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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-07-28 Minutes Page 1 New Hanover County/City of Wilmington Community Relations Advisory Committee Virtual Teams Meeting July 28, 2020 – 5:30 PM Committee Members Present: Chair Evelyn Bryant, Vice-Chair Jeff Hovis, Reverend Charles Davis, Courtney Horton, Jen Johnson, Lori Wainright, Florence Warren, Scott Whisnant Staff Present: Tufanna Bradley, NHC; Dahria Kianpour, NHC; Suzanne Rogers, City of Wilmington Absent: Kathy King, Elise Rocks, Lewis Stroud, Chief Deputy Ken Sarvis, Donny Williams, Chief of Police Guest: Linda Thompson I. Call to Order Chair Bryant called the meeting to order at 5:30 pm. Quorum was established. II. Approve Agenda MOTION: Reverend Davis MOVED, SECONDED by Mr. Whisnant, to approve the agenda. Upon vote, the MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. III. Approve Minutes MOTION: Vice-Chair Hovis MOVED, SECONDED by Ms. Wainright, to approve the minutes of June 23, 2020. Upon vote, the MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. IV. Sub-Committee Reports  Crisis Prevention/Preparedness: No report.  Programming and Public Education: Mr. Whisnant stated he is putting together a presentation on school redistricting and the history from the past 15 years. He is working with a UNCW professor and would like to share the information with CRAC members for input. He is open to presenting it at the August meeting and will send the presentation to the members for feedback. A brief discussion was held regarding issues that are arising due to Covid-19 such as evictions, education disparity, childcare, etc. Live Oak Bank and Cape Fear Collective are working to have more wifi towers to assist with the virtual schooling. In regards to virtual education for students, Ms. Thompson stated she is working with churches and licensed day care centers who want to offer their facilities as virtual learning sites. The County and DSS are looking into expanding the virtual sites. Mr. Whisnant expressed interest in being involved in the discussion. V. LGBTQ Recommendation Status Update Ms. Johnson reviewed the LGBTQ recommendation document. Chair Bryant stated she met with the City today regarding the recommendation. Tony McEwan is the point of contact for the City and will be connecting with Ms. Johnson to provide an update on the next steps. Chair Bryant stated she did not send the recommendation to the County since the scoring is for the City. A brief discussion was held that even though the County doesn’t get scored, there are some things that could still be implemented. Chair Bryant stated she will send it to the county manager. Ms. Page 2 Bradley stated there are some pieces of the recommendation that the County has already researched and possible changes are coming soon. Ms. Bryant stated she will include this as part of the presentation recommendation as well. Ms. Warren left at 5:50pm. VI. Statues, Name Changes, Mayor’s Pledge Recommendation Update Chair Bryant stated she wants to include the Mayor’s Pledge and name changes to be included as part of the recommendation to the City. The first draft of the recommendation letter had not been sent yet since the removal of the statues had already been done. A brief discussion was held regarding next steps and the process for renaming streets and parks. The County does not name the streets. For the renaming of the park, the Commissioners brought it up at a recent board meeting and voted to change the name. Suggestions were made to include in the letter asking what the County/City’s next steps are regarding the permanent removal of statues, renaming streets, and if there would be a formal process established. Reverend Davis, Ms. Johnson, Ms. Wainright, and Mr. Whisnant will draft the st new letter and Ms. Wainright will share the draft letter to the CRAC members for review by Friday, July 31. th Chair Bryant is scheduled to make the CRAC presentation to the City Council at the August 18 meeting. VII. County/City Workforce Housing Advisory Committee Update Chair Bryant provided an update regarding the County/City Workforce Housing Advisory Committee. The committee is working on a survey and individual stakeholders are being interviewed by UNCG to provide input on how to conduct th the survey. Around the August 18 timeframe, there will focus groups to review the findings of the report. Dave Spetrino, Vice-Chair of the committee, proposed a pilot project on workforce housing and housing affordability. There th will be a meeting on August 18 to discuss the County UDO and she will have more information about that for the workforce housing piece. Regarding the policing issue and the new citizen review board, Ms. Thompson stated they are looking into putting a group together that will include some of the City Council members and the City Attorney. The City will be researching how it was done at Charlotte-Mecklenberg as there was great success with their citizen review board. More information will be forthcoming. VIII. Public Comments – None. IX. Announcements  th August 7, 12pm-2pm: UNCG Housing Event: Heir Properties and the Loss of Intergenerational Wealth. A flyer with the information was emailed to members.  A brief discussion was held regarding the representation of diversity on the CRAC and to recommend to the elected officials to appoint diverse members.  Chair Bryant stated that in October, CRAC will transition to reporting to the City. She stated to keep in mind some ideas for what the agenda would be moving forward and how to improve communications with the City and County officials as far as following up on recommendations that are made. A suggestion would be to include a deadline for a response to the recommendations and for the chair check in on the progress. X. Adjourn: Meeting adjourned at 6:46 p.m.