as a private citizen.

I reside on Brookwood Drive in Charlottesville.

H.R.

3892, a copy will be provided for you, is the Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act of 2015 introduced in both the House and the Senate.

It states the reason for seeking the designation of the Muslim Brotherhood as a foreign terrorist organization by the United States Secretary of State.

Furthermore, there's secret archives of the Muslim Brotherhood in America, two truckloads of documents, and hundreds of video and audio recordings seized in a 2004 FBI

in search of the secret sub-basement of a senior member's Annandale, Virginia home, Ishmael L. Barase.

Some of those documents were subsequently used as evidence in the federal prosecution of five Texas Holy Foundation charity officials found guilty in September 2008 of all 108 counts of material support to terrorism and funneling millions of dollars to the Hamas, a designated foreign terrorist organization.

They all received lengthy prison sentences.

One of these evidentiary documents and explanatory memorandum on their strategic goals in North America said that the Muslim Brotherhood must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within by their own hand and ours.

There are over 200 unindicted co-conspirators, including the North American Islamic Trust and the Islamic Society of North America.

In 2008, they both petitioned the court to have the names removed.

It was rejected because they were intimately connected with the assigned task of providing financial support to Hamas, as evidence indicated.

What does this have to do to Charlottesville?

Well, the Charlottesville property records indicate that the Islamic Society of Central Virginia, Charlottesville, Masjid, is owned by the North American Islamic Trust, an unindicted Kochis spirit in the largest terrorism financing case and further in U.S. history.

Furthermore, their bylaws said that they associate with them and also the Islamic Society of North America, also an indicted co-conspirator.

The bylaws also indicated they defer to another Muslim Brotherhood entity, the Fiqh Council of North America on their legal and religious rulings.

That Fiqh Council certified this book

English translation is a valuable, important work where there is a textbook for teaching Islamic jurisprudence to English speakers or as a legal reference for use by scholars.

This book, as well as the text of the other three schools of Sunni jurisprudence, all say that the only legal definition of jihad is to wage war against non-Muslims.

It further states that jihad is obligatory for all Muslims.

Funding it is obligatory.

Lying to non-Muslims to further it is obligatory.

These are all felony violations of the U.S. Code and they're obligatory according to this book.

The Charlottesville Masjid also collects money for Zakat.

This book says Zakat is obligatory to distribute to those fighting for Allah, meaning people engaged in Islamic military operations for whom no salary has been allowed in the Army Register.

That sounds an awful lot like 18 U.S. Code 2339B, providing material supports or resources to designated foreign terrorist organizations.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

I'm very disappointed I wasn't.

I'm here for my, what I would call my second part of my comments on the current state of criminal justice here in Charlottesville.

My address, you mean the one I already wrote down?

No, I have no objection to it, but I don't understand.

For years.

Well, slavery was customary in this country, too, at one time.

And so that's as far as customary is worth.

For those people who didn't have a chance to hear me two months ago, I brought again to the council's attention what appears to be a serious matter of racial profiling by the police department, that we now have three years of statistics showing that over 70% of the people being stopped are African American.

In this last year of 2015, only 12% of those stops resulted in any activity by the police, whereas twice as many white people were found to have been engaged in criminal activity as black people who were stopped.

The question is, under what circumstances are the police stopping people and how dare they, how dare they stop 70% of African American people when twice as many white people are engaged in criminal activity.

and how dare you not respond to this problem for years now.

Now the second part of my discussion has to do with the war on drugs, something we all recognize has been an abject failure.

Every level of government except ours of course because we have a wonderful institution called the Jefferson Area Drug Enforcement Task Force that goes around making snitches out of addicts.

The very addicts that you claim to want to help

are being used by Jade in order to catch other addicts.

Now we've got a very good article in the Seaville Weekly that I would encourage everybody to read on the subject and the impact on two families of the activities of Jade.

And in one of those cases, a jury found him not guilty.

Why?

Entrapment.

Now I've tried entrapment cases and they're the most difficult case for a defendant to try.

A defendant has to prove that the crime that was committed was the creative product of the police department.

So the jury found that.

So we now know that the crime that was committed was the creative product of jade.

What has happened to them?

Are they free to commit crime?

Are they?

Well, if they're not, then is somebody going to do something about it?

And if the police department won't do anything about it, isn't it your responsibility to do anything about it?

Hasn't this gone on too long?

We've invoked the themes that were brought up previously by the cons, a just society, by the women with NOW, a society that doesn't discriminate.

Both of those things are lacking in the treatment of African Americans in this community and in particular with respect to the criminal justice system.

You don't listen.

You don't do anything.

Unfortunately, the press hasn't even reported these statistics.

And I don't quite understand why because they're so striking.

These statistics are much more serious than the ones that the Justice Department found in Baltimore and went after Baltimore in order to change their policing pattern.

If you don't want to do anything,

Good evening, my name is Will Lister.

I live in Louisa County and as many are aware, we've had one of our commissioners from the Blue Ribbon Commission resign due to health matters and we all wish Gordon Fields well.

I'd like to recommend that now that the Commission is at an even number, we want to get it back to an uneven number in regards to how they cast their vote or decisions.

And I'd like to recommend that you appoint another applicant, UVA Professor Irvin Jordan.

And putting him on would bring us back to an even number.

If that's not in the cards for you and you don't want to put him back in, I hope that you'll have some foresight into other commissioners that have, as the resolution, asked for an open mind.

We do have on there one commissioner who is not of an open mind.

Good evening, my name is Nancy Carpenter and I live in the Rose Hill neighborhood.

One brief comment before I get into what my subject matter was.

Mr. Fields was a representative from the Human Rights Commission on the Blue Ribbon Commission and we did have an alternate, a second, that we felt would be a good match for this.

So I'd like to make sure that she is considered as well when you do a replacement.

Sue Lewis, I think.

The reason I'm up here tonight is that in the job that I do to put the roof over my head, I've been getting some phone calls lately from single mothers who have been fortunate enough to have received very precious housing choice vouchers.

Most of these women, I believe, are

African American, and we also know that the HUD has not replaced the budget when it comes to housing vouchers since the recession.

We're still at pre-recession levels, so the vouchers are few and far between.

The problem is that a lot of these women don't have the money it takes to pay the deposit.

The rent is fine, if they can find a landlord, that's fine, but the problem is, you know, the deposit.

To find, because you already know that there is an income

issue because they are, you know, getting a housing choice voucher.

So you already know that they don't have the income to perhaps pay a deposit.

And we also know that these are moms and also the facts show that the single biggest predictor of adult homelessness is being homeless as a child.

So I'm very concerned that there are children that are living already in unstable situations.

They're doubled up, tripled up, sometimes they're split up, you know, in the city and that

I would hope that if I can't start the conversation, to bring it to your attention and also to CRHA, what mechanism can be in place?

What can we do to help these families when they're close to getting a housing voucher in order to provide them the stability they need in their home, in order to provide a place where someone can come and do their homework in a situation that is quieter and perhaps less traumatic than being doubled up?

We also know that if they can't do their homework, they go to school, they're not rested, they have perhaps behavior issues, you're all of a sudden fast-tracking a kid to the school-to-prison pipeline all for the want of maybe 900 bucks.

I mean, that doesn't sound a lot to a lot of people in this room, but to some people that's like a million dollars.

You might as well, you know, be asking them to sell their soul.

So I'm just asking that there be a way, a conversation, start looking at

Is it a matter of somehow doing some type of savings program?

Is it a matter of, I don't know, a no interest loan perhaps to be paid over a reasonable amount of time in order to get these women into their housing so that they can provide and move on and have the housing that they want to provide for their children.

Thank you.

Stephanie Marshall.

Stephanie Marshall, Albemarle County.

While I respect City Council's recognition and honoring of one of our Gold Star families from this area, my question is why did it take 12 years?

And why hasn't City Council honored other Gold Star families from this area in previous years?

I have research to find if City Council had honored or recognized Marine Corporal Bradley T. Arms family

and I have come up empty handed.

I've also researched to find if Beta Bridge had been painted to honor other fallen soldiers from this area and again nothing.

If some of you are wondering, Marine Corporal Bradley T. Arms was killed in action in November of 2004, five months after Captain Humayun Khan was killed defending this great nation.

It seems to me that in order for a Gold Star family to be honored and recognized by the current city council,

They must speak at the Democratic National Convention.

This is not appropriate, nor is it acceptable.

It reeks of choosing to honor specific individuals and their families because they fit your narrative.

Honoring our fallen should in no way be politically driven.

I respectfully ask City Council to honor our other local Gold Star families and their fallen soldiers at future meetings.

I have a list of fallen soldiers from our area to share with you.

Good afternoon, Council.

I'm Shymora Cooper, 200 Burnett Street.

On behalf of the Habitat families, I would like to thank the city for supporting the Habitat program.

Thanks for supporting the mission to eliminate poverty housing and empower families by helping provide decent, safe, affordable housing in the city of Charlottesville.

This has been an awesome experience for me and my children.

I've learned the importance of budgeting to become more responsible for money and saving for my children's future.

Because of the city of Charlottesville's support, families like mine are able to become homeowners in the city of Charlottesville.

So I want to thank you for your support.

I also would like to thank Mike Signer for coming to our dedication on Saturday and Kathy Galvin for last Saturday.

And I also want to thank you, Wes, for all your support within our community.

And may God bless you.

Thank you all.

Good evening.

My name is Mary Carey and I live in 100 Ridge Street.

I'm here tonight because of the weekend.

I put a post on Facebook on Thursday asking the community

to help the people at Crescent Halls because of the heat and no air conditioning.

I mean, it was like the floors were sweaty.

So Friday, I put another post up.

I asked the people to pray for the people at Crescent Halls to see that they get some relief.

I went out of town Saturday.

While I was out of town, my phone practically blew up.

I would like to say thanks to all the wonderful people in Charlottesville that came together for the people at Crescent Halls over the weekend.

You would not believe how this community came together.

I mean, and still coming.

When a community comes together like this one did this weekend, that goes to show you something lacking here in city council.

I'm going to tell you something.

As city council people, we voted for y'all to help us.

We can't even get you to respond when we stand here.

which you should be doing.

Mr. Jones, we didn't vote for Mr. Jones.

We voted for y'all.

He's got enough to do.

What's wrong?

Y'all not intelligent enough to respond to us?

You've been doing it for years, then all of a sudden, no response.

We come here, we can stand out there in the middle of the mall and yell and talk and ask questions and things.

Nobody responds.

Same thing in here.

Y'all sitting up there like a bump on the log.

But see, when people come together, that goes to show you something's lacking.

Something's lacking in city council.

Charlottesville is very angry with all of y'all.

They get no support from you.

They get no feedback from you.

And soon as something happens, here you come, just like media whores.

You ready for somebody to put a camera on you

or Mr. Chris Callahan putting a microphone in your face so you could be heard.

People at Crescent Halls didn't want to be seen or heard.

They just wanted a fan.

And the city answered their responses.

And God bless the people in Charlottesville for coming together.

I got one thing to say.

Hello, my name is Deborah Booker and I live at Crescent Hall.

I'm president of the tenant association there and I'm dressed like this because it's hot.

It feels good in here.

And when 20 some of us got on that city bus and came down here today, it felt good on the bus too.

But where we live, it doesn't feel good.

So we're asking city council, what are you all going to do to help us?

What are you all going to do?

That's what we want to know.

Because we're fed up and we're tired of being patient and waiting and told to wait three or four weeks before we can breathe.

There's elderly and disabled people there.

There's 105 apartment units there.

All elderly and disabled people.

And they have health problems.

We have breathing issues.

I have three inhalers.

I have a nebulizer machine beside my bed.

When I moved to Crescent Hall ten years ago, I had a touch of asthma and I had one inhaler.

So I don't know what's going on there.

But now it's so hot, my voice sounds like I can sing bass.

and this is not my voice.

So I'm just saying I'm speaking for the residents and for myself because I live there and I don't know who to point fingers at and who to do what, who to accuse, but it's not our fault either because we live there and all we want is some help.

We want to be placed somewhere where it's decent for us to live until whoever decides whatever they're going to do with that building.

Because we are getting rent statements, we are paying our rent, and we are abiding by housing rules to do what we have to do.

And we go to the meetings, and we speak out, and we ask for help.

So I'm fed up, and there's 20-some residents that came here, and a lot of people in the community.

And I want to say thank you to Miss Mary Carey,

and to JoJo and to all the people who have come over this weekend and bought food and drinks and water, watermelon, everything.

Ice, coolers, fans.

We gave out over 60 some fans and I still have a list because it's 105 units and they're still coming in.

So I want to say thank you to the circle of people who've shown us love.

But I don't know what to say to you all except to say, what are you going to do for us?

What are you going to do for us?

Because we are human, we are people too.

And it's hard to believe that, you know, with so much construction and building going on all around us, we are just a few blocks from here.

You know, we live in the city too.

And we've been there a long time.

so I can't understand how all these brand new buildings are going up and we are sitting there deteriorating away so I'm not trying to point my fingers at anybody but I'm wondering who's gonna show up and what are they gonna do and how long is it gonna take before somebody does something.

What do we have to do to be heard?

Thank you.

Natasha Banks

Natasha Banks.

My name is Natasha Banks and I'm here to speak on behalf of my grandmother that lives at Carson Hall 408.

Complain about the unit.

First let me back it up.

A year ago she lived at 6th Street and she had a condemned apartment for a year.

They moved out of that, put in the high rise.

Now she at the high rise.

Let me get you my list right quick.

When you call to the maintenance and tell them about the complaint that's in the unit, the maintenance don't go and pick the work order.

So the maintenance men don't know what's really going on because of the reception not passing down the message.

The next thing, my grandma had 13 kids, 10 still living.

She got 36 grandkids.

And I don't know how many great grandkids.

How can you tell us?

We got to take turns to come visit my grandma, who's 88 years old, with a disabled daughter who lives with her, 47 years old.

We big.

We like a rack of us.

So how can you tell us that one of us, we have to take turns to come and visit because of people complaining about and so many banks.

And it's a rack of us.

So they call us by them banks people, them banks girls or them banks folks.

All right.

Oh, she just paid a rent.

Ain't been in her apartment for three weeks.

Living with somebody else.

My mother and the power attorney, which is the sister who here, they all had a meeting with housing.

One of the housing workers said, oh, we'll get a hotel.

She got people that she have, remind you, she got custody of her grandson.

She got a mentored daughter, but she also have workers.

How can somebody go to a hotel, stay with her overnight, you know what I'm saying, when we family members can stay there 14 days and then leave and come back again, because that's a part of the lease.

Complain about that.

Then ain't reimbursing nobody for where's her rent?

Why she had to pay rent?

And she barely even been there since August the 1st.

It's been going on since May.

One more thing.

Oh, they lied to me.

They lied to my momma.

They lied to my aunt.

When we asked the lady, Tatiana, when the unit gonna get started?

When it gonna start working?

I literally went into my grandma's bedroom.

You can actually jump up and down water that thick because of the AC compression.

The AC started messing up, so everything started draining.

that calls a flunk.

This mildew is outrageous.

They never started on her unit.

Went in there today.

Seen the maintenance men in the hallway.

When you gonna get started on the unit?

Oh, we gonna go in there tomorrow and go pull up the carpet.

Well, my grandma living with somebody else on the couch.

Oh, but she paid a rent for the month, though.

That ain't fair.

What else?

Uh-uh.

I ain't come to Starr enough.

I just wanted my boys to be her for the basis.

And anything else?

Oh.

Thank you.

Samuel Adams.

Yes.

Good afternoon, council.

My name is Taylor, not Adams.

She just put the wrong name.

Oh, OK.

I live at 500 South First Street across the halls.

I live at 308.

apartment 308.

Um, I've been there going on 10 years and this is the first year I had to go and come to y'all about the air conditioning systems.

We pay me and my mama pay almost $1600 in rent a month to live uncomfortable.

If I gotta pay that much, like I told my mom, we could have went and got us a house.

You know, y'all sitting, we paying the city

for the city to take care of us.

The city ain't taking care of us, we taking care of them.

And that amount of money, I should not have to come here and say anything about anything in that apartment.

It should be perfect, but it's not.

So I need to know, you was there a couple weeks ago, last week.

Was it warm in the hallways?

Yeah, Saturday was the same way.

Sunday, today, you go there and there, it's the same way.

Just because they put those little portable air in the laundry room, ain't got nothing to do with the hallway.

You know what I'm saying?

So they waste money for that.

The unit they put in that hallway, they could have used it in somebody's apartment.

If you're going to waste money, waste it the right way.

You know what I'm saying?

Not the wrong way.

And that's the wrong way.

And you have people that's living in units that are all behind the walls.

where they're living at and they can't breathe, got mold in it.

But y'all claim you can't do nothing about redevelopment because you don't have the money.

But you got money to help people, to allow people to build these tall other buildings, way taller than our building.

You see what I'm saying?

But you can't fix it so that we can get funded so we can get our place done, right?

We live to be living comfortable just like y'all do.

And I know when you go home, you got your air conditioner on, don't you?

Don't you?

Yours on, I'm sure yours on, yours on.

But we ain't got no air conditioner.

And then they gonna tell us it gonna take us six to eight weeks to get it fixed?

You knew it was broke down in the wintertime.

You should have had that done.

Thank you.

Peggy North.

Peggy Northair?

Okay.

My name is Peggy North and I live across the halls.

Jojo.

Jojo, I want to thank Jojo.

I wanted to thank them with all my heart and I love you.

I do, I really love you.

If it wasn't for you and Mary Carey and all y'all other people, we would be suffering bad.

Because we suffer bad in those apartments because they're so damn hot.

It bolds your head.

I mean, I've got COPD, I've got asthma, and I have to eat my inhaler four to eight times a day.

and I suffer.

I can't breathe in it and I got mold and mildew in it and I'm about to rip my carpet up myself.

If I have to pay a fine, I'm going to have to pay a fine because it's wet and it's mildew and it's just awful and I don't know what to do.

I done told them about it and they won't do nothing about it and the management got online and lied like a dog and said that we was lying about the things and that we didn't need them and that we didn't need the food or nothing and she wasn't nothing but a liar.

She was nothing but a liar, a big fat liar.

and what is she doing, laying back in her little 90 or something, walking around, twisting her thing and just twisting around in her AC, just walking around and looking good.

Paul Wolf, we're just suffering in that heat.

No, I don't think it's right something got to be done.

All right.

I want to thank everybody for having the, we thank folks who come to public comment.

I want to thank you all for being so direct with us, everybody who comes.

on behalf of City Council.

In this particular instance, I'm going to ask my colleagues if anybody has anything they want to say.

We usually have the City Manager respond to the next meeting, but in this case, because this all happened this weekend, and Mr. Jones, you did brief the Council on what the response had been to this,

and Mr. Bellamy perhaps if you but I'm wondering Mr. Jones if you would want to summarize to folks just because this all happened this weekend and so many folks here were raising issues with Crescent Hall what the city staff's response has been and also for the

The purpose of folks who may not know out there the way that CRHA is designed and the way that what Crescent Hall is under, just in terms of the city government, it might be helpful for folks to know.

Sure, I'll talk a little bit about, because I really, we don't run the housing authority, so I don't have great details on what was done this weekend, aside from what they sent to us this afternoon when they sent them on to council.

As you know, the housing authority is a separate entity from the city of Charlottesville.

So the city, we do not have direct oversight aside from the fact that the city council appoints the board members to the housing authority.

We have over the course of the last few years been trying to work more closely with the housing authority to address some issues.

Apparently this weekend there was a lot of work that was done

during the week and the latter part of the week on Thursday, Friday and Saturday to try to address the air conditioning issues that they were having.

The folks from the Housing Authority have said that if anyone has an issue in their apartment right now, they should contact the Housing Authority and they will be responsive to the concerns that are being raised with air conditioning right now.

That's what they said this afternoon.

We usually don't do this right after, but given that so many folks had raised concerns, I thought it made sense.

We have to, we've already gone, yeah, I'm sorry.

We're going to have to, okay.

All right.

So if I may, so, so if I, so if I may, ma'am, as the individual who is currently serving as the council rep on the housing authority board, as well as the vice mayor in the city, there are a couple of things in which I would like to state in regards to what transpired this weekend.

On Friday night, I had the opportunity to go over and see firsthand what was going on, a building in which was very hot.

Sunday night, we went back over.

We got a chance to see some things that had transpired in regards to TRHA trying to make improvements, as well as Monday morning, I was there this morning, and I walked up and down all of the hallways once again trying to see what's going on.

So here is what it appears as if where we are right now.

and this is the first thing in which I believe that we all need to do before we decide to get upset with each other, before we decide, so if I may respond because I did not interrupt you.

If you could just let him speak, please.

No, we understand that everyone is upset.

I'm upset.

I'm upset that it even happened.

So in regards to responding to all of the comments, because I took note in which there were seven of the eleven today specifically about this issue, for an individual to say that

Council as a whole, as well as the CRHA board, I will be the first to admit that we are nowhere near where we need to be in regards to Crescent Halls as a whole.

I think everyone in this room can agree that something different needs to take place.

however one thing that I think that I have no issues with saying is that this new housing leadership our executive director Mr. Grant Duffield and his staff they are committed to working to try to do their best in terms of making this situation better now this situation has been messed up so may I so this situation this situation at Crescent Halls has been messed up for a very long time those issues

So in regards to something in which we have heard on several different occasions, a relocation plan for residents, redevelopment here in the city of Charlottesville, there were

Outpours from different residents who have stated that why do we see development going on in other parts of the city and why can't we fix the basic necessities in our public housing sites.

And I agree with you.

Those are things that we are diligently working on.

One thing I can assure you

The same way that we were there on Friday, Sunday, today, the same way I can look you in the eye and tell you that this is not going to continue, I am guaranteeing you that we are working on it.

This does not change overnight.

One of the reasons why I ran for council is for situations just like this.

I know first hand what it feels like to live in a housing building where you don't have air condition.

I know first hand what it feels like to live in substandard conditions.

I know first hand what it feels like to cut mold off of a bread to make a grilled cheese sandwich and be hungry.

So I know very, very much.

We need to allow him to speak.

If I may be allowed to respond, because I was in the middle of our conversation.

There are a couple of things in which I believe we need to do in the very immediate future.

First thing that needs to take place, every individual who lives, who currently lives in Crescent Halls, as well as any of our public housing sites, who have an immediate concern with their unit, we need to compile those lists, as well as those names, and let's get that information to CRHA.

That's the first thing.

After we get that information to CRHA, our Public Housing Association of Residents, Brandon Collins, afar is here.

Making sure that we also get the responses to FAR as the next step and after which, after we get the responses to CRHA as well as working with FAR, then we can move forward with a plan of action.

There is no way in which individuals will be able to move forward with a plan of action without a plan nor without us having the individual complaints on record.

So in order for us to do that, we have to follow certain steps and procedures.

I'm well aware that there are many people who are upset.

They have the right to be upset.

We understand why they're upset.

But this will not deter us from moving forward.

This will not deter us from doing what we must in order to improve this city.

And I'm very confident of such.

Thank you, Vice Mayor Bellamy.

Mr. Fogel, thank you.

Mr. Fogel, we have the opportunity to talk about it tomorrow at the meeting, correct?

Mr. Fogel, I'm talking about it.

Alright, we're going to take a break.

Music Playing

Do you think you could find Mr. Bellamy?

OK, I'm going to bring us back in order.

We have an item on the agenda, which I mistakenly skipped over early on, which is appointments to boards and commissions.

Yeah, we had a resignation of Gordon Fields from the Blue Ribbon Commission on monuments and public spaces.

So I would like to place

in nomination, Sue Lewis to be the replacement.

Second?

Second.

Thanks.

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

That carries five to zero.

Consent agenda.

Item A, minutes for July 18th.

Item B, appropriation VDOT FY17, primary extension paving funds, $289,641, second of two readings,

Item C in appropriation, Greenston on Fifth Corporation sponsorship agreement for enhanced police coverage, $82,184, second of two readings.

Item D in appropriation, Piedmont Workforce Network and Commit Worker Training Grant, $3,610, second of two readings.

Item E in appropriation, Piedmont Workforce

Force Network Incubate Worker Training Grant, $4,730, second of two readings.

Item F in appropriation, Charlottesville Albemarle Adult Drug Treatment Court Grant Award, $205,000, first of two readings.

Item G in appropriation, Victim Witness Assistance Program Grant, $250,902, first of two readings.

An appropriation of proceeds from the sale of 1312 Nunley Street by the Thomas Jefferson Community Land Trust, $126,731.08, first of two readings.

Item I, an appropriation mobile computer and record system equipment, $173,272, first of two readings.

Item J, an appropriation Safe Routes to School grant application, $56,000, first of two readings.

Item K, a resolution, Charlottesville affordable housing fund allocation for Albemarle housing improvement program, emergency repairs program, $50,000, first of one reading.

Item L, a resolution, surplus city SUV donation to Charlottesville Albemarle Rescue Squad, first of one reading.

Item M, an Ordinance, CDBG Home Cold Revision, second of two readings.

Item N, an Ordinance, Polling Place Change, Refer to Election Precinct, second of two readings.

Item O, an Ordinance, Water Street District Corridor Resoning, second of two readings.

Any questions?

Anyone want to move any item off?

Any discussion?

Questions?

Okay, all in favor?

Second, sorry.

Second.

All in favor?

Consent agenda carries five to zero.

Thank you.

This is the first of two readings, which means we'll only need a second on it.

which would grant actually three separate easements to Dominion Virginia Power to serve the YMCA that's currently being constructed in McIntire Park.

The YMCA, Dominion Power and city staff have been looking at various alternatives

In terms of the best way to get power to this new facility and by city staff I specifically will mention facilities management and public works, environmental staff and public works, and parks and rec staff.

I will say, in my opinion, we're quite diligent in looking out for the best interest of the city and protecting the park from any adverse environmental consequences.

The initial plan called for the power to be brought in through an easement that originated on the CHS Charlottesville High School site.

and would enter the park on the north side and connect to the new facility.

There were a number of concerns with that proposed route.

abutted against the existing track at CHS, so there were concerns about whether the easement would be compatible with a new and enlarged track.

There were concerns about intrusions into the root system of the trees in the park, and the proposed path also went through a sensitive area between the tennis courts and the creek

that divide the park from the CHS site that has some unstable soils in it.

Eventually, everyone came to the same conclusion that the best route to get power to the facility was through the path that currently provides power to McIntire Park.

And that is, if you look

In your council agenda materials, at least on my electronic version, it's pages 129, 130, and 131.

You will see three separate easements.

The first is a 15-foot-wide path that leads from close to the bypass to the north side of the YMCA facility.

The second is an overhead line easement that will allow the placement of an additional pole

There next to the bypass there is one existing pole already there.

And the third is also a new pole at the end of Sherwood Road on the south side of the bypass.

That little corner there is actually part of the same parcel as the park there behind Walker School.

As I say, the city staff, YMCA, Dominion, Virginia Power all agree that this is the preferred route that will have the least amount of impact on the park and they are requesting therefore the approval of these easements to bring power to the YMCA facility.

And it is scheduled for a public hearing.

I have a question.

So on the map, the first one that you showed, which on mine is page 128,

I don't know if it might be 129, one of the squiggly long easement.

So the question I have is that that is coming from where the bypass is, then it's kind of coming through the driveway and then up around the back of the YMCA, all the way around the pool and all the way around to the other side of the YMCA.

Why is that necessary?

Why can't they just put electricity into this end?

into the end, closest to where it's coming from.

I think it was done to protect trees on the other side of the building.

Okay.

Ah, okay.

Got it.

I did see that was underground.

Other questions?

OK. Do we have a motion?

Oh, public hearing, I'm sorry.

We have public hearing, which I need to open.

We don't have anybody signed up for it.

As I said, it's right down there, the sign-up sheet.

But is anybody here interested in speaking in this public hearing, which I will open right now?

Okay, public hearing is closed.

Any other further discussion or questions?

Is there a second?

Second.

Okay, that's all we need for this first of two readings, so moving on to the next agenda item, number three resolution, Habitat for Humanity.

This is an allocation of $480,000 from the Affordable Housing Fund.

Before you tonight is a request for the allocation of Charlottesville Housing Fund dollars to Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville.

Mr. Dan Rosenzweig, the executive director and CEO of Habitat for Humanity, is with us here tonight and will be available to help and assist me in responding to any questions or concerns you may have.

I also have my replacement here tonight, Ms. Stacey Pethea, sitting on the front row.

Congratulations and welcome.

Please come back.

Can you tell me her last name again?

Pethea.

So it's P-E-T-H-I-A.

Are you comfortable introducing yourself for a minute?

So what would you like to know?

Where were you before?

Before I came here, I was in Pittsburgh working for the Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh.

I was the Landlord Outreach Coordinator for the Housing Choice Voucher Program.

Thank you so much.

Anyway, I know Stacey will do great jobs.

I've had the privilege of working with her the past couple of weeks and tying things up this week with anticipation of Friday being my last day.

Getting back to our presentation tonight, prior to really going over the Habitat specifics, I just want to start off with a reminder that our comprehensive plan calls and highlights the need for affordable housing throughout our city.

and as we know this is a key component that's necessary for implementing the comp plan and there's several challenges to that.

One would be the high cost of land in our city, the limited availability of land, and thirdly, federal housing policy.

So things like our low income housing tax credit program as well as various HUD programs really tend to concentrate poverty into existing sites or into congregate sites where

where you can put multiple units in one location and there's economies of scale with that but there's also consequences.

That said, those are challenges to incorporating units throughout our city and I just wanted to keep those in mind but Habitat has approached staff with a proposal that would help the city

with the goal of incorporating units in other places within the city, affordable units.

And specifically the request before you tonight is for $480,000 out of Charlottesville affordable housing funds, and they're being requested to help with the purchase of various lots in different locations, a total of 16 lots to provide new supported affordable housing opportunities.

Habitat will be responsible for identifying

the lots that they would purchase for negotiating with the owners and for purchase of the lots as well as building the homes that the 16 families would go in.

So all that responsibility is on them.

They would be building these homes in character with the existing neighborhood and environment.

And in some cases that would involve construction of a single family home, whereas their typical model tends to be more of

the attached model like we see in Elliott and some other locations, but in this case they will build appropriate to what is required by that lot.

In some cases that would involve additional landscaping and hardscaping, perhaps not really required in current other builds.

So that all adds to the cost and is part of the justification for coming to you tonight to ask for this extra money.

All the units would go to our 15% goal of a 15% supported affordable housing within the city and consistent with Housing Policy 1, families would be selected and they would be primarily city residents and or employed within the city.

Beneficiary families would be selected from Among Habitat's qualified waiting list or partner family waiting list and would have incomes between 25% and 60% of AMI, so definitely on the lower end.

benefiting those that we would classify as extremely low or very low income.

Leverage would be provided through direct mortgages that are loaned to participating families, which would amount to about 2.3 million, as well as Habitat fundraising that would go along with that.

And over the 30 year period of the mortgages that would be provided to the families buying these homes, additional tax revenue about 1.8 million to the city.

So something important for long-term consideration.

Accountability will be assured through the execution of a grant agreement and required reporting both during the life of the grant as well as through the life of the unit.

That was something we incorporated with Housing Policy 1.

And if there's a change in the status of that unit or it sells and converts to a market rate unit, then Habitat would use those proceeds to further more supported affordable housing units.

And that could be at some point in time, you know, 20 years from now, but that's the general idea.

I do have a question.

Thank you.

And I hope before you step down that we're able to give you some sort of acknowledgement for your last day before us.

So just keep that in mind.

Come to hack on Wednesday.

OK. Well, I'm curious, though, with the idea of I understand the existing zoning is going to be ruling over these lots.

So if it's possible,

to do more than one unit on that lot.

Will this program do that?

No.

OK. And I looked at Ann just to get a nod on that, but that would be my take as well.

I thought we expanded that considerably.

That was the case with the sale of the Kenwood lot.

In that particular case, it was like a homeowner covenant, I believe.

Craig verifies that.

But yeah, I'm believing that the R1S, and I have to double check that, but I'm thinking that the smaller, you know, the small lots don't allow the accessory units.

But that has not been Habitat's model heretofore, not to say

Do you have any comment on that?

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

My name is Dan Rosenzweig.

I live at 740 Lexington Avenue in the city.

I'm the President and CEO of Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville.

There would be nothing in this proposal that would stop either us or the families from building an accessory dwelling unit, essentially if the zoning allows it.

Throughout most of the city we are zoned R1S, so that's allowable.

We haven't as of yet had that model.

It's actually a model that we're looking at down the road when we get to Southwood, the idea of building

And I guess this is a separate question then.

Yes, it's been part of our conversations as part of code audit, questions about the code audit.

But I think some of the questions that you're asking really want to be within the context of the code audit because there are a lot of levers that we can pull that create additional affordable dwelling units and additional allowances

I don't want to put Mr. Rosen's screen on the spot, but this is kind of going into discussion a little bit.

So the, I'm going to support this, I'm in strong support of this, love what Habitat is doing.

There's the backdrop question about the current mode that we're in with housing allocations from the Affordable Housing Fund is it's stakeholder driven.

We had a discussion about this last

last meeting and I'm hoping that in a future meeting we're going to have a work session about priorities for being proactive about the Affordable Housing Fund and how do we be strategic about it.

So I was just wondering if you could put in this, not a long speech, but in some context how this fits into the, so we have the goals, we have the strategic goals in the City of Charlottesville, 15% affordable housing.

Can you kind of speak about where you think we should go in terms of strategic goals with the Affordable Housing Fund, as City Council, the policymaking body here, if we were to become more proactive about our achievement and how Habitat fits into that?

In two minutes, I got it.

I think I did hear about the conversation you had last month.

and while I do think that it makes sense to lay out some strategic initiatives, I think you have to be a little bit careful given the way that funding tends to come down from say federal programs.

You tend to end up, one of the biggest challenges in the affordable housing sector is that there tends to be money looking for projects rather than projects looking for money.

And so you end up, that's why you end up with low income tax credit projects, which I don't

have a problem with other than they, by nature, concentrate affordable housing.

And they end up with so many rules because they're trying to satisfy a vision of what should happen.

It doesn't end up often being context sensitive.

It doesn't allow an NGO like Habitat to be live and opportunistic.

And so the way this housing fund was created back in 2007,

The idea was that this was supposed to be flexible money with a high, high leverage factor.

And if you look at the Housing Advisory Committee report, which recommended 15% affordable housing, there was a leverage factor of something like 11%.

You'll never get that if you flip the equation and say, we're looking for this project.

Where you'll get that is if you're a very strategic

about the funding and the funding can actually flow out almost in the nature of stimulus money quickly.

So think for example about an NGO or somebody who has a sliver of land in between two parcels or lacks that sliver of land, but they can assemble those three parcels and now they have two acres and they can do a PUD.

That's how you begin to move the needle.

That was a very efficient and substantive answer to a very complicated question, so thank you very much.

And related to that, I think Mr. Ikeifuna has brought this up, that we should be actually providing some way of identifying that the city is participating in the investment of these projects.

A city logo on the signs that are on the sites, I really do think it needs to become much more obvious that this public money is being used to expand the stock of affordable housing.

Is there something that we need to vote on?

Can we just make that a statement?

A request?

I'd be perfectly happy with that.

On the larger side,

you know where you've got like a Congress side it's it's much easier to have something out there more more permanent and Mr. Iacofuna had talked with me about that as well and incorporating it into the grant agreement and Stacy and I talked about this actually just last week in terms of what would be the appropriate way to structure it because when when housing rehab is going on it we just have a variety of ways that we do investments with the housing fund and what the most appropriate way for for signage to occur

I would, again, one caution about that especially when you're trying to get market rate momentum in mixed income communities.

So we're actually pretty purposeful in a situation like that.

We sort of downplay the Habitat logo.

Sure, but I'm thinking in terms of seeing some AHIP projects where you see the AHIP sign that are rehab projects, what would it take to have the city logo in conjunction with that?

Okay, I think we've actually hit our 15 minutes.

I would just say I also support this and I also, I assume that you heard during public comment that you had a very able and wonderful advocate in Ms. Cooper who I would also like to congratulate on her home ownership.

Hear, hear.

and thank her family for being so good.

I'd like to say I really did appreciate being there on Saturday.

It's very moving and heartening and it's supporting these projects and it's just like the best of our community.

You see the diversity and the commitment, the pluralism, the neighbors helping neighbors and it's right downtown.

And I would just like to say one more thing.

I really appreciated the maps and the indications of where these projects were being, where they were located.

It really does give us the idea that you're trying to do a geographic income mixing.

for the discussion.

All in favor.

Motion carries five to zero.

Thank you very much.

She's been a dedicated public servant and has done a lot for affordable housing here in Charlottesville.

I know she would rather have snuck out without that, but Kathy, thank you for being here.

Thank you.

So thank you for this time this evening to provide an update on the Office of Human Rights activities and also the Human Rights Commission's activities for 2015 and to answer any of your questions about what we're doing right now for the 2016 work plan year.

So as you know the Office of Human Rights began in

2013 with the appointment of the Human Rights Commission in November.

And from there, it was through the Human Rights Ordinance that drove the work of the office and of the commission.

We try to do three primary things.

The office addresses individual issues of discrimination.

The Human Rights Commission addresses systemic issues of discrimination and both the office and the Human Rights Commission does outreach and education.

So I'm first going to talk about the 2015 Human Rights Commission work plan.

They had a retreat back in January of that year.

to figure out what were the things that they were going to focus on.

And just to give you a couple of ideas, one was to focus more on hosting more community meetings.

They wanted to look into expanding the disproportionate minority contact, focus on criminal justice with adults.

And there were, there was one group in particular that they worked with to try to make something happen.

and increase the visibility of the Human Rights Commission and review city policies because that's their primary responsibility.

And so some of the things that helped draw their work was how they got organized with their subcommittees.

And this chart here gives you some idea of how the subcommittees within the commission helped focus their work

for the 2015 work plan year.

So we had an administrative matters subcommittee that basically focused on all of the administrative concerns that drive the work of the commission, the bylaws and the rules and procedures.

We have an age, disability and religion discrimination group.

All of those three protected classes were combined because

There are only 11 people on the commission and those tended to be the smallest area of any concern that may have either been brought to the office or to the commission to look into.

Then we have a community engagement subcommittee that focuses on either putting together activities or engagement activities to

increase the awareness about the Human Rights Commission or the Office of Human Rights and you received in the packet a long list of all of the different connections that both groups made over the course of 2015 and we're continuing into 2016.

We have a race discrimination committee and I should go back to the community engagement.

Within the community engagement, their responsibility with

their outreach into the community was to be responsible for the community bridge builders committee.

And so there are a couple of folks from the community engagement subcommittee who help guide the work of the community bridge builders.

Under the race subcommittee, there are a couple of areas that are

what they want to be their responsibility in terms of community engagement.

One is the dialogue on race and we are in process of rebooting that initiative that began back in 2009.

And then there hopefully will be an opportunity to be a part of any review of police data because we have been given different updates

regarding stop and frisk data from the police department.

And so we're looking for those updates to continue to the Human Rights Commission.

But it is specifically the responsibility of the race discrimination subcommittee who might look at any or who will look at any disproportionality or disparity regarding race relations and the police department.

The other thing that the race discrimination committee also works on is looking into foster care and as I mentioned before, hopefully looking at how the DMC disproportionate minority contact work would affect the adult community because all of it right now with the DMC task force is focused on juveniles.

Other subcommittee is focused on sex discrimination.

There are two areas in which that committee gets community engagement.

One is through the Charlottesville Area Safe Space Training Coalition.

And so they are not responsible for organizing any of that work, but it is through the Sex Discrimination Committee that they collaborate with any training or awareness that might go on

with that particular group.

And I might add that the Office of Human Rights provides safe space training specifically for different city departments.

Safe space training has to do with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender education and awareness for specifically city employees regarding their work.

and then the domestic sexual and gender-based violence advisory panel is a group of service providers within the city who are looking to figure out what gaps need to be filled that the city and the Human Rights Commission can provide some assistance with and right now I think the one thing that everyone in that group has agreed on is just doing a lot more education and awareness about

what gender-based and sexual assault are.

And then there's one group that was added for the 2016 year that I'll mention.

It's the Housing Ad Hoc Committee and I'll talk a little bit more about what they do.

But those are the different committees that were created in 2015 to help guide the work because they felt a little unfocused and getting into these subcommittees really

pushed them in being focused on doing the work that they're tasked to do.

So their 2016 work plan right now, the Race Discrimination Committee is working on doing the foster care follow-up.

And so as a matter of fact, we're planning a meeting with, we've already met several times with the Department of Social Services.

Diane Kukniew has been very cooperative in answering the questions that the Human Rights Commission

had regarding any community concerns around foster care.

And so the next meeting, we're meeting with a couple of service providers to figure out what are some of their concerns and how might the Human Rights Commission move forward with making sure that everyone has access to services and that families feel like they're being treated equitably.

The Dialogue on Race, as I mentioned before, is in the process of doing a reboot.

The Sex Discrimination Committee, we're still collaborating with the Charlottesville Albemarle Safe Space Training Group.

The Disability, Age, and Religious Committee is participating heavily with the ADA.

Okay.

Thank you, Americans with Disabilities Advisory Board activities, thank you Kristin.

And so we got an opportunity to participate, myself and one other Human Rights Commission member got to go to a Mid-Atlantic ADA conference down in Richmond and it was very educational and it was very exciting.

We came back with a lot of energy to get more involved within the community to cooperate and collaborate with Jim Herndon as the ADA officer for the city.

The Housing Ad Hoc Committee is working on a community impact assessment.

and it's not an easy document to put together because they're very mindful of the fact that they want either city council and or other boards and commissions to take into consideration with any decision making that goes on how will it impact the community in some sort of cultural way and so

So they're trying to figure out what's the best language to come up with that would make it easy for the different leadership bodies within the city to be able to use and that it would not be, wouldn't create any conflict with any state law regarding taking into consideration any kinds of social, racial impact statements or assessments

when you're talking about either housing, development, any kind of decision making regarding effects on the community at large.

And then the community engagement committee with its work plan is also looking at just doing more planning and outreach activities within the city.

With the Office of Human Rights, the work plan that was created in 2015 focused on creating a trusting environment, promoted visibility of the office, assist non-jurisdictional customers.

That means people who had an issue that was outside the city of Charlottesville because the ordinance only allows for addressing issues of discrimination within the city limits.

increase community understanding of the Office of Human Rights Services and support the Human Rights Commission work.

And so the primary thing out of the office, obviously, is looking at complaints.

And so the 2014 data that you were last made aware of, I think basically

lumped all inquiries to the office into the category of complaints.

And so what I chose to do for 2015 was to define what an inquiry versus a complaint was to sort of provide a little bit better understanding of what kinds of issues are being addressed within the office.

So an inquiry is a question about our services, programs or procedures and anything that fell outside the jurisdiction that wouldn't necessarily require an investigation of a complaint because it took place outside of Charlottesville.

And then a complaint was defined as an issue that fell within the ordinance,

and the complaint, the person filing the complaint wanted to take some sort of action.

So those were the two ways it might change, but for 2015 and looking at that data, that's how we defined how to look at all of the contact with the office.

So as I said before, in 2014, the data that was shared with you

was that there was a total of 107 complaints.

And so in 2015, what

When looking at the data, it was disaggregated by the office having about 700 plus inquiries.

That averaged to about three contacts a day asking about services or someone who may have had a concern about an issue that happened to them.

that did not include all of the questions or phone calls and other contacts regarding meetings that myself or perhaps other commissioners would have to go to.

So this is all about someone asking about

What does the office do?

And I had a problem and I need some help.

And of those 700 plus inquiries for the city of Charlottesville, 32 of them fell out to be what we defined as complaints.

There were a total of 52 in general, so those 20 additional complaints were what occurred in other areas, and I'll talk a little bit more about that.

For Charlottesville, there were about 32 intakes for complaints for 2015.

So as you can see here, the location of the complaints, 32 took place in Charlottesville.

Albemarle County for 2015 had 12.

And then in other areas, whether they were coming from across the mountain or Madison or Nelson, there were eight.

outside of the city and outside of Albemarle County.

And of the protected classes, you can see our protected activities.

There are five different protected activities.

We have employment, housing, public accommodation, credit, and private education.

Employment was the most requested service for

any concerns around complaints followed by housing and then public accommodation and then the did not indicate is what the number five is for we had no complaints filed for credit or private education but the folks who did not want to indicate what they were

concerned about, they were complaining about an issue but they didn't say that it was related to one of the protected activities or protected classes.

So all of the employment complaints were referred to the EEOC and that relationship with the EEOC as you may or may not remember was changed

because of the EEOC's staffing issues.

They used to come up in the very beginning to Charlottesville once a month to have face-to-face intakes with anyone who had a concern and they were not getting enough intakes in order to justify having someone be away from the office the entire day out of Richmond.

And then they lost a couple of staff members

Excuse me, a couple of staff members.

So that made it even more difficult.

So what I'm working on with Mr. Calhoun, who is the director of the Richmond office, is to come up sometime this fall to do a and here's what the office of the EEOC is all about.

And here are our services just to sort of reintroduce himself to the area.

and to see if that creates a little bit more interest in having him have a staff person up here or somehow we're going to work on tightening up that relationship again.

Housing is also the other area where we refer all complaints.

So they are referred to the Piedmont Housing Alliance.

They are the intake office for the Fair Housing Office out of Richmond.

The public accommodations concerns, a lot of them were related to mental health.

People who felt like they were being denied access to services.

A couple of calls in 2015 had to do with stray calls from CAT service and once those folks were redirected to the CAT office, always with

A note saying if you still have any questions, please call our office back.

They never did.

They always got their issues taken care of through the transportation office for the city.

So the public accommodations piece is, there was a, and those are not all city related.

Some of them were also connected with Albemarle County as well.

People feeling like they

We're not given adequate access to services either regarding mental health or health services with their particular situations.

Protected classes, race was the largest issue with 22 of those complaints falling in that area.

Sex being the second largest and then national origin and disability were the next largest, followed by age and then religion.

The other

protected classes, marriage, marital status, and pregnancy or childbirth didn't receive any complaints regarding those two areas.

And so community engagement, as I mentioned before in your packet, there are a whole host of different groups that we connected with and

from city departments and collaborating on different things, different community groups, various student groups, and that's ranging from school age to UVA and Piedmont Community College, special events where there were just one-time things where requests for the Office of Human Rights or the Human Rights Commission was asked, and then festivals and celebrations where we try to provide information tables to increase the visibility of the office and the commission.

Thank you.

Mr. Bellamy is coming back.

I have a small list of questions.

And actually I'll start with the last one first because it was one that occurred to me as you were speaking.

When folks' cases go to the EEOC, now that the EEOC is not in Charlottesville, and I really appreciate your efforts to bring them back because I think that was something that a lot of people felt was important.

But if a case does go to the EEOC, does that mean they have to go to Richmond to get heard or to talk to people or to have it dealt with?

Yes.

I don't know what Mr. Calhoun is able to do once they've accepted a case to investigate

I just know that when they were trying to come once a month they were doing so initially at our request and we just didn't have enough numbers for them to justify leaving the office.

Well I really do urge you to, and if there's anything we can do to help with that, I think

I can see why the monthly thing might not be effective as a way to do it because they're just sitting there and somebody make them in the next day and miss them.

But I think that there are, in trying to deal with human rights issues locally, one of the things that we found had been a real barrier to people was that they weren't filing complaints because then they had to deal with enrichment.

and so we we want to take that barrier down and so if we can get them to say you know kind of as needed we will come and you know if that's a mileage issue or whatever that is I hope that that you will ask us if we can be supportive in that.

Definitely.

So one of the questions I had on several of the things for the 2015 or 2016 work plan and we're kind of eight months into 2016 so we've already kind of done a lot of it and it

maybe very similar to your 2017 work plan.

You talked about examining city policies as part of the kind of mission of this office and I was just wondering what sort of metrics you're using or what sort of kind of method you're using to examine city policies and

and I asked with two things in mind, the mayor brought up in a discussion we were having, the human rights campaign has some kind of metrics for looking at LGBT impact of policies in a city and I know that the National League of Cities has certain metrics and technical support for cities trying to examine city policies, not for necessarily, you know,

intent of any kind of violation of human rights, but certainly for impact, because often there are unintended consequences that are very disproportionate.

Just going back, and I won't make a big speech, but going back to Mr. Fogel's contention about the stops being disproportionately of African American citizens,

I think that one of the things we found in the young people's study was that that was because the police have to respond to calls from the public, and the public was disproportionately calling about young black kids.

Is that racist?

Possibly, but it doesn't necessarily look at a policy, and so how do we figure out what policies have disproportionate impact, and is there a way that we can do things differently?

What has been really helpful is inviting different department heads or members of different departments to come and talk about what is it that they do and then we just ask them up front, is there anything, is there a policy that you think the Human Rights Commission should examine

that would help with doing their job better.

We haven't gotten a whole lot of requests to say we have issues here and we have issues there, but what has happened when we are engaging with other folks either throughout the community or just in conversations with themselves with the commission where they're trying to figure out

Why is this particular program doing better or it's not being accessed more by these groups of folks?

Or how come it seems like this data that we've been shown seems to be affecting a community more so than another?

And because of that, then that prompts them to want to say, well, what does the policy say?

And so we do not have a

A list of questions like, for instance, you mentioned the Human Rights Campaign and their metrics.

I think we're going policy by policy.

It's a very slow process, but they are volunteers and they are trying to figure out what is it, how can they have the best and most effective impact.

on the city regarding some of the different ways in which we hear from the community that there's either disparities or disproportionality.

I would hope that for 2017 you would look at using some of these technical support possibilities from either the National League of Cities, where we can actually have a kind of a methodical way of, because sometimes departments

not because they meant to, but things just are the way they are and people don't always see those impacts without some other way of looking at it.

So I appreciate that as a way to start.

Right, and to add on to that, I believe in October or early December, myself and one of the human rights commissioners will be going to Baltimore to participate in a leadership exchange that's being sponsored by the

everyday democracy group.

We've done that before in the past when the dialogue on race initiative was in place and so they bring together groups of different city governments and nonprofits from across the country together and we talk about how we're doing, what we're doing well and where the challenge is and we try to learn from each other's mistakes and

Where are you on an assistant?

That's in process.

Of the complaints, the 32 actual complaints, have any been resolved?

Because one of the things that I was, when I just saw that, that just meant there had been a complaint.

Five, actually six of those complaints were not found.

Okay, so not substantiated?

Right, and one was appealed in 2015.

And that was the only time the Human Rights Commission had

Someone from the public who was not, did not like the decision that was made come before them and ask for a reexamination of his concern.

No, they've been resolved until 2016, however, that's another story because there's a lot happening there and hopefully in a few months I'll be able to share with you some successes.

We'll try to get you in before August.

And the last one was just, you mentioned in the report that you were sort of backing away from the push for a disproportionate minority contact study for adults because the funding from the MacArthur Foundation that they were trying to get didn't happen.

But I do understand that the Office of Human Services has, or maybe the OAR, but anyway, we have a grant into the state

to do that work again.

Well, and that's good because they were very excited at the opportunity to collaborate.

It's really important and really expensive.

And one of the things that makes it more complicated with the juvenile system, we have kids in the city going to juvenile detention or being on juvenile probation.

Whereas in the adult system, we have federal and district and circuit, we have people who go to Louisa, people from Louisa get arrested in Charlottesville.

All people who go to state prison versus the local jails and all those computer systems don't talk to each other or even use the same data.

So yeah, it's complicated, but still necessary.

Thank you.

Okay.

Three quick questions.

No, it would be on the director's end.

Yeah, the EEOC.

If a complaint is referred to another body, then the office doesn't follow up, there's no access to that confidential information.

So it's not until charges are shared

I don't follow up with that person to see if they've done their due diligence in doing an intake with the Richmond office.

Once we get another body in the office, that might be something that we might be able to at least find out on.

But beyond them actually going and checking in with the Richmond office, that would be the only information we would

That would be on the EEOC's part and again it has to be a confidential intake because that whole process whether they come into my office and

Mayor Signer, I have just an observation and I guess a question and it relates to the community input impact assessment that you mentioned that the Commission is investigating the use of that tool.

Last Thursday, the Place Design Task Force had a meeting in which case Rachel Lloyd, who's on the Blue Ribbon Commission on Race and Public Space, reported out to the task force that

It was a very big concern among many in the community about the changes in neighborhoods related to development and redevelopment.

So that gave rise to a pretty intense conversation within the place task force about the kind of the tension between gentrification and the need for affordable housing.

the need for cultural preservation, historic preservation, but also, again, affordable housing.

And so understanding where in the city do we grow, where do we preserve or protect, safeguard, and then where do we have a transition between the two.

So that

is giving rise for the place will be coming to this body in about a month with their annual report.

And one of the issues that they would like to talk about and become involved with is the next comprehensive plan update and having a very robust community engagement on the ground to get at those very questions.

So this is making me think that there should be some sort of synergy between

your subcommittee and members of the Place Design Task Force.

Is that a possibility?

I think right now, at our next meeting, we're hoping to have some language put together.

I just came across another document that I'm hoping they'll find helpful to provide some insight into how you want to navigate this, because again,

it's complicated because again you're talking about what developers have the right to do and so our focus would be this document's focus would be on asking leadership what kinds of questions do you need to ask of not just yourself but of the different departments involved how their decision-making is impacting the community whether it's

in housing and development or whether it's in looking at transportation or any of those areas.

Carrie Rainey is the staff person responsible for a place and I will bring that back to the chair as well.

I'm the council representative on the place and perhaps there might be an opportunity for

Well, I wanted to say something quickly.

I know that, you know, while I was campaigning for city council, I heard, while people complain or have questions about many parts of city government, I heard a lot of concern about the Human Rights Office and I want to say that I feel like there is, since it was its inception, that there is real progress in tailoring it to the needs of this community at this time and in listening and in finding the projects and finding the work

and the right size, kind of right sizing it.

I know that's been a task that we've been engaged in at the budgetary level, at the staff level, as Ms. Szakos said.

And I want to kind of applaud you for the work that's gone into the

Report and what you're describing in the upcoming plans.

And I found it very extremely helpful that you, Ms. Green, were the person to speak to about this human rights campaign report that we got, where they really are engaging with municipalities all around the country and trying to incentivize them to make progress on dozens of discrete items that show how you're engaging with the LGBT community.

We had a really rich conversation about it.

There's lots of work to be done in trying to get

get the score a little bit up because there were some areas of progress they didn't know about.

There may be some policy items that will come to us where it's perfectly suited to what the Human Rights Commission can do, which is kind of tee up some policy items for city council.

And we're going to meet and talk a little bit more about that.

And I've already talked with a couple, Ms. Szakos and I talked about it, and we'll be all.

So I just want to thank you for doing that kind of work.

I think that it is actually very well tailored to what this office was set up for.

Well, thank you.

I am very proud to be able to say when I go to, for instance, our annual meeting for the Virginia Association of Human Rights Organizations across the state, and there are only seven if you include the Richmond office, and Charlottesville in its short time that it's been in place,

has really impressed a lot of folks.

And so I think for as much as we all know that we have a lot to do, we are doing a lot very, very well.

And it is being noticed.

Okay, we're all set.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, you're very welcome.

Okay, we are at the end of our regular agenda.

Mayor Signer, I do have an item, if I may.

And it's with regards to a symposium that will be at the University of Virginia from November 18 to 19, 2016.

The symposium is about Jane Jacobs, who was a noted urban planner about 50 years ago.

She wrote a book called The Life and Death of the American City, as well as The Economy of Cities.

Her connection to UVA is that she received the Thomas Jefferson Medal in 1996 and her father was an alumnus.

The bigger impact of Jane Jacobs on the city of Charlottesville, you could just read our comprehensive plan and see it.

because she talked about 50 years ago the importance of walkable cities, of having diverse cities both in terms of age and people, and that you need a lot of different kinds of businesses

and different kinds of buildings, old and new, to generate a healthy economy.

One of those aspects of a healthy economy was to have it so that people not only did a lot of the conceptual abstract work but also did the making work using your hands.

So the main thrust of this symposium in November will be the equitable city or city work and equity.

The request that's been made by Suzanne Muma, who is a member of the faculty at the architecture school's planning department, is to provide resources for an honorarium for speaker.

And in my conversations with you, Mayor Signer, as well as Councilor Szakos, the goal is to make this a much more connected to the community of Charlottesville.

and so I brought together Ms. Mumma and Andrea Douglas to talk about what kinds of collaboration could be had between the African American Heritage Center at the Jefferson School and this segment of the symposium which is focused on equity and work in the city.

So I am, at this point, I am just asking for an opportunity to have

This put on the agenda for the first meeting in September when Miss Douglas and Miss Mumai had a chance to get together and iron out a possible collaboration so that this city would be very much involved with sponsoring a speaker that would come that would really speak directly to issues of equity, redevelopment and bringing back all kinds of diverse workplaces in the city.

One person I'd like to point out that is already been identified as a keynote speaker is June Manning Thomas.

She's the professor of urban and regional planning at the University of Michigan.

She has written extensively on issues of history, social equity in neighborhoods and urban revitalization.

Many of the issues that were just discussed tonight with Ms. Green and the Human Rights Commission.

And this, the hope is that

The afternoon part of one of the days of the symposium would actually be at the Jefferson School City Center, but that has to be worked out.

So that's the request right now is not certainly not to vote on anything, but to just be able to get it on an agenda item for the first meeting in September.

Can I just ask a quick question?

And I will say a piece here in response because we're in the other business section of the meeting

There's not really a motion on the table just to respond.

It's kind of a question for my colleagues, because I'm really curious about what you all think.

Because when putting an item on the agenda, it can either be something that I do, or if I've got concern about it, then we want three people to probably put it on.

And I applaud and appreciate totally, Ms. Galvin, your commitment to this area of our city and the rationale for this item and the relationships and the meritoriousness of the cause.

Absolutely.

My concern with this is with the precedent setting and with the underlying policy about kind of one-off program-focused allocations from this fund.

So, and that's the concern and I really am curious to know what everyone else thinks about this because I think about this, the university and the city, there are hundreds of incredibly valuable events happening every

I was asked to talk at a conference about immigrants in Charlottesville that the Department of German Studies presented at UVA and it was amazing and there's and they could have used a couple thousand dollars for a speaker and there are every department is full of luminaries and really remarkable events and I just I'm a little concerned and I guess what it got me to is what's the policy for how we make and we don't really have a policy for how to use this fund and then we started thinking about well maybe each counselor would

you know with we could have some policy where you'd say there's a certain amount of money for community engagement projects which would meet some set of criteria but then that would you'd worry about that looking like a personal fund of some sort for projects and then you're worried about that so I'm really left it I am concerned about the precedent of kind of

I will offer my thoughts as having been dealing with council priority fund for the longest I guess.

The council priority fund generally is for things that are council priorities.

The things that we have already identified as priorities and I think in this case both land use and equitable development are things that we have talked about endlessly in this room and I think that this is a way to bring a resource to us

to be able to get city staff engaged in that by sponsoring it.

So for me, this one is kind of a no brainer and I fully support it.

I think that that that one of the things that we hope to do with the council priorities fund is to make it somewhat nimble.

And I am a little concerned that if there are too many rules and regulations for how it's used, that it's just another city fund and we wouldn't need council to be engaged at all.

There would just be a metric and people would get money.

And maybe that could be something we would consider, but

I can see merit in what Kathy proposed and if we're looking to craft a policy

It seems to me that within the larger council fund, if we, probably as a start, could carve out something that would make it more equitable among the five councilors.

Kathy sees things one way, I see things another, Wes sees things another, Kristin has been involved in this in a long time, and of course Mike, you see it,

differently as well.

And if each one of us had an opportunity to give our flavor or whatever, I think that would be a much broader contribution to the discussion.

So I would like to hear more, especially from Andrea, see how this is going.

But if we could just make sure that it reflects the entire council

and like I said, it wouldn't have to be perfect right out of the box.

I don't have an issue with the symposium as a whole, but one thing that I am, one reason why I have reservations with supporting is that we've had countless symposiums, talks, speakers, and we gotta get towards action.

What we saw and heard earlier today is individuals wanting action.

If we believe that what happened earlier was by mistake and was just because people are just upset about this one thing, then we are mistaken.

Bringing in another speaker in the city, essentially how I'm seeing this play out is when people in our community hear that the city sponsored another event

to bring in a speaker to talk about the issue.

What is going to come up is, well, why are they paying for people to come in and talk about it instead of using that money to do something about it?

And that's where we got to get towards.

Just me, quite honestly, I'm tired of talking or hearing speakers about what we should do or what needs to happen.

I want us to move forward with what is going to happen.

if that is going to be redevelopment or how we're doing different things to try to bring about jobs or how we're going to do things in terms of bringing about affordable housing and fixing some of the infrastructure issues that we have here in the city that we need to start doing them opposed to continuing to talk about them.

I'm kind of frustrated with where we are right now.

This isn't a disrespect to you in any shape, form, or fashion, Kathy.

I just, excuse me, Ms. Galvin, I just want us to move from talking

to Executing.

I totally hear you and I too get frustrated when people just talk about things.

I think sometimes something like this can help us move from talk to action.

I think sometimes when we talk only amongst ourselves, we go in circles and sometimes

That's true.

May I just bring up something, please?

Because I think this is a great conversation and discussion, so I appreciate the time.

For example, I cannot commit to any of this, but one of the ideas that has been discussed with Andrea and Ms. Mumma is bringing in other people who have run community development corporations that were owned, managed,

led by community people to redevelop their own communities.

We've talked about this endlessly, community development corporations in this city.

We've always been talking about it just in terms of the housing authority.

But the idea of bringing together those folks, and we even talked about the Dudley Street Resident Association, Neighborhood Association in Roxbury, these folks have done it.

and we don't seem to be able to get from the idea to the doing because we don't seem to have a clue as to how to begin the process.

So this is some more talking, but a lot of the delay in doing redevelopment is because there's a lot of fear and anxiety about what that redevelopment looks like and that that's why this is important to show examples, to have conversation in the community, with the community about what this looks like and how it can be done.

So the pushback has been coming a lot from members of the community.

And understandably so, because the last time there was urban renewal done in this community, it wiped out an entire business section of the African-American community.

And this particular symposium is focused at length on work in the city and building entrepreneurship

and focusing a lot on the African American community.

So I understand the frustration about talk, but this is bringing a lot of people that have done it.

I would disagree only from the perspective in which we've had members of FAR, CRHA, take trips to other places in which it's been done, we've seen it be done.

I don't think the reason why we have the

We can't seem to move forward in terms of redevelopment.

It's because we may not seem to have the people who know how to do it.

I'm just going to be very honest.

I think we're lacking the fortitude to be able to just say, this is what we are going to do, and we are going to move forward with it, period.

That is what is lacking.

And until we decide, CRHA, FAR, the community, the city as a whole, working with developers and whomever to say that this is going to happen, timelines, measurables, we're moving forward, whether you're with us, we want you to be engaged, we gotta go for it, we gotta go for it, we gotta go for it, until that happens,

then we're going to be in the same spot.

One thing that I fear is we have someone come in, we speak about it once again and then two months later, three months later, four months later, we're right back to square zero because the action plan isn't moved forward.

Can I try to

I appreciate you and the passion and the patience entirely in the focus on results especially in this area, especially in light of what we just heard and this feeling here.

I think that among this council, we've got a pretty unified group for good redevelopment.

I think we are ready.

We just had a work session at the vice mayor's urging and behest about with CRHA board.

And that was just two weeks ago.

I take those facts as entirely consistent with your urgency, fierce urgency.

And I think that I just don't

I just would put in a word for the power of a good idea to influence huge amounts of action.

When Bryan Stevenson was here, that was what gave probably you and me both that idea of changing the narrative, at least it did for me.

That talk really influenced my world view.

just in the same way as when the Oregon expert that you had on regionalism was in here last December.

That really, at least for me, influenced the MOU strategy with the county and regionalism really gave.

So I just don't want to set up a false choice about how talking is mutually consistent with brilliant action.

I think that sometimes a good, wonderful idea, and that's education, can change

I can agree with that.

Your cautionary note is absolutely noted by me.

I mean, I think that it's actually a great additional criterion for, and I haven't thought about this the way that you said, I mean you're right, it's about council priorities, so if it's not

if it wouldn't meet

approach to this, which would allow more of an individual approach with some part of funds.

We need to think about this, but let's talk about it a little bit between now and... Well, I'm in support of putting it on the agenda.

It's a great...

It's a great concern, especially in light of what we heard tonight, I think.

The conversation needs to be had, so I'm glad we had it up here.

Well, thank you very much for getting it on the agenda, and I'll let Andrea and Suzanne know, and take it from there.

I did have one other quick thing.

It's not really business, but just under the announcements, I neglected, we all neglected, I guess, to announce that school is starting on the 23rd.

So be very careful driving.

There are little people waiting for buses.

Little people aren't quite sure where their bus stops are.

Teenagers who are all excited or anxious or wandering into the street.

So at school bus times, please, please, please, please, please be careful.

Alright, we're opening now our second Matters by the Public.

This is open to all.

Nancy Carpenter again, just real quickly.

Charlene didn't know I was sitting in the seats behind her, but I chair that ad hoc housing committee, so I was very interested, Ms. Galvin, in what you were saying.

I am going to follow up with them, and I really want to hook in and have those joint conversations and what they're looking at and what we're looking at.

I don't know, serendipitous?

I don't know.

Excellent.

Thank you.