May 2, 2008
community Monday
There will be 3 community meetings of note on Monday evening: the Richmond Department of Parks & Recreation will hold a focus group meeting to discuss and exchange ideas on the redesign of the Chimborazo Playground and Recreation area, the RTD will be hosting a “Public Square” on the James River and development, and the School Board will likely be voting on the Patrick Henry Charter School Initiative.
- The Richmond Department of Parks & Recreation will hold a focus group meeting to discuss and exchange ideas on the redesign of the Chimborazo Playground and Recreation area. The meeting will be held on Monday, May 5, 2008 at 6:30 pm in in St. John’s Parish Hall. For more information, contact Mr. Heywood Harrison, Parks Planner, Parks, Recreation and Community Facilities at 804-646-5608 or at Heywood.Harrison@richmondgov.com.
- Calling all James River advocates! By now we hope you’ve heard that Scenic Virginia has been invited to participate in a Richmond Times-Dispatch-sponsored Public Square panel focusing on the future of the James River. The event is scheduled for Monday, May 5 from 7:00 - 8:30 pm at the Richmond Times-Dispatch, located at 300 East Franklin Street in Downtown. In particular, we will be making the case for a riverfront park east of Downtown, in order to preserve the historic viewshed from Libby Hill Park in Church Hill and to preserve public access to the river.
- The Patrick Henry Charter School is open to any Richmond City elementary student and the upcoming School Board vote, likely to occur on 5/5/08, will impact every child and district within the city limits. They’re asking for your help. Find out more.
In addition, The Partnership for Smarter Growth (PSG) and others are organizing a rally to support the downtown master plan just prior to the RTD panel discussion on the river portion of the plan. All of this happens this Monday evening May 5th. Rally at 6 pm at the Patio of Penny Lane Pub — corner of 5th and Franklin, the discussion starts at 7 at the Times Dispatch building — 300 East Franklin Street.
A new website has been set up to support the Master Plan, more info is there. (envisionrichmond.org)
Yes to the Patrick Henry Charter! I’m hoping this will spur RPS to compete. Would be a great time to form a magnet school like the Governor’s at the elementary level…Bellevue is the perfect location. East end needs a specialty school.
ALSO: Monday nights at GlobeHopper - GlobeHopper has a announced a series of open dialogue events each Monday. The calendar so far has 3 great Monday night discussions set up for the next 3 weeks: Smart Growth in Richmond, Local Foods, and The New Three R’s Moving from Reduce, Reuse, Recycle to Renew, Replenish and Restore.
at the Richmond Times-Dispatch - one heck of a place to have a meeting about the environment!
Good article in the RTD today: http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/opinion/oped.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-05-02-0028.html
Given that 200 people were expected to come to the School Board meeting in support of the Patrick Henry Charter at 6pm, spineless RPS administrators decided yesterday to reschedule the vote to 4:30pm today knowing that parents will be either at work or transporting children at this time.
A letter from Carol Wolf on the RVA news:
“Changing an agenda at the last minute, for whatever reason, is not something that instills trust. There is nothing that can be said by either proponents or opponents to the Patrick Henry Charter Initiative that cannot, or should not, be said to the widest possible audience. We gain nothing as a system or a society when we appear to engage in efforts that will squelch public comment or the right to dissent.
Dissent is as American as the 4th of July. Elected officials who seek to stifle public comment or dissent by scheduling meetings at inconvenient times, harm the fundamental freedoms that this nation is supposed to promote and protect.
I respectfully and firmly disagree with this action. ~ Carol”
http://rvanews.com/2008/05/school-board-to-discuss-patrick-henry-at-430pm/