Baptist Ministers' Conference
of Richmond and Vicinity
300 West Grace Street
Richmond, Virginia 23220
(804) 643-0192
December 15, 1997
Ms. Susan Crump
United Way Services
224 East Broad Street
Richmond, VA 23241-0209
Dear Ms. Crump:
Greetings in the name of the appointments after receiving the nominations from members of the Task Force by January 4, 1998.
In view of our request to the Richmond City Council, we do not think you should proceed with the appointments until the City Council has acted on our request to them. You will notice we have informed them of our request in the letter that we are sending to them on this date also.
This action supports the position taken by the Richmond Coalition For The Homeless at its meeting on December 12, 1997 in which it voted to ask you not to take any action until the recommendations have been approved by the City Council.
Thank you for your cooperation.
Yours in His service, Almighty God! I am writing to request that United Way Services not take any action of appointing members to the Board of Directors for the Nonprofit Homeless Services Coordination Organization as you have been requested to do by the Task Force.
Barbara E. Ingram
President
December 15, 1997
The Honorable Larry E. Chavis, Mayor
And All Members of City Council
City of Richmond
900 E. Broad Street
Richmond, Virginia 23219
Dear Mr. Mayor and Members of City Council: Greetings in the name of almighty God! We have three (3) reasons for writing this letter: (1) To urge you to Reject the Report of the Richmond Regional Homeless Task Force Presented to the Richmond City Council to included the Final Report of the Coordination Body Subcommittee which made Recommendations for the Development of a Nonprofit Homeless Services Coordination Organization; (2) To Recommend instead that you accept the Recommendation of A Society Without A Name For People Without A Home (ASWAN); and (3) To request documents under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act pertaining to the Concept Paper for the Homeless Facility.
First, we are requesting that you reject the report of the Richmond Regional Homeless Task Force because they have not complied with your requirements as listed in Resolution Number 95-R302-255 adopted November 13, 1995. The Task Force did not adequately represent the homeless community nor the organizations that you requested of the City Administration. the homeless community is majority African-American and yet on March 3, 1997 the Subcommittee issued The Final Draft of the "Recommendation" Document that was written by an all white subcommittee. When we objected to this, Rev. Eddie L. Perry was added to the Subcommittee along with another African American Clergy that was supposed to be added. We never filled the other position because of the illness of the member that we intended to put in the position. However, it didn't matter because as the Petition of ASWAN states, after Rev. Perry was added to the Subcommittee, he was informed that he was not a member of the Task Force. What had been fought for in the Subcommittee was overturned at a later meeting of the Task Force that neither Rev. Perry nor ASWAN was informed about. These circumstances are correctly reported in the ASWAN petition as pertains to Rev. Perry.
The only update to what is contained in the ASWAN petition as pertains to Rev. Perry is that after being put back on the Task Force at the meeting on September 26, 1997 as reported in the minutes, he still never received any correspondence from the Task Force that other members received. Therefore, upon learning of the meeting to protest the lack of receipt of the minutes or the information that was to be acted upon on the agenda. When he complained to the Chairman about this lack of receipt, the Chairman's response was "the fact that you are here means that you found out about the meeting." That is not the way we expect our representative to be treated when representing us at a public meeting.
Your resolution called for the City Administration to include churches and other interested citizens in the process. At the December 9th meeting When Rev. Perry told them to delete his name from the report but not from the Task Force, that effectively eliminated any African-American churches from being included in the process. Rev. Perry did not want his name on the report to indicate they had an African American Clergy person involved in the process when his input had been eliminated. Every time the homeless individuals attempted to speak in the meeting to add their input, the chairman told them that comments were limited to members of the Task Force. We raise the question when did the Chairman become the sole member of a committee to decide who gets to speak at a public meeting? A look at the minutes of the meeting of September 26, 1997 will indicate ASWAN attempted to add some more African American Clergy to the Task Force. The motion was denied by the Chairman because he indicated, "the City Council Resolution that created the Task Force only empowers the chairman to appoint members to the Task Force." When we read that resolution we cannot find that authority being given because the City Council didn't say anything about creating a Task Force. It merely asked the City Administration to work... "to initiate a long term planning process"... So why would these African-American Clergy be denied, when there were so few African Americans on the Task Force other than ones who worked for government.
The Resolution asked the City Administration to include leadership from the surrounding counties in the process. the minutes of August 4, 1997 indicates the name was changed to "Richmond Regional Homeless Task Force," while also indicating that the counties, "could only participate on regional issues because the Task Force is a City Council appointed body." Yet, at the meeting on December 9, 1997, when our representative raised a question about the Counties, he was informed by the chairman that the governing bodies of Henrico and Chesterfield Counties had refused to participate. If that is the case, we question how can this be considered a "Regional Task Force" created by Richmond City Council Resolution? Other than St. Joseph's Villa, we cannot identify any role played by the counties.
We are concerned that if the homeless were precluded from speaking at a meeting conducted by Richmond City Administration, how would their interests be protected in a meeting of a private non-profit corporation?
We are further concerned that this Task Force was operated in a manner that was more indicative of a dictatorship than a democracy. The same individual who served as chairman of this Task Force is also the individual who made the motion at he Planning Commission meeting to recommend those three Zoning Ordinances that are so detrimental to the interests of the religious community and the homeless community.
For the above reasons we emphatically call upon you to reject the recommendations of the Richmond Regional Homeless Task Force. These recommendation are detrimental to the homeless individuals and to the providers who dare to oppose the wants of the city Administration.
In our letter to you dated August 27, 1997 we informed you that we "will continue to stand with the homeless... We will continue to support the Daily Planet, and we will continue to help ASWAN in any way possible. We have just begun to fight!" When we said that, we were not looking for a fight as much as we wanted to put everyone on notice that this was part of our mission of being the church. We have no other choice than to stand for the homeless and those who have no one else to stand for them.
Turning now to our second reason for writing the letter which is to recommend that you accept the recommendation of ASWAN as listed in their petition that was presented to you. Basically, we are saying since we do not believe the Task Force has completed the work as assigned to the City Administration by you in the Resolution, we think it should be replaced by a body more representative of the homeless community and other individuals and organizations concerned with reducing and/or eliminating homelessness. the process should not be controlled by the needs and desires of the business community. We need to be concerned about the moral aspects of treating individuals the way we would want to be treated if we were in their place. Merely moving the homeless out of sight of the downtown community is not a solution. The homeless may be homeless but they still have civil and human rights that need to be protected by the city rather than the city contributing to their hardships by placing obstacles in their way. ASWAN has demonstrated they have a lot of talent and suggestions to bring to the table as to how the homelessness can be reduced.
Finally, we request documents under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act. We had heard a lot about moving the homeless to 17th & O streets, but we had not seen anything on it until the Report of the Richmond Regional Homeless Task Force was presented at the Task Force meeting on December 9, 1997. There was an item listed as "number 2" under the General Recommendations that stated, "The concept plan for the 17th & "O" site has been developed and approved by City Council. The plan calls for the construction of a comprehensive homeless service center consisting of 60 beds and offices. Once that site is built, the month-to-month lease for 302 W. Canal Street will be terminated, and the building will be demolished."
After many individuals objected to this item being in the report because it was the first time that many had seen it, the chairman stated "we can either send these recommendations as a Task Force or I will send them as an individual." the item was removed from the report. It still raises questions for us. We request that we be provided all documents that relate to this concept paper being approved by City Council. When we read the entire Concept Paper, it is even more disturbing because it appears that this Homeless facility will be in direct competition with the Daily Planet even though it was stated that it will not take the place of the any existing organization. We are requesting that we be provided all documents that support the items listed in the complete Concept Paper for the Homeless Facility at 17th & "O" Streets along with the documentation where the City Council approved the paper.
The above documents are all requested under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act. Please send all documents to the home address of our Chairman of the Civic Committee: Rev. Eddie L. Perry, 4401 N. Lakefront Drive, Richmond, Virginia 23294-6002. Should you need to discuss this letter, he is our contact and may be reached at (804) 270-0681.
We are also asking the United Way not to take any action on naming the members of the Board that it was asked to do by the Task Force. It was to receive any names by January 4, 1998 and then make the selections. They were then to notify all members of the Task Force and if any Five (5) members objected to their choices, the Task Force was to meet again. We think they should suspend that action until you take your action because we do not think it is appropriate for them to make the selections when their Board contains so many members from Corporations and they are so dependent on Corporations for their funding.
This letter has been approved by the members of this organization voting overwhelmingly in the affirmative at our regularly scheduled meeting on this morning.
Yours in His service,
Barbara E. Ingram
President
.
Copies
Richmond Affiliate, Congress of National Black Churches
ASWAN
Daily Planet
Interim City Manger
United Way