The city will be in charge of the Water Street Parking Garage starting August 1, and Mark Brown will collect rent. Staff photo
Two years ago, before Nazis came to Charlottesville in 2017, the big story was the contretemps between Mark Brown, co-owner of the Water Street Parking Garage, and then-mayor Mike Signer and the city.
The escalating parking wars led to suits and countersuits, panicked meetings of downtown business owners, threats of closing the garage and of eminent domain, challenges to the hiring of a former mayor and whopping legal bills on both sides.
At the July 16 City Council meeting, as the clock approached midnight, councilors approved a settlement that gives them most of what they wanted, but the full cost is not known at the present.
“I wasn’t sure until 11:58 last night this would get approved,” said Charlottesville Parking Center general manager Dave Norris, who has seen seemingly solid deals with the city fall apart before, the day after the meeting.
In the settlement hammered out over the past two years, Charlottesville Parking Center, which Brown owns and which manages the garage, agreed to sell 73 spaces to the city for $413,000. The spaces, previously owned by Wells Fargo, have been a sore point for the city, which sued Brown for buying them from the bank when the city had a right of first refusal should any parties want to unload their spaces.
“We’re selling them at the same price we paid for them,” says Norris, a former Charlottesville mayor whose own hiring was a point of contention when the city, through Chris Engel, director of economic development, questioned Norris’ qualifications to run a parking garage.
Charlottesville Parking Center was founded in 1959 by business owners who feared the emergence of shopping malls with ample parking would be a threat to getting people to shop downtown. The Water Street Parking Garage is a jointly owned public/private entity, and CPC owns the ground underneath the garage, as well as the surface lot across the street.
Although the city had the opportunity to buy Charlottesville Parking Center when it went on the market in 2008, it didn’t. Brown bought CPC in 2014 for $13.8 million and an uneasy alliance with the city began. In March 2016, Brown sued the city, alleging it forced him to offer parking below market rate—and below what was charged at the city-owned Market Street Garage.
In the settlement, the parking center will lease its remaining 317 spaces to the city for $50,000 a month for 16 years—with a 2.5 percent annual increase after the first year. The city believes it will make more than $900,000 in net revenue during the first year of the lease, according to a city document.
“It’s really a good thing for all parties after two years of contentiousness,” says Norris. “As of August 1, they’ll have full control and can set whatever hours and rates they want.”
CPC used to manage the Market Street Garage, but during the heat of battle, the city fired CPC and hired Lanier Parking to manage that garage. Most CPC employees who run the Water Street Garage will go to work for Lanier, which will take over the management of Water Street, city parking manager Rick Siebert told City Council.
When questioned by Mayor Nikuyah Walker, Siebert said none of the Water Street Garage employees will make less than the city’s minimum wage and that they have benefits.
For Charlottesville Parking Center administrators like Norris, it’s time to dust off those resumes. “This is the end of our role as a parking management company,” he says. “I’m exploring my own options.”
Brown continues to own the land underneath the garage. He was traveling in Greece, and in an email says the settlement is a “very slightly modified version” of a proposal CPC made to the city in January 2016 before any litigation was filed, “so we eventually succeeded in achieving our preferred resolution to the problem.”
At one point, Brown tried to buy the city’s portion of the garage—and the city did likewise. He also threatened to close the garage, which totally freaked out downtown business owners. The Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville made clear to the city that it believed the garage should remain publicly owned.
“I think we’ve gained significant efficiencies,” Siebert told City Council, as well as gaining control of the garage’s operation, “which I think is so important to the public.”
At the July 16 council meeting, Signer noted that “Ms. Galvin and I have some scar tissue and war wounds from this.”
Councilor Kathy Galvin recalled “all-day long mediation sessions.”
The city hired Richmond attorney Tom Wolf with LeClairRyan, who charged the city a discounted rate of $425 an hour. At press time, the city had not provided what those legal fees added up to over two years.
“We really decided to stick to our guns and stick up for this being a public good, a public asset,” said Signer. “And it was very difficult and there was a lot of fighting from the other side, a lot of scaremongering from some of the local journalistic outlets.”
He added, “This settlement a couple of years later is a good result for the public on all fronts.”
What's going to happen to the quarter-million-dollars worth of solar panels on the slated-for-demolition Main Street Arena? TBD.
Photo by Skyclad Aerial
Hot topic
In 2012, the Local Energy Alliance Program floated a low-interest loan of $280,000 for Mark Brown to install solar panels on top of the Main Street Arena using a $500,000 grant from the city. Now that he’s sold the building and it’s slated for demolition, some are wondering what will happen to the panels on the roof.
The loan was paid in full when Brown listed the property, confirms LEAP spokesperson Kara West.
“The only reason we put those panels in was because the city wanted us to,” says Brown, who says he broke even on the panels. “Most of the savings came from them shading the building from sun on that side of the building.”
Solar expert Roger Voisinet says some parts of the system, such as the inverters, can be recycled more easily than others. As for the panels, “It depends,” he says.
There’s plenty that can be recycled from the building, he observes, such as the copper roof and the equipment that makes it an ice rink, which current owner Jaffray Woodriff pledged to donate to a business venture that would create a new ice rink in a different location.
Woodriff’s Taliaferro Junction LLC bought the property in early 2017 for $5.7 million, and the arena, as well as the building that houses Escafé, are all coming down to make way for a tech center. That won’t happen until the Board of Architectural Review approves the site plan, probably not before this summer, according to city planner Brian Haluska.
Details are not final on what will happen with the solar panels, according to a Woodriff spokesperson.
The solar panel loan was controversial at the time, says Brown. “I don’t think there were any real losers. It wasn’t an Omni bailout deal.” That’s a reference to the city pumping $11 million in taxpayer funds to the hotel in the ’80s and secretly forgiving the loans in closed executive sessions a decade later.
Says Brown, “I’d assume [the panels] will be thrown in the garbage.”
“There are people in Virginia history that I think it’s appropriate to memorialize and remember that way, and others that I would have a difference of opinion on.”—Lieutenant Governor Justin Fairfaxspeaking to reporters after he declined to adjourn the Senate January 22 to honor General Stonewall Jackson
New city flack
Brian Wheeler, executive director of Charlottesville Tomorrow, will take over as spokesperson for the City of Charlottesville, a position Miriam Dickler most recently held. Wheeler starts the $98,000-a-year-plus-benefits job (more than $5,000 above Dickler’s salary) February 20. He co-founded the online news nonprofit in 2005 and implemented a groundbreaking partnership with the Daily Progress. He will devote the remainder of his time with Charlottesville Tomorrow to finding a fundraising successor.
Paw patrol
The Charlottesville-Albemarle SPCA is housing a group of canines that Humane Society International rescued from a dog meat farm in Namyangju, South Korea. Many of the animals suffered eye infections, skin disease and have leg and paw sores from standing and sitting on thin wire mesh. HSI rescued 170 pups in total, but it’s unclear how many are up for adoption locally.
Police Academy director dies
File photo Jen Fariello
Albemarle resident Hugh Wilson, creator of “WKRP in Cincinnati,” died January 14 at age 74. He was a writer for “The Bob Newhart Show,” and he broke into directing with Police Academy in 1984. He also directed Guarding Tess and The First Wives Club, and in 2001 made Mickey with fellow Albemarlean John Grisham.
#metoo for UVA board member
First lady of New Jersey Tammy Murphy says she was sexually assaulted while a second-year student at UVA. Murphy, who graduated in 1987 and sits on the Board of Visitors, revealed the attack at a January 20 Women’s March event in Morristown, New Jersey. She says she was pulled into the bushes walking home alone and managed to escape. Her attacker was later jailed for a different crime.
Another counterprotester arrested
Six months after the Unite the Right rally, police arrested Donald Blakney, 51, for malicious wounding near the Market Street Garage melee. He was released on $2,000 bond.
Worst headline about a UVA alum
“Another sycophant trashes her reputation” was Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank’s January 16 piece about UVA law’s Kirstjen Nielsen, now secretary of Homeland Security, who denied hearing President Donald Trump use the term “shithole” to describe the countries he doesn’t want immigrants from in the infamous meeting at which she was present.
Killed bills
Here’s what legislation has died in the General Assembly so far.
SB360 would allow localities to ban firearms at permitted events.
SB385 limits handgun purchases to one a month.
SB444 allows localities to remove war memorials, and it died in Senate committee on party line vote 7-6 January 16. House Minority Leader David Toscano has a similar bill in the House of Delegates.
SB245 prohibits conversion therapy for LGBTQ youths.
SB665, carried by state Senator Creigh Deeds, adds Charlottesville and Albemarle to the list to localities where it’s unlawful to carry certain firearms in public places.
SB744 makes not wearing a seatbelt a primary offense and requires backseat passengers to be belted. Currently police can’t pull over a driver for being seatbelt-less and can only ticket if they observe another primary violation.
Cities are always involved in one sort of minor litigation or another, typically for unpaid taxes, but over the past two years, Charlottesville has been embroiled in a lot of high-profile cases, mostly as a defendant. Having a hard time keeping up? We are, too. Let’s review.
Militias
The city, downtown businesses and neighborhood associations sue armed militias and Unite the Right participants for militaristic violence August 12.
Charlottesville Parking Center
Mark Brown’s suit over Water Street Parking Garage rates filed in 2016.
Charlottesville filed a counterclaim.
Current status: In mediation
Fred Payne, Monument Fund et. al.
Suit to prevent removal of Confederate statues, motion to remove tarps.
Current status: Next hearing is December 6
Albemarle County
Objects to city overriding county law at Ragged Mountain Natural Area to allow biking.
Charlottesville has filed a counterclaim.
Current status: Motions hearing is December 6
Joy Johnson et. al. [filed by Jeff Fogel]
Demands that the city fire Hunton & Williams, claims City Manager Maurice Jones had no authority to hire Tim Heaphy’s law firm to do a review of city actions August 12.
Natalie Jacobsen and Jackson Landers
FOIA suit to force city to produce August 12 safety plans.
Current status: The reporter plaintiffs had to amend the complaint naming the city rather than the police department, and no new hearing date has been set.
Granted bond
Chris Cantwell. Staff photo
“Crying Nazi” Chris Cantwell—whose name comes from a tearful video he posted to the web before turning himself in to police for allegedly using pepper spray at the August 11 tiki-torch march at UVA—literally cried when he was granted a $25,000 bond December 4. He won’t be released from jail until he can find a place to stay, according to the judge.
More sick animals
On the heels of Peaceable Farm owner Anne Shumate Williams being convicted of 25 counts of animal cruelty in Orange County, the Louisa County Sheriff’s Office is hoping to save about 500 animals in what appears to be a similar case. This time, goats, emus, sheep and a peacock are among the neglected critters. Charges are pending for the 77-year-old and her two adult sons who run the farm.
Quote of the Week
Nikuyah Walker. Photo by Eze Amos
“Systemic racism does not fall on the backs of two black men.” —Councilor-elect Nikuyah Walker at the December 4 City Council meeting
Point of no return
John Casey. Courtesy Cramer Photo
Former University of Virginia professor and award-winning author John Casey will not return to teaching creative writing at the school this spring. UVA is currently investigating at least three Title IX complaints from former students who claim he sexually harassed them.
Better than a 9-5
Airbnb announced last week that homestay hosts in Charlottesville and Blacksburg have earned $2.3 million during the University of Virginia and Virginia Tech football seasons since 2016.
Rights waived
Daniel Borden, charged with malicious wounding for his part in the August 12 Market Street Parking Garage beatdown of Deandre Harris, waived his right to a preliminary hearing in Charlottesville General District Court December 4. He’ll go before the grand jury in December.
Since 2016, Charlottesville has faced a larger-than-usual number of high-profile lawsuits, and in at least two cases, its insurance carrier won’t be picking up the tab. And while the carrier hasn’t seen the most recent suit, filed by Albemarle County over the Ragged Mountain Natural Area April 20, that litigation could join the Lee statue coverage denial as a “willful violation” of state law.
The city’s insurer, the Virginia Municipal League, covered Joe Draego’s federal lawsuit after he was dragged out of City Council for calling Muslims “monstrous maniacs,” and a judge ruled the city’s public comment policy banning group defamation was unconstitutional.
But VML is not covering the lawsuit filed against the city for its 3-2 vote to remove the statue of General Robert E. Lee, nor is it covering Mark Brown’s Charlottesville Parking Center litigation against the city, which heads to mediation May 31.
In that case, the city is paying Richmond LeClairRyan attorney Tom Wolf $425 an hour. At press time, City Attorney Craig Brown was unable to come up with costs of that suit, but a year ago, as of April 30, 2016, before the city had gone to court on Brown’s emergency receivershippetition, it had spent $11,593.
Craig Brown says the suits on the statue, parking garage and the dispute with Albemarle have “all generated a large amount of public interest, whereas someone tripping on a sidewalk doesn’t.”
“It’s unusual to be involved in as much high-profile litigation as it is now,” agrees former mayor and CPC general manager Dave Norris.
“There’s only a certain amount of appetite taxpayers have to paying high-priced lawyers,” he says.
The litigation with Albemarle stems from the city’s December 19 vote to allow biking at Ragged Mountain, which is located in the county, despite county regulations that prohibit biking at the reservoir. Before the vote, Liz Palmer, then chair of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors, sent a December 15 letter to City Council asking it to defer action and citing state code that prohibits a landowner locality from adopting regulations in conflict with the jurisdiction where the property is located.
And while the city held a year’s worth of public meetings about uses at Ragged Mountain, conspicuously absent from that process was the county. “We were not involved in that,” says Board of Supervisors chair Diantha McKeel. “It’s unfortunate it got as far as it did without recognizing that.”
McKeel stresses that the city and county are not at odds on most issues, but says, “Both of our localities have agreed this is a legal question that has to be settled in the courts.”
After the City Council voted April 3 to adopt a new trails plan that would allow biking, the city offered binding arbitration, “precisely because we wanted to resolve the underlying legal issues without having to go to court,” says Mayor Mike Signer.
That was an offer the county declined. “The question goes back to state code,” says McKeel. “We can’t mediate our way out of that.”
Attorney Buddy Weber, a plaintiff in the Lee statue suit, sees a pattern with the city’s decision to proceed at Ragged Mountain over the county’s objections—and state statutes. “What you really have to ask is where they’re getting their legal advice,” he says. “Are they doing this to invite litigation?”
An injunction hearing is scheduled for May 2 to halt the city from moving the statue—or selling it, as council voted to do April 17. “We thought it was reckless for them to do what they did to remove the statue,” says Weber.“Selling it falls in line with that. That’s why we need an injunction.”
But when Councilor Bob Fenwick changed his vote to remove the statue February 6, he said it was an issue that would have to be decided by the courts.
For activist Walt Heinecke, that fight embodies the city’s values on the Civil War statue, and he also applauds council’s funding of $10,000 to Legal Aid Justice Center to support immigrants. “I do think it’s important,” he says.
Other legal battles, like the city’s defense of its 2011 panhandling ordinance or the Draego lawsuit, “seem like a complete waste of money,” he says. Heinecke hasn’t followed the Ragged Mountain debate, but says, “It certainly seems there would be better ways to work this through rather than bull-dogging it.”
Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy, who had his own day in court recently to fend off a petition to remove him from office, says when he was campaigning, he frequently heard comments that prior councils were “paralyzed” and that citizens wanted City Council to make decisions.
“This council is committed to making a difference and to making bold choices,” he says. “We’re not going to be paralyzed.”
UVA men’s hockey president Raffi Keuroglian says he was surprised by how many people were interested in club-level hockey in Charlottesville. The team practices Monday nights at Main Street Arena and will host playoffs there this month. Photo by Ron Paris
he Main Street Arena first opened as an ice rink in 1996. During its 20-year history it has hosted hockey, curling, conventions, roller derby, concerts and parties. It was also sometimes the subject of controversy because it often struggled to make a profit while sitting on some of Charlottesville’s most valuable real estate. Now, it is slated for demolition, and some members of Charlottesville’s quirkiest and most dedicated subcultures are worried.
In July 2010, local real estate investor Mark Brown purchased the building (then called The Charlottesville Ice Park) for $3 million. The business had been losing about $70,000 a year for the previous owners, Bruce Williamson and Roberta Williamson, and for several months there seemed to be a strong chance that Charlottesville’s ice sports would end entirely—including the UVA men’s hockey club. Brown immediately began exploring options for cutting costs and adding revenue.
One of the first things he did was add a bar by the entrance, which seems like a no-brainer today, but in ice rinks of this size bars are unusual. The upstairs event space, which had been briefly used for retail as the home of the Eloise clothing store, was converted into a night club and restaurant now known as The Ante Room. Brown also invested in special flooring that could be laid over the ice, so the rink could be used for conventions, large parties and even roller derby.
The rink became profitable, but Brown decided it was time to sell the building and listed it for $6.5 million in September. Jaffray Woodriff, a 1991 UVA alumnus who is the founder and CEO of Quantitative Investment Management, which manages a $3 billion hedge fund, made a $7 million offer on the arena in December. A press release issued December 29 from Payne, Ross and Associates said the land and building at 230 W. Main St. (the arena address) and the land and building at 215 W. Water St., the location of Escafé, were under contract by Taliaferro Junction LLC. A spokesperson confirmed plans to demolish the arena and erect an office building, rumored to become a tech incubator space.
Through his PR firm, Payne, Ross and Associates, Woodriff declined to be interviewed. But owner Susan Payne says, “The contract is being negotiated and there are some open issues.”
It is not clear whether Woodriff will allow the Main Street Arena, Escafé or The Ante Room to operate during any period while he is waiting for architectural plans to be completed and permits to be finalized.
Gathering place
Katie McCartney sat with a beer at the rink’s bar on a recent Monday night. Behind her, dozens of warmly dressed people walked—not skated—across the ice. McCartney is the president of the Blue Ridge Curling Club, and Monday nights are theirs at the rink.
Charlottesville seems like a strange place for a curling league. The sport, which involves pushing heavy granite stones across the ice, was invented in medieval Scotland and has grown in popularity around the world in places with cold winters and thick ice, especially Canada. But a curling community has grown here out of a mixture of Northern transplants and curious locals who watched Olympic curling on television and wanted to give it a try.
“I was looking for something to do on a Monday night,” McCartney says. “I came out of curiosity and got hooked and I’ve been playing the sport now for going on seven years.”
The Blue Ridge Curling Club currently has about 120 players who compete against other East Coast teams. Photo by Ron Paris
The club has about 120 players and competes against other organizations along the East Coast. As the players’ trips to the rink’s bar suggest, the club is as much about having fun as it is about competition.
“We have a very diverse skill level,” McCartney says, “which led us to host this social league where people can come out and have a beer and curl but also work on their game and get some coaching, and we’re able to do all those different things.”
It is hard to imagine how a curling club can exist without an ice rink, but McCartney is hopeful. In fact, everyone interviewed for this article expressed hope.
“When I first heard about [the sale], I was super stressed out. We’re a very new organization that’s trying to grow and establish ourselves,” she says. “…On the other hand, I love curling and the people that I curl with love it so we’re going to continue to do our sport and continue to take advantage of the space when we have it.”
McCartney believes there is enough interest in ice sports in the region that someone will build a new rink nearby. Meanwhile, if they have to they will make a deal with a rink in another city hours away. “Things can still go on in less-than-ideal circumstances,” she says, adding that the club is still actively recruiting new members. “I’m not super concerned about it disappearing from Virginia.
“I think it’s a big process that takes a lot of time and we are not a part of that decision,” she says. “As a result, we are super happy for the time we have to curl here and at some point we’ll start making plans for where we get to curl next. For me, the important thing is welcoming people who are curious about the sport and introducing it to them in a way that’s fun and interesting.”
Ante up
The same kitchen that produces food for the bar where McCartney sipped her beer and watched curlers also serves The Ante Room upstairs, whose entrance faces Water Street. Previously called The Annex, The Ante Room is the only music venue in Charlottesville that regularly features metal acts for the balkanized local metal community.
Black metal, grind core, speed metal and various other subgenres may sound the same to outsiders. To connoisseurs of metal, though, these varieties have very different styles and techniques. All depend heavily on advanced technical skill and speed by guitarists, bassists and drummers—and The Ante Room is open to all of them.
Bartender and metal musician Luke Smith spoke to C-VILLE hours before the doors opened for a three-act bill of black metal bands. [Editor’s note: We are saddened to report that Smith died suddenly, days after he was interviewed for this article; the cause of death is still being investigated. A tribute concert/celebration for Smith was held January 24 at The Ante Room.] Smith was the frontman for two metal bands, Salvaticus and Blooddrunk Trolls. When he first arrived in Charlottesville around 2012, there was no place for a metal band to play. The now-defunct Outback Lodge used to host metal but has since been demolished and redeveloped into the building that houses Sticks Kebob Shop.
“I started up Blooddrunk Trolls and The Annex popped up and I started talking to Jeyon Falsini [founder and manager of The Ante Room], and he said if you want to do something we’ll try it,” Smith said. “Jeyon’s open to booking anything. We did a series of shows together and it just started ramping up.”
The Ante Room hosts at least one metal night a month, sometimes with up to eight bands on a single bill.
“The thing about The Ante Room, being that there’s a built-in PA [system] and a full bar, it’s easier for a band to get paid and make money,” said Smith. “You can charge an $8 cover.” He said the Twisted Branch Tea Bazaar has been friendly to metal bands, but the logistics are awkward.
“I’ve played there with three metal bands and there’s just too much gear [to fit on Twisted Branch’s stage and bring up the stairs],” Smith said. “I don’t know what we’d do [if The Ante Room closed], unless another establishment decided to start doing metal. The Ante Room is also big with the hip-hop community. …Jeyon has been necessary with cultivating the scene here, but I don’t really know where we’d go.”
Luke Smith’s death metal band Blooddrunk Trolls played a quadruple bill with grindcore bands Drugs of Faith and Antigama and heavy metal band Earthling in May 2015 at The Ante Room. Photo by Sallah Baloch
Smith said Charlottesville’s larger, mainstream performance spaces have been unwilling to book metal. “They kind of want to bank on sure things versus taking a risk on a kind of niche scene that could possibly not draw as many people out,” he said.
A small, alternative space in the basement of the Jefferson Theater has recently been used for a weekly Goth Night run by Gopal and Angel Metro. Could that experimental space also be used for metal? Manager Danny Shea isn’t sure.
“Gopal has done a remarkable job transforming that area and in a small unconventional space,” Shea says by e-mail. “I’m not sure the hallway is the solution, but [I’m] certainly open to look into ways to cultivate music communities as I can in our venues and in town.”
Falsini has a philosophy of giving bands and genres a chance, even if there isn’t an obvious or immediate payoff. They get second chances. And even eighth chances.
“I think you should always try things,” Falsini says. “Always keep an open mind. The different rooms I’ve booked in the 10-plus years I’ve done this, I’ve always seen every room as a fresh [opportunity] for every band I’ve ever worked with. …I’ve noticed that frequency is the key. It takes about seven shows of a particular genre in order for the room to be known for that genre. So your first seven country shows might not knock it out of the park, but the eighth probably will.”
The Ante Room also hosts Latin dance nights that appeal to groups like The Charlottesville Salsa Club. No other music venue in Charlottesville regularly hosts events geared towards Charlottesville’s large Latino immigrant community and the Anglos who love their music and dance traditions.
Home base
Down the block from The Ante Room’s Water Street entrance is Escafé. Formerly located on the Downtown Mall where The Whiskey Jar is today, Escafé has been a gathering spot for Charlottesville’s gay community for decades. Private gay clubs with membership requirements have come and gone, but Escafé has remained as a public establishment with food, drinks and dancing for queer and straight communities.
The owners of the restaurant rent the building from owners who have reached an agreement with Taliaferro Junction to sell the building for demolition. Because Escafé was penalized twice last year by the ABC for not selling enough food in proportion to the drinks customers bought (55 percent of sales must come from food), the loss of its lease may be the final straw.
Longtime patron Jason Elliot stood in the courtyard under a drizzling rain in front of Escafé and pondered what it has meant to him.
“Escafé was actually the very first gay bar I ever went to, about 10 years ago,” Elliot says. “That was my first exposure to ‘gay after dark,’ if you will. And pretty quickly it became a home base. Any time I was in Charlottesville I had to go there to see friends who became family.”
Elliot, a UVA graduate, now works for the Virginia Department of Health as a counselor specializing in HIV prevention and treatment. Later, sitting out of the rain at a coffee shop a few blocks away, he opened up about what Escafé meant to him.
“It very quickly did become a place where I would come when I was feeling happy, when I was feeling sad,” Elliot says. “It really did become my second home here in Charlottesville.”
Jason Elliot says Escafé, the first gay bar he ever went to, became a second home for him when he moved here 10 years ago to attend UVA. Photo by Amy Jackson
Compared to other small Virginia cities, Charlottesville has a high number of businesses that display a rainbow flag as a show of support, or where employees wear a discreet safety pin on their shirts.
“I think the great thing with Charlottesville, with society as a whole, there are a lot of places where we can gather, there are a lot of places where we are safe, where we like to go,” Elliot says. “But there’s a difference between a safe place, between a gathering place, and home. For a lot of people they have the same feeling about Escafé that I do, that this place is home.”
The Impulse Gay Social Club, located above an Asian grocery store on Route 29, is not within walking distance of homes or other establishments. And Impulse is a private club that requires membership and enforces a dress code.
Open to all, Escafé is embraced by people across generational lines.
“You’ve got your Friday night and your Saturday night crew, which is dancing,” Elliot says. “All night long we’re going to be there. …You also have a lot of the older gay community that’s going to head out for brunch or early dinner on Friday afternoon before it gets wild and loud. And with UVA, a lot of the people are really transient.”
Elliot looks beyond the gay community at all of the other groups that will be affected by the pending demolitions.
“Really what spoke loudly is that now it’s not just Escafé, it’s all the other businesses, the organizations, the other homes on the block, so to speak. The arena, the rink, The Ante Room,” he says. “…This is bigger than just one business, affecting more than just the gay community or the youth community or the night community…the Derby Dames, the metal community or even Latin night for salsa dancing, they’re all groups that are going to suffer from Escafé, The Ante Room, the arena closing. It’s a wide range of people who are missing out and losing out.”
Inside Escafé last Saturday afternoon, owner Todd Howard had the wooden top of the restaurant’s greeting stand turned upside down as he reshaped it and worked with a power drill as he talked.
“I would certainly leave [relocation] open as an option,” Howard says.“I know that things like this deal take time. …If it should happen that the stars align and we do some hard work and maybe get some further backing we could probably relocate. Escafé would probably be different because this space has defined Escafé in its current iteration.”
Howard puts the drill down and checks a measurement on his inverted tabletop.
“It doesn’t mean that we actually stop working, stop caring, stop developing,” Howard says. “I just repaired the plumbing today. The work still goes on no matter how long we’re here, whether it is two weeks or two years. …And people should be aware that we’ll be giving notice so there can be a long goodbye.”
Long shot
Late at night, people can often be seen dragging enormous bags of hockey equipment past the merrymakers at Escafé on their way from the closest parking lot to the ice rink. It is a long haul with heavy equipment, especially for a goalie. For both the UVA and JMU men’s hockey teams, this trek is a mandatory part of the ritual of practice.
“We’re currently undefeated in the league,” says Raffi Keuroglian, who is both a player and the president of the UVA men’s hockey club. “We’re a strong team and we’re going to be competitive. We’re actually hosting the playoffs at the Main Street Arena in February.
“I’m a fourth-year at UVA. I played hockey for most of my life,” Keuroglian says. “One of the things I was surprised by is how many people were interested in hockey at the club level. It didn’t hurt that we were just a mile away from Grounds. In the Charlottesville community we have a lot of support as well.”
Keuroglian and his teammates had been hearing rumors of the building’s sale so they were prepared for the bad news. “I wasn’t exactly blindsided by it,” he says. “It’s obviously disappointing. It definitely is a blow to the team. But it is what it is.”
The team doesn’t intend to give up on its sport.
“The closest rink is in Richmond so it would be tough to have the same kind of program but we would obviously have to schedule more games on the road,” Keuroglian says. “The interest level is still there to continue the program. I still think it’s possible that another rink could be constructed in Charlottesville.”
It isn’t only UVA’s hockey team that is at risk of losing its home in Charlottesville. The Main Street Arena also hosts youth hockey programs that don’t currently have a local alternative.
“Silversauce” Annie D., a silversmith and former bar manager at the arena and The Ante Room, has two children in her life who spend a lot of time on the ice.
“My nephew Joey Davis plays hockey in the youth league and my daughter, Liala Finer, is a figure skater taking lessons in the learn-to-skate.”
Joey lives in Culpeper and drives to Charlottesville to play and practice. Annie figures that both kids will keep trying but may find themselves at a disadvantage.
“For Joey, he’s going to keep it up and probably move more toward Northern Virginia competition,” Annie says. “He’s also 17 so the competition is getting stronger. It’s nice to have a rink to practice on in Charlottesville. In Culpeper there isn’t a rink. They travel here and they travel to Richmond. But they’re not going to drive to Lynchburg [where there is also a rink]—that’s even farther.”
Annie thinks she will probably have to take her daughter to a rink in Richmond, “and that might make it more of a hobby than a sport because it’s not going to be as convenient for her to learn how right here where it’s an everyday thing.”
“During the time that I managed the bar at the rink it was an opportunity to have a bar in a hockey rink,” Annie says. “Who has ever heard of such a thing? For being on the Downtown Mall, it’s a community area where now the parents have something to do and there’s a social life around it. We added music to it. Now you have kids skating and adults enjoying the atmosphere of music and late-night parties even, and the bar, which is just beer and wine, but when your kids are on the ice it’s nice to have a beer and a snack while watching six HD TVs.”
Natalie Raab, 14, a competitive figure skater, trains at Main Street Arena five days a week. She will be competing in the world championships in April with the Virginia Ice Theatre of Fairfax team. Photo by Ron Paris
The Raab family has already glimpsed what the future without a local ice rink holds, as the rink at Main Street Arena is normally closed from April to August. Natalie Raab, 14, is a competitive figure skater who trains locally and in Richmond (her sister, Leah, 8, also skates). When the rink is not in operation, the family is up at 4:30am to make skating practice in Short Pump by 6:30 and be back in Charlottesville for school at 9am. Currently, Natalie trains five days a week in Charlottesville, and she and her sister practice one day a week in Richmond with their Virginia Ice Box Ensemble team.
Natalie hopes to reach the national level one day, and currently competes in both singles skating and theater on ice teams. In April, she’ll join the Virginia Ice Theatre of Fairfax team in the world championships, and in June she’ll compete in the national championships with the Virginia Ice Box Ensemble. Natalie’s mom, Janice, says the convenience of having a local rink helps her daughter balance the demands of school and skating, and that they will have to continue driving to SkateNation Plus in Short Pump several times a week if no other option is available.
What’s next
Four blocks from the arena, Whitney Richardson rolls up on a pair of roller skates at the Carver Recreation Center for a Charlottesville Derby Dames practice. She serves as president of the team,and skates under the name Crashiopeia.
“I started in March 2010,” Richardson says. “I did the very stereotypical thing, which is I watched the movie Whip It, and I wondered if there was a team here, because I moved to Charlottesville six months earlier. I’m not the going-to-the-bar type and I was looking to get exercise, make friends, and I walked into derby and someone threw skates at me and said, ‘Welcome home,’ and that was it. And that’s where I’ve been ever since.”
The Derby Dames have often held roller derby bouts at the Main Street Arena, where they have attracted crowds of more than 1,000 spectators.
“Every different type of person you can find on the roller derby team,” Richardson says. “We have teachers, we have scientists, we have stay-at-home moms, we have stay-at-home dads. And we have one goal and that is to skate and to knock each other down. With love.”
The Charlottesville Derby Dames have 40 skaters on the team and about another 40 referees, non-skating officials and volunteers who have helped make roller derby happen in Charlottesville for the last decade. They have a contingency plan if the artificial floor laid over the ice in the rink disappears. In addition to a practice space in Ruckersville, they have a space in Fishersville in a building called Expoland that fits the bill.
“One time we went and they had a chicken sale in the parking lot,” Richardson says. “It’s a multipurpose space. …If anyone wants to donate space, it’s tax deductible.”
The Derby Dames are currently ranked number 48 out of 320 leagues in the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association. They are still actively recruiting new skaters, volunteers and kids to join their Junior Derby league, for children between 7 and 17.
Investor Mark Brown has mostly good memories of his time at the Main Street Arena. He tried curling for a while, learned to ice skate and attended UVA hockey games with his children.
“It was a project that I really enjoyed doing,” Brown says. “It was something that my kids enjoyed. It was different from anything I’ve done before.
“Probably the strongest memory that I have of the rink is the very first event we had there was a Best Of C-VILLE party, and we had the rink ready for the party about two minutes before the doors opened,” Brown says. “We were still screwing down the bar top! …If there was anything I will remember about the place it was that, just trying to get the place fixed. We converted it from an ice rink to a multipurpose building.”
Completing a $7 million real estate deal takes time. Brown doesn’t know exactly when the transaction will be finalized. But he believes that the broad coalition of communities that used the Main Street Arena will be able to convince someone to build a new rink on less expensive real estate.
“There’s already groups working on that,” Brown says. “I don’t anticipate any problems with them making that work in Charlottesville. Most rinks work in rural or industrial centers…lugging hockey stuff from one of the parking garages is not ideal. I would be shocked if there was not in the future skating in Charlottesville.”
Roger Voisinet, a local investor and real estate agent who helped start the UVA men’s hockey club, is exploring options for creating a new ice facility. Voisinet is among a group of investors in the Main Street Arena who would retain the hardware and property at the rink that could be used elsewhere. Voisinet says an announcement may come this spring.
All of the communities affected by the potential ice rink demolition have hope of surviving.
“I don’t think The Ante Room will be gone,” Annie D. says. “The Ante Room will live on. …There has to be another space. The Ante Room has built something really good. It is unfortunate to lose that space because it’s a great club. It took a long time to build it. And Jeyon Falsini has built it to be something of an extreme in town, and not just the other music that we are seeing at other [venues]. We’ve got hip-hop shows and metal shows. Nobody else is doing that and the community wants it. …Jeyon will find some way to find somewhere to put that.”
Jeyon Falsini, manager of The Ante Room, says he’d look for other spaces to house the music venue known for booking diverse genres, but says rent would be a big factor. Photo by Eze Amos
Falsini wants to try.
“I would start with looking to move it somewhere else,” he says. “It’s gotta make sense. The rent’s gotta make sense. The cost has to make sense. …I also have another business, a booking and promotion company, Magnus Management. I help book the bands at the Tom Tom Festival. If I didn’t do The Ante Room I would go back to just that business and expand on that. I do see that it is necessary, in order for a music scene to survive, for a place to exist.”
Jason Elliot sips his latte and considers the situation philosophically.
“I just think the take-home of it is we’re all in a very unstable climate right now,” Elliot says. “We don’t know what the future for a lot of things holds. Locally, statewide and nationally. There’s a lot of question marks. I think places like the arena, Escafé and this block, they helped take away some of those question marks. And even though we’re wondering what the future holds, I’ll always think of that block as being an exclamation point in my life and not a question mark.”
Main Street Arena has sold for $5.7 million, but ice skating fans still have time to lace up their skates. Staff photo
Even before Mark Brown listed the Main Street Arena for sale for $6.5 million in September, the rumor mill was working overtime about possible buyers for the prime Downtown Mall location, including speculation back in the spring that a Japanese developer wanted to turn it into a hotel.
The current buzz? That Jaffray Woodriff, founder of Quantitative Investment Management, which manages a $3 billion hedge fund, is going to buy the arena and turn it into a tech incubator hub. Another part of the chatter is that the ice park will move to a less pricey neighborhood, such as the Albemarle urban ring.
A call to Woodriff was routed to attorney Valerie Long, who declined to comment.
“Nothing is settled yet,” says Brown. “A number of people are looking at it.”
In 2010, Brown bought the ice rink that Lee Danielson and Colin Rolph built in 1996 and which is credited with helping to turn the Downtown Mall into the success story it is today.
The ice park itself, however, was a major financial drain. When team Danielson and Rolph split up, it was sold to Roberta Williamson and Bruce Williamson, who bought it for $3.1 million in 2003. They sold it to Brown for $3 million seven years later.
Brown’s strategy was to melt the ice for part of the year and use the 17,000-square-foot-rink for other purposes, while saving on electricity and water bills.
Roger Voisinet is an investor in the 230 W. Main St. facility, and he points out that the property is for sale, not the business. Six or seven locals, two who have children who play hockey, joined majority owner Brown to keep it from becoming a boarded up shell like the Landmark Hotel.
“We had a 10-year note,” says Voisinet, and the group had to invest an additional $1 million to keep the Main Street Arena open, he says.
Since the buy, Brown’s enchantment with owning property downtown has dissipated, fueled largely by his legal battles over the Water Street Parking Garage, which he co-owns with the city.
So when will the fate of the ice park be revealed? Says Brown, “When the for sale sign comes down.
Mark Brown says he’s not angry the city rebuffed scenarios to settle the Water Street Garage litigation, but he is selling the Main Street Arena and looking for more hospitable municipalities.
Photo Jackson Smith
In the ongoing melodrama between the city and Charlottesville Parking Center owner Mark Brown, a letter from City Manager Maurice Jones says there’s no way the city will sell its Water Street Parking Garage shares to or even work with Brown, who, perhaps not coincidentally, announced plans to sell the Main Street Arena and take at least part of his investments elsewhere.
The latest barrage was in response to an August 8 letter from CPC general manager Dave Norris outlining three scenarios in which CPC would sell its parking spaces in the garage to the city or vice versa, complete with an optimistic plan that CPC would build a parking garage on a Market Street lot jointly owned by the city and county to appease the county, which has threatened to take its general district court out of the city because of the dismal parking situation.
Jones writes that former mayor Norris’ statements that the scenarios represent an opportunity to end the dispute “quickly” and “in the city’s favor” represent a “fundamental misunderstanding” of the city’s position.
He scoffs at the idea that the city would buy Brown’s interest in the Water Street Garage, which includes 390 spaces, the land underneath and commercial spaces, for $8,995,400, the amount CPC contends the city would have to pay if it goes through with its eminent domain threat. Brown bought CPC, including a surface lot across from the garage, for $13.8 million in 2013.
A major sticking point for the city is that while Brown offers to sell his spaces for $18,232 each, his offer to buy the city’s 629 spaces was at a much lower $7,822 each. “That huge discrepancy suggests that CPC either has no interest in seriously negotiating the sale” of its garage spaces or that it “continues to mistakenly believe” the fair market value of its spaces is far greater than the city’s because it owns the land upon which the Water Street Garage sits.
That, says Jones, is like the city arguing its spaces are more valuable because they’re exempt from real estate taxes. Neither “advantage” would be passed on to a purchaser, he says.
And in case there’s any doubt about the city’s position, using both bold text and underlining, Jones says, “City Council has no interest in selling its spaces in the WSPG to CPC.”
As for working together to build a garage on Seventh and Market streets after Brown’s attempts to force the city to sell its Water Street shares, says Jones, “I can unequivocally respond that no one on City Council can imagine any scenario where this type of partnership would be of interest to the city.”
On page three of the four-page letter, Jones lists Brown’s, er, CPC’s misdeeds, including suing the city, secretly negotiating with Albemarle to build a garage on Market Street, allowing downtown businesses to believe he was contemplating closing the garage because the association that runs it had not approved a budget and filing a second lawsuit seeking the emergency appointment of a receiver.
Norris declined to comment on the city’s letter, but Brown had something to say about it: “It seemed like the ramblings of a lunatic. Maurice Jones didn’t write a word of that.” Brown says he believes Mayor Mike Signer and the city’s Richmond attorney, Tom Wolf, wrote the letter.
“Not true,” says Wolf. He also downplays the tone of the letter. “I think it’s just responding to their letter. I don’t think it’s a go-to-hell letter.”
In a September 14 statement, Wolf says, “I would think that after a while people would get tired of Mark Brown’s constant whining and his relentless efforts to twist everything to benefit himself at the expense of others.”
Jones’ letter says, “This dispute is not, however, about parking rates and never has been,” and alleges that Brown’s scheme all along has been to force the city to sell its interest in the garage to him.
“That was an outright lie,” declares Brown. He contends the only time CPC ever made an offer was when the city requested one in writing.
As for an amicable settlement of the increasingly hostile dispute, says legal expert Dave Heilberg, “As of today it doesn’t look like it. It’s hard to tell how much [of the city’s letter] is posturing.”
Heilberg calls such communications in civil litigation “nastygrams.” And if the parties really want to settle, he says, “They’ll come in with offers a lot closer.”
City Attorney Craig Brown says, “Yes, there is a possibility for the case to settle. …CPC just needs to offer to sell its spaces in the Water Street Parking Garage for their fair market value.”
While Mark Brown, who also owns Yellow Cab, has listed the Main Street Arena for sale before as what he calls a “teaser,” this time he says he’s serious and has ordered a for sale sign. The arena is listed at $6.5 million.
“I don’t have any confidence in [city leadership’s] ability to function in a rational way,” he says, as Charlottesville transforms from a town to a small city. He sees “signs of dysfunction” in how the city is run. “You can’t put out patio chairs in the wrong color but they let the Landmark sit for eight years,” he says, referring to the hotel skeleton on the Downtown Mall.
“I’m not angry,” he says, while expressing concerns about the Belmont Bridge (“How long has that dragged on?”), the Strategic Investment Area and the West Main streetscape. “I don’t see any leadership from City Hall,” he says.
Brown believes money invested in municipalities that have “real leadership” will result in a higher return.
As for the fate of the only ice rink in the area, says Brown, “That’s going to be up to the owners of the building. I’m going to be investing elsewhere.”
Joan Fenton ousted George Benford as chair of the Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville.
Photo Eze Amos
Simmering undercurrents from the parking war between the city and Charlottesville Parking Center over the Water Street Garage have splintered the Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville, whose chairman abruptly resigned August 8 after being told he was illegally elected. The move leaves some members confused about who’s in charge and one who is working to start a new downtown business alliance.
Benford says he was in New York on business August 8 when he got an e-mail from DBAC vice-chair Joan Fenton, who owns Quilts Unlimited & J. Fenton Gifts. According to Benford, Fenton said his election was illegal because the bylaws had never been officially approved to allow an election in March, and that she would take over in the interim.
“I said I’d just make this simple and resign,” says Benford. “There’s been a lot of dissent from one or two people. This is a volunteer job. Nobody gets paid.” He adds, “I don’t have energy for this.”
In his resignation letter, Benford listed his accomplishments during the five months he was chair, including DBAC membership being at an all-time high. What he didn’t mention was the parking dispute between CPC owner Mark Brown and the city that has roiled the organization and had it sending conflicting messages to City Council.
Benford came under fire from Fenton and others for an April 17 letter to City Council that said the DBAC would not take sides in the dispute between Brown and the city. It urged a quick resolution and for the city to come up with a long-term plan to deal with parking.
Fenton contends that Benford went to the city and said the DBAC was in favor of it selling its shares of the garage to Brown. She also accused him of not being transparent, and of stalling a DBAC vote on a resolution to keep the garage a public utility.
“From my perspective, [Benford] has done so much damage to the organization and now he’s continuing to damage it,” says Fenton.
“He has a large group of people beholden to Mark Brown,” she says. “There’s a perception CPC is running DBAC.”
Certainly the two organizations have always been intertwined, with downtown booster Stroh holding leadership positions in both. CPC has provided office space and support to DBAC, says Benford, and CPC employee Sarah Mallan is DBAC’s secretary and treasurer.
“DBAC records are kept at the parking garage,” says Fenton. “I think that’s a conflict.”
Brown says that two people out of 17 on the DBAC board work for him. “Didn’t the DBAC encourage the city to fight me and not settle with me?” he asks.
Fenton also questions board members who don’t own businesses downtown, such as Benford, who used to own the restaurant Siips on the mall, and Amy Wicks-Horn, who joined DBAC when she was director of the Virginia Discovery Museum.
Benford says he offered to resign when he sold the restaurant. “Everyone, including Joan, asked me to stay on,” he says.
And Fenton questions the link between Wicks-Horn, who currently works for the Piedmont Family YMCA, which received funding for the new Y from the Jessup family, a member of which also sold Brown his shares in the Water Street Garage Condominium Association.
“I categorically deny that,” says Wicks-Horn. She says she’s not representing the Y with her DBAC membership, and she volunteers because of her passion to support downtown.
“DBAC is a strong partner with CPC and it’s also a strong partner with the city,” she says, and both entities are concerned about the issue of parking downtown. “That doesn’t mean we’re in the city’s pocket and it doesn’t mean we’re in CPC’s pocket.”
Spring Street owner Cynthia Schroeder sees the need for a new business group, an idea she’s had plans for since 2012. “I’m starting a new, honest, open organization to increase business on the Downtown Mall,” she says. “It’s fresh, it’s going to be very active.”
Schroeder doesn’t believe Benford should be chair of DBAC. “It’s unraveling,” she says. “I’m going to put my energy into my effort,” which she says she’d like to have in place by January.
After submitting a resignation not only as chair, but as a member of the DBAC executive committee, board and association itself, Benford reconsidered August 10. “I have received numerous requests to rescind my resignation letter,” he says, and he will remain on a member of the DBAC and its board of directors.
The legality of Benford’s chairmanship was raised at a bylaws committee meeting August 5, says Fenton. Some have questioned whether her interpretation of the bylaws, which the board had talked about updating but she believes never did, is correct.
“I can’t swear to one or the other,” she says. “But if he resigned, it doesn’t matter. He’s got copies of the bylaws, and he could have said, ‘I think you’re reading this wrong.’”
Fenton says she’s been asked to hold an emergency meeting, but with a regular DBAC meeting scheduled for August 17 and the annual meeting in September, she wants the entire membership to vote on who leads the group. “We can start with a clean slate,” she says.
Former mayor Dave Norris urges the city to stop kicking the can forward and resolve the Water Street Parking Garage morass once and for all.
Staff photo
The parking wars have quieted since a judge rejected the Charlottesville Parking Center’s petition for an emergency receiver June 27 and CPC owner Mark Brown decamped to Greece.
But here in the dog days of August, CPC general manager Dave Norris, whose June 24 proposal was rebuffed by the city, offers four scenarios for settling the dispute over the Water Street Parking Garage that has smouldered since the city nixed Brown’s parking rate increase last fall.
That led to a suit and countersuit, with the city threatening eminent domain on the jointly owned garage.
What’s different this time?
“These are new options that we feel have been responsive to the concerns expressed in the previous settlements,” says Norris. “More importantly, it addresses the bigger issue of the lack of parking downtown.”
And that’s an issue that has Albemarle ready to jump ship with its general district court. The county is studying a move from historic Court Square to the County Office Building on McIntire Road with its ample lots.
“The real news is that we’re proposing to build a new garage that would keep Albemarle courts downtown that we’d pay for 100 percent,” says Norris.
That’s scenario No. 3, in which the city sells its spaces in the Water Street Garage to CPC, which builds a 300-space, state-of-the-art garage on the lot owned by the city and county at Market and Seventh streets. Upon completion, CPC would guarantee 100 spaces for county court use at no charge for 30 years.
“That could be a significant win-win-win scenario for everyone,” says Norris. “If people are concerned about parking rates, the best thing is to increase the supply.”
He also offers to sell CPC’s spaces in Water Street Garage to the city at a rate it would have to pay under eminent domain, which CPC believes is considerably higher than the $2.8 million the city offered in June. Another scenario is the city sells to CPC and takes its earnings to build another garage. During that time, CPC pledges it will not charge more than the city-owned Market Street Garage.
“One of the concerns that’s been expressed is that we’d jack up rates to the roof,” says Norris. “We’d give them two to three years to build a replacement with rates not to exceed Market Street, and honor current validation and long-term parking leases.”
The fourth scenario is for the city to continue to pursue eminent domain, which will be a lengthy and costly proposition, says Norris.
His latest August 8 proposal came hours before City Council was to meet in a closed session to discuss parking.
And his predictions on how well received his latest proposal will be?
“My sense is there is a strong desire in some quarters to litigate this out under eminent domain,” says Norris. “That’s a lose-lose. The city has already incurred $60,000 in legal bills. It hinders expanding parking downtown.” That, he says, would be on hold until the Water Street litigation is settled.
City spokesperson Miriam Dickler declines to speculate on the latest CPC proposals. “Council hasn’t discussed these yet, so I really don’t know,” she says.
Former mayor Dave Norris urges the city to stop kicking the can forward and resolve the Water Street Parking Garage morass once and for all.
Staff photo
Mayor Mike Signer and City Councilor Kathy Galvin insist there is nothing personal in the city’s dispute with Mark Brown over control of the Water Street Parking Garage. In meetings with reporters July 6 after the city rejected Charlottesville Parking Center’s June 24 proposed settlement of the escalating controversy over the fate of the garage the city co-owns with Brown, the two said they decided to answer questions about the issue to demonstrate the unanimity of council.
“It’s a very unusual set of circumstances,” says Signer, because the other side at every turn has tried to “create a sense of panic.”
The city’s June 6 resolution to make an offer to buy out Brown’s share of spaces at Charlottesville Parking Center was not a change in course after months of discussions with Brown, says Galvin. His lawsuit against the city over parking rates and his threats to close the garage “make us think that single ownership of the garage should be with the city.”
The parking center’s proposed settlement, says Signer, was not a response to the city’s offer to buy out Brown.
In the CPC settlement proposal that came one day after the Downtown Business Association of Charlottesville sent the city and Brown a letter urging both sides to tone down the “extreme threats” and four days before a judge denied CPC’s petition to appoint a receiver for the garage, general manager Dave Norris basically ceded control of the garage to the city as far as rates, as long as the city paid the difference in fair market rate to CPC.
It was Brown’s insistence on being able to profit from the public/private partnership that was the breaking point. The councilors reiterated that the Water Street Parking Garage Condominium Association agreement “does not contemplate pecuniary gain or profit to the members thereof…”
Throughout the discussions, says Signer, Brown accused the city of “stealing my money.”
That CPC wanted the city to subsidize his share “suggests a sense of entitlement,” says Galvin. “It reinforced the sense we should go our own way.” CPC can still manage the garage for one year, rather than the five years it wanted in its proposal, the city said in its response. “His behavior has destabilized the community,” she says.
“The soap opera has all been on one side,” adds Signer.
And that soap opera includes Brown’s March 14 lawsuit against the city, the city’s April 29 countersuit that claims it didn’t get the right of first refusal on spaces CPC bought from Wells Fargo and the DBAC splintering over the garage, with one faction saying it wasn’t taking sides, while Violet Crown hired Susan Payne, who did PR for Signer’s council campaign, to sway downtown businesses to urge the city not to sell out to Brown.
“We’ve tried to be stabilizing,” says Signer. “The more deliberate we’ve been, the more erratic he’s been.”
And the city is still not ruling out eminent domain as a remedy, “one that we would consider only reluctantly,” says Signer.
The attorney Brown hired to handle any eminent domain moves by the city, John Walk, in a July 11 letter, rebuffed the city’s $2.8 million offer to buy Brown’s shares of the garage, and said it would cost the city at least $9 million, based on the tax assessed value, to buy him out. Not that he’s selling, says Walk, who reminds the city Virginia’s constitution prohibits the use of eminent domain for economic development.
The CPC camp has maintained that it thought an agreement was almost a done deal during negotiations June 2, the same night DBAC held a meeting at Violet Crown. Norris says Signer specifically asked Brown not to send Norris to that meeting, something Norris now says was a mistake.
“We said we weren’t planning on attending,” says Signer. “Ms. Galvin said she wasn’t going to be there. With the ongoing litigation, we said it wasn’t a good idea for us to be there. I think they’re reading way too much into that,” he says, calling the CPC depiction “false theatrics.”
Norris did not immediately return a phone call.
Sitting outside the conference room in City Hall where Signer and Galvin were meeting with reporters, Payne handed out a statement expressing the support of Violet Crown and many downtown businesses for the city holding firm in its decision to pursue affordable parking in the Water Street Garage.
