Beginning Monday, June 18 through Tuesday, June 26, 2012 at various times each day (schedule below) and weather permitting, the City of Richmond Department of Public Utilities will be performing its annual floodwall testing.  During the testing at the Mayo Bridge, the bridge will be closed to all forms of traffic including motorists, bicyclists and pedestrians. The following is a schedule of the dates and locations along the floodwall that testing will occur:   While floodwall testing is taking place, motorists will be detoured to adjoining streets.  Barricades and signs will be posted to alert motorists.   The City of Richmond Department of Public Utilities (DPU) is a premier provider of utility service.  DPU provides natural gas, water, wastewater and storm water utility services to more than 500,000 residential and commercial customers in the metropolitan region.  In addition, DPU operates an electric street lighting utility, whi...

Mayor Dwight C. Jones and Richmond City Council Vice President Ellen Robertson presented Love Your Block mini-grants to several neighborhood groups on Tuesday, June 12 at 11 a.m. in the City Hall 2nd floor large conference room at 900 East Broad Street. In January 2012, the City of Richmond’s Neighbor-To-Neighbor (N2N) Initiative was awarded a $10,000 grant from Service Nation, in partnership with the Home Depot Foundation, in the form of Home-Depot gift cards toward the implementation of a Love Your Block (LYB) program. By way of the LYB grant, the City will provide competitive mini-grants, in the form of a $500 Home Depot Gift Card, to neighborhood groups to purchase the supplies needed for their local project. Community groups may also coordinate with City Departments for services (as available) to support the effort. LYB grants encourage community groups to identify priority projects and develop volunteer-fueled solutions to: 1) Improve resident perception of safety, wi...

~Recommendations advocate for additional technological resources~ The Mayor’s Youth Academy Future Leaders Council presented Mayor Dwight C. Jones and Richmond City Council with three recommendations to improve city youth access to additional technological resources during today’s City Council Informal Session. The recommendations grew out of the Future Leaders Council work to develop a youth agenda for teens in the city of Richmond. The three technological recommendations were: 1) City recreation centers should be equipped with Wi-Fi hot spots where internet is accessible. With this improvement youth will be able to connect their laptops, iPads, and smart phone devices to the internet. 2) City public libraries should designate ten to fifteen computers with limitless time for research projects, research papers, filling out job applications, college admittance applications, and financial aid. 3) Richmond Public Schools should assign employees to come before and after...

Eleven recognized by city’s Economic and Community Development Department The city of Richmond’s Department of Economic and Community Development recognized local area businesses with an event titled  “City of Richmond Businesses – Worth Their Weight in Gold.”  The event was held on   June 7, 2012, at 7:30 a.m. in the ballroom of the newly renovated John Marshall and was held in honor of Business Appreciation Week as designated in Virginia for the week of June 4 - 8, 2012. Mayor Dwight C. Jones addressed award recipients at the breakfast event where businesses were recognized for their impact on job creation, business retention and attraction and investment fueling Richmond’s economy. “This event gives us an opportunity to provide collective and individual recognition of area businesses that have contributed greatly to the economic fabric of our city,” said Mayor Jones. “Richmond is home to an array of small businesses as well as Fortune 1000 companies,...

~Innovative plan to ensure that low-income students are reading on grade-level by the end of third grade picked from more than 100 applicants~ An ambitious plan to ensure that more city of Richmond children are reading at grade level by the end of third grade has been chosen as a finalist for the All-America City Award , sponsored each year by the National Civic League.   The plan was submitted by a community coalition that included Richmond Public Library Richmond Public Schools, the City of Richmond’s Early Childhood Development Initiative, and United Way of Greater Richmond and Petersburg. Other partners include Communities in Schools, RVA Promise Neighborhood, Children’s Museum of Richmond, and the Literacy Institute at VCU. Richmond is one of 32 finalists selected through a peer review process from a field of more than 100 entries across the country. Winners will be announced July 2 in Denver, Colorado. Beyond the award contest, Richmond’s plan makes the city a ch...

For the past couple years the City has been reviewing ways to cut costs in the Division of Solid Waste, while enhancing resident services. A major change that will be implemented in July 9, 2012 is the elimination of Friday trash collection. Residents who currently have Friday pick-up will be placed in other week days. Beginning this week, bright green notification stickers will be placed on supercans alerting residents who are impacted of their new collection day.  Elderly and disabled residents who are registered for ‘backdoor’ service will continue to receive it. The Department of Public Works will conduct community outreach aimed at educating the public so the transition will run as smoothly as possible. Also, beginning                June 1, residents will be able to go to the City’s website and key in their address to find out their collection day.  This change to a four day operation for the Division of Solid Waste will reduce...

Mayor Dwight C. Jones and Student Government Association (SGA) Presidents from Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Monroe Park Campus and Virginia Union University (VUU) joined a conference call today that was hosted by President Barack Obama to encourage Congress to prevent college loan rates from doubling. During the national call, the President encouraged students and public officials to request Congressional action to prevent student loan rates from doubling for more than 7.4 million students, adding an average of $1000 to their debt. The U.S. Senate is scheduled to vote on college interest loan rates on May 8. Students participating on the President's call were asked to spread the word by using social media and the hashtag #DontDoubleMyRate to encourage Congress to act. "We need to do everything we can to put higher education within reach of every resident," said Mayor Jones. "Higher education cannot be a luxury that is obtainable by only a small few. Access ...