Don't Think The May Elections Are Important?

Click on title to Roanoke City Website where this is posted:

COUNTRYSIDE

City Council Extends Golf Course Lease Until October 2008.

In November 2005, the City of Roanoke purchased the Countryside Golf Course, an approximately 140 acre 18-hole golf course in the northwest of the City close to the corporate limits. The golf course is currently still operating under lease from the City, which City Council voted to extend to October 2008.A request for proposal (RFP) was first advertised in August 2006 seeking a qualified developer to turn the property into a mixed use neighborhood. Development of the Countryside property will futher the goals of Vision 2001-2020, the City's comprehensive plan, as well as the Peters Creek North Neighborhood Plan, and the Strategic Housing Plan. After reviewing the proposals recieved, City Council decided to extend the lease of the golf course for another year and re-evaluate the site's future prior to the lease's expiration. Click the following links for more information: Download the presentation from the Countryside Community Meeting held on April 3, 2007 and review the Community's comments. Click here to download the Countryside RFP

Relief - VP of Operations, Meadowbrook

Those who are on my email list received the very comforting response from the VP of Operations at Meadowbrook Headquarters in Florida. Just that he took the time to reply was a welcome surprise to me after Mr. Smith said he would not talk to me/us about the property anymore. Mr. Beasley seems to appreciate our efforts which is again a welcome relief from the silence we get unless we relentlessly "nag" for a response. We should continue to keep our eyes open on buffer and tree replanting. When the Zoning Commission Public Hearing is announced we should attend. I am still curious as to the plans for the expansion. You golfers may be "banking" off the building for a hole-in-one on Number 2 and Number 3!

URBAN STREET GOLF - AlmostGOLF Video:

Meadowbrook Silent on Property Sale

LEFT: BEFORE ---------------------RIGHT: AFTER -----------

CLICK TO ENLARGE
It seems the word has come down from Meadowbrook Corporate Headquarters to Countryside Management that they "can't talk to us anymore about the property". This is according to my call today to Steve Smith, General Manager of Meadowbrook. I said "I understand from Chris Chittum of the Roanoke City Planning Department that movement of the stakes (I don't see one darn inch difference) has satisfied him. Mr. Smith's only response was "I can't talk to you anymore about the property". What does that mean? Did Roanoke City contact Meadowbrook and get Steve Smith in trouble? Did Meadowbrook Attorneys advise him not to communicate with us or anyone else for that matter. I am asking Chris Chittum for the plans for the property that Newbern wants. At this point all we can do is speculate. Something is going on behind the scenes. Either Meadowbrook is not happy with the property's squeeze on the 2nd and 3rd fairways or they are playing along with the City to be in the running for the Request For Proposal on operating the golf course in the future. Either way the SECRECY only leads to speculation.

Survey Stakes Moved Ten Feet

According to Information on Roanoke City's GIS mapping system - Newbern Properties sold the property that the Trane building occupies to The Tuckawana Group LLC on 9/15/2001. Have you noticed there is a 25 foot strip of property owned by Newbern Properties connecting to Frontage Road? Entrance to expanded Trane building?

I called Mr. Chittum on Wednesday for more information following his phone message on Tuesday advising me that the stake(s) were moved 10 feet back from the third green. It took awhile to get the answers to three questions:

1. Who placed the stakes into the ground?


2. How many feet from the current property line are each stake?


3. What is the required distance from property line to the expanded structure?

Answers:

Engineers came out from the city to initially meet with Mr. Newbern to come up with the general location of the proposed new property line. Finally after asking for the third time stressing "who stuck them into the ground?" The answer to that was a surveyor for Mr. Newbern.

How many feet are there to the stakes? Another difficult question to answer for Mr. Chittum. Finally I was able to get that it is 30 feet from the back of the building. It is 215 feet to the furthest stake and forms a triangle. This will take out all the buffered pines just now becoming mature enough to hide this attractive building. (GIS has a measuring tool I used on the above map to measure 30 feet and 215 feet. In blue is speculation on entrance to the disired property.)

My third question of how close can you build to the property line - Zoning of L-1 (Light Industrial). There is NO minimum.

The land must be assessed and two public hearings must take place. Since the Countryside property is zoned Recreation and new zoning would be L-1 it must be heard by the Zoning Commission first. Then after the zoning (if approved) it requires another public hearing.

Mr. Chittum has no idea what the property is going to be used for. This is hard to believe. So the secrecy leads to speculation that the 25 foot piece owned by Newbern Properties will be a driveway to the enlarged Trane building. A driveway across the cart path.

According to Mr. Chittum, Steve Smith, the general manager of Countryside for Meadowbrook gave approval and affirms that play will not be interfered with ... does Mr. Smith know what is going to be built? Is a driveway going to cut through the cart path? Is a structure going to be right on the property line? I have been unable to reach Mr. Smith for comment.

Look for comparison on position of stakes after the "alleged" move of 10 feet.

Council Meeting - Trane Property - Wasena Park

UPDATE: Listen to message from Roanoke City Planning Department - moving the stake(s) 10 feet:

The RED Line is Where The Three Stakes Converge

The BLUE Line had NO Stakes - Should Follow the Tree Line

.

It was a very, very long Council Meeting that I attended Monday. I went not only to present the pictures of the Trane Property that was staked off but to also support the Wasena Park group wanting to save the beautiful trees that will be cut down along the banks of the Roanoke River. This is part of the flood project being conducted by the Army Corps of Engineers. I went down to Wasena Park Sunday afternoon. I am SO jealous. The huge trees were showing their colors in all their splendor. The sun shown through them like a kaleidoscope. Take a moment to view the video. How I wish we had a park like that. It made me even more determined to hang onto this golf course. We all saw what the Countryside property means to the City and it did not include a "real" park. It was row upon row of houses, retail, and through traffic.

The "bench cut" to accommodate the flood reduction program at Wasena Park takes out Wiley Drive and will leave a permanent scar. It also prevents the disabled and our older citizens from reaching the Roanoke River picnic area. At least Council promised to revisit the aesthetics and the access when the engineers complete their work.
.
After 2 hours I finally got to speak. Mayor Harris left so he did not hear the "public comments". I had pictures printed of the stakes that you see on the blog. I included a picture of the map above because pictures of stakes did not tell you anything unless you could put them together in an overview. Council did look at them and then they ended up with Ms. Burcham.

.

In short I pointed out that this property line DOES interfere with play according to Meadowbrook management. That is unless Trane opens it's doors so golfers can play through. This conjures up scenes from the movie "Caddyshack" doesn't it?

.

The bottom line is - according to Ms. Burcham, the City Manager, Meadowbrook had blessed the previously measured property lines. However, I explained that the stakes were far from what had been initially measured out according to Steve Smith, the golf course manager and golf pro, and would require the impossible task of reconfiguring number 3 fairway. I say impossible because there is barely anything left of number 3 now. I am very glad I went to the meeting because Ms. Burcham was unaware that the stakes had been planted and had not seen them.

.

Here comes another "whoa Nellie" as Ms. Burcham was none too pleased that I brought it to the Council's attention before she became aware of it. I was very forgiving and said that I believed the stakes were just placed last week so it would be understandable that the City Administration may not have seen them yet. However, after the meeting when I approached her to reassure her that the stakes were recent I got the "ice box" and "no lookie in the eyes" shut out demeanor that has defined Ms. Burcham these many years. She gave me the pictures back without looking up .. "here you probably want these back ... we'll go out and take a look". I just hate that, just really hate that, smile, @:D

SEE WASENA PARK - Turn on your speakers:

Calling "Interference" With Play!!

Second Fairway - CLICK TO ENLARGE ANY PICTURE

Second Green

Carl Haley of Cheraw Lake Plays 2nd Green

ABOVE:

Third Green and Sandtrap

.

.

.
LEFT:

Line up of

Stakes at the

Third Green

Steve Smith, the General Manager and Golf Pro at Countryside Golf Course operated by the Meadowbrook Corporation has notified corporate offices in Florida that the third fairway and green will not be playable with the taking of this property by Trane/Newbern Properties.

Mr. Smith, observed upon first viewing the measurements for the Trane property expansion as put forth by Mr. Newbern that it seemed not to be interfering with play.

According to Steve Smith now, however, the measurements first shown to him and the just planted stakes that define the property are TWO VERY DIFFERENT measurements. One only needs to look at these pictures and say "whoa Nellie".

.

REMEMBER, Mayor Harris promised that the property Jess Newbern, III, wanted for the Trane expansion was only a possibility if it did NOT interfere with play. We all heard it at the August Council Meeting.

Ward System For Governing Roanoke City

A history lesson for those not around in 1997.

CLICK TO ENLARGE MAP

The Headline in the Roanoke Times November 5, 1997 read:

"ROANOKE VOTERS SAY NO TO WARDS"

After finding the above map online I became curious as to what happened to this STUPENDOUS idea. All search engines came up empty. I could find no articles associated with this map. Matt Chittum of the Roanoke Times to the rescue! Matt sent an original article printed on November 5th, 1997 - the day after the ward idea was sunk - 54 percent against to 46 percent for the ward system. If you have not visited Matt's "DataSphere" you are missing some good stuff. At least to us "geeks" that are always hungry for another bite out of a "pie chart".

According to the November 5th, 1997, Roanoke Times article it took TWENTY years - yes that is "2 0" years to get a ward system on the city ballot.

Some things never change. The article could have been easily written in 2007 just the same as it was in 1997 (10 years ago). Just as in 1997 we have a business lobby pulling the strings. This quote from the 1997 article is just as today:

"I hope this puts the ward system to bed for a long time," said Bill Poff, the lawyer who was co-chairman of the business-backed committee that lobbied against wards.

Two South Roanoke precincts went against wards 2-to-1. The vote was still closer then expected.

The Roanoke Times article continues:

Audrey Wheaton, the retired social worker who headed One Roanoke Inc. with Poff, said "Our citizens are confident in our present form of local government."

Under the modified wards proposal, the city would have been split into five wards. A council member would have been elected from each ward, and the mayor and vice mayor would have been elected at-large. Instead, all seven council members continued to be elected at-large.

Gary Waldo, a leader of the pro-ward faction, faulted Vice Mayor Linda Wyatt, labor union members and civic leagues for failing to speak out for wards.

City government studied ward proposals twice before, in 1977 and 1992, but this was the first referendum on wards.

More than any city campaign in years, the wards vote brought the city's establishment into open conflict with scrappy, populist types such as the Roanoke Education Association and the NAACP. Powerful lawyers, wealthy Roanokers and business executives worked hard against wards. They noted that voters who now get to cast ballots for all seven council members would have had just three votes under a ward system - ones for the candidate from their ward and one each for mayor and vice mayor.

Ward detractors also called forth an image of Chicago in the days of ex-Mayor Richard Daley - a city of back-room deals and corrupt, cigar-chomping, ward-healing politicians. They warned that council members would be fighting over provincial matters within ward borders instead of promoting the larger interests of the city.

Advocates said that was just fear-mongering that obscured the ward-bashers' real worry - that neighborhoods would steal power from a privileged few already pulling strings in the back rooms of government.

The pro-ward camp said neighborhoods have gotten little personal attention from council members and that members are not held accountable for their treatment of neighborhoods. Ward advocates pointed out that some sections of town, most notably Southeast Roanoke, have not had a representative on council for decades.

But Southeast voters supported wards by only a scant margin.

Members of Bill Bestpitch's Committee for Better Representation, the pro-ward group of which he is chairman, said at a gathering at his house Tuesday night that city administrators tried to make the wards issue confusing to voters. "They fought us every step of the way," said Lisa Farthing, also a member of the city task force that drew up a ward proposal to take to voters.

"It was a huge threat," Waldo said of the ward proposal, "because for too long the affluent, the elite, the people in the southern tier of the city have controlled everything."

Even though the railroad no longer dominates the city, Roanoke still operates as a company town, Bestpitch said.

Waldo said the ward proponents were outfinanced by One Roanoke Inc. While that group used a public relations firm, placed numerous newspaper ads and produced slick materials, "all we had were some TV ads paid by one of our friends, our brochures" and volunteers traveling all over the city to speak to civic leagues and church groups.

At polling places in Southeast Roanoke Tuesday, People would be voting for neighborhood interests, not for the city as a whole, said a middle-aged man. "Roanoke has too little progress as it is."

Bud Chisom, a 67-year-old truck driver and former city firefighter, voted for wards. He said he did it because too many council members are clumped together in South and Southwest Roanoke. "They get the honey and we get the rest," he said. "You'd have a whole lot better chance of representation, instead of a guy sitting out yonder in a rich section of town. He might never have driven through Southeast."

"We just don't have a mouthpiece is what it amounts to," said Southeast resident Howard Spangler, 61.