Food Banks Running Low

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 16, 2008 in General News. 16 Comments

Cart for the Food BankLocal food banks are in a bad way, Scott Shenk writes in today’s Daily Progress, facing strong increases in demand with corresponding increases in donations. Both the Emergency Food Bank and the Blue Ridge Area Food Bank report increases of 200-300% over this time last year, forcing them to cut off supplies to needy families. Things are toughest in the summer, since kids don’t have access to the daily subsidized breakfasts and lunches that they do during the school year. The need, of course, is for more people to donate food.

The Blue Ridge Area Food Bank, which covers about a third of Virginia, gets a lot of their food from grocery stores, while the church-run Emergency Food Bank relies heavily on individual donations and canned food drives. I called and asked a few months ago, and the BRAFB isn’t really keen on people just showing up with food, but you can contribute at area grocery stores. [Update: The BRAFB says you’re welcome to bring food to them, too, despite what they told me.] I’m partial to the Emergency Food Bank, who is thrilled to have people arrange to come by with a sack or two of canned soups, boxes of cereal, tins of tuna, etc.—e-mail them to arrange a contribution, if you’re able to help.

The Downtown Brick Replacement Debate

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 14, 2008 in Development, Government and Taxes. 40 Comments

Old Mall BricksIt looks like the debate over the Downtown Mall bricks got interesting when I wasn’t paying attention. Dave McNair writes in this week’s Hook about the question of why the city isn’t reusing the existing bricks to rebrick the Mall. Since the new surface will use bricks of the same dimensions as the current ones, and since the city’s own estimate is that 80% of the bricks are in good shape, it stands to reason that they could be reused. McNair points out that a similar project in Columbus put high school students to work de-mortaring bricks to prep them to be laid anew. I’m yet to see a price tag on the actual cost of new bricks, only the $7M figure for the entire overhaul, but it seems like an option well worth exploring.

Downtown’s Empty Storefronts Not So Empty

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 14, 2008 in Business. 3 Comments

I’ve heard people remark about the large number of vacant spaces on the Downtown Mall recently, something we haven’t seen much of since about fifteen years ago. Henry Graff reports for NBC-29 that the real estate might be empty, but it’s spoken for. Only 3% of all Downtown Mall spaces are vacant, while everything else that looks shut down is undergoing renovations or have leases pending.

CPC Sued Over Open Lot Bidding Process

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 12, 2008 in Business, Government and Transportation. 9 Comments

There’s increased suspicion of secret dealings between the city and the Charlottesville Parking Center, Rachana Dixit writes in the Daily Progress:

A rejected bidder for the Charlottesville Parking Center’s assets is filing a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the city, the latest development in an ongoing saga on whether the city will attempt to purchase CPC’s shares.

Spencer Connerat, formerly of Collective Resources Corp. and a CPC stockholder, said the suit is an attempt to force the city to specify if and when it inked a confidentiality agreement with the CPC. Such an agreement would be needed to allow the city to bid on CPC’s assets.

Connerat claimed city officials did not disclose the agreement’s date, and have not responded to his requests to get the information. The action was sent to the city’s General District Court last week.

All of this is over the open, paid lot on Water St:


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The Hook has been following this story for a while, and Hawes Spencer recently wrote about CPC’s odd rejection of a pair of private bids, leading some to suspect that CPC expects the city to come in with a higher price. The lot first went on the market three years ago, and Spencer called shenanigans on the whole thing last spring. So the suspicion that this isn’t entirely on the up-and-up isn’t totally out of the blue.

Progress Profiles The Schilling Show

Published by Waldo Jaquith on August 12, 2008 in Meta News and Politics. 19 Comments

Bryan McKenzie wrote about former city councilor Rob Schilling’s show on WINA yesterday in the Progress, highlighting how the Republican is using his knowledge of city government to act as an outside agitator. (I’m a sucker for local media articles about other local media outlets.) The Schilling Show is firmly conservative and anti-establishment, and features the sort of guest lineup that you’d expect—Agnes Cross-White, Rick Turner, Ken Boyd, Keith Drake, etc. The city Democrats quoted in the piece are less than thrilled with the show, describing him and his show as “full of ridicule” and “a lot of hot air stitched together by a fair amount of blatant demagoguery.” Recent interviews are archived on the page’s webpage—decide for yourself.

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