At the March 27 Full Committee meeting, we continued discussing whether to sponsor an informational forum about the City’s upcoming Draft Zoning Plan (Modules #1 and #2 of 3 are now available) on which our local party hasn’t taken a position. We did an informal straw poll at the meeting and a significant majority voted to hold a forum.
So far, most of the informational events have either been the City presenting the plan or presentations from local activist group Livable Cville; there’s not been an event where people can hear perspectives from multiple stakeholders.
We’re thinking that, in addition to being useful in and of itself, such an event can be part of our agenda of increasing outreach to the community. Working class and minority families are increasingly being priced out of the local housing market, and they need to know that we hear and share their concerns.
This will be on the agenda for the 4/24 Executive Committee meeting, so we want to check one more time to see:
1. Would you like to see this kind of multiple stakeholder panel/forum on the Draft Zoning Plan?
2. If so, what groups/people would you be most interested in hearing from?
3. Any other thoughts about this that you’d like to share with us?
Please send your thoughts to cvilledemschair@gmail.com .
More broadly on the topic of community outreach: we’re always looking for ideas and projects to increase our involvement in our community, and we would love to hear from you about what we can do in that regard (e.g. each newsletter issue now identifies a possible action item that’s relatively quick and easy for people to engage with). Please send any ideas or suggestions for anything else related to community engagement: cvilledemschair@gmail.com . Thank you!
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Bert Ellis, long-time reactionary and new UVA Board of Visitors member, has already telegraphed his intention to shake things up at UVA even if he’s restrained from cutting down First Amendment-protected student political speech he doesn’t like on Grounds.
“It’s finally here! Charlottesville has released its draft zoning map. As dry as that sounds, this small document has the potential to dramatically change the look, feel — and livability — of this city for decades to come.”