Government and University Ties
Some are direct ties with the potential for conflict of interest, while others simply have the potential for cronyism.
William Buettin is member of the Economic Development Authority and is Senior VP of United Bank. One of the Board members of United Bank-Winchester also sits on the Shenandoah University Board of Trustees–Walter Aikens.
J.P. Carr with Glaize Developments Inc. is a member of the Economic Development Authority. Mary Bruce Glaize, who is on the SU Board of Trustees, is married to Philip B. Glaize Jr who is listed as a vice president on the business license of Glaize Developments with Mr. Carr.
Suzanne Conrad is on the Economic Development Authority and works for Adams Nelson & Associates, one of the companies involved in the sale of the Solenberger building to Shenandoah University. She is also an immediate past Chairman and member of the SU Harry F. Byrd, Jr. Business School Board of Advisors.
Charles S. Dehaven Jr is on the Board of Trustees for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefield Foundation (SVBF). He served on the steering committee for SVBF’s Huntsberry Capital Campaign along with James Vickers, the Chairman of the SU Board of Trustees.
Larry Omps is Chairman of the Economic Development Authority. He is also on the Board of Trustees at Shenandoah University.
Richard Shickle is Chairman of the Winc- Fred MPO’s Policy Board. He is also the Vice President for Administration and Finance at Shenandoah University.
Harry Smith is a member of the Winc-Fred MPO’s Citizens Advisory Committee. He is also on the Board of Trustees at Shenandoah University.
William Wiley is on the Planning Commission and he works for OakCrest Commercial. OakCrest’s principal is James Vickers, the Chairman of the SU Board of Trustees.
The Winchester Watchdog 
and don’t forget the “Spring Street Connector” project that will tie in very nicely with the “new” Millwood Ave!
Fill me in.
the “Spring Street Connector” is the city’s plan to make Spring Street the main traffic artery for the proposed new shopping center planned for the 9 or so acres beside the K-Mart.
Currently, Spring Street is about half a block long and connects Millwood ave & Greystone Terrace. It is seldom used except by local residents and a few Good Will customers.
The development has been on hold for about 12 years thru 2 sets of owners because of the main profer; that access had to be gained through the K-Mart traffic light, which is (was) a privately owned drive.
So this year, the city took the needed K-Mart property through condemnation and eminent domain, traded some real estate with JDC for the Spring Street Connector, and will relocate Spring Street through JDC’s property & tie in to the K-Mart light so JDC can build their 9 acre shopping center.
The K-Mart traffic light (as you know) is between Millwood Ave and Jubal Early. I can’t believe the “Spring Street Connector” has escaped any media & public scrutiny, esp in light of the Millwood closure. Most of the “pieces of the puzzle” to the development are done and Spring Street was the key.
In fact, Council is to vote on rezoning some of JDC’s property from MR to B2 on the 12th.
After you posted your comment the other day, I looked into it. The media has reported on the project somewhat. I will probably write something about it this weekend…and perhaps with a “Fox News spin” just for our reader Common Sense. 😉
With regard to Millwood, many issues that you make comment on show either your ignorance of the facts or that you choose to ignore them to show your bias against the proposed project. Please go back and pick up the star articles (May 12, 2010; May 20, 2010, July 7, 2010) which will show that city officials are concerned about the “Y” at Jubal Early Drive and Millwood Avenue and other safety concerns.
Most important get some help in accurately interpreting the Millwood Avenue Traffic Diversion Study. Several of your facts like the LOS comment concerning the Jubal Early Drive/Apple Blossom Road intersection are wrong and very misleading. OVERLL the LOS of that intersection improves. It’s the south bound left turn lane that gets the lower rating. Tim Youman’s admitted on June 30 that this was not an issue. Also pedestrian issues were addressed in the study. You fail to mention that the MPO TAC and the Policy Committee unanimously voted to accept this study which is a strong statement on its validity.
If you want to shed light on the current project that will catastrophically change that area of Millwood Avenue then report on the proposed “graded separation” ALREADY in the 2030 long range transportation plan and referenced in the City newly adopted comprehensive plan as the plan to move forward. That plan removes Beltone from the map completely. (See draft of 522 Corridor Study for a diagram) and will remove any notion of an attractive entrance to the City’s eastern gateway.
In an effort to shed light on the subject you really do a disservice by choosing only select facts which is compounded by your not having a technical background to understand the traffic study. If you are not careful you become as irrelevant as the Pibbster’s Pub and the editorial page of the Winchester STAR.
It appears that you didn’t read my article, or perhaps you didn’t read the final draft of the study. Either way, it looks like you are uninformed.
I never said that safety was not a “concern” with city officials. As I stated in the article, Jim Deskins said the city was concerned with safety during the March 2010 MPO meeting. I stated THROUGHOUT the article that “safety” was the main concern, remember? Do you recall the quote from the article about the stakeholders’ number one priority being safety? However it has been obvious that the University has progressively pushed the “aesthetic” argument this spring.
Did you completely ignore the quote from the study that said the amount of pedestrians crossing that road was not collected since it appeared that few pedestrians crossed in that area? Do you think I made that up or something?
Here, I’ll post it again:
You didn’t like the LOS comment concerning Jubal Early & Apple Blossom? Weird, since it came straight from the study too.
Here is what I wrote:
And here is what the study said:
I never said the study was “invalid.” I said the study presented a false dichotomy (that is a type of logical fallacy, by the way) and I placed the blame for that squarely on the folks who commissioned the study — the MPO. That the MPO would vote to accept a study that went with their goal (which is to close down the road) is a given. Why would I need to add that into the article? Although I certainly can if you think it is that important.
The point is not whether I think the project is a good idea or not (although I don’t.) The point is that the outcome has been predetermined since September 2009, and the idea that there is public debate and that the public has any say over the matter is a farce. The City and Shenandoah University (and subsequently the MPO) have simply been working to find the best way to publicly justify closing the road. Period.
That the City has plans to acquire more private land for public use is no surprise. It also doesn’t surprise me that they would “remove Beltone from the map completely.” It’s called eminent domain, and municipalities use it like a mighty hammer to get their way. Just look at the Spring Street Connector Project.
Thankfully your opinion of my “relevancy” has very little bearing on what I write or will write in the future, especially since you haven’t really read what I’ve written anyway.
Have a good day.
Here is a direct quote of Chris Price, former executive director of the Northern Shenandoah Valley Regional Commission, from the Northern Virginia Daily’s May 20, 2010 article “Regional Planners to study road closure”:
“Shenandoah University has growth and development goals for the future and they’ve had discussions with the city … and what would the impact of the development plans be. At this point, these plans are conceptual but, in conversations with the city that go back years, I think that there’s been a desire to say, ‘OK, if we’re going to consider this, we need to do this as part of the overall transportation network’ because the potential closure of Millwood Avenue in front of the university is an issue that has broader community concern.”
I’m telling you, the closure of Millwood has been a done deal since September 2009.
Well Watchdog, like Fox News and the other conservative news blogs you can spin a story to say whatever it is you want it to say. We can argue “tit fot tat” all day. I know that study pretty well and know that you aren’t taking all of the information and presenting it in a balanced way. A For example before your comment on pedestrian data complete ignores the paragraph on page 10 that begins the topic concerning “Pedestrian Data” which clearly states that a fair amount of pedestrian traffic crosses that area during the peak hours of traffic. Data wasn’t collected because it was already provided by the City.
Problem I have with your spin is that you presume that the closure of Millwood is a done deal. If, in fact, that was the case the City could have just given the edict to close the road and it would have been a done deal. In fact what has happened and is still happening is that discussion is taking place and various pieces of information are being collected to help make a good final decision for the proposed project.
Don’t mind you reporting just be fair in your conclusions. I can say with certainty that this isn’t a done deal and never has been.
Fox News? Are you serious? You’re going to throw an overused red herring like Fox News into the conversation? This has nothing to do with “liberal” or “conservative” and everything to do with the government and a private entity working in cahoots to make something happen against the wishes of many local residents.
If the reason pedestrian data wasn’t collected “because it was already provided by the City,” then why did the FINAL DRAFT of the Study state that the reason data wasn’t collected was because observations indicated an insignificant amount of pedestrian crossings? During morning rush hour, an average of 21 pedestrians and 2 bicycles cross that stretch of Millwood per hour, and during the evening rush hour an average of 33 pedestrians and 1 bicycle cross per hour. Besides, does the City have pedestrian numbers for other well-used roads in Winchester that we can look at? How did they come up with the raw data?
The project is a done deal as much as the move of DSS to the Snapp Foundry was a done deal and the use of tax dollars for the Taylor Hotel is a done deal. If the City wants to make it happen, it will happen. To give an edict to close the road would be political suicide. Come on, Common Sense, you have to know how the game of politics is played, even in small cities like Winchester. If you just look at the gist of the talks over the last two years, it becomes clear that it was never “if we close Mildred” but WHEN. And that is what many people have been starting to realize. I am not the first to come to this conclusion, and I certainly won’t be the last.
Again, page 10 of the final study looks clearly at the Pedestrian Data issue. You actually do a good service by linking all the newspaper articles. I have pointed three from May and July 2010 that I suggest you include.
Just report fairly and leave your bias conclusions out. You are simply wrong to say this is a done deal and has been since the beginning. I know that is not the case.
Have a nice day.
Incredible. You are focusing on a NON-ISSUE.
Here is what the report says on page 10:
This is typical in any city. People who walk to work are going to be on the road around the same time that people are commuting to work via automobile.
Whether it is “moderate” or not depends on what the consultant considers to be “moderate” and how it compares to other roads of comparable vehicular use in the city. The term remains undefined in the report and no comparisons are provided.
I seriously doubt the City will be closing every road that intersects the Green Circle Trail.
And Common Sense, considering I am simply a non-syndicated citizen journalist on a non-syndicated blog website with no obligations to ANYONE, I think I can report however I want. If that means incorporating my “bias conclusions” and commentary when I feel like it, I will do so. 🙂 What is “fair” is completely in the eye of the beholder.
Really, then quit implying that you are “keeping an eye on local government so others don’t have to!” That implies that you are looking at things in a fair and unbiased way which obviously, as you state above, you are not inclined to do.
Perhaps Fox News will buy you out someday! I’ll check in on occasion to keep you honest. Glad I could help do so on this important issue.
You are a bossy bit of goods. 😀
What you think is “fair and unbiased” may be completely unfair and biased to me. EVERYONE has personal biases that will come out in the way they speak and write and what they choose to talk about or what they choose to avoid. If a newspaper omits certain facts or avoids certain discussions, is that “fair and unbiased”? If a newspaper gives a disproportionate amount of attention to one side of a debate, is that “fair and unbiased”?
I am looking out for the average Joe citizen and the average business owner who is nickel-and-dimed to death while watching their property rights erode. I am not looking out for the best interests of government officials or their cronies in large private corporations. Seriously, average Joe citizens and average business owners typically don’t have the time or energy to “keep an eye on local government” like the officials and their cronies do.
I am not telling lies in my posts, Common Sense. If something is my opinion, most readers are astute enough to figure out that it is an opinion. What I do do, however, is come to rational conclusions based on the evidence.
And from everything I’ve seen, heard, and read, the University has wanted Millwood closed for over ten years, and in 2009 they finally had a City Council sympathetic to that wish. Bye-bye Millwood.