Letter to Richmond Mayor Avula about the Threat to the Historic Westwood Neighborhood.

Below is a copy of a letter Selden just sent the Richmond mayor. It is a shame that residents of Westwood, a tiny but important community at Willow Lawn Drive and Patterson Avenue, have to once again band together and resist yet another legalistic assault by an indifferent and uncaring City administration. The importance of this neighborhood can’t be underestimated, and the threat to it is very real. The Shockoe Examiner explored the significance of Westwood years ago – please read this entry that illuminates the history of the neighborhood, its role in the struggle for Civil Rights, and why an appeal to the Mayor is so important.                                                                                                                

Dear Mayor Avula:

The historic neighborhood of Westwood is again under attack, and it is remarkable how often this tiny African-American Richmond community has faced destruction and persevered.  Richmond has a terrible record of destroying its Black neighborhoods: Jackson Ward was gutted by I-95, Fulton was turned into an urban prairie, and Navy Hill was bulldozed into Shockoe Valley.

As horrific as all that sounds, none of these disasters of civic planning was fueled by the overt racial prejudice that once drove an effort to erase the entire Westwood neighborhood down to the ground and disperse the families who had been there for generations.  And yet, Westwood prevailed and survived.

In recognition of its astonishing past and fragile present, the community has been recently named to the list of Preservation Virginia’s “Most Endangered” list.  Nevertheless, Westwood is again under siege by an insensitive bureaucratic assault called “Code Refresh.”  This ham-handed revision of the city zoning code would allow more density on the existing street grid.  The affordable homes and lots in Westwood have already felt the attention of developers in their neighborhood, builders who are snatching up houses and properties.

Mashing more density into Westwood’s existing housing stock will forever alter the character of the neighborhood and rising taxes will disperse the current residents.  This triumph of the developer is the result of insensitive and poor planning on the part of the “Code Refresh” proponents.  Places like Westwood desperately need to be exempted from “one size fits all” planning, and Richmonders look to your office to provide the kind of leadership and vision to understand this.

Mayor Avula, a myth in our country exalts real estate developers as kings.  Let’s not allow Richmond’s future to become yet another victim of that horrid idea.  Revise “Code Refresh” to accommodate our past – it is ours to have or lose, and as they well know in Westwood, it is up to us to defend our history.  We need your help and support.

Sincerely, 

Selden Richardson

To contact Richmond Mayor Danny Avula, call the Mayor's Office at (804) 646-7970 or email RVAMayor@rva.gov.  

You can also visit or send mail to the office at 900 E. Broad St., Suite 201, Richmond, VA 23219