Are Diamonds A Board’s Best Friend?

Y’all. I literally can’t help it with the silly titles. I dad joke, too. But all cheesiness aside, I’ve scored some great background information for you today that I hope adds clarity to the unfolding debate around the Arthur Ashe Jr Athletic Center (AAJAC).

You can read a recap of the initial, May 16, board discussion here , or watch it for yourself here. The gist is:

• The Arthur Ashe site is part of the 67-acre Diamond District redevelopment plan.

• The City owns this property. (Per Richmond Parcel Mapper)

• RPS has managed this property for about 40 years.

• RPS wants the City to pay the school district for this property.

• RPS wants assurances that - in the absence of the AAJAC - the city will help relocate the building’s current functions so RPS can continue to serve the athletic needs of its students.

But why are we even talking about this right now? What is at risk? Who has the power? And what does it all mean for the future of RPS students? We reached out to the city’s Office of Equitable Development, and the 2nd District’s City Council representative for some additional context (specifically, source documents that can be found throughout the city website and that we’ve linked below). Here’s what we learned, starting from the beginning:

In 2017, the City of Richmond set out to design a 20-year plan for “equitable and sustainable growth.” This plan - Richmond 300 - was unanimously adopted in 2020, and centers community needs of “environmental justice, walkability, and economic growth.”

One exciting part of this plan calls for the redevelopment of the Diamond District. Its location - proximate to the interstate, and at the junction of several strong, growing communities - makes it an ideal location for a mixed-use entertainment district, anchored by the baseball Diamond. Think: signature buildings, parks, and high-density residential use to help address the city’s need for additional, and affordable, housing - 5% of which will be prioritized, in cooperation with RRHA, for the replacement/relocation of willing residents from Gilpin Court.

As a city resident - I am pumped at the promise of this project. More restaurants for me, more housing for new neighbors, and more things to do with my family.

As participants in Richmond Public Schools, this project also serves my family in a big way:

Our city needs more revenue. Richmond (including RPS) runs in large part on property taxes, and a huge portion of our properties - 8,500 acres - are tax exempt. Between universities, government buildings, and churches, our city misses out on about $90 million worth of annual revenue. These institutions also continue to expand across our city, in the absence of city investment into other community needs like housing, commerce, etc.

One important way to increase city revenue, then, is to increase the value of the properties we CAN tax. Properties like the low-density, low-value, largely industrial space around the Diamond.

One of the “Diamond District” properties in question is, of course, the 40-year-old Arthur Ashe Jr Athletic Center. This athletic facility includes an indoor track and basketball courts - but we heard in Monday’s meeting that it's also home to academic competitions, convocations, and musical celebrations. There is much love for this building, and really strong feelings about its potential razing.

But Richmond is prone to nostalgia, so let’s sidebar for a quick reality check: the AAJAC is forty years old, and - like me - it’s showing a bit more wear-and-tear every year. This also isn’t news: for four years, community members have attended Diamond District redevelopment meetings, describing the site as functionally obsolete. Which makes sense - because our district (our state!) is billions of dollars behind investing in safe, modern school facilities. (We talk about that in depth here.)

The school board acknowledged the burden of maintaining its facilities back in October 2021, when it approved a resolution to “not authorize any expenditure for the purpose of renovations to facilities that neither function nor are not intended to function principally as a school….”

This, during a heated debate over replacing George Wythe with a smaller school, when half of the board hoped to reallocate Wythe-construction funds to renovate Woodville Elementary and the Altria Trade School property.

Four months later, fate added to the district’s facility priority list: an emergency restoration of William Fox Elementary, and urgent repairs to RPS’s only swing-space, Clark Springs Elementary.

RPS alone is drowning in about $2B worth of facility construction/maintenance needs, and - in this October vote - the board agreed it couldn’t even consider maintenance investments for non-instructional facilities (like the Arthur Ashe Center) for at least another 11 months.

With this degree of need, it’s totally understandable that the School Board would want to get every penny they’re owed for this property.

Before we circle back to AAC, let's have a quick lesson in “surplus” properties in the state of Virginia:

School systems cannot sell their own property. When they decide to offload a property in their portfolio - it goes through the “surplus” process. It is returned to the city, and the city handles the sale. Per City Code, any resulting proceeds are “assigned to support public schools in the City.” Specifically, this money is earmarked for “the construction of new public school facilities or for the capital repair or renovation of existing active school properties.”

That’s pretty exciting, right? Especially because - if the City sells Arthur Ashe as part of the redevelopment (which is still to-be-determined) - RPS will need to invest in some sort of replacement facility to meet the athletic needs of district students. Using recent construction costs as an estimate, a 72,000 sqft replacement at $324 each would cost more like $23 million, plus the cost of land. The $8MM payout that Jonathan Young keeps citing surely won’t cover the bill, but it makes a significant dent!

At the heart of the conflict: RPS does *NOT* own the AAJAC. The school district manages the property through an “informal contract.” But, in title and deed - it is city property. Since the schools do not own it, they cannot surplus the building, and they are not entitled to proceeds.

Forty years ago there was essentially a handshake agreement that the schools would manage the building on behalf of the city, and now everybody is reading into the arrangement what they want to see.

I’m DEFINITELY not a lawyer. But I AM a texter. So I’ll summarize the two sides via (totally made up) text:

Now - because we’re unapologetically Team Kid - it must be stated that the needs of the children have taken a back seat to the petulant politics. The spirit of the law is meant to ensure that school districts recoup costs when property they manage and invest in gets sold. So, despite the legal technicality, it feels like there ought to be some middle option here. ESPECIALLY if an unintended consequence of the city’s “no payout for you” stance means interrupting student access to an athletic facility.

Some good news here is that the City’s RFI does offer a commitment to assist “in relocating the functions at AAJAC, demolishing the current building, and redeveloping the current AAJAC site as part of the larger Diamond District redevelopment.” (pg 13)

This gives the RPS school board a variety of opportunities to advocate on behalf of the students they serve. They can:

• Communicate the facility’s current functions. How does RPS use this space?

• Collaborate with the city as to where these functions can best serve the students using them. Is there a more equitable location that is also proximate to the greatest number of students who use this facility?

• Consider whether there’s an opportunity to outsource student’s athletic needs. Federal funding through the American Rescue Plan is providing $78 million for several new community centers in Richmond. Maybe these spaces can serve in place of the Arthur Ashe Center, while simultaneously reducing the burden on RPS’s limited maintenance budget.

• Ask the city to fund a larger CIP budget next year. This is the proper channel through which RPS’ needs are provided for.

[Note: A KidsFirst contributor noted that no school board members were present at the diamond district community engagement event on Wednesday]

I could not identify whose responsibility it is to be having these conversations with the city on behalf of RPS. Is it the whole board? Are there one or more board members acting as a liaison to the city’s development office? Given the board’s history of muzzling the superintendent - I wonder if the administration is similarly discouraged from communicating with the city.

These are all questions to keep in mind as the board deliberates this matter. On behalf of our children, I continue to push for collaborative leadership and a constructive RPS-City relationship.

If you found this information helpful, please consider sharing it with a few of your friends. Our goal is to keep families engaged in RPS by making dense subject matter like this one “digestible.” As always, if you have thoughts you’d like to share with your elected representative, you may find all of their contact information listed here.