Mayor pulls stadium plan before Council vote
Just when you thought the Shockoe baseball debate couldn’t get any more dramatic…
Update #2 — May 27, 2014; 10:37 PM
Mayor Dwight Jones surprised City Council Tuesday evening by withdrawing his Shockoe Bottom baseball stadium plan mere hours before Council was scheduled to vote on it.
Five council members had pledged to vote against the mayor’s plan Tuesday evening, a majority vote that would have killed the stadium proposal. Among the dissenting council members were Charles Samuels (2nd District) and Jon Baliles (1st District), who on Tuesday afternoon criticized the Mayor’s reticence in divulging stadium plan details (see below).
However, the Mayor remains determined to get his plan through Council, and on Thursday he’ll brief council members on the particulars of his plan. From the Richmond Times-Dispatch:
“The issue of taking the paper off of the docket is to make sure we get an informed vote,” the mayor said.
Jones said he still hopes that council members will attend Thursday’s briefing and intends to be able to present all of the information “as soon as possible.”
He said his proposal is “not dead because we believe in the plan.”
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Update #1 — May 27, 2014; 1:33 PM
Councilman Charles R. Samuels (2nd District) and Councilman Jonathan T. Baliles (1st District) didn’t want to be left out in the statement cold have followed up with a counterstatement to the Mayor’s statement.
“We are disappointed that the Administration has decided in favor of yet another delay in providing details of their Shockoe ballpark plan. They introduced the latest version of their plan on May 12 with a requested public hearing date of May 27 and, to date, have not asked for a continuance. A special four hour mid-day meeting was requested only after 5:00 p.m. on Friday, without consulting Council members’ schedules.
Council has followed regular procedure and bent over backwards to get more information through all of the hearings over the last six months. The plan has been vetted by multiple Richmond City Council Finance and Land Use Standing Committee meetings and Council as a whole has been continuously patient in allowing the Administration to miss deadlines that they themselves presented to Council.
Only after they were aware the vote might not go in their favor did they appeal for a special meeting. Council has never set a deadline for this plan and is simply following the Administration’s date which was to have the public hearing, per their request, on Tuesday evening.
We have kept open minds with everything this Administration proposes. However, after six months with a proposal that has far more questions than answers, as site control is still in doubt and it is already over budget, this plan is not ready. After all, we are talking about $80 million of public debt. In the meantime, we have schools, roads and other issues which require our local government’s attention. We extend the olive branch to the Mayor to work and find solutions to the issues that face our City. “
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Original — May 27, 2014
The above cartoon was first published in July 2009.
Mayor Jones had some choice words for city council after this article came out on Saturday. “Stadium plan could die just as its details become clearer“. The article states that on Tuesday (today) the city council now has five members that will vote against the plan and effectively killing the current plan and bringing the discussion back to square one.
The full text of the Mayor’s statement can be found here.
This decision is surprising since they’ve chosen to vote against something without learning about it first. At no point have all City Council members been briefed on the most up-to-date information about all aspects of the plan. Council members are receiving the detailed information they requested, but most briefings have taken place in committee meetings or in lightly-attended informal sessions. Nevertheless, they now want to kill the project before hearing the information that staff, the developers and the baseball team have invested a great deal of time and expense to gather. This is the second time in less than a month that two members have tried to kill the plan without first understanding all the details.
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Richard Hayes
When Richard isn’t rounding up neighborhood news, he’s likely watching soccer or chasing down the latest and greatest craft beer.
Notice: Comments that are not conducive to an interesting and thoughtful conversation may be removed at the editor’s discretion.
You didn’t brief the council? Why not? If your staff did so much work, where is it? Can we see it? Can we attend the meeting on Thursday or is that just for the City Council? Were the details given to Venture Richmond executives and no one else, or were they not given any details either?
The Mayor’s statement makes it look as if nothing at all has changed except minorities will take a 40% share of what? Just the stadium, or all the development? That’s a large difference.
We’ve been going through this since 2009? Woah. I’m sure longer than that, but I’ve been passively interested in this topic and don’t remember it from that long ago.
It’s easy to forget with all the stadium news that Richmond isn’t a baseball town. If this deal doesn’t go through our dads don’t lose their jobs on the team and our moms won’t lose their costume-making income, and I won’t lose my job at the baseball plant*. Obviously there will be an economic impact and it would be terrible to lose the team, but someone following RVA news might have the impression that we all live for baseball.
*I’m not into sports.
The Mayor’s statement is pretty hysterical: “This decision is surprising since they’ve chosen to vote against something without learning about it first.” He makes it out as if the burden is on City Council and not his office. Shouldn’t the Mayor’s office have scheduled a meeting to review all details of the proposal and hear all concerns of Council prior to a vote?
Here we are with the stadium debate again which boils down to funds and where they should go. OK, why in the hell then are funds going towards replacing stoplights or light poles, sidewalks and other items NOT immediately needed over things that are? Isn’t that considered mishandling or misappropriation of funds?
It still burns me up that in 2007 right after blocks of historic landmark department stores were demolished to make way for an Arts Center, locals fought to save and preserve the old Murphy’s Hotel at 8th and Broad which had become a city office building in disrepair but failed. Yet the city and mayor “promised” that it WOULD NOT tear down the building without starting immediately on a new replacement which artists renderings had been distributed. Then $185-million was earmarked for the 2009-2010 budget for the building construction. Here we are 7-years later and that corner is still only a surface parking lot!
http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d103/richmondpics/Random/newstaterend1.jpg
So, with track records like that, what are the odds if the stadium is voted down that any sort of high-rise hotel or super duper supermarket which were tagged with it will be built in our area to help bring in revenue as well as clean up the blighted area which has remained an eyesore for years?
Well good riddance. As a city resident I didn’t want my taxes going to this plan. I didn’t get wrapped up in the idea that this was hallowed ground or that we just weren’t a baseball city. It was just fiscally poor policy, and no sound argument of how the city would recoup it’s cost was ever really given. Obviously it won’t be 80 million that will go now to our schools/infrastructure/parks, but damn wouldn’t that be grand? That said, as a resident of the Huguenot High disctrict, perhaps we could get a bit more for our money if we spent less on “showpiece” school structures and more on making the schools structurally sound/ up to date/ and increase teacher and school level staff wages?
Dwight is a self serving jackass who never deserved that office. Period. The mask is off. He’s showing his true colors. Nothing left to lose, get rich as possible with no regard for the citizens of Richmond before his term ends.
This Mayor is over is head crazy! This project has been his main focus for too long. The funds are needed elsewhere in the City. That should be Mayor Jones focus. Now he might be voted down and he pulls the plans. The Council needs to give this Mayor a deadline so they can move on.
PEACE IN…
It’s so plain Mayor Jones is acting to satisfy wealth, and the gangster mentality of money entitlement to do as they so please against the majority public interest to the extent of their willingness to desecrate land that has such sacred and historic meaning to ability of human beings( Richmonders and Americans) to access a redemptive spirit that honor inherent value in humam dignity over “golden calf” intent for material enrichment and tyrannical political dominance.
THE HISTORIC LAND IN THE BOTTOM NOT ONLY GIVES OPPORTUNITY TO REMEMBER AND HONOR THE GREATEST OF HUMAN TRAGEDY EVER IN HUMAN HISTORY, BUT IT GIVES CHANCE TO IDENTIFY WITH AND TO LIVE BY UNIVERSAL VIRTUES THAT HUMANITY NEED AND MUST HAVE FOR ESTABLISHING PEACE AND LOVE DESIRED AND DESERVED BY ALL TRIBES IN THE ONE HUMAN FAMILY.
PEACE IN…PEACE OUT…