Though the State Review Board gave conditional approval to a Fifeville historic district last March at an unusually controversial meeting, it has taken 11 months to work through those conditions. But a revised report was finished this week, and it renames the district and provides more references to antebellum African-American history.
Originally, the district was named “Fifeville-Castle Hill,” but the name caused an outcry, and the State Review Board recommended the name be changed.
This fall, Charlottesville Preservation Planner Mary Joy Scala sent a letter to property owners to solicit their opinions on the name, and the consensus choice was “Fifeville and Tonsler Neighborhoods.” Benjamin Tonsler was an African-American educator who lived in the neighborhood, which also includes Tonsler Park.
The city will post the report on its website next week in order to receive comment before submitting the historic district to the National Park Service.
Historic districts are largely symbolic, but provide federal and state tax credits for renovations. Nevertheless, the process riled neighborhood tensions, which C-VILLE covered in-depth last year.
Read more in next week’s C-VILLE.