17 Responses to “Agenda, July 15 City Council meeting”

1. posted by brenda p at July 20, 2008 8:08 am :
   

   Finally, some coverage on the meeting in the P-I.

   From the article, in response to Councilman Ross’ concern that police would receive an increase but fire not:

   “If part of the rationale is to not have a divided house, we need to look at all city employee salaries,” City Councilwoman Dama Rice said. “We keep picking groups and we deserve quality employees. I totally agree that we have a large discrepancy in salaries with other areas and something must be done.”

   However, Rice said she would only be in favor of having Canada re-examine all city employee salaries, not just those of the fire department or police department. The rest of council agreed.

   Ms. Rice, that’s a lovely sentiment, but completely misses taxpayer priorities in the context of limited resources. Petersburg has *the highest crime rate per capita* in the state of VA. And it has more unaccredited schools than any other community in the state of VA. Your taxpayers have asked that the allocation of more funds to the PD and schools be made top priorities above all other priorities. Sure, tourism could get a boost. Sure, fire could get a boost. But our city’s #1 crisis is crime/education. That being the case, the community would like to see these institutions be made more competitive — not just in terms of salaries, but also in terms of equipment — so that these crises can be turned around post haste. Then, when the city is more safe and the students are doing well, feel free to allocate a more balanced budgetary increase.

   Again, when the city has finite resources, it needs to prioritize among its various competing needs. We don’t need ‘fairness’ right now. We need bold steps to fix big problems.

2. posted by brenda p at July 20, 2008 8:42 am :
   

   For some reminders of how TAXPAYERS think on this matter (complete with some 90 comments):

   Bad numbers

   Letters presented to City Council calling for priority change

   Open letter to Council re: city budget / police funding

   Petition

3. posted by shawn at July 20, 2008 5:06 pm :
   

   Wow, benda, STRONG opinions.

   I’m with you.

   Did you know “bloggers” are the # 1 thing holding this city back?

   http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1569924710?bclid=1571610484&bctid=1674063159

   It’s terrible. Before “bloggers,” businesses and the affluent were clawing over each other to move here. Before “bloggers,” people couldn’t get access to “statistics,” which, of course, are not objective, and people could never figure out anything that might make petersburg unattractive, until “bloggers” came along.

   I know governments don’t like transparency, but they aren’t supposed to come right out and say so, right?

   Now who’s fault are the bad statistics? 1. The govenment? A case could be made, but not everyone in the gvmt even agrees with each other. 2. The residents, in general? Much stronger case can be made, but considering that they are the voters, I wouldn’t reccommend one make it, unless you want to be like the republican who said america has become a “nation of whiners.” Hardly matters if it is true — just don’t make the case.

   Or, 3. Bloggers.

   Right, #3 — bloggers are the cause of the problem, because if it weren’t for them, the statistics, good or bad, just wouldn’t matter, right?

   And besides, we don’t want americans to be INFORMED when they are deciding to move themselves or a business to a new era, and we CERTAINLY don’t want the to be aware of the challenges they will face.

   Statistics are BAD.

   But not as bad as bloggers.

   I mean, it alliterates, so it’s got to be true, but not as true as if it rhymed.

4. posted by Michael at July 20, 2008 6:01 pm :
   

   Wonderful commentary! This site is doing good things for Petersburg.

5. posted by Chuck at July 20, 2008 7:51 pm :
   

   Wow. Just Wow.

   Someone claimed blogs were the gospel truth? Since when is passing out beneficial information to the community (constituents) bad? I thought most cities relied very heavily on statistical information??

   If people cannot accept criticism then they should not be in the public sector. If all you want is a bunch of koutouing sycophants…well, that’s just kinda sad and not realistic.

6. posted by brenda p at July 20, 2008 8:32 pm :
   

   I think Shawn linked to the wrong segment from the Ward 5 meeting.

   This might be what he intended to link to (?):
   http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1569924710?bclid=1571610484&bctid=1674063159

   The above is a link to a newer segment on PetersburgTV which makes available Mayor Mickens’ presentation from the recent Ward 5 meeting. This is a 30-minute segment, in which the Mayor discusses everything from real estate development to transportation to the golf course to mammogram programs to the apartments being rented by Ft. Lee staff to the new hospital…. etc. etc. etc. The amount of info is great. And yes, the Mayor expressed reservations about the value of stats, and blogs.

   I’ll offer the following perspectives, one on stats, one on blogs.

   Before moving to Petersburg, we lived in Richmond’s Church Hill. When we were considering Church Hill, we were a bit tentative, as we heard really mixed info about the place… the major downside relating to area crime. In trying to figure out whether we’d be comfortable moving there from the ‘burbs, we turned not only to area residents for their take, but also the crime incident statistics that the City of Richmond makes available online. What we found: crime was nontrivial, but the trend over the prior 5 years was radically decreasing. We figured folks were obviously coming together and doing something right in the area, so we were willing to make the community our home. Moving forward a bit, when we considered Petersburg, no such data were available. But we already had tested ourselves in an area undergoing change, so that didn’t deter us particularly. The long/short: we would not have gone down that road –and would not be in Petersburg– if not for useful data along the way. Of course, this anecdote is but a sample size of one….

   As for blogs, the Church Hill blog, which this one is modeled on, stood out as part of the reason the community in Church Hill is so strong. When I lived there: civilians and members of the PD would problem-solve together on the site… victims of a rash of B&Es exchanged info on M.O.s so as to help others avoid similar (and help the police while at it)… people interested in a common objective could find each other and arrange to meet offline to realize that objective… folks wrote in to say that they believed a formerly abandoned property had a new lease on life thanks to the blog drawing attention to its sad state to potentially interested parties in the community… etc. I think we are seeing similar on this site. Folks interested in green initiatives or high gas costs (or here) are able to exchange helpful information, folks interested in gardens or dog parks have been able to find each other. Amazing photos of the area are available, and by and large the posts highlight the many interesting programs abreast in the community. Of course, one finds discussions of concerns and priorities, but such are not unlike what one hears at City Council meetings.

   The local interest blogs (there is also the Central Park/Poplar Lawn Park area blog and the nearby Dinnwiddie history blog, for example) also show that Petersburg isn’t 100% rooted in the past… it has blogs! Is this is good thing? Well, consider these data points:

   * When this blog was launched in March 2007, it was one of 200 or so aggregated on RVABlogs. RVABlogs now aggregates over 300 blogs (317 at the moment), and the ‘hoodblogs have now been shifted over to the hip sister site RVANews. (= blogs are growing)

   * Some folks at Harvard and several other universities seem to think this loose-knit gaggle of Richmond-area blogs leads the nation ‘by far and away‘ in terms of its collective bloggy efforts, particularly congratulating the ‘hoodblogs and the blog aggregators. (= which is deemed a good thing by people that study these things)

   * The Church Hill blog (the oldest and most active of them all) won “Editor’s Pick” in Richmond Magazine’s 2007 Best/Worst, describing the blog as ”feisty, informative, and entertaining”, and the Feb 2008 issue of Richmond Magazine followed up with additional high-fives. (= and Richmond, it seems, is generally embracing them too)

   * One of the region’s blogs, Greater Fulton News, was launched in part by a partnership with VCU’s school of mass communications. Interestingly, that site’s ‘resources‘ section provides a link to area crime data right there with a link to Commercial Area Revitalization. (= information access is viewed as helpful to area development)

7. posted by brenda p at July 20, 2008 9:00 pm :
   

   On the subject of criticism. A really great quote, written by a man who was diagnosed with terminal cancer and trying to capture his life lessons for his young children: “When you are doing something badly and nobody’s bothering to tell you anymore, that’s a bad place to be. You may not want to hear it, but your critics are often the ones telling you they still love you and care about you, and want to make you better.” from: The Last Lecture, by Randy Pausch (available at Minerva Books!).

8. posted by brenda p at July 22, 2008 7:11 am :
   

   Interestingly, other VA leaders seem to think highly enough of blogs to have some of their own. A few examples:

   U.S. Senate candidate Mark Warner

   Richmond Mayor Doug Wilder

   Richmond Mayor candidate Paul Goldman

   [I will add more as I stumble into them.]

   I recall former councilwoman Joan Carter (forgive me, but I don’t recall her married name) calling for the need to staff a Public Information Officer, consistent with the city’s 2020 plan. That call has stuck with me.

   On numerous occasions, I’ve noted that on the street, people will say ‘the city needs to do…’ or ‘why isn’t the city doing…’, but from attending Council or Ward meetings it was clear that the city was doing whatever the question at hand was (e.g., starting to interview for fire/police chiefs, back in the day when we had neither). Thing is, the vast majority of folks can’t make all these meetings and absent coverage of tangential nuggets such as ‘we’re now interviewing for X (see comment #2)’ in the various media, or some sort of visible evidence, folks may be inclined to conclude that the city is not doing.

   In this respect, I applaud PetersburgTV for beaming up extensive segments of things like the recent Ward 5 meeting, as sometimes the information content of these meetings is just too dense to be adequately summarized in a 4-paragraph article somewhere.

   But perhaps another way for the city to mitigate such unfounded angst itself would be to release a periodic e-newsletter that would give the skinny on things in the works (e.g., status on filling empty positions such as rental inspection officer, status on exciting projects such as the library and a head’s up about the cool virtual tour associated with same, new partnerships in the areas of health, home ownership programs, etc.), respond to reader questions submitted via email, etc. Or maybe a blog would be a useful and visually more interesting format for accomplishing same? Of course, I understand no one is sitting around looking for more things to do. Anyway, I’d be happy to bounce ideas around if anyone with the city would like to discuss.

9. posted by shawn at July 22, 2008 11:19 am :
   

   It’s funny that when an institution has good statistics, they gladly point to them, even implying that there is something real behind them and that looking at them might make you smarter.

   Unfortuanately, with statistics, somebody’s got to be last.

   In the interview with Superintendent Rhee, she talks about how, when she taught as an outsider in a very poorly performing elementary school, how she would POINT OUT to the kids that they were DEAD LAST, and use that to MOTIVATE them, since the kids KNEW they could try harder, but too many people were shielding them from how poorly they were performing visavis the rest of the world.

   We can keep saying “statistics don’t matter, and negative PERCEPTIONS are what are holding us back,” and we will keep producing people like the young woman, who is obviously intelligent, who yelled at council for being part of a GRAND CONSPIRACY, part of which was taking away free lunches from some people, seemingly without having been taught in school that a nobel prize winner once famously said “there’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

   ….and people will keep laughing at Petersburg as a result.

   In MY high school, the football team had that phrase (There’s No Free Lunch) printed on the back of their T-shirts.

   Food for thought.

10. posted by shawn at July 22, 2008 12:02 pm :
    

    Speaking of bad numbers, can someone tell me what is wrong here?

    http://www.progress-index.com/articles/2008/07/22/news/pi_progindex.20080722.a.pg1.pi0722shoot_s1.1825758_top3.txt

11. posted by brenda p at July 22, 2008 12:08 pm :
    

    And add to that: http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-07-22-0163.html

12. posted by Chuck at July 22, 2008 12:22 pm :
    

    HEY NOW! Don’t go pointing people to bad news!! All is rainbows and unicorns in the ‘burg….or hadn’t you heard?

    So I guess if that one guy was a five time convicted felon, Virginia doesn’t do the 3 Strikes thing?

    I like quotes too,

    ‘Crime does not pay……as well as Politics.’, Alfred E. Newman

13. posted by shawn at July 22, 2008 2:32 pm :
    

    Right chuck. Convicted of felonies FIVE TIMES!! And the guy doesn’t even look that old — yet, this criminal justice system can’t protect us from this lowlife. I wonder if he’ll be let out.

    It must be very frustrating to be a cop.

14. posted by Michael at July 22, 2008 5:02 pm :
    

    Shawn,

    I know one person named Shawn in Petersburg. That person sat (with very small new pup in lap) with my
    wife & I in the Brickhouse pub one fine evening. Last time we had a chance to discuss the world and Petersburg. Is it you? If so, ask Brenda P to give me your email address, or vice versa.

15. posted by Chuck at July 22, 2008 7:00 pm :
    

    Looks like the kids that were killed in the accident were not the shoplifters. They were the ones that backed into the responding police officers call. When asked to pull over they fled, running thru several stoplights and leading police on a high speed chase.

    I always thought if a police officer asks you to pull over, ya do it. I wonder if they were afraid they would get in trouble - does P’Burg have a curfew - it said the girl was 16. Shouldn’t she have been in bed or something at 1 AM on a Tuesday?

16. posted by shawn at July 22, 2008 11:33 pm :
    

    Micheal,

    “GWB is unlucky for America…”

    “what once was a puppy is now a dog, and what once was a piglet is now a hog.”

    That puppy is now a big, friendly, galumph.

    I wondered if Micheal was you, based on something you said earlier.

17. posted by brenda p at July 23, 2008 10:25 am :
    

    Style Weekly just came out with its 5th Annual Power List, the 100 most powerful people in Richmond according to those who make these lists.

    #75 relates to…drumroll…: BLOGGERS! (Specifically, the guy who helped launch PPN, John Murden, and the guy who has taken the lead in the aggregation stuff, Ross Catrow).

    75. Ross Catrow and John Murden

    Richmond’s online community has a streak of serious civic engagement because of the infrastructure provided by John Murden and Ross Catrow. Murden built, modeled and then shared his template for neighborhood blogs. Now a dozen outlets across the city keep tabs on micropolitical issues and neighborhood meetings. Catrow’s aggregator, RVAblogs.com, serves as a central clearinghouse for each new post from more than 300 local writers on a myriad of topics…. Their innovations have quickly built a new forum, nurtured a fresh pantheon of pundits and welcomed scorekeepers in the arena of public accountability.

    Here’s what John has to say about finding himself on this list:

    …Style Weekly’s 5th Annual Power List has deemed Ross Catrow & me to be the 75th most powerful people in Richmond. This is obviously laughable, but the honor is a nice nod to the strength of the collaboration of all of the folks that write, read, and comment upon blogs (and other stuff)….

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