May 19, 2025: Three candidates for Charlottesville City Council introduce themselves to the Greenbrier neighborhood
Plus: Charlottesville City Council agrees to a new lease with the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial Foundation for their spot in McIntire Park
There have been several other 24-hour periods that have gone by May 19 and world history is filled with several milestones such as an act of Parliament in 1649 that established England as a Commonwealth. That would only last for eleven years before the monarchy was restored. Much closer to now in 2015, the Blue Ridge Swim Club was added to the National Register of Historic Places.
Three years ago, a historic marker for Gregory Hayes Swanson was unveiled outside the Jefferson Madison Regional Library. Swanson won a lawsuit against the University of Virginia to be admitted as a law student in 1950. That latter story made the next edition of Charlottesville Community Engagement. I’m Sean Tubbs, and somehow all of this fits together.
In today’s installment:
Charlottesville City Council agrees to a new lease with the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial Foundation for their site in McIntire park
News from the City Manager’s latest report including an outreach campaign to get short term rental providers to register with the city
Charlottesville is on track for a $4 million surplus for FY25, though revenue from sales, lodging, and meals taxes are all lower than anticipated
The Greenbrier Neighborhood Association holds a campaign forum for the three candidates running for two Democratic nominations for City Council in the June 17 primary
First shout-out: Charlottesville Community Bikes
In today’s first subscriber supported shout-out, Charlottesville Community Bikes strives to provide wheels to anyone who needs a ride. That includes:
There’s a Kid’s Bike program for people under the age of 12 (learn more)
Several social services organizations refer people to Charlottesville Community Bikes for access to reliable transportation (learn more)
Keep an eye on their calendar for the next mobile repair clinic (learn more)
There’s also a workforce development program that “blends mentorship and comprehensive training in bicycle mechanics” (learn more)
Visit the Charlottesville Community Bikes website today to learn more!
Council approves new lease for city parkland where Dogwood Vietnam Memorial stands
The first memorial to American soldiers killed or wounded in the Vietnam War dates back to April 20, 1966 when one was installed in Charlottesville’s McIntire Park.
Since that time, the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial has been on city land and remained in place even after the John Warner Parkway was built. The Dogwood Vietnam Memorial Foundation was formally established in 2015 to advance the future of the site.
This year, Charlottesville City Council agreed to put $100,000 in the capital improvement program budget toward infrastructure to improve access to the site. Members of the foundation had asked for $1 million.
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On May 5, 2025, Charlottesville’s parks and recreation director appeared before Council for the first reading of a new lease agreement that would for the first time formally lay out the foundation’s responsibilities to use the space.
“We do have [what] I like to call a loose agreement at the moment, but we really want to have an updated agreement,” Anthony said. “And that is why we're here today to present an updated lease agreement so that it outlines maintenance and then also minor construction that happens on that site.”
One provision in the lease relates to future infrastructure. Section 9.a.ii has the subheading of Pedestrian Bridge Access.
“DVMF will engage with the City in good faith and take all reasonable action to allow and assist the City in the planning, construction, development, and approval of a pedestrian bridge, multi-use trail, and associated parking lot to provide improved/handicap public access to the Leased Premise,” reads the draft lease.
During the budget discussions, City Councilor Natalie Oschrin expressed her concern about a plan to build that bridge across the John Warner Parkway. Anthony said the language in the lease was about an existing pathway to an existing bridge to the west that crosses the railroad tracks. Oschrin said that was not clear.
“Since that’s not specified, I think that could easily be construed to be supportive of a new bridge,” Oschrin said. “And I don't know if that's something that we want to have in here if we’re not ready to commit to that yet.”
Oschrin suggested one solution to the access issue would be to just move the memorial.
Steve Friedman of the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial Foundation said that is not a desired option.
“Part of the reason we want this lease is to keep the memorial where it is now,” Friedman said. “We do not want to move the memorial.”
Friedman said the foundation does want to fundraise to eventually build a pedestrian bridge across the John Warner Parkway, but that’s a separate issue.
“It's just mentioned in here as ongoing negotiations in good faith,” Friedman said.
If the Dogwood Vietnam Memorial Foundation raises the necessary funds to build a bridge, Council would have to approve that action. Oschrin said she hopes another way can be found to increase access without having to build the bridge and a new parking lot.
The vote to adopt the unanimous was 4 to 0. Charlottesville Mayor Juandiego Wade was in Ghana.
Charlottesville launches campaign for short-term rentals to register with the city.
Operators of short-term rentals in the City of Charlottesville have until June 1 to file with the Department of Neighborhood Development Services or face a $100 late fee.
“A homestay is a rental property that is offered for a period of less than 30 days,” reads a frequently asked question list on the city’s website. “The entire home, part of the home or an accessory apartment may be used for short-term lodging.”
To be eligible, property owners must live in their residence at least 185 days a year.
Postcards have been mailed to those providing the service. The city is also seeking additional information through a community survey which can be accessed here.
Information about the survey and the outreach program are included in City Manager Sam Sanders’ report for today’s City Council meeting.
Another piece of information is that the city has hired a long-term employee of Albemarle County’s Department of Community Development.
“Victoria ‘Tori’ Kanellopoulous will join the department as our new Senior Long-Range Planner starting Tuesday, May 27th,” reads the report from Neighborhood Development Services Director Kellie Brown.
Kanellopoulos has been working on Albemarle County’s update of the Comprehensive Plan since it got underway in November 2021.
Brown also reports that a planning intern will take the lead this summer on developing fact sheets for the city’s neighborhoods with an emphasis on 10th and Page and Rose Hill.
Other items from the report:
Sanders met with the Fifeville Neighborhood Association on May 8 and told the group that no decision has yet been made about whether a low-barrier shelter for the unhoused will occupy the building the Salvation Army currently uses a thrift store.
The city’s outdoor pools will open this Saturday, one week after the city’s four splash pads opened for the season.
Construction began on May 5 for a shared use path from Westwood Drive to McIntire Park. Public Works Director Steven Hicks said work is expected to be completed in September.
Sales and meal tax revenue continue to underperform in Charlottesville
Another item on tonight’s meeting of the Charlottesville City Council is a report on the city’s finances through March 31, 2025. That’s the end of the third quarter of the current fiscal year.
“Revised revenue projections indicate that revenues are tracking slightly above the adopted budget of $251,948,630, by $4.0M or 1.89 percent,” writes City Manager Sam Sanders in the report. “As a note of comparison, the financial report issued for the 3rd quarter last year, anticipated a revenue surplus of 5.41 percent or $11.5M.”
The city has collected $2.2 million more from real property tax than anticipated and nearly $1 million more in personal property tax revenues.
However, sales, lodging, and meals tax collections are all under the budgeted amounts.
Through March 31, 2025 the city collected an estimated $14 million in sales and use tax. The budgeted amount is $15.8 million.
Through March 31, 2025, the city collected an estimated $18.1 million in the meals tax just below the $18.2 million anticipated.
As for lodging tax, the city budgeted $9.56 million and collected $9.1 million.
The report also notes that the city is about to unveil a new way of tracking capital improvements on a quarterly basis. Deputy City Manager James Freas will present this to Council before it is released to the public.
Second shout-out: Alliance Française de Charlottesville
The Alliance Française de Charlottesville promotes the French language and francophone culture through educational and cultural programs. Visit the Alliance Française website to learn more about group classes, private lessons, cultural events, and social activities for both kids and adults.
Three candidates for two Democratic nominations for City Council address Greenbrier neighborhood
Early voting has been underway for the June 17 primary for over two weeks now and there’s less than a month to go.
The Virginia Public Access Project has pulled data from the Virginia Department of Elections and through May 18, 458 voters in Charlottesville have cast ballots for the Democratic Primary.
In addition to statewide races for Lieutenant Governor and Attorney General, voters in Charlottesville will select two nominations for City Council. This is the first time that ranked choice voting will be used yet there are only three candidates in the race.
On May 14, 2025, the Greenbrier Neighborhood Association held a candidate forum for the race.
“Our candidates, we have two incumbents,” said Jake Mooney who served as moderator. “They are Mayor Juandiego Wade. They are Brian Pinkston, who's the Vice Mayor. And there is Jen Fleisher who I believe is running for the first time.”
Mooney first asked candidates to introduce themselves. Juandiego Wade went first and said he’s been in the community since coming here to attend graduate school after receiving an undergraduate degree from Norfolk State. This is where he met Claudette Grant, his wife of 32 years.
“We love this city,” Wade said. “And I came here without the intention of staying here for 30 some years, of making a career at it.”
Wade has worked for Albemarle County for 34 years with the last 15 or so as a career counselor. He announced his retirement from that position shortly after the campaign forum.
Brian Pinkston said he has been in the area since 2004 and also moved to the area for graduate school.
“When I was working on my PhD, I got a job working in facilities management at the University,” Pinkston said. “My undergraduate is from Georgia Tech in mechanical engineering. And I've spent 30 years doing project management type work.”
Pinkston and his family moved into the city from Greene County in 2015 after he got a salary increase. He wanted to get involved in the community after the national election of 2016. He ran for Council for the first time in 2019 when there were three seats available. Pinkston placed fourth in a five-way Democratic nomination race.
In 2021 he tried again and placed second in a three-way race behind Wade and cruised to an easy victory in an uncontested general election. Pinkston said he’s enjoyed his time on Council.
“I think, for a lot of ways, as an engineer, seeing how the different parts of the community work together, and as a project manager, seeing how, you know, we're able to bring people together of goodwill around a hard conversation or hard issue, treat each other with mutual respect, value difference and try to find compromise,” Pinkston said. “And that's what we've done in the last three years and three months.”
The newcomer to the race is Jen Fleisher, a program officer for the Blue Ridge Health District. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she was part of the agency’s efforts to do community outreach to expand service to sectors of the population that may not actively seek health care.
“We actually just had a clinic last night and all of that work from COVID to now has been a real community wide effort and thanks to those strong partnerships that we built kind of region wide in throughout the localities around Charlottesville,” Fleisher said.
Fleisher has also become involved in efforts to improve area transportation systems to make journeys safer for all modes of travel. She said there’s a lot of talent in the community waiting to be harnessed.
“I think our city can do more to make the most out of all that talent and energy,” Fleisher said. “So I find that maybe what sets me apart is that I really know how to get things moving and especially when the stakes are high.”
Two questions made up the first query. What should be about the unhoused population in the community and is the answer to let developers build as much as they can?
Fleisher said she supported work toward creating a low-barrier shelter and increasing the amount of transitional housing. She said developers should work within the language of the new Development Code.
“They must provide that affordable housing,” Fleisher said. “Density… can be done smartly and strategically rather than everything getting gobbled up for market rate and just giving way to kind of the highest dollar.”
On the campaign trail, Pinkston said many have expressed concern about the unhoused population and Council has accomplished a lot such as directing money to the Salvation Army’s project to expand the family shelter on Ridge Street. He said work continues toward finding a location for a low-barrier shelter.
“This is something that I am deeply frustrated about that we've not been able to do more about,” Pinkston said.
As for the second question, Pinkston said not enough homes built enough around the country and he said the new Development Code will begin to change that over time.
Wade said Charlottesville is an expensive place and he said many of the people he mentors are in households at risk of losing their rental homes because landlords can always find a tenant willing to pay more. He said he will continue to tackle the issue on Council.
“We see the unhoused very visibly on the Downtown Mall,” Wade said. “I talk with the shop owners on a daily basis. They contact me because I know them, they're friends on what we can do to address it. Many of them have mental disabilities that really must be addressed and if we don't do that, they're going to continue to be unhoused.”
Wade said he stands by his vote to approve the Development Code in late 2023 but said the new rules have not yet resulted in many new units.
The final question was another combination. Mooney asked candidates to name the top services the city provides and to provide a closing statement.
Wade responded that the number one thing Council does is hire a city manager.
“I think that we have an awesome city manager in Sam Sanders because they really run the city,” Wade said. “Secondly, I think that we need to adopt a budget and we have, we do that.”
Wade said stability has been restored to city government since he and Pinkston were elected.
Pinkston said one person on the campaign told him that local government should only provide a minimal role, but he disagreed.
“That's not what we do in Charlottesville,” Pinkston said. “We're a progressive city and we believe that government can be and should be a force for social good.”
Pinkston said that means funding programs to assist people in need. He agreed that Sanders is running the city the way the Council wants it to be run.
“I think the most important thing that we can do right now is continue to keep that leadership pointing in the right direction,” Pinkston said.
Fleisher said the top three services the city provides are public education, public transit, and transportation infrastructure.
“I know the city can do more to foster healthy living and quality of life for every resident,” Fleisher said. “And that's why I'm running.”
There are two additional events, though one a round robin event for multiple offices.
Can I Talk to You Cville is holding an event called Governing Charlottesville on May 27 at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Learn more here.
The Free Enterprise Forum will hold a City Council candidates forum at 6 p.m. at the Hillsdale Conference Center. I will be one of the moderators alongside Neil Williamson of the Free Enterprise Forum. Learn more here.
Reading material for #866:
Big Clean coming back to Louisa County, CBS19 News, May 6, 2025
Louisa lifts boil water advisory issued after water main break, Ryan Nadeau, WRIC 8 News, May 16, 2025
Charlottesville mayor retires from day job in Albemarle County, Emily Hemphill, Charlottesville Daily Progress (paywall), May 17, 2025
Charlottesville: New City Attorney played role in notorious press freedom case, Crystal Graham, Augusta Free Press, May 17, 2025
Personal observations about the #866 of it all
I’ve spoken a lot about how many of my dreams are all related to this strange work I do. I also wake up in the middle of the night convinced I need to get to work in order to meet all of the deadlines. This is part of the business, and I’m glad there are pleasant moments when I’m awake in my dreams and I can choose to not worry about writing.
Mondays in particular are tricky as I have a lot to get done. After doing this work for a long while. I’ve gained valuable skills that may one day be useless and irrelevant. Possibly obsolete!
I’ve noticed the algorithms on Facebook seem to be telling me to relax and just let AI take care of everything. I’ve noticed that there is now one website that is harvesting all of the same meetings I write about and spits through them an engine. I saw one today about a meeting I also covered and I don’t know what to except continue to try to become more efficient and add more capacity. I believe that storytelling and effective communication are human traits, and I believe we are cheaper when we let energy vampires control our life.
I’m well aware that what I do is not fashionable. I’m well aware there are some people in this community who would very much like me to go away. I’m also well aware I’ve done this newsletter now for 58 months and I’m hoping to continue.
For now I’m hoping to get to WINA on time for my radio appearance and then an hour or two of sitting in a public spot thanking people who are paying to make this happen.
Today’s YouTube video is a silly mash-up because why not? There may be an unobjectionable word.