Meet top volunteer at botanical garden B1
Kicking it up a notch
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Richmond Free Press
VOL. 26 NO. 17
© 2017 Paradigm Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA
www.richmondfreepress.com
Bedden out
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Fr ee
c e l e brat ing o u r 2 5 t h A nniv e r s ar y
April 27-29, 2017
Richmond School Board to meet Monday on selection process for superintendent’s replacement
Reclaiming history
By Holly Rodriguez
Just weeks after proclaiming that progress was on the horizon for Richmond Public Schools and that he had no intention of leaving the school system, Superintendent Dana T. Bedden is out. The Richmond School Board announced last weekend that his contract will end June 30, a full two years before it was set to expire June 30, 2019. “The board decided to move in another direction as we have philosophical differences,” School Board Chair Dawn Page told the Free Press on Tuesday. “We mutually agreed to separate and terminate his contract Dr. Bedden early.” The board has been largely a wall of silence a half years to our students, parents, staff and since calling a special meeting 6 p.m. last Friday administration,” the statement said in part. “We in which members wasted no time going into wish Dr. Bedden well.” closed session. Specifics of the agreement, including any Board member Scott Barlow, 2nd District, severance Dr. Bedden may receive, are being who was out of the country in Spain, was con- negotiated, Ms. Page said. nected to the meeting via telephone, signaling She said Tuesday she is not at liberty to the critical personnel issue the board was about release any more details or to comment further. to discuss. She would not say whether Dr. Bedden was fired After more than three hours, the School by the School Board or whether he resigned. Board emerged but released little information. Sources told the Free Press that Dr. Bedden On Saturday, the board issued a three-paragraph recently applied for a position with the Washstatement saying that Dr. Bedden was out. ington-based American Association of Colleges “The School Board thanks Dr. Bedden for for Teacher Education and for the superintendent his contributions to our school division and apPlease turn to A4 preciates his service during the past three and
City Council continues to wrestle over budget By Jeremy M. Lazarus
Regina H. Boone/Richmond Free Press
Margaret Stallings walks down the original wooden staircase inside the 114-year-old St. Luke building at 900 St. James St., which still has many of the coveted features of the city’s older buildings.
St. Luke building, first home of Maggie L. Walker’s bank, is being turned into upscale apartments to spur development in Gilpin Court By Jeremy M. Lazarus
Upscale apartments are taking shape in the long-empty St. Luke Building, the once vital four-story headquarters of a mutual aid society where renowned Richmond businesswoman Maggie L. Walker once had a bank. The owners, Margaret Stallings and her daughter Wanda Stallings, are moving ahead with a $3.5 million venture to install 12 large apartments in the historic landmark building at 900 St. James St. in Gilpin Court. Call it a surprising development — and the biggest in decades — for an area largely occupied by a public housing community notorious for poverty, gunfire and crime on the north edge of Jackson Ward and Downtown. Instead of seeing a wasteland, the Stallings family sees an opportunity to lead the revitalization of a down-at-the-heels section of the city that has only one way to go: Up. “My brother, Ronald Stallings, has led the redevelopment of South Jackson Ward,” Wanda Stallings said, “and I want to lead the redevelopment of North Jackson Ward,” as the city has dubbed the Gilpin Court area. The two areas are separated by an interstate highway, which in the 1950s was cut through what was then the center of Richmond’s AfricanAmerican community. To get this development underway and leapfrog largely stalled public plans for revitalizing the Gilpin Court area, the Stallings have partnered with developer Charles E. Ayers Jr., the owner of River City Ventures LLC, which is engaged in creating homes and apartments in The Fan, Church Hill and Hopewell. “Sure we are pioneering,” Mr. Ayers said, “but we think this is a start to creating a better future for this area.” The Stallings family owns 5 acres of land
in the area. The success of this project would enable them to make plans for additional residential and retail development on what is largely vacant property, he said. Backed by financing from Chesapeake Bank, Mr. Ayers said the St. Luke plans call for four Please turn to A4
More than 60 people trooped to the microphone Monday to plead with Richmond City Council not to cut programs they need. One of the biggest contingents included people who found jobs because of help from the city’s Center for Workforce Innovation. They urged the council to restore $400,000 to the city budget to enable the program to hire six additional people to help the unemployed secure work. Members of City Council were sympathetic, but essentially shrugged their shoulders. So far, the council has spent at least 16 hours going through Mayor Levar M. Stoney’s proposed spending plan for fiscal 2017-18 that will begin July 1. They are trying to find cuts in order to fund their top priority:
Improving the pay of veteran police officers and firefighters to keep them in the city. The total cost: $2.7 million. As the council completed its latest five-hour budget session on Wednesday, it was still $100,000 short of meeting its goal on police and firefighter pay. As they left, most members were mulling whether to take $6.8 million of the $8.3 million in savings the Richmond Public Schools has built up during the past four years to
ease the pressure. They have asked Mayor Stoney to certify the money is available. The decision on whether to use that money for city needs is likely to come when the council meets again Monday, May 1, to try to complete their amendments to the Stoney spending plan. Surprisingly, City Council appears to be ignoring another big fund it could tap — the city’s own savings account that has Please turn to A4
Confederate statues coming down in NOLA Free Press wire report
Gerald Herbert/Associated Press
Workers dismantle the 35-foot granite Liberty Place monument Monday on Canal Street in New Orleans. The statue, which commemorates a white supremacist uprising in 1874, is being removed along with three others honoring Confederates.
NEW ORLEANS A monument to a deadly white supremacist uprising in 1874 was removed under cover of darkness by workers in masks and bulletproof vests Monday as New Orleans joined the movement to take down symbols of the Confederacy and the Jim Crow South. The Liberty Place monument, a 35-foot granite obelisk that pays tribute to white people who tried to topple a biracial Reconstruction government installed in New Orleans after the Civil War, was taken away on a truck in pieces before daybreak after a few hours of work. In the coming days, the city also will remove statues of Confederate Gens. Robert E. Please turn to A4
Regina H. Boone/Richmond Free Press
Getting his wheels Anthony Bullock, 12, works on his balance and gets comfortable riding a bicycle during a practice session last week at Great Shiplock Park. The student at Anna Julia Cooper Episcopal School in the East End was with Jim Cramer, a retired pilot who has been Anthony’s mentor for three years. The pair met when Anthony was a student at Richmond’s Woodville Elementary School through the public school’s relationship with the Micah Ministry of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church.