After one term on City Council, Vice Mayor Holly Edwards decided to step down and focus on her family. While on Council, Edwards has been a champion of social causes and has not shied away from controversial issues, voting consistently against the Meadow Creek Parkway and throwing her support behind a dredge-first approach to the community water supply plan. In this exit interview, she shares her thoughts on the future of Charlottesville, her struggles, her successes, and her most difficult votes.
C-VILLE: How did you decide not to run for a second term?
Edwards: It was based on the fact that everybody else has an opinion but my family, and this was really a gracious time to be able to step down and be able to focus on my family. I don’t think you should do this if you are not willing to make the commitment, unless you are willing to, really willing to not go into this as a sprint, but going in as just a long-term commitment for the time you are on Council. I’m still happy with my decision, even though I must admit, we have had a very interesting campaign season and I kind of wonder if I were to do this now, if it would have changed things.
I think it’s just so important to not think back and be able to make a decision and move on and really give prayful consideration to everything that you do. I think more and more I relied on my faith and my values to be able to do it, even though there were some decisions that some people may not have agreed with, at the end of the day, you have to live with your own conscience.
What do you consider as your most successful stances while on Council?
When the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir Task Force was formulated, I volunteer to go and I consider that a success, because I knew that was an area where I had to really stretch and really grow and learn. When I was campaigning I didn’t get the endorsements from any of the environmental groups, so I knew that was an area that I needed to really initiate some leadership.
It was my idea to have an elected official on the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority Board. It has been talked about in the past, but I did bring in it up in a Council meeting. I consider that a success. It might not be as cool as some of the other things, but to me it was important. The public comment period was really tense, those were the beginnings of the debate over the water supply plan, but the atmosphere and the culture of the meetings was really negative and shortly after I joined the board, I provided some suggestions as to how we could change the public comment period and actually give staff an opportunity to give thought to some of the responses and to come back with some of the responses. The board was open and I really appreciated that.
More after the photo.
What were some of the most difficult decisions you had to make while on Council?
There were some things that came up that I just never expected. I never expected the whole noise ordinance in Belmont to be so contentious. That was a really difficult time and I never saw that coming.
I think that even though we made some decisions that people weren’t happy with in the beginning, I really thought I was making the right votes. But as things evolved, it became apparent that there were a lot of other variables, things worked out for the best, and the gentleman who was involved, who knows where he is now? Who would ever have seen that coming from the beginning? That was really hard, because I wanted the neighborhood to feel that we were listening to them and that they were valued. Sometimes you just have to make the decision to vote and do what you think is best for the greater good. Who knew that goats were going to be so important? How in the world did goats become such an issue?
Once you cast your vote, you stuck with it until the end. Why was it important for you not to change your mind?
I felt that once I made the decision, for example the Meadow Creek Parkway, I decided that once I voted, my vote was my voice and that I would move on and I wouldn’t spend a lot of time deliberating about it. Even now with the water supply, I voted and I don’t want to give voice to it, because there are so many things that we need to concern ourselves with. I felt it was important to dredge first and then maintain the structure that we do have even though, clearly, a majority of Council doesn’t agree with that and I respect that, but I still stuck with my decision. I would say it is well with my soul to stick with that. There has been so much over the years, it really did go by fast.
What are some of the issues you wanted to bring attention to or focus on?
Out of all the parts of the budget, the part that I wanted to focus on was the agency budget review process. I wanted to see if the process really provided that system accountability that I think nonprofits should have. I just wanted a better system of accountability for the way services are provided, especially since we have such disparities in wealth in our community. I just think there is enough blame to go around is the reason why things are the way they are. We could begin with the families and choices, but how could we strengthen the families, what do we need to do better as a local government to provide resources? Because if there is one thing that I have learned it’s that throwing money at a problem does not necessarily solve the problem. Even when we pilot a program, always have an evaluation process in place. I think that is the one thing that is most important for councilors to understand.
The relationship between the City and the County has been tense for quite some time now. What do you think needs to change?
When I was campaigning I had this ideal, even an unrealistic expectation, that things would just…why can’t we just get along? It just didn’t make any sense, but once I got on Council I saw how complicated the history is, how complex the relationships are, and how tenuous the decisions we need to make are. I think it’s going to take a new generation of leadership for the City and the County for things to evolve, because it took many years for us to get here, and it’s going to take many years for us to be able to do that. Ultimately, I think the long-term discussion is going to be, How can we really be one community? Because that is going to be the key to solving some of the issues, and what would one community look like?
You have been involved in the process to redevelop the city’s public housing sites. What is your vision for the future of public housing?
We can’t go back and change the past. One thing I have initiated was the apology for Vinegar Hill, because those were just really, really bad decisions based on the culture that the city was living in at the time. I wondered, what would have I done if I were on Council at that time? It’s ridiculous, because I wouldn’t be on Council because I am black, I wouldn’t have had an opportunity to even weigh in on that level. But now that we are here, it is really important that we do redevelopment right and that includes honoring the Residents Bill of Rights. Because what happened with redevelopment before… the people who were most effected were not a part of the decision making. We are at a point now that if redevelopment is done right, we can figure out how we can actually move people out of poverty. And it goes back to some of the nonprofits and social service agencies. How can they be designed better so that they are really not poverty maintenance programs? I wonder if some of the funding we give nonprofits, the only thing we are doing is keeping them in business and keeping the nonprofits out of poverty, but we are really not moving ahead in a way that is really meaningful. What I would like to see is true government/private partnership. It will be nice to figure out a way to get away from relying on federal funding, because I think the reliance on federal funding has got us here in the first place. I just don’t think we can be dependent on federal funding for housing, not over time.
Locally, I think we need to continue to do the best that we can and provide as much support as we can. I hope that with redevelopment, it’s not just redeveloping the buildings, it’s also an opportunity to redevelop the lives of the people that are moving in. This is really an opportunity to create new opportunities and new beginnings and new lives for people. There is a Ghanaian proverb that says, “the run of a nation begins in the homes of its people,” so what can we really do to strengthen our families and really provide support and services that all the nonprofits say they provide to help people move to the next level in their lives? With this being a second chance city, we really need to look at it and as a city, as a local government, where do we need to forgive ourselves, because we don’t always get it right.
You pushed for the Section 3 policy to be adopted in Charlottesville. How do you think it will help locally?
I would consider initiating the Section 3 policy a success. Section 3 was created back in 1968 during the riots in Watts when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated and neighborhoods were annihilated. The thought was to put money into those neighborhoods, but by using the people of those neighborhoods, by creating jobs, creating opportunities. It also creates a sense of ownership for the community.
I found out that Section 3 was something that the Housing Authority should have been doing and the City should have been doing. Example. Another tension-breaking moment was the rebricking of the Downtown Mall. All roads were leading to having to rebrick the Mall, and it moved beyond people falling and getting their heels stuck. I thought, how can we get some local people employed while we were doing it at the same time? It was a really difficult decision to make, but once I realized that I could add that to the resolution, it made the idea far more palatable. Using that as a small example, it was such a successful pilot that it paved the way for thinking about how do we create local jobs for all of our infrastructure needs and repairs, since we proved that it could be done with the Mall program. But now the next step is, how can we make sure that this is part of the process when we do redevelopment? How can we make sure that this is part of the process when they are going to build the Meadow Creek Parkway? Are they going to build the earthen dam? What are the opportunities for some of our local residents to clear away trees? We need to start thinking about everything that we do, and I think Section 3 really makes us accountable. By having a policy in place, we basically have guiding principles in place for us to get there, which we never had before.
Even if the jobs are temporary positions, working a little bit for somebody who has been unemployed for a while is better than nothing and for some people, working a little bit gives them such a boost in self esteem that maybe they’ll want to continue to find other jobs or opportunities.
Do you see the Dialogue on Race as a success?
Yes, I consider it a success … and even though it was a small beginning. The whole journey of addressing race relations in our community has a really long and difficult history. I think we need to have meaningful conversations about what race means in our community, and the reason why I wanted the Dialogue was because I had been to diversity workshops that were really done poorly where black people left feeling angry and white people left feeling guilty and we didn’t make any progress. Even though the dialogue on race may not be perfect, it is based on the model that had clear results. Even now with the feeling of not being welcome on the Downtown Mall, when it came up, [President of local the NAACP chapter] Dr. M. Rick Turner mentioned that maybe that was something that the Dialogue on Race could explore, there was finally a place to put that. Because up until now we really didn’t have a place to put it and now the next step might be to really have a Human Rights Commission of some sort to really solidify what that place would look like. We have the new leadership with Maurice Jones and his energy and his insight and his presence has been really helpful.
What do you make of the fact that African Americans may not have representation on Council for the first time in more than 30 years?
What I take from it is that I have to respect and appreciate the diversity within our community, and there is just as much diversity within the African American community as is in the greater community. For some people, they feel that there have been times in the past where there hasn’t been an African American on Council and we have done O.K. There are other people that feel absolutely outraged that there wasn’t an African American elected. Some people feel as if she wasn’t the best candidate, it just so happened she was African American. There are a variety of ways of looking at it. I do think that having representation from the African American community is important on Council.
What do you think your legacy will be?
Part of it would be that I really worked hard to give thoughtful and meaningful responses. I tried to work hard at getting people to feel meaningful, especially during public comment time. But such as it is, I accept it all as a gift, some gifts you might want to return at the end of the day, but the idea is that people are really doing the best that they can. I like to believe that people felt that I listened to them and I think that on Council being able to listen is just so important, because the bottom line… it really is to serve.
What is your vision for the future of Charlottesville?
What I worry about is Charlottesville becoming less and less diverse. There was a study that came out that said that the African American population was slowly decreasing, that if we are not careful, we are going to wake up and over time it is going to turn into an all white community. I think it’s going to be so important to make sure that as we have a vision for the future, even looking at the comprehensive plan, that if diversity is really going to be important, that it has to play a role in all decisions.
What’s next for you. Will you still maintain your presence in City life?
I haven’t figured out what that might look like. As far as the involvement in City life, I haven’t gotten the memo from God yet, because I said that if I were to run again, it would be because there is a burning bush and Moses left his sandals on my front porch. I know for now my focus would be on my family, my daughters. They will be in 11th grade and they are looking toward college, so developmentally as a parent, I think this is a good place for me to be. As far as civic involvement, I think that once you get bit by the bug, you are never away from it. My life will never be the same as a result of this experience; the way I see the community, the way I see the world just will never be the same.