ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, April 2, 1996 TAG: 9604020066
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAN CASEY STAFF WRITER
The Rev. Charles Green predicted Monday that the public will boycott a hearing on a referendum for a modified ward system in Roanoke because people don't trust City Council.
Green is president of the Roanoke chapter of the NAACP and a leader in a movement to have Roanoke voters abandon at-large elections for a different system. He told council Monday that many pro-referendum voters don't trust thecouncil because it rejected a referendum last year after all seven members had promised to support one.
He asked council to cancel the April 22 public hearing, which council scheduled two weeks ago. But the hearing is still on because no other members supported Councilwoman Linda Wyatt's motion to cancel it.
Green told council members the public hearing ought to be moved to July, after the new City Council takes office. Elections are May7.
"Many persons who have contacted me believe the same members of City Council will act as they have in the past," Green said. "There have been a lot of promises that have been broken in the past. We have no reason to think that anybody [on council] would do anything different."
After council voted to retain the hearing date, Green predicted citizens would boycott it.
"They don't have trust in the people who will be voting that night. They've turned it down before," he said. "There's only one person up there we trust."
Under Roanoke's existing election system, council members are elected at large, and nobody represents a defined section of the city. A modified ward plan would create election districts, while leaving the mayor and some other members to be elected at large.
Council voted down the referendum March 13, 1995. Opposing it then were Mayor David Bowers; Councilmen William White, Mac McCadden; and Jack Parrott; and Councilwoman Elizabeth Bowles. All of them had promised to support a referendum during their election campaigns.
Voting in favor of the referendum that night were Wyatt, who sponsored it, and former vice mayor John Edwards, who has since been elected to the state Senate.
Bowers, once a strong proponent of a referendum, is the only incumbent seeking re-election who voted against the referendum last year. He said recently that he has changed his mind again and would support it.
Councilman William White said if referendum proponents don't show up April 22, council may vote it down. That didn't seem to bother referendum supporters.
"We have a win-win situation," said the Rev. Leonard Hines, second vice president of the Roanoke Chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. "A lot of people are getting perturbed by the dishonesty on [the current] City Council. ... Whatever they do April 22, we have a new chance with the new City Council" after July1.
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