Everyone’s invited to the Fulton Funk Jam in Gillies Creek Park on September 4th from 3pm to 8pm. There will be a live band, DJ Star Funk, Praise Music, Pastor Garland Jones of Mt. Zion Church in North Carolina, Sports Events and much more. School supplies will be given away to school children to get them off to a good start!

The City’s Adopt A Tree Program has a new deadline of Sept.1. If you are interested in having a new tree planted, and adopting it, see the details here.

Fulton’s own Kelly Kennedy is co-starring in “On Golden Pond” at Barksdale Theater at Hanover Tavern July 16 until Aug. 29. It runs Thursday through Saturday nights at 8 and Sunday afternoon at 2. Tickets are $38 every performance and $35 for seniors 55 or older. Their website:  BarksdaleRichmond.org.  Gather your friends and see Fulton’s talent!

The city will pick up brush and large items next week, July 19-23. To arrange a pick up, you must call 311 and give the address.  Items should be placed where your trash is collected.  The next scheduled pick up is Aug. 16-20.

An unscientific analysis of property listings on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) of the Greater Fulton area reveals the following, as of July 9, 2010:

• 42 houses actively on the market in the MLS in the greater Fulton area
• Lowest listing price is $29,950
• Highest listing price is $349,950
• The mean listing price is $123,784
• The median listing price is $115,000

Rocketts Landing is hosting Dragon Boat Races on July 31 all day! Dragon Boat racing is an ancient tradition from China where 40-foot canoes decorated like dragons race across the water. Each powered by 20 paddlers, one steerer, and a drummer. Other cultural events, including dragon dancing, will take place on sh ore. More information here.

The Department of Public Works has started improvements to Williamsburg Road in response to citizen concerns over damage to parked cars and faded crosswalks. The striping defines the travel lanes, helping drivers to stay out of the parking zones. Crosswalks are being re-painted as well. Hopefully these improvements will also slow traffic by making drivers more aware of the road, parked cars, and pedestrian crosswalks.

I attended a presentation of the Richmond Stormwater Utility today, and found out some very useful and interesting information about the new Stormwater Utility program and fee.

Richmond has instituted the new fee as a proactive measure. Cities such as Norfolk and Virginia Beach have their stormwater utility fees prescribed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as a result of not undertaking stormwater cleanup efforts on their own. Norfolk and Virginia Beach’s fees are double Richmond’s fee.

Richmond’s base fee is $45, depending upon the amount of impervious surface on a property. Impervious surfaces include roofs, driveways, and patios.

Richmond chose to implement a separate fee, as opposed to raising real estate taxes, for several reasons:

• The fee provides a dedicated source of funding for stormwater maintenance and capital improvement projects.
• Increasing real estate taxes as a source of funding would put a larger burden on homeowners, and the revenues would be put into the General Fund, resulting in fewer stormwater improvement projects because of competition for other projects (schools, police, fire, etc.) funded by the General Fund.
• Businesses, government agencies, non-profit organizations, churches, and universities also pay the stormwater fee based upon the impervious surface area of the property. Real estate taxes are not paid by government agencies, non-profit organizations (including churches), and universities, even though they typically contribute to the stormwater problem because of their large impervious surface coverage.

The existing wastewater and sewer fees are separate from the Stormwater Utility, and do not cover maintenance and capital improvements to stormwater facilities. The sewer fees are high in Richmond because of an earlier mandate aimed at eliminating the discharge of raw sewage into the James River, which used to be the case.

The stormwater outlets on our streets flow directly into the streams and rivers, and eventually into the Chesapeake Bay. Stormwater runoff is not treated at the sewer treatment plant. That means that everything left in the street, including trash (of which there is a lot), ends up in the streams, James River, and Chesapeake Bay.

Additional information is available at the Department of Public Utilities’ Stormwater website.

You are invited to come to two events this evening at the Neighborhood Resource Center, 1519 Williamsburg Road.

At 6pm in the NRC Garden, there will be a press conference to announce the selection of the NRC as the convening agency for the UP Neighborhoods Initiative of Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC).

At 7pm at the NRC, the Greater Fulton Hill Civic Association will hold its final General Meeting before the summer break. Three special guests will speak at the meeting:

• Delegate Jennifer McClellan of the 71^st District of the Virginia House of Delegates will give a legislative update.
• Councilmember Cynthia Newbille of the 7^th District will discuss the East End; Transformation Charette that will concude on June 7^th and focuses on the 25^th Street/Nine Mile Road Corridor in Church Hill; and
• Mark Baker of Baker Development will provide an update on Echo Harbor.

Other topics include community concerns, Neighborhood Watch, and a report of the Civic Association Nominating Committee to nominate officers for the upcoming year. As always, there will be door prizes and refreshments.

We look forward to seeing you tonight.

Everyone is invited to the East End Charette, which begins on Wednesday June 2nd. Click here for the schedule. Your ideas are needed on how to make the Nine Mile Road-25th Street corridor a better place to live and work. Please consider coming out and participating!