Norfolk’s three newest council members – Tommy Smigel and Andy Protogyrou were elected last May, Angelia Williams was elected last November – are hosting a town hall meeting Saturday morning. The three seek public input on Norfolk’s subsidy of a proposed office building.
The meeting will be held at Granby High School (7101 Granby Street) from 9am to 11am. Doors open at 8:45am.
VIVIAN J. PAIGE | All Politics is Local 
I would encourage all who may not be able to attend to send an e-mail, snail mail too slow, to your council representatives stating your position on this subsidy.
Actually, if you are attending put your thoughts in writing to the council, too.
Hope to see you there!
Ditto Doug! Spread the word. And I will repost here what we need:
Important questions to prep for Saturday’s meeting:
(1) Details of this latest proposed “deal” are needed by the public. The details of this proposal were supposed to be provided to council at the 1/11/2011 informal session. The matter was withdrawn. Therefore, no documents available. Where are they?
(2) Same thing on the 2/8/2011 meeting. It was a closed session and therefore the presentation that was scheduled to be made by Woolard is likewise not available to the public. Where is it?
(3) Next Tuesday’s meeting, 2/15/2011. This article states that it is an afternoon meeting. Yet, there was an agenda item on this week’s meeting to change it to 7pm. What happened? Not changed? Why?
Midtown Office Tower – So, what is all the money about?
It seems to me that this is more than meets the eye. Tivest Development of Chesapeake agreed to build the six-story Midtown Office Tower on city property. They have asked that the city cover 65 percent of rent payments if a key tenant can’t.
So, who is going to profit from this? Just Tivest? I don’t think so. The owners of the older City Leased Building in Norfolk will again, by redevelopment of their property that the City or City Service Agencies are currently leasing. The City, by guarantying the rental of this new building will by moving out of the old locations leave buildings open for Norfolk’s Developers and Real Estate Owners to build more High Density Developments and make a bundle at the expense of the tax payer and neighborhoods.
This is not something new. It has been going on since the first redevelopment in the City when these realtors, developers and City Councilmen figured it out that they could make a bundle out of busting up neighborhoods, rezoning and development. It is a continuing cycle. After all, the City’s Rezoning Committee is appointed by the City Council and is made up of real estate agents.
So, its seems that this maybe reaching somewhat. I think we would all be surprised if we could find out the details of these workings. What do you think?
I think we all should support openness in government.