There are roughly 10,000 University students who live within the City of Charlottesville, which is holding city-wide elections tomorrow for three City Council seats. This means that students have the potential to be a powerful voting bloc if they organize behind candidates who are offering the best solutions to issues that will affect quality of life at the University and in the broader community. With this in mind, the managing board endorses three candidates, Kathy Galvin, Satyendra Huja and Dede Smith, whose platforms account for the needs of both present and future members of the University community.
Galvin is an architect and urban designer who has served on Albemarle County's growth management committee and the Charlottesville School Board. Her background in local planning issues shines through in her proposals for managing the population growth that is expected to occur in Charlottesville in large part because of the University's presence. Although all of the candidates have identified transportation as a special challenge facing the region, Galvin's solution is slightly different than those of her competitors.
She has stressed the need for density-oriented development to sustain the types of mass transit options that are required to ensure future students and other new residents are not adding their cars to already clogged local roads. "There needs to be enough density, not just of housing but of businesses as well, to bring in the ridership needed to support a strong public transit system," she said in an email. To this end, she also said she would go along with the Council-approved plan to construct a new earthen dam at Ragged Mountain Reservoir, arguing that "it makes environmental sense from a regional standpoint because it will sustain compact, walkable and amenity-rich growth within the city and urban ring of the county and not foster low density, auto-centric, single-use development in the rural areas."
Huja brings to the table a similar platform and level of expertise in urban planning. He worked for the City in an unelected capacity for 31 years, first as its director of planning and community development and later as director of strategic planning. For the past four years, he has served on Council and has been a major advocate for bicyclists and pedestrians within the City. Most recently, he voted for an amendment to the Fiscal Year 2011-2012 budget which doubled the amount the City will spend on bicycle infrastructure from $50,000 to $100,000. That same budget included $300,000 for enhancing the City's network of sidewalks.
Huja has said he will seek further expansions in funding for these types of projects if he is re-elected, specifically pledging to increase annual spending on bicycle infrastructure to $250,000. In addition, Huja voted for the construction of an earthen dam and has expressed support for zoning reforms that would encourage high-density housing, which is important for both students and local residents struggling with high rent.
Smith is a long-time Charlottesville resident and the wife of Psychology Prof. Timothy Wilson. She served on the Charlottesville School Board from 2000 to 2006, but the majority of her career has been dedicated to various conservation initiatives including, most recently, the founding of Citizens for a Sustainable Water Plan. This group opposes the earthen dam approved by Council and has endorsed an alternative plan that would involve dredging the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir.
Although the present combination of low interest rates, comprehensive environmental mitigation strategies and expected future growth at the University and in the surrounding areas indicates the earthen dam is the best option moving forward, Smith's other positions are closely aligned with the student body's interests. She offered the strongest support of any candidate for maintaining the downtown farmers' market in its present location south of Water Street between 2nd Street SW and 2nd Street SE and developing the surrounding properties into a market district. Her background as an environmentalist also suggests she can be counted on to support the University's sustainability initiatives, and she even floated the idea of integrating the University's proposed UBikes bike sharing program into a broader City-run scheme.
For reasons having to do with both equity and public safety, students also must consider the candidates' stances on the concentrated poverty that exists in some portions of Charlottesville. Although there is no silver bullet for this problem, the strategies put forth by Galvin, Huja and Smith for encouraging job and enrollment growth at the University offer the best hope for sustaining an expansion of economic opportunity both locally and statewide.
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