THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, August 5, 1995 TAG: 9508050272
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Charlise Lyles
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines
George Ricks is a community-minded man, president of his civic league. He's fiercely proud of the nice homes and well-kept lawns in the Greenhill Farms subdivision off Norview Avenue in Norfolk.
He and his civic league buddies figured a summer block party would be an excellent thing for the neighborhood. Another way to help keep it nice and neighborly.
A retired schoolteacher, Mr. Ricks believed in doing things the right way. So he set out for City Hall to inquire about the proper procedures for such a gathering.
That'll be $50 for a permit, plus the $300 or $400 you'll need to pay the $525,000 liability insurance the city requires to cover injury, death or property damage, a bureaucrat told Mr. Ricks.
``Insurance?'' puzzled Mr. Ricks. ``Four hundred dollars?'' Actually, $500 is more like it, according to several insurance carriers.
FIVE HUNDRED BUCKS!
That certainly raises the price tag on a quaint little you-bring-the-potato-salad-I'll-bring-the-hot-dogs neighborhood gathering, placing it right up there with a wedding reception, a 40th-birthday bash, taking the family to King's Dominion.
Always a man to probe more deeply, Mr. Ricks requested to see the city code wherein the insurance policy was written. But Section 29-69 made no mention of insurance.
Whereupon, another civic servant responded that the policy is based on the state code.
Mr. Ricks returned home to his nice neighborhood considerably dismayed at the high price of maintaining community.
``This was for togetherness, to share ideas, to get to know people who have moved in, to let them know that we are friendly and open,'' said Mr. Ricks.
Mr. Ricks said he understands that the city must protect its right of way, and that a lawsuit over injuries would waste the money of tax-paying citizens like himself.
Still, Mr. Ricks departed City Hall feeling considerably annoyed.
It also bothered Mr. Ricks that, based on his informal on-the-spot poll, most of the folk whom he encountered at City Hall that day live in Virginia Beach.
Undaunted, Mr. Ricks and his civic league have filed for a permit for their Aug. 19 party and have requested that the city review its insurance requirement.
This week, Norfolk's risk management office telephoned several area cities to investigate their policies.
It found, as I did, that not one requires insurance for a block party, despite the state code. Not Portsmouth with a landscape just as urban as Norfolk's. And not Chesapeake, where residents request up to 50 block-party permits per year, the most in the area.
Some cities charge permit fees as high as $77, and in some cases, restrict parties to cul-de-sacs or dead-end streets.
But, said Norfolk spokeswoman Kathy Bulman, Norfolk must ``err on the side of caution. If someone backs a car out and injures someone, who do you think will be sued? The city.''
We do live in a litigious society.
``It feels so good in my hood tonight,'' sings Montell Jordan in one of the summer's hottest hip-hop jams. ``To all my neighbors, you've got much flavor.'' Sounds to me like Jordan is having a block party.
Those lyrics are an anthem to the virtues of the ``hood,'' - practically a term of endearment. In these times when concern for our neighborhoods has risen anew, it's unsettling to see that one means of creating community has become cost-prohibitive. by CNB