Monday, March 1, 2010

RePHRAME follow-up with City Council - PLEASE CALL/EMAIL

Dear RePHRAME members and supporters,

Last week, City Council voted unanimously to reappoint the current RRHA resident commissioner, whose first term ended in November 2007 and who continued to serve for 27 months without being reappointed. 

At the urging of RePHRAME, the reappointment was changed from giving the resident commissioner another 4 years (starting now) to making the reappointment retroactive to the end of her first term (November 2007).  Her second term will now end in November 2011 instead of February 2014 (resolution is attached).  RePHRAME has already begun laying groundwork to nominate a highly qualified replacement in 2011.

This process has been an important step toward accountability and transparency in the operation of public housing by the City and RRHA, and the value of resident participation specifically.  In the process of making this change, RePHRAME received positive commitments from members of City Council to increase resident representation on the RRHA Board of Commissioners, and to work toward greater transparency in RRHA overall.

To close the loop on this, at the RePHRAME meeting last week all 20 members in attendance agreed to follow up with their City Council members and ask others to do the same.  To that end, please use the contact information below to contact your City Councilmember, thank them for changing the reappointment and bringing accountability to the reappointment process, and let them know we look forward to further progress toward accountability and transparency in the operation of RRHA.

Here’s a sample script:

Hello, my name is ___________ and I live the ___ District.  I am contacting you today as a member/supporter of RePHRAME.  We want to thank you for changing the reappointment dates of the RRHA resident commissioner, and in doing so restoring accountability to this process.  We look forward to working with you in the future to further improve RRHA accountability, and to increase resident representation in the management of public housing in Richmond.

Thank you!

Sincerely,

_________

And here are the emails and phone numbers for City Council:

President Kathy Graziano, District 4
Office: 320-2454

Vice Chair Ellen Robertson, District 6
Office: 646-7964

Bruce Tyler, District 1
Mobile: 357-6007

Charles Samuels, District 2
Office: 646-6532

Chris Hilbert, District 3
Office: 646-6055

Marty Jewell, District 5
Office: 646-5724

Cynthia Newbille, District 7
Office: 646-3012

Reva Trammell, District 8
Office: 646-6591

Doug Conner, District 9
Office: 646-5497