Four Days in Oxford; Water Bill Tsunami; Demolishing A True Understanding of Our History.

RVA 5x5 - August 30, 2024

No algorithms. No content filters. No A.I. — Honest and insightful analysis from Richmond, VA.

Have a great and safe Labor Day weekend! This week check out our stories on:

• A look at the details surrounding Mayor Stoney’s former communications director (who spent $98,000 of city finds with her former business partner’s firm) also spent $8,000 to go to Oxford University (yes, the one in England) for a four-day seminar on how to become a Chief of Staff.

• Meanwhile, closer to home, yet another story about a city resident who, instead of spending $8,000 to go to Oxford, is instead being billed $8,400+ for his water bill and after eight months, no one can provide an answer or “the fix.”

• The fight is not yet over to save the Richmond Community Hospital, but it is inching closer to the deadline in which it is sadly more likely than not that the “leadership” at Virginia Union will bulldoze history in favor of more housing.

STORY #1 —Four Days in Oxford
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the cesspool of corruption and inefficiency, Samuel Parker at the Times-Dispatch discovered that the city’s former Strategic Communications Director Petula Burks — you remember, the one who spent more than $98,000 on her city credit card with a former business partner of hers in just six months in 2023 — well, she appeared back in the news this week after it was uncovered that she spent almost $8,000 of city funds to attend a four-day conference at Oxford University in England in July 2022 not long after being hired.

When asked by the Times-Dispatch why the city would send Burks to an executive leadership program hosted by the Chiefs of Staff Association entitled “Connecting the World’s Chiefs of Staff” 3,500 miles away, all the city could come up with was sending Deputy Communications Director Margaret Ekam to say that Burks “no longer works for the city.” And at the Mayor’s press conference this week, when asked about it, Stoney also offered a nothing burger and simply relied that the question “is about person who no longer works here at the City of Richmond.” 

What no one can answer is why would a Communications Director fly to England for a training program about Chiefs of Staff? The organization also offers online training and certification courses that don’t require airfare.  

The web site of the organization says:
The Chief of Staff Association is the international professional association for chiefs of staff, representing members in over seventy countries. Are you a chief of staff looking to expand your network, access world-class education and gain professional certification?