Author: Scott Weaver

Since 2006, the number of affordable housing units priced under $100,000 in Charlottesville dropped by over 300, from 479 to 144 in 2008. During that time, the city’s focus on affordable housing has shifted from providing housing to middle-class residents to addressing the lack of low-income housing and its homeless problem. From that focus, two solutions are emerging that could fundamentally change the way the city tackles its affordable housing problems.

“In the last five or 10 years, we’ve become more aggressive at addressing the need for moderate-income, work-force housing,” says Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris. “Where we haven’t invested hardly anything is the 0 to 30 percent area median income.”

This comes at a time when the 376 units of city public housing are full, with a waiting list 875 people deep.

The city will commit $2.4 million to affordable housing this year, $1 million of it from its Economic Strategic Incentive Fund. One of the projects that Norris calls “our best opportunity” is the redevelopment of public housing into mixed-income housing.

Last year, the city spent $50,000 on redevelopment master planning, and Norris says he expects to spend more this year. The $300,000 proffer from the condo project on the corner of West Main Street and Ridge/McIntire Road is designated for redevelopment.

But talk of redevelopment brings with it memories of Urban Renewal. The city plans to take groups of people to other cities that have tried similar redevelopments. Norris, though, says that many were built without enough resident involvement and, rather than integrating the community, served to displace the public-housing residents.

“To me, if we do nothing else but run with this project—which is a huge project—the potential is tremendous,” says Norris. “There’s a lot of fear from residents that we’re going to come in and pull a Vinegar Hill on them, and I understand that. We’ve got to make sure there’s full resident participation.”

Norris says that the city must shift its focus on affordable housing to a longer-term view. This includes addressing the city’s growing homeless problem, particularly chronic homelessness and the working poor living in temporary shelters, and not just looking at the middle class.

Mayor Dave Norris says that the city must shift its focus in affordable housing to those earning less than 30 percent of area median income.

“Now things are different,” says City Councilor Holly Edwards. “We’re recognizing the need to stabilize our homeless and to create a system of economic justice, where people have opportunities for housing.”

Edwards talks about the need to get the homeless off the street, then address whatever issue may have forced them there. One way to do this would be to add single room occupancies (SROs). SROs function essentially as long-term transitional housing, giving one person a room in a larger building for a minimal rent, usually 25 or 30 percent of their income or a fee of $25 until they are in a more stabile situation. Many have on-site social services.

Norris calls SROs “the answer to homelessness.” The city is looking to partner with a nonprofit group called Virginia Supportive Housing (VSH), which builds and manages SROs. It doesn’t, however, pay for them. The city will consider funding requests from VSH and is currently trying to identify a site for a possible SRO. The zoning is equivalent to an apartment building.

The cost to the city, though, is hard to determine at this point, since it is dependent on the number of units. Norris says that a VSH project in Norfolk came in at a little under $100,000 per unit. Charlottesville’s number of long-term homeless, says Norris, is relatively small.

“It’s a few dozen people,” he says. “We know them all by name.”

Edwards says the focus of an SRO must be specific to address that population.

“In order for it to be really effective,” she says, “it needs the social support in place. Is an SRO a home, or is it transitional living? Let’s call it what it is from the very beginning. But let’s not build an SRO if we only want people to be there six months and then move.”

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If there is one phone number saved into political reporters’ cell phones, at the top of their speed dials, burned into the muscle memory of their collective index finger, it is that of UVA politics professor and director of the Center for Politics Larry Sabato.

Even way back in 1994, The Wall Street Journal called him “probably the most quoted professor in the land.” A former Rhodes Scholar and author of more than 20 books, Sabato is the go-to political expert for a nation of news writers and TV talking heads.

The last time a Washington Post writer quoted Larry Sabato was February 13. Likewise, Sabato’s last appearance in the New York Times happened February 12.

In April 2008 alone, Sabato was quoted in no less than 72 news stories and broadcasts. His quotes appeared in myriad newspapers and websites: U.K.’s the Guardian, The Richmond Times-Dispatch, Fox News, the Sacramento Bee, the Hollywood Reporter, The Peninsula (Qatar’s Leading English Daily), USA Today, The Times-Picayune of New Orleans, The Voice of America and The Malaysia Star.

But Sabato quotes have shown up less frequently in two of the county’s leading gray ladies: The Washington Post and The New York Times. The last time a Post writer quoted Sabato was February 13. Likewise, Sabato’s last appearance in the Times happened February 12.

The lack of Mr. Ubiquitous from two of the nation’s leading papers may have lead some to wonder, did the Post and the Times place a moratorium on Larry J. Sabato quotes?

“We seek always to have diverse sources in the newspaper,” says Robert McCartney via e-mail, the metro assistant managing editor at The Washington Post, “but there’s no moratorium on quoting Larry Sabato.”

A spokesperson for The New York Times (yes, it has its own press people) did not respond to the question by press time.

So rest easy. No one is shutting Sabato out. Except, perhaps, Ben Tribbett.

Tribbett writes the blog “Not Larry Sabato,” which provides analysis for Virginia political districts. The name, he says, comes from what he sees as the lack of analysis that Sabato gives to reporters.

“He’s always everywhere, but not actually saying anything,” says Tribbett. “It was the kind of thing where 500 people in the state got the joke, and the rest of them said, ‘Oh, that’s such a weird name.’”

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.

On April 29, the deal was done. Late-night music at the Corner icon Satellite Ballroom will make way for late-night cigarette and condom purchases. Goodbye indie rockers, local musicians and the crown jewel of the Charlottesville music scene.

Hello national-chain behemoth CVS.

Local businesses Just Curry and Higher Grounds will have to vacate the Anderson Brothers Building near the UVA grounds, as will Richmond-based Plan 9. The deal went down despite protests from locals. A Facebook group named “Coran Capshaw, Save Satellite Ballroom,” 1,836 members strong as of May 1, changed its tactics from urging owner Terry Vassalos to keep Satellite where it is to instead calling for a boycott when the CVS opens.

Currently, this CVS on the Downtown Mall is the closest to the Corner.

If that boycott comes to pass, jilted Satellite lovers will have plenty of other CVS options. With stores on the Downtown Mall, in Barracks Road, Fifth Street and the 250 Bypass (not to mention another a ways up 29N), the pharmacy chain isn’t hard to find.

So what if CVS already has 50,120 square feet of retail space in Charlottesville? The nearest store (Downtown Mall) is a whopping 1.1 miles from the Corner. A store on the Corner would really put the “convenience” in convenience store, no?

But right next to the Grounds? Would other universities of comparable sizes and cities put a CVS on its main drag?

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill doesn’t have any CVS stores on Franklin Street, though it does have a pharmacy. Princeton University does have one on Nassau Street, which runs on the north side of the campus proper. Another state school in a middle-sided town, The University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, does without a CVS on campus.

“We don’t have any on campus, but there are some in the area,” says Justine at the university’s Campus Information Center (which prohibits its students from giving out their last names).

Which, of course, leads to the inevitable question that UVA students will soon not have to ponder late at night: If there’s no CVS, where do you go to get cigarettes, condoms and a beard trimmer?

“I’m not sure,” says Justine, “but I’m going to guess they go to liquor stores or convenience stores. Is there anything else I can help you with?”

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.