Alexandria — To the Editor:
On June 2, I attended a meeting of the Old and Historic District Board of Architectural Review (BAR) at City Hall. After addressing only one consent item on the docket, a work session on the redevelopment of the southern Robinson Terminal ensued, not in the Council Chambers but in the Council’s Work Room which is a short move across the hall.
As everyone knows who has ever attended one of these work sessions, the table in the work room is not “miked up” so it is always extremely hard to hear the proceedings. Many of the 20 or so citizens in attendance obviously missed some of the comments made by members of the BAR. If the city is not going to specify that mikes are to be used in the work room then move the session into the Council Chambers where every comment is audible.
More importantly, in the interest of total transparency and full disclosure, every work session conducted by the Council, the Planning Commission and the BAR all should be televised. That decision would dictate that all work sessions should stay inside the Council Chambers.
By doing that everyone in the Alexandria community would be able to watch the entire proceedings. Now that’s good government.
Townsend A. “Van” Van Fleet
Alexandria