The old City Hall ca. Today it is used for state offices. Photo courtesy of the Cook Collection at the Valentine. During the ensuing discussion, an older man seemed older to me, as I was at the time quite younger than now , rose from the bleachers burning from a three-alarm ire.
Would it require state-approved letters of transit by those seeking to get in and out? Poverty has taken root in the inner-ring suburbs, while the city is growing again, energized by younger professionals with disposable incomes. These new residents, often from larger cities, have reasonable expectations of proper schooling for their progeny, good roads, trash collection, and wise stewardship of public spaces and access ways.
In public forums today, there is caviling and wailing about the disastrous past seven years since the citizenry started directly electing its mayor. We indulge ourselves in pangs of past glories both real and imagined because they provide odd comfort. He would tell you governance of Richmond has never been pretty. For his trouble, Yoder was beaten, incarcerated and sued. Some 56 chummy white men ran Richmond. They oversaw a byzantine arrangement of commissions and committees.
Yoder left town in March to seek treatment for his tubercular wife. The next year, the city underwent reduction from eight council wards to four.
An administrative board of five members elected at-large for four-year terms assumed the major responsibilities of prior committees. Council retained control of the purse strings and the lawmaking. That was the first of three charter changes Richmond would undergo before reaching its present mayor-at-large over a nine-member council. Put another way, every other generation, we revise or completely overhaul our system of governance.
