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Glenwood Ridge project meeting set for 10/16
10/05/2017 5:22 PM by John M
Councilwoman Newbille will host a special meeting to discuss the Section 106 area of the proposed Glenwood Ridge Development on Monday, October 16, 2017, from 6:30 – 7:30 PM at the Neighborhood Resorce Center at 1519 Williamsburg Road.
This is the last time to weigh in on this project. Please make your voice heard. Support is needed to help influence the critical details and keep it’s tenants and our neighborhood in positive living situations.
I’ll be there. I’m very surprised by how various officials reviewing this project have treated it as inevitable while simultaneously ignoring things like the legal requirements for community involvement in the demolition of the historic building already on the property. Thanks @Martha for bringing the City’s legal requirements to their attention and getting this meeting scheduled.
Blah!! Were DONE!
Get out while you can! This is a bad area anyway. Especially poorly maintained Glenwood Ave!
I plan to attend the meeting and I would like to hear how this project is slated to impact our neighborhood schools.
How is there not more discussion about this? Back on January 22nd, there were 112 comments about this and now, there are (including mine) four comments. Did everybody stop caring?
@Brian – I certainly care. But I had wrote 3 emails to our councilmember Dr Newbille about this development back in the winter/spring and none received the courtesy of a response.
From what I’ve gathered indirectly she wants this development to happen and the only thing she’s doing to appease the naysayers is finding money to extend the sidewalks along Glenwood. Her vision for the East End involves the maximum amount of low income housing that can be shoehorned in. Even if creates new pockets of concentrated poverty which housing policy experts agree is a failed model. Not good for the residents or the community at large for many reasons I’ve stated on past CHPN posts.
The other reason why I’ve cooled down on commenting here on this matter is just the nature of CHPN. I can write a long exhaustive exposition on why concentrated poverty does not work and cite sources about what are considered better practices. But as soon as a few new posts about “This Weeks Calendar” or “Dog Poop in My Yard” push a substantive item like Glenwood off the front page the discussion basically evaporates almost like it never happened. Don’t get me wrong – I love CHPN and visit it several times per day. It’s a fabulous news aggregator. Just in my opinion not really the ideal medium to invest in stating long researched and (hopefully) persuasive argument in the comments.
At the end of the day the most important thing we can do is show up to this meeting Martha Looney has pushed for and be vocal there. If we don’t show up not only will this poorly conceived development get rubberstamped the developer will think we’ve lost our will to oppose and will buy the adjacent large parcel and basically double down putting even more of the same on Glenwood.
Agreed! If you care about this neighborhood and want to make your voice heard, then be at this meeting and influence what happens here!
#6 – Thanks for your post. Lots of others share your decision to cool down on CHPN commenting. This forum had a good run though!
Newbille’s lack of response to constituents is well known and despite being called out on that lack during various meetings, and despite giving her word publicly at those same meetings to do better…”better” aint’t happened.
At one point when a commenter wrote here about her lack of responsiveness, CHPN claimed that perhaps Newbille doesn’t respond to constituents because she’s too busy with BIG district concerns. WTF?
I attended a meeting when Newbille stated that what Better Housing is doing in Union Hill “…represents my vision for the east end.”
Yes, HER vision.
And what Better Housing is doing in Union Hill is providing 52 low income housing units. In more evolved cities, breaking up low income clusters is being shown to better, to improve, the lives of those who leave them. And breaking up the clusters doesn’t include just shuffling people from one low income cluster to another.
Better, better, better…a misused word in parts of Richmond.
But Better Housing and its enabling councilperson Newbille act on the conviction that “better housing” for people does indeed simply involve moving them from one low income project to another low income project – that things like new appliances and a new address will make life just fine.
And Glenwood Ridge certainly meets Newbille’s vision of what’s good for us.
There is another meeting this evening to discuss this development at the First Fire Station @ 308 N. 24th. St & is starting @6Pm.
So, please pass this information along to as many people as possible and show up! The meeting this evening might be our last chance to try and stop the demolition of the Trolley barn, save the Chesapeake Water Shed and prevent the developer from building that hideous looking development.
So yet again…no communication from the city regarding any meetings…
Hi Ron, tonight’s meeting is her regular monthly district meeting.
Due to intense public outcry, the city has now included the Church Hill Association as a formal “consulting party”. Meaning, we get to weigh in now. Legally, we were to have been included in the process all along.
What you can do: Email Kimberly.Chen@richmondgov.com and ask for what you want.
Also, email John Sieg at johnsieg@mson.com He is the CHA president and will be forming a committee.
The new, extended deadline for public comment is 11/18.
@9 and @10, the meeting at the fire station is Councilwoman Newbille’s regular seventh district meeting. There is a separate announcement right here on CHPN.
On the Richmond City Council web page, it states:
“The mission of Richmond City Council is to represent citizens in creating and amending local laws, providing government policy and oversight, and approving the city budget.”
And
“Richmond City Council is committed to creating a vibrant community that is a great place to live, work, learn, play, visit, and raise a family.”
You make your own conclusion what Newbille is or isn’t doing legally or morally by those statements.
I can attest that Newbille does not respond to emails. She has never for the entire time she has been in office. Her sidekick Sam Patterson use to be her voice. Has anyone contacted him? As you say, she has her own agenda and to hell with what anyone else thinks. She is NOT working for “ALL” of her constituents but only a select few.
We placed our formal requests to the city and included both The State and Federal Councils on Historic Preservation. As a result of the 10/16 meeting, the Feds were also included as Formal Consulting Parties (think “internal affairs”)
We did this by the deadline and the State has agreed to a formal hearing in early December where the Final Draft Memorandum of Agreement will be decided.
This “MOA” will be the law. The developer must do what is in it or “no permits for you”.