Recapping Brownsville’s School Board Forum

Last night was a fun forum at Brownsville. The White Hall and At-Large candidates for school board made some time to lay out their positions and reasons for running for school board.

First thoughts:

I was thisclose to leaving out my opinions, but can’t help myself. The tweets are after the break; I highly recommend you read those.

  • Unless convinced otherwise, supporting/advocating for the county school system building their own private internet is reason for me to disqualify the candidate. Why, exactly, is Albemarle county building their own internet?
  • Supporting SOLs in their current format is reason to disqualify the candidate.
  • Colleges don’t look at SOLs, to the best of my knowledge. This seems to be a baffling & upsetting statement. (stated here as well)
  • I appreciated Dolly Joseph’s thoughts on technology, “hitting it with a technology stick” and her pushing back on the 1:1 technology ratio. We do live in a relatively affluent community (relatively!) – giving kids who already have devices is wasteful. (my opinion: and stupid).

As a friend said last night on Twitter:

I’m glad we all have chance to watch presidential politics tonight, but we’d be a better country if more people paid attention to local govt

Truth.



Read the tweets.


 

 

Big Crozet Weekend – 9-10 October 2015

Lots of stuff this weekend in and around Crozet: (see everything at the Crozet Calendar)

1 – What’s missing?

2 – Submit your own event – it takes less than 60 seconds.

White Hall School Board Candidate Forums – 2015

It’s a bit weird to be having a contested election. And nice! There is much more than School Board on this year’s ballot, but local elections are where our votes can matter the most.

There are various forums coming up for the White Hall School Board candidates. If I have any information incorrect or missing, please let me know or correct me in the comments.

6 October – The Crozet Elementary PTO is hosting a candidate forum

7 October – “From the Daily Progress: White Hall School Board Forum at Henley Middle School Cafeteria 6:30-8:30 PM (doors open at 6).”

13 October from 6:00 to 6:45pm: The Brownsville PTO is hosting a forum

13 October (waiting for confirmation) the CCA is holding a candidate forum – probably from a bit after 7pm until ..

Charlottesville Tomorrow’s education reporting has been top-notch.

Curiously, the Virginia State Board of Elections page’s most recent election results are from 2003(!) for the White Hall School Board seat. During that election, 3,770 votes were cast. As of 2010, Crozet’s population was 5,565 people; I’d wager we’ve added at least 500 people since then.

In an election with this relatively few voters, these votes matter.

 

What’s on the Ballot in Crozet this Year?

Election day is 3 November, 2015. Now’s as good a time as any to learn who’s going to be on the ballot.

Start here; the Virginia Department of Elections has a pretty good site.

For the first time in I don’t know how long, we have a choice for our School Board rep; neither of whom is the incumbent.

White Hall School Board: David Oberg and Caroll J. “C. J.” Hatcher are competing.

At-Large School Board seat: Dolly R. D. Joseph, Catherine M. Lochner, J. S. “Jonno” Alcaro

More at the excellent CvillePedia’s page.

Click through to see my sample ballot (I live in the Brownsville district) — there are some big elections, namely the school board, Commonwealth Attorney, Soil & Conservation … dig in, and please, please please, be an educated voter. And a personal request: if you’re not going to be said educated voter, consider not voting.

 


Continue reading “What’s on the Ballot in Crozet this Year?”

September 2015 CCAC Meeting – Piedmont Place & More

Piedmont Place in downtown Crozet
Piedmont Place in downtown Crozet

1 – Take a few minutes to read about Piedmont Place, the new building coming across Library Ave from the Crozet Library. Plans include a skybar, apartments, a market akin to the Main Street Market on West Main Street in Downtown Charlottesville

2 – Sidewalk and transportation update from Trevor Henry.

3 – Alternative plan proposed for Barnes Lumberyard from Paul Grady.

4 – Downtown Crozet planning grant wasn’t funded.

Click through, start at the bottom, and make your way up.

Continue reading “September 2015 CCAC Meeting – Piedmont Place & More”

Crozet Park Gets Funding for Perimeter Trail

This is cool.

From Crozet Park’s Facebook page: (and RealCrozetVA)

We have some exciting news to share!! The Federal Highway Administration will provide us with a recreational trails grant. This grant plus the generous private match from the Neumeister family will allow us to proceed with building the long awaited Perimeter Trail. Creation of this trail has been on the Park’s master plan for many years, and respondents to last year’s Park survey overwhelmingly chose the Perimeter Trail as the most beneficial addition to our Park.

Background from the Crozet Gazette:

We are poised to start several Park projects in 2015:

Perimeter Trail: a paved, 8-foot wide, multi-use path, almost a mile in length, will go around the entire Park. Funding for this project would come from a grant the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) along with a generous gift from a local family. Our goal is to break ground in early summer.

Crozet Park is (seemingly) quickly becoming more and more of a destination location in Crozet … now … how about sidewalks on Park & Tabor?


Continue reading “Crozet Park Gets Funding for Perimeter Trail”

Putting Your House on the Market in Crozet Soon?

* this is a real estate post. I’m actually a real estate agent in real life.

Thinking about moving over the next several months? Call me for your complimentary professional photos NOW while everything is green.

No obligation to list with me, but if you do, we’ll have great photos to use!

Taking pictures now is critical for the winter and spring market.

This picture of Grayrock remains one of my favorite examples of why taking pictures in the fall is critical:


This is why I advise my clients to take pictures of their houses in the fall.

A photo posted by Jim Duncan (@jimduncan) on

July 2015 CCAC Meeting Recap

Sorry for both the delay in getting this up and for not being there. Luckily, Tim and Sean were! I hesitated putting this up so late, but I’ve found these recaps to be useful from an archivist’s perspective.

Discussed –

– Meetings with developers
– Electronic sign for the Crozet Fire Department?
– Expansion of the Growth Area at 250/64?
– CDBG Planning Grant

Click through, start at the bottom and work your way up.


 

Crozet Real Estate Conversation – Take 1

It’s easy to recite cold numbers when talking about the Crozet (or any) real estate market. One of the things that I really like to do is talk about real estate.

There is more to real estate insight that talking in 20 or 90 second sound bites, and I hope that’s evident in the video below.

David and I love talking about real estate – whether it’s last quarter’s median sales price numbers, prices per square foot, or where in Crozet houses are selling – real estate is something we love. Seriously.

I’ve written occasionally about real estate here (53 such tagged posts in nearly 10 year years). I’ve found that many Crozetians are interested in real estate. If you’re curious about what happened in the first half of 2015 in Crozet’s real estate market, hopefully you’ll find this interesting.

I titled this post “Take 1” because this was our first time out; we’ll be doing these every quarter. Have something you’d like us to address? Ask or leave a comment.