Larchmont - Edgewater Civic League Meeting, August 22, 2022
President - Nate Kinnison Ngkinnison@gmail.com
Vice President - Mike Crockett mike.crockett@yahoo.com
Secretary - Gail Nicula Gnicula1@verizon.net
Treasurer - Kate Lennon lennon.katherinem@gmail.com
At Large - GM Ziller gmzjr@verizon.net
Officer Charles Dreer, First Patrol Division, Community Resource Officer, Blue Sector. 2500 North Military Hwy Norfolk, VA 23502, 757-664-6900,
Mobile 757-353-1268, Charles.Dreer@norfolk.gov
Recent crime statistics for our area: 7 stolen vehicles. Officer Dreer reminded residents:
Don’t leave spare car keys in your cars! (2) Lock your cars; remove all valuables. (3) Don’t leave firearms in your cars. Thieves are roaming through cars city-wide and taking whatever they find, even change in the change jar.
National trend: Kias and Hyundais are being stolen disproportionately. See this recent report from Channel 13 (WVEC) news: https://www.wzzm13.com/article/money/cars/car-owners-file-class-action-lawsuit-against-kia-and-hyundai/69-5a5f4b3a-9473-47e1-85d2-e46d1aa29364 [Essentially, thieves can pop the steering column and using a mobile phone charging cable, access the steering column to short it out.
Reminder: If you see something that seems strange in the neighborhood, regardless of how innocuous it looks, call! The NPD non-emergency number is 757.441.5610. (Ed: If you see an actual robbery in progress, call 991 immediately.)
City of Norfolk/HRSD Pump Station Projects: Doug Beaver (Director of Utilities) & Dan Riley (Project Engineer). Update on upgrades to the sanitary sewer system. We currently have 8 pump stations in our area. The new plan reduces this number to 5. Norfolk and HRSD will be working together to operate and maintain these stations. Trying to address some resiliency issues as well as O&M costs. $58 million price tag on this now (up from 21M!). The city is reviewing the project with a fresh set of eyes because of the enormous price increase. Also present: Holly Ann Mattel, partner engineer with HRSD. Main recommendation: Rehabbing some of the pump stations to save some money. Some pump stations will be rehabbed, others rebuilt. No schedule yet until the final plan has been approved. When they have renderings, the team will come back to the civic league for our input. Mr. Riley anticipates that they will have renderings to share with us next Spring (2023). Question about the enormous price increase: One reason is that durable consumer goods are getting harder and harder to get. For more information, go to the website: Larchmont Area Sanitary Sewer Improvements .
Maury High School | Future Construction: Dr. Noelle Gabriel, Norfolk School Board Vice Chair
Maury High School Feasibility Study
The Norfolk Public School system is a major entity in City of Norfolk, with more than 27,000 students, 5000 employees, and a $54M budget. Presentation: Maury High School’s next 100 years. Due to federal grants and city of Norfolk funding, $150M has been allocated for Maury’s renovation or replacement. In addition, three more schools (Jacox Elementary, Granby Elementary, Norview Elementary) will be renovated in the near term.
Maury High School was built 1910 – it is the oldest school in VA. [Norfolk’s 2nd oldest school is Madison at 102 years old.] Maury has been renovated 4 times. Current capacity: 1743 students. Desired capacity: 1889 students. Expect 4 years to rebuild/renovate from start to finish. The firm engaged by the school system, HBA architects, came up with two renovation designs and two replacement designs.
Renovation Options A1 (38 months) and A5 (35 months) are shown in the linked briefing, page 21. The renovation option would mean students would have to work from mobile units. Complete replacement options would entail building a new school on the athletic fields, having the students continue to work in the old building, and then moving the students to the new building when complete, followed by razing the old building. The School board will come to us for feedback in late September and October. Costs range from $140 M to $164 million. (See page 54 in briefing). It would be more expensive long-term to renovate Maury. Page 55: adds long term maintenance and energy costs which offset renovations apparent lower costs. The B-2 option seems to rank highest, based on six ranking factors. Next stage: Community input and feedback.
One of Dr. Gabriel’s concerns: None of the new Maury designs includes a pool. The School Board will go back to the architect for pool pricing. Next steps: page 58 in briefing. Comments/questions: There has been some discussion about the number of high schools that the city needs, since enrollment is declining. Answer: Yes, there is ongoing discussion about this question. Another question: Why does the new school have to be built on the same site as the old school? (Dr. Gabriel will follow up on this question). Will there be an auditorium? Yes – every high school has a separate auditorium, gym, and cafeteria. Question about the name of the school: Not a priority for the School Board right now.
Safe Routes to School Committee. Travis Davidson, travis7davidson@gmail.com, (757) 287-7538
Safe Routes to school
Three tiers of projects:
Jamestown Crescent Safety – options for bike lanes discussed. Speeding on the street is all too common. We need to document safety issues and then approach the city for resolution. Nate will follow up with John Stevenson, Norfolk’s Acting Director of Transit, to ask about options.
Park at the corner of Upper Brandon and Magnolia:
Virginia Park, Upper Brandon & Magnolia
Triangle Park “Berm Project” Update: Contractor is currently finishing work on the bulkhead, to be followed by a trench. Waiting for a response from the city about time frame. From a resident’s conversation with the foreman: “Spoke to the Foreman at the job today [AUG 11]. He said they should be finishing up securing the bulkhead in 2 weeks. They have been filling in cracks and will be laying more concrete in the large gaps where they have placed wooden forms. The Foreman said he knows a trench will be dug afterwards but he has not been given those plans and may not be the person managing the project.” Nate will try to get more details.
Very big deal: A Publix grocery store will be coming to the neighborhood! To be located between 39th - 41st street and Hampton Blvd, on the east side of Hampton Blvd. Groundbreaking is tentatively scheduled for December. See the site plan: Site Plan PDF
From Tara Saunders, Executive Director, ODU Real Estate Foundation: “It has been a year since I first discussed the Monarch Way mixed-use project on Hampton Blvd. with you that includes a full-service grocery store, 325 market-rate apartments and 25,000 square feet of ground-floor retail for restaurants and other storefronts. We were able to successfully re-zone the property through the City of Norfolk to a Community Commercial (CC) zoning. Since then, we have made many steps forward and have been working with the City on the site plan approval. It was through this process, that the Planning Department noted that the total height of the project was out of compliance with CC Zoning, and they have recommended we re-zone the property to Monarch Way (MW), formally known as University Village (UV). The vast majority of ODU’s campus on the eastside of Hampton Blvd. is zoned MW. The new zoning will keep the project consistent with the developments/buildings in the area.
While this is a positive re-zoning for the project, it means that Old Dominion University Real Estate Foundation will have to go through the entire City process again. The project has not changed in any way from what was submitted to the City of Norfolk last fall. The city will receive the exact same information and renderings of the project they received initially. The only difference will be the final Zoning category...
I have attached a rendering of the project for your convenience. Please note slide #5 is not the selected model of architecture for the project, but is one only to show an example of what a building could look like at the corner of 41st Street and Hampton Blvd.” Tara Saunders - ODU Real Estate Foundation, Exec Dir.
Another Very Big Deal and New Neighborhood Event: Memorial Day Parade!
LECL will be sponsoring a Memorial Day Parade next year. Many community stakeholders will be involved, primarily LUMC, the Larchmont Elementary School, and other community organizations and individuals. Please contact Mike Crockett, Civic League Vice-President, Mike.Crockett@yahoo.com , if you want to help with this event.
General Information:
For the good of the order:
Adjournment: 8:35 p.m.
[Attendance 22 in person; 10 on Zoom]
Respectfully submitted,
Gail Nicula,
Secretary
Additional Information - Nate KInnison
Elizabeth River Run, September 4, 7 - 10 am
Crape Myrtle Pruning Event, Neighborhood west side
October 22, 9:00 am - noon
Signup form: https://forms.gle/Uugz7UdCrkbV6c5z8