City hopefuls stress accountability

The message echoed by the five candidates for the City Council during a Wednesday forum was that the city government and area authorities must be held more accountable to residents.

“We’ve heard loud and clear that [residents] don’t feel like they have a real ally in City Hall,” said Mayor Dave Norris, a Democrat who is the race’s sole incumbent.

Norris was joined by fellow Democrat Kristin Szakos and independents Bob Fenwick, Paul Long, and Andrew Williams, who is running as a write-in candidate. The forum was sponsored by the Alliance of Neighborhoods, a consortium of neighborhood and homeowner associations that was created last year.

Questions given in advance of the forum included what the candidates would do to combat traffic, create opportunity for the city’s poorest residents and ensure responsiveness to neighborhood requests. On traffic, the candidates ran the gamut with their responses, saying they would try to encourage use of public transit, incorporate speeding fines and install various traffic-calming measures in neighborhoods.

“I’m a big fan of speed bumps,” said Szakos, who also advocated for streamlining the city’s transit system and installing bike lanes throughout Charlottesville.

The alliance also pointedly asked whether the candidates would do away with the regional authority model for the Rivanna Water & Sewer Authority and the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority.

“It’s been fascinating to watch how they’ve responded to groups who are mobilized on issues like the water supply plan,” Norris said. “They weren’t exactly used to being asked questions.”

While the leadership of both entities has come under fire recently, most candidates agreed that they would not do away with the structure.

“We do need a team of people who basically focus and tackle certain things. We have to,” Williams said.

Fenwick has been most critical of the authorities, after calling for a change in the area’s long-term water supply plan to focus solely on restorative dredging. He said he knows there are very hard-working individuals at the two authorities, “but the leadership is dysfunctional.”

Audience members were also able to pose questions during Wednesday’s event.

Area residents created the alliance last year in an effort to preserve the quality of life in Charlottesville and Albemarle neighborhoods. Members say the threats that many neighborhoods face — traffic, little coordination between the two localities, a lack of public amenities such as transit and sidewalks and poorly planned development — are mostly invisible to elected officials.

On Wednesday, all of the candidates also said they would not support an increase in the city’s real-estate tax rate, which is 95 cents per $100 of assessed value.

“City Council is missing citizen concern,” Fenwick said. “The responsibility rests right up here on City Council.”

Long, however, also said that residents should not quit after voicing a concern one time, if it does not get addressed. Residents have a responsibility to be involved in local government, he said.

“They should participate in the political system,” Long said.