From Monroe Campaign press release:
Richmond, VA—On Saturday, January 22, starting at 8 p.m., the Monroe Park Campaign will be screening the film Dark Days as well as a short documentary about Monroe Park at Gallery 5. Tickets will be $3 and can be purchased at the door.
Since its inception four months ago, The Monroe Park Campaign has steadily grown; businesses, organizations and news sources are finally getting interested and involved in the fate of Richmond’s oldest park. However, like all independently-run initiatives, the Campaign has accrued its fair share of expenses. To help raise funds, they’ve decided to throw a benefit at Gallery 5. The Campaign will screen the touching film, Dark Days, as well as a documentary about Monroe Park and the forthcoming renovations that are threatening the welfare of Richmond’s homeless population.
Dark Days was made by British filmmaker, Marc Singer. The film follows a group of homeless people living in an abandoned section of the New York City underground railway system. Hailed as an “an eye-opening experience that shatters the myths of homelessness”, Dark Days is a film you will not likely soon forget. DD has received numerous film-festival nominations and awards, including: Best Documentary/Non-fiction Film at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards and the Cinematography Award and the Audience Best Documentary Award at the Sundance Film Festival.
The Monroe Park Campaign is a coalition of churches, feeding groups, radical organizations, as well as concerned citizens that have come together upon hearing about the Monroe Park Advisory Council’s plans to shut down Monroe Park during renovations. For a period of 9-18 months, the council plans on fencing off all 8 acres of the park making it inaccessible for students, homeless people currently living and socializing there, weekly feeding programs as well as anyone else who may use the park. The Campaign is working to keep at least 25-50% of the park open during the entire duration of construction and to prevent the hiring of any private security task force to police the park after renovations, especially when the master plan calls for reducing the “apparently homeless population” as one of its goals. Ultimately, the Campaign hopes to influence the type of renovations that are being planned for the park, in the hopes of making it a friendlier place for everyone.
Gallery 5 is a community-oriented, socially-motivated art gallery and performing art center in Richmond’s Historic Jackson Ward.
DATE & TIME: Saturday, January 22 • 8 – 10 p.m.
LOCATION: Gallery 5
200 W. Marshall Street
Richmond, VA 23220
Note: I have received a request that an official clarification be included in this post that states that there are known discrepancies in the information presented as “factual”. “This is important because they are soliciting money for their cause in the press release”.
I am not interested in being buried by legal ‘ese’. I am also not interested in having comments with profanity and ad hominem attacks on this post.
The Monroe Park Advisory Council has no say in whether the Park stays open during renovations. The master plan makes no mention of closing the Park while the improvements occur. The decision to close the Park during construction will be made by the same City officials that manage the construction. In addition, NOBODY lives in Monroe Park. The Park can only be used at night in traveling through it. otherwise it is closed after dark and is well patrolled by police.
Please be aware that the “Monroe Park Campaign” spreads misinformation on the Park as its policy. I would caution my neighbors on making donations of any kind to THIS or ANY group without first establishing the validity of its rhetoric.
Nobody mentioned people living in Monroe Park.
It’s true that the Monroe Park Advisory Council isn’t in a position to decide on the park’s closing or not. That’s city council, and though conflated in the event description here they are also a primary focus of a lot of campaign supporters.
However, the plan drawn up and endorsed by the MPAC does explicitly support an anti-homeless agenda. If people in the Monroe Park Campaign blur the lines between the city government and councils formed by and for the city government, that likely has more to do with the opacity and lack of forthcomingness by those entities than any intent at spreading arbitrary misinformation.
Also they’re not the ones trying to kick poor folks while they’re down.
But don’t take my word for it:
http://monroecampaign.wordpress.com/data-links/
See “Monroe Park Master Plan”, or the linked articles for a shorter version.
We have heard it straight from Alice Massie, HEAD of MPAC, that the plan is to close down the entire park. This was confirmed at an MPAC meeting I attended, and confirmed again by Charles Samuels.
I have never claimed that the plan itself says that the whole park will be closed. The fact that the Master Plan leaves out this VITAL piece of information really sucks. Considerations like that ought to be in the plan, because they certainly give a more accurate picture of the real situation.
Perhaps MPAC can’t influence the decision about closing down the entire park. I don’t believe that though. Aside from that, multiple members of MPAC have incorrectly and without ANY validity said that there is no other way to renovate Monroe Park than closing the whole thing, or they have given incredibly inaccurate estimates for the cost of doing it in stages. Alice Massie said it would “exponentially double” the cost to renovate in stages. Which doesn’t even make mathematical sense.
If MPAC made a recommendation to the City that Monroe Park be renovated in stages so as to allow sections to be open that would be good.
You are right that no one lives in Monroe Park, but it certainly is a place where a lot of us spend a good chunk of our days. Aside from this one example of poor word choice in the above press release, I am not sure where you get off questioning the validity of the campaign to keep Monroe Park open. It is certainly less manipulative that Charles Samuels’ “factual misstep” about Monroe Park not having bathrooms or drinking water.
There is no reason for Monroe Park to be closed down. We will keep saying it. Keep the park open. We aren’t going ANYWHERE. Attempts to gentrify Monroe Park and remove the homeless and “Homeless appearing” WILL be met with resistance. There will be no compromise on this point.
I used the word “LIVING” in the press release to draw attention to the fact that there are people who frequent the park on a daily basis and do in fact spend the majority of their day there. So, yes, they are “living” there.
MPAC may not have total control over the decision to keep the park open during renovations, but MPAC did write that 130 page renovation plan. That 130 pages is FULL of bad ideas. Ideas that are bad socially, ideas that are bad economically, and ideas that just don’t make sense.
Here are some of the things that I find wrong with the plan that MPAC did come up with. This is only a few, like I said, the ENTIRE RENOVATION PLAN SUCKS.
More information on the monroe campaign on the Wingnut blog under the Tab Monroe Park Issue. http://www.wingnutrva.org
Some of my revisions:
There should be NO paid park director, especially at the outrageous salary of 150,000 a year.
There should NOT be over 300,000 spent on a carousel and carousel installation.
There should be NO off-site office for the park director. Paying 40,000 a year for an office for a person who’s position need not exist is a huge waste of resources.
There should be NO programs manager, especially at a salary of 55,000 a year. Monroe Park has plenty of awesome programs now, with no director.
Trees that are not dying should NOT be cut down. Magnolias, hollies and other shade giving trees are important.
The bathrooms need to be properly maintained, and available to the public year round. They need to be stocked and heated or cooled as seasonly appropriate. If the bathrooms are not available due to improvements to make them more accessible, more plentiful, or more useful, portapotties need to be placed in the park.
The building in the center of the park should be adapted to serve as a community kitchen. This kitchen would be available for any organization that wanted to cook and serve free food in the park. This would encourage community meals and make the preparation of those meals more inclusive and convenient.
The current trashcans in the park are clearly TOO small to serve the many people who frequent the park. There should be larger trashcans as well as an on-site dumpster.
25% of the park needs to remain open at all times during any renovations that do occur.
There should be no rules or restrictions regarding the free distribution of food, beverages, clothes, or any other item in the park.
There should be NO private security of the park. It is oppressive and a waste of tax payer money.
Sorry Todd, MPAC gonna lose this fight.
Hey Scott
Do you take requests to remove official clarifications that are not based on fact, but are just as political as the original post?
Mo
Or perhaps clarify the one piece that is debatable, aka:
“For a period of 9-18 months, the [city] council plans on fencing off…”
…and removing the note and associated legalese?
In another vein, we do appreciate you moderating this site. No matter which side of the fence any of us are on we appreciate the public forum, and I at least appreciate the stress that goes into taking care of spaces on the internet.
I have never heard an explanation as to why any other park wouldn’t do for the purposes of FNB. The main reason is that no other park or neighborhood would tolerate it.
Mo and friends, try choosing another park and see the reaction you would get. Your stated objective is political and to be as big a public nuisance as possible.
Turn the Checker House into a public kitchen? Nonsense. This park belongs to all the people of Richmond, not just FNB, not just Park Campaign and not just those who come for a free meal or to provide one. You know there are plenty of BETTER places that would accommodate your free lunches and none of them are in public parks.
What do you have against carousels anyway?
Paul: “I have never heard an explanation as to why any other park wouldn’t do for the purposes of FNB.”
That’s because they don’t have an explanation…they are like children. They want Monroe and nothing else will do and they will hold their breath until they get it (gee, I really hope they don’t turn blue!)
Mo:
“There will be no compromise on this point.”
“They need to be stocked and heated or cooled as seasonally appropriate.”
“There should be NO private security of the park. It is oppressive”
Ha! You’re funny!
This is more tiresome than funny, in my opinion.
Let’s cut the name-calling, SEW. And let’s leave out what “SUCKS” general declarations, Mo.
Clearly there remains large differences of opinions about what MPAC can or can’t do and the renovation plans.
There are 41,600 total acres in the city of Richmond…while the park is being renovated there will be 41,595 acres available for Food Not Bombs to push their agenda…sounds fair to me!!
http://www.vimeo.com/9852388
sounds like people are justifying pushing out of a specific demographic on the grounds that there will be other places for them to go, so it doesn’t matter. The Master Plan is discriminatory, unconstitutional, and anti-homeless.
Read it for yourself, there are links that Eric and Mo have provided. This isn’t about Food Not Bombs, or even just homeless people. This is about public space remaining public.
Its been brought up to City Council that making this park privately managed would make it far more expensive to run than many other parks in the City. Conservatives should be up in arms about this as well.
Nathan- does being run by a private foundation make Maymont Park more expensive?
http://www.maymont.org/Page.aspx?pid=291
The benefits are extensive in establishing a conservancy for Monroe Park. I am also in favor of placing Monroe Park under a conservation easement. Placing the James River Park under such an easement a couple years ago was a tremendous achievement for our city. In citing such terms as “discriminatory, unconstitutional and anti-homeless” without making a factual and quite specific legal charge serves your logic very poorly, sir, and is just more baseless rhetoric. By the way, most of the features in the master plan were suggested in a very well publicized and extremely well attended public charette in 2007. Many of my neighbors were there as well as young and old, black and white, rich and poor, student and laborer, etc etc. You did not participate, sir, nor did any of your FNB colleaugues. It’s like not voting and then complaining that you are not getting your way.
Seriously,harping on the word “sucks”?!?!
Thats seems pretty puritan.
My use of the word “suck” is no more antagonistic than Todd Woodson’s successful attempt to get you to include an unnecessary and partisan disclaimer on this post.
Hi there,
As a representative of the Campaign, I would like to respond by linking to a few articles where we obtained some of our information:
http://styleweekly.com/ME2/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=Publishing&mod=Publications::Article&mid=8F3A7027421841978F18BE895F87F791&tier=4&id=B564128BDE2B49CAB1E94FBAF77B13F2
“Karn and the Wingnut group demand that at least 25 percent of the park be “available to the public at all times during construction.”
“Construction could be phased but [if] construction [were] phased, each phase would exponentially double the cost of construction,” Massie says, objecting to any increase in cost just “to accommodate their feeding.””
-Here Alice Massie implies the work is being done all at once and that is the preference of the Monroe Park Advisory Council.
http://www.nbc12.com/Global/story.asp?S=13449462
“The park is expected to close for 9 to 18 months for the 6.2 million dollar project.
A safety fence, put up during construction, will keep out dozens of homeless.”
http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/news/2010/nov/05/home05-ar-632832/
“Samuels, whose 2nd District includes that park, found the meeting a success and said he still does not believe it’s realistic to keep a portion of the park open during construction.
“I think we’ve got to close it all at once,” he said. “That’s from the engineers and professionals for public-safety reasons.”
Glenn Telfer, who is working on the project for the engineering firm Draper Aden Associates, said trying to split up the work would be significantly more expensive and problematic, because the improvements would include a reworking of roads and utilities.
“It’s a matter of money and priorities,” he said.”
-This is MPAC’s chosen developer, right? Is he on a different page from MPAC and its intentions?
—-
I would like to suggest a couple of things.
First, that if the Monroe Park Advisory Council doesn’t believe that the park needs to be closed 100% during the renovations, that the Monroe Park Advisory Council stand in solidarity with us in reaching out to City Council and other decision-makers to help keep a portion of the park open. If we’ve found common ground, then let’s stand together.
Second, if there is no common ground on this issue, and the Monroe Park Advisory Council believes that the park should close 100% during renovations, then you can’t deflect blame or heat from our Campaign by misleading people on a blog.
Our Campaign doesn’t wish to go back and forth on a blog about these important issues. Please, in the future, if you want to discuss something that we’ve put out to the public, or something that you plan to put out to the public, let’s chat via email: monroeparkcampaign@gmail.com
I’d like you to start working on your concerns directly with the Campaign.
Thanks and sincerely,
Liz Sussan
“In citing such terms as “discriminatory, unconstitutional and anti-homeless” without making a factual and quite specific legal charge serves your logic very poorly, sir, and is just more baseless rhetoric.”
Todd, did you read the renovation plans?
@Todd – At that time, I was not a resident of this city, and I have seen the way people run “charettes”. just because you say its open, doesn’t mean its open.
And FNB has attended your meetings. Not just the recent one either. Years ago, before I was ever involved they were there and they didn’t like the plan then.
As for your other points, the wording is in the Plan, have you read it? I have read it. I have also read MPAC’s notes, where many of the members seriously discuss “banning” food serving programs, as well as hire a person which has the partial job description of “discouraging” food serving programs. In other words, harassing them. Which is not appropriate for a City employee to do, when no one is even breaking a law.
Also my remark about it being more expensive just adds up with the funds you suggest. I don’t mean for admission, I mean on the taxpayers and on the City. Maymont park is a different entity because it isn’t 8 acres of flat grass with trees surrounded by major streets. Maymont lends itself to upkeep and has animals and all sorts of amenities. Monroe Park is grass where people play frisbee, climb trees, sit by a fountain, or play chess. They are two completely different types of parks, and we need different types. I am not going to go to Maymont because I need to kill some time before work, or because I want to walk over and meet some friends. I am going to take my partner on a date there. The simplicity of Monroe Park is where its beauty is.
Besides all of this, you can waste money wherever you want, I really don’t care. But I want that park to stay partially open. Not just for FNB, or churches that minister there, or folks that hang out there, but because I like that park. I want to use that park. I don’t want to wait for a bunch of ridiculous stuff I will never use to be built, when all I want is to sit under a tree and read a damn book.
If anyone wants to actually read for themselves, visit those links. MPAC has taken down all of their notes and the Master Plan from their site. Now why would they do that? As for having this circular debate with you Todd, I am bowing out. You are insisting something is the truth, which just plain isn’t. I don’t know how else to prove you wrong other than telling people not to take our word for it. READ THE DOCUMENTS YOURSELF. Don’t just listen to me or Todd tell you what the truth is.
Nathan- you say FNB attended the MPAC meetings “years ago” and in your words “didn’t like the plan then”. Odd since the plan didn’t take shape until after the charette. There was no plan for them to dislike before then.
I too am quite weary of the discussion. Its like the movie Groundhog Day. I wish you all the best.
2007 was 4 years ago. So yes, years ago. I don’t know the exact dates or anything Todd, stop implying I making shit up, because that is silly. I have better things to do than make up lies just to prove Todd Woodson, some guy I don’t even know, wrong about a park.
More profanity and civility has taken a dive.
I am closing comments. Pretty disappointing.