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Charlottesville City Council seeks new board, commission applicants

Szakos suggests young community members, University students apply

<p>Clerk of Council Paige Rice said applications are often opened throughout the year as needed.</p>

Clerk of Council Paige Rice said applications are often opened throughout the year as needed.

The Charlottesville City Council stated Tuesday it is accepting applications for membership on 16 boards and commissions. Members will work with Council on various community issues and projects.

Clerk of Council Paige Rice said City Council takes applications throughout the year as openings in boards and commissions become available.

“Whenever we have openings, [like] if someone retires, we open up the application process. It’s pretty much open most of the year,” Rice said. “Normally there are two to three big pushes. But there are a lot of different boards with different term expiration dates. It’s kind of all over the board.”

Rice said the application process is usually closed for a few weeks after each round to allow City Council time to make appointments, which usually happens four to six times every year.

“Right now we have quite a few [boards and commissions] open so we’re hoping for lots of applications,” Rice said. “We’re hoping for 30 to 40 applications…but we always have openings.”

City Council is currently taking applications for Youth Council, the Board of Architectural Review and the Charlottesville Economic Development Authority, among others. Youth Council is a group of young people who advise City Council on issues relevant to youth, and includes students from each school zone in the city. Private school and homeschooled students can take part in Youth Council as well.

Many of the board and commission positions require specific backgrounds, like the Board of Architectural Review, which calls for a background in history or historical preservation.

“Depending on what the board is, special skills may be required,” Rice said. “We always have openings because the Council waits until we have an appropriate applicant to make an appointment.”

When making appointments, City Council considers the current composition of the boards and commissions and what skills might be missing from each.

“If they have a lot of people from one neighborhood [on a board], they might fill vacancies with people not from that neighborhood [so you have] geographic representation,” Rice said. “[They also look for a] variety of work backgrounds.”

City Council member Bob Fenwick also said diversity in the groups is important.

“We get a diversity of opinion across the city,” Fenwick said. “We judge the pulse of the city through these commissions.”

Deliberations over applications usually take place in closed meetings before the Council’s regular sessions.

City Council member Kristin Szakos said interaction between the boards and commissions and the City Council varies.

“Some we don’t interact with a whole lot,” Szakos said. “[But there are] some that are quasi professional commissions, [who] dig into things on our behalf. [We] delegate part of our function to them. [Those are] more formalized.”

Fenwick said some groups work independently.

“They’ll set up their own meeting times and that kind of thing,” Fenwick said. “They only report directly to City Council during work sessions, [where they] give the Council a report, [and] many times that’s what we base the decision on.”

Szakos said certain boards and commissions, such as the tree commission, are temporary and oriented around a specific issue to help City Council.

“The City Council has a very wide responsibility for a lot of things and we need help digging out the weeds on some of those issues,” Szakos said.

Szakos said it is important for students to consider a position on the City Council’s boards and commissions.

“Sometimes students don’t think of themselves as city residents, but they are,” Szakos said. “I would encourage people to look into it and apply. Some [positions] are specific, but some really are general public positions.”

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