A City Council Candidate Interview, a Mock RCV Mayoral Poll, and the Virginia Zoning Atlas
Cheers RVA!
Temperatures cool down a bit today with sunny skies but a high of only 66, and a low of 44 in the evening.
the pulp:
A pedestrian was struck and killed by a vehicle on Midlothian Turnpike early Wednesday morning in South Richmond, via channel 6. The driver remained at the scene. State Delegate Mike Jones, who represents parts of South Richmond in the Virginia General Assembly, said he walks the corridor every day and night with his dog, and remarked on potential solutions:
It starts with the drivers. Drivers must be aware of where they are. Don't be distracted. Be alert of what's going on, and slow down. Second we need road designs shifted. I dealt with that on my time with City Council, that these roads are designed to go faster than what's posted. That has to change, but then these streets have got to be lit up. Some of these lights, they go on and off at different times. It's darker now a little bit more in the morning, gets darker, a little earlier in the evening, and so this area has got to be lit up.
A 6-story apartment building is being planned for a building site adjacent to Willow Lawn, from Mike Platania at Bizsense.
South Richmond News interviewed Nicole Jones, candidate for City Council in the 9th district (“South-Central Richmond”). Jones currently serves on the council, after being appointed last December when councilmember Michael Jones was elected to the House of Delegates. Read the interview here.
Scott from Oregon Hill posted a mock ranked-choice voting mayoral poll. He also noted that UVA, GMU, JMU, and Washington & Lee use RCV for their campus/student government elections, but VCU, UR, and VUU are still “behind the times.” Back in 2022, he offered $1k to any university student in Richmond who could implement a RCV method for electing school officers and incorporate said process of democracy into their school bylaws.
the dive:
The Henrico Citizen reported on a recent event at the University of Richmond focused on housing and education equity in the region.
The event, titled “Reading Between the Lines: Zoning, Housing, and Education in the Richmond Region,” was hosted by the University in collaboration with a variety of organizations focused on housing equity.
Housingforward Virgina introduced the Virginia Zoning Atlas, a mapping tool that displays data about the impact of zoning on housing availability.
Currently 2% of land in Richmond allows for larger apartments to be built by right, a number similar to Hampton Roads. By comparison, Henrico has 9% of land available for larger apartments and 3% for midsize apartments.
An update to a 2017 study on school and housing segregation was also provided. The report indicated that while the city has become more racially diverse in recent years, some neighborhoods were experiencing ‘triple segregation’, where communities are divided by race and ethnicity, poverty, and by language.
Researchers found that schools serving neighborhoods with higher poverty tend to have larger rates of multilingual students and employ higher shares of inexperienced teachers.
Genevieve Siegel-Hawley, a co-author and educational leadership professor at VCU, said local decision makers in housing and education should work more closely with each other to solve school inequity.
“For example, if a developer is building a new development and the school needs to be able to serve the students, they need to talk, so they understand what kind of capacity is needed,” she said.
Read the full article here.
the vibe:
Have a cooler day RVA!
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