RECENT COMMENTS
JessOfRVA on then it happens to you...
Becky Metzler on Updated! Guess what's happening on Mosby/Venable?
Mary on then it happens to you...
Sid on then it happens to you...
Becky Metzler on Church Hill Startup Tackles Insurance for Freelancers
Neighbor on then it happens to you...
Dan Rooney on then it happens to you...
And all of them are sober
09/26/2009 8:46 AM by John M
Union Hill on Facebook recently shared these nuggets from the March 18, 1856, issue of the Richmond Dispatch:
Union Hill is rapidly becoming a town within itself, and …will soon be as thickly settled as almost any portion of Richmond. Most of the residents of [Union Hill] do business in Richmond -many of them are industrious, hard-fisted mechanics, who now own the tenements they occupy, and all of them are sober, honest citizens. We do not know of a neighborhood in the States where the laws are more rigidly observed by all classes than on Union Hill, and where, in the same amount of population, as few crimes are committed. The residents act as their own policemen.
TAGGED: Union Hill
Yes, it’s amazing how we stay relatively sober considering VA-ABC Store #187 (allegedly one of the Commonwealth’s most profitable yet absolutely one of the grungiest, least hospitable stores in the state) resides in Union Hill.
Whenever I patronize that store I leave angry over the circa 1970 bullet proof glass (which I find incredibly insulting and unnecessary,) the nasty gulag-style parking lot and architecture, and poor selection of liquors.
That store drives me to drink!
Let’s bring back the spirit of ’56!
Elaine, Store #187 may SEEM inhospitable, but apparently it welcomes underage VCU students.
The image of everyone in Union Hill as teetotalers is amusing, but I’m pretty sure sober also meant serious back then, just as it does now.
Actually there was a HUGE nationwide temperance movement in effect in the mid to late 19th century. In some places sworn sobriety was even a requirement for residency.
The next time you browse a map and see “Temperanceville”, you’ll know why.
Do you know why Southern Baptists oppose legal alcohol sales? It’s so embarassing to run into your neighbors at the ABC store. And the bootlegger delivers.
why are you targeting Southern Baptists?
Leigh, lighten up. I am a Southern Baptist but I don’t feel anyone was targeting me. If someone says something that can be taken as a positive or negative comment. It is always best to take it as a positive comment. Why? You don’t have to get all upset and say things/words to someone that you can’t take back later.
the word sober in this thread has troubled me in the way folks interpreted the sober.. I think the word in the quote was talking about being “serious, sedate or solemn” not intoxicated. What do you think??
I think everyone forgot to see that this was an excerpt from a newspaper in 1856…
What would this article read today if someone were to do a piece on Union Hill?
First thing that comes to my mind:
A weathered community.
In need of a helping hand.
Unfortunate
If a community can be forgotten and everyone turns a shoulder to, this one would be it. Project housing and government subsidized living. I see window units hanging out of every window, weathered roofs, battered brick foundations, dirty concrete sidewalks, dead trees that need removal and replanting.
If the city wants to spend some money, and do a good thing for its citizens, this would be a great place to start. Update the housing for one. Give these folks a better chance to better them selves!!
How about, Energy star windows, central heating and air, fenced yards behind the “apartments”. These buildings are so run down and in need of repair, yet everyone turns away and stops looking because no one wants to help.
There are families trying to make it, living in these so-called “homes”. What I call the homes are a disgusting, disgraceful representation of the city trying to “find a place” for people in need to live. I ride my bike through these areas and just wish that the community could better it’s self, but with 4 dingy walls, what kind of vision does one have?
The groan of raggedy window ac units rattling on their last leg, the cries of an infant, a mother sitting outside with her child, unable to pay for a baby sitter so she can actually get a job and work.
Stop sitting around complaining about the ABC store’s condition. That is the best building in the area. Start looking at the housing these folks have to live in, and most probably do not have a choice. Imagine trying to move a family if you don’t have a car, a truck, or the money to pay for a u-haul!! Living with drafty windows and doors, musty bricked walls, and leaky roofs.
THIS IS AMERICA for Gods sake! Yes you can make of it what you want, but in some cases you can only dream, struggle, and wake up tomorrow hungry.
The city’s contemplating spending $600,000 of taxpayer money to make up the RRHA subsidised housing shortfall – may have already made the loan. If this loan is made out of an already tight city budget, what gets cut: police, fire, road repair? #10…you’re calling for ‘Energy star windows’ and other improvements in addition to rent subsidy in the federally subsidized housing projects RRHA administers. If you care this strongly about the plight of the poor, ante up but don’t call for some politician to take more money out of my pocket.
Ann, why don’t you go live there for a week. have fun!
Ann, I also have to quote you here.. “what gets cut: police, fire, road repair?”
What I would like to bring to your attention is that you feel “road repair” is more important than human welfare?
Lets see, what got these folks into the situation they are in the first place.. Do you think drugs? maybe just they like it? or do they deserve to be forgotten.
For most, none of the above. try to imagine, i know it will be hard because you have a very narrow mind, but imagine if you, yes you, started out in a good situation. Not doing bad for yourself. making good money. living. have a car. maybe even a house! but .. job goes away, you can’t get another for one reason or another, you get depressed, sad, angry.. maybe you don’t understand exactly where to go from here and just get stuck. it happens. people just get stuck.
you end up in a living situation that is just not the nicest thing but at least it is a roof. you have bugs, no ac, have trouble finding even part time work, have no family to turn to, no church. where do you end up? you end up living but just getting stuck, depressed, angry.
This happens to people all the time. Rich or poor. we all need a helping hand from time to time.
such as this case, you could use a helping hand to see the anguish, the frustration, the confusion, and the moment of getting completely lost because you don’t know what else to do any more.
what is $600,000. how much would that actually cost YOU directly.. city of Richmond’s tax paying population / 600,000. do you actually think that people in need care how much money you spend? How much money the government spends? they don’t care because they are trying to figure out how to make that next dollar last them another week.
Maybe a project would help employee folks. maybe it would teach them a skill. have you ever replaced windows, installed HVAC, repaired / upgraded electrical services in a home? I have. when someone takes the time to teach you how to do these things, you become more confidant in what you can accomplish. sometimes, because of people like yourself, the government HAS to step in and take the roll. teach the citizens. once everyone is back on their feet, then the government needs to step back. but if there are still folks in need, by all means the government should step up.
Today’s generations being raised and them before have lost the love for their neighbors. lost the ability to sacrifice for a friend or stranger. You, Ann, have lost this. Compassion. Find it, walk the streets, look into the eyes of someone and see them just asking for help but too afraid to actually say it. sometimes it takes a few to shine the light for the many. be the few ann. make the difference.
#10, 12, 13…your comments about Union Hill? “First thing that comes to my mind: A weathered community. In need of a helping hand. Unfortunate”
I live in Union Hill. I have “…replaced windows, installed HVAC…” I’ve never repaired or upgraded electrical services in a home, opting instead to replace them. I’ve been poor, raised kids by myself. I live now with no AC, no TV, no dishwasher, and I went to the same Richmond public schools that are free of charge to all who live in the city. I walk the streets of Union Hill almost daily. And I have an extraordinarily narrow mind and little or no compassion.
“what got these folks into the situation they are in the first place.”
I would hazard poor choices with regard to education and substance abuse.
Why does this mean that the city should take even $3 of my money to pay for your scheme?
So if you have struggled and are still struggling, would you not appreciate a community’s help / guidance? Would you not appreciate not having to spend so much on heating for your home in the winter if your windows were not drafty? Could you not benefit from feeling safer because your door locks actually work? would your kids be happier if they could come home to a cleaner, safer place?
Call it a scheme if you want A.H. but scheme or no scheme, people are people. Some you can’t help, i agree, but most are looking for guidance. a way to better them selfs. Most do not want a hand-out, they want to work for it. most are proud people but still scared of what tomorrow may or many not bring.
drafty homes that use more energy than you could imagine! seriously, if we spent money to improve the insulating values of windows, insulate the walls, ceilings, and floors, don’t you think that it would pay for it’s self? Less power needed to heat, less power needed to cool?
I know my first and only home i owned, replacing crappy windows, insulating the walls, floors, and ceilings paid for it’s self in just over 2 years. $4,000 is all it took and my heating bill went from $320 / month to $89 / month. savings of $231 / month!!! multiply that by our cool months (5) = $1,155. And, i was keeping the house at 62 degrees (in case you were wondering)
now on to cooling. 3 months of cooling (yes, i only use the AC when the humidity is un-bearable) so, ac / electric went from $180 / month to just over $70 / month. total savings: $110 / month or $330 / season.
So lets see.. that comes to:
per year savings: $1,485
total cost of upgrades: $4,180
(labor performed by me)
How long does it take to recoup this cost? 2.8 years.
after 2.8 years, the occupants could be saving more than $1,485 / year. THAT is $123.75 PER month!! what could you do with $123 extra per month!?!
So does it make sense to spend $600,000 in updating, helping folks?
Absolutely.
I’m free suckas…
and I blame it all on the man. If it werent for him putting crack residue in innercity drinking water I would have turned out different. But not the prison done sobered me up, straightened me out, and I am stronger than ever.
@mwa3c, I recognize and appreciate your compassion for our neighbors and agree that the living conditions of many of them are deplorable. For the record, however, Union Hill has no public housing within its “borders.” What we do have are homes owned by absentee landlords who allow their impoverished tenants to live in squalor. If the City went to each of them and gave them money to improve those homes, the first thing those landlords would do is find new tenants willing to pay higher rent for the improved conditions.
As for your other comment: “once everyone is back on their feet, then the government needs to step back.” We have been waiting for the government to “step back” since implementing the Great Society. That first generation of families in public housing used it for what it was meant: a hand up. Scores of our City’s most contributing members were raised in public housing. The effects of long-term handouts, however, is abuse, subjugation, government dependence, and the gaping wounds in our larger neighborhood that are the “courts.”
When the government steps in and takes over the role of “provider” and “head of household,” it releases our men from their traditional familial responsibilities in favor of pursuing their baser instincts. If you need evidence of this visit Venable any time you like. We’ve raised nearly two generations of young men in a permanent state of unchecked adolescence. Your plan, though well-intentioned, would bring about a third.
“I would hazard poor choices with regard to education and substance abuse.”
Uh, A.H., this is a gross over-generalization that has no proof to back it up. Trust me, I’ve looked.
Is it really hard to believe that sometimes poverty is generational/cyclical? That if we reached out and tried to help a little more we could help them do better? Sometimes poverty is all a person knows so they keep on trucking right in the line of rinse, wash and repeat.
The idea of generational poverty has lots more research to back it up as does the relatively new concept of mixed income housing.
Houdon, I greatly appreciate your comment!!
I must ask though, Is the housing in Union Hill being allowed to run it’s self down or is there any code-based violations that would bring attention to these areas?
I also see your point on:
“When the government steps in and takes over the role of “provider” and “head of household,” it releases our men from their traditional familial responsibilities”
and
“We’ve raised nearly two generations of young men in a permanent state of unchecked adolescence.”
Would there be any good / reasonable way to support those that actually need this area, need the lower priced housing, that could benefit from some changes done to the area? and make it difficult for those “in a permanent state of unchecked adolescence” to call these areas home?
I can support 100% the idea of housing for those in need. But if it is just being used as a “mooching” point for people between the age of 21 and 55 i can not support them.
NOW, if the age groups 21 to 55 wanted to work to better the homes in the area and learn something, great! throw them the keys and let them show us what they can do.
However, i MUST stress, a person in need is a person in need. No one should be deprived of a home. No one should have to live in a place that is thumbed at because of status or money in hand. Union hill just seems to be that kind of place though. where everyone tip-toes across the sidewalk trying to mask the fact that they know this place exists.
I see families there. I see mothers there, i see children there, i see older folks there and it just looks like someone dropped a bomb on it, swept some of the debris into the street, put some tarps over the holes in the roof and walked away.
Our government started all this hand out stuff. Look up the “The Great Society” 1995. In this program families found out that a woman could get more public assistance if there was no man in the house. How about us finding a way to Put the man back into the home carrying for his family and mentoring his male children.
@mwac3, Can you give a *precise* location in Union Hill where “it just looks like someone dropped a bomb on it, swept some of the debris into the street, put some tarps over the holes in the roof and walked away.”
I’d like to pick up the debris and maybe scrape a patch of sidewalk or two. Seriously.