THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, March 29, 1996 TAG: 9603270111
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Ida Kay's Portsmouth
SOURCE: Ida Kay Jordan
LENGTH: Medium: 90 lines
While Hampton Roads cities seem to have problems getting their act together on many highly visible projects, they work together in many unknown ways to help each other out.
And Portsmouth has been on the receiving end of this generosity over the past couple of weeks.
After the old trees here suffered through the winter storms, the city was a mess with tree limbs all over the place. City crews have been working long and hard to try to get all of the broken limbs and downed trees picked up.
In fact, they collected some 1,500 tons of stuff in February, compared to about 750 tons last February. Concentrating on the storm debris, the crews skipped some of their normal bulk collections, a necessary evil that left junk on the streets and some citizens upset.
For a while, it looked like Portsmouth would be a mess right on through April - even with the city employees working six 10-hour days a week.
Then our neighbors came to the rescue.
Norfolk sent one truck and crew for several days, then last Monday sent five crews and trucks over to help clean up the mess.
Virginia Beach sent one truck and crew for several days and subsequently sent 10 trucks with operators to work here March 23.
Chesapeake, still picking up its own debris, has promised to help if Portsmouth still has problems when Chesapeake crews are finished.
``We felt doomed if we were left to our own resources,'' City Manager Ron Massie said.
Assistant City Manager Luke McCoy, the man who oversees trash collection, called his counterparts in other cities.
``And we were overwhelmed with their support,'' Massie said. ``We probably will be finished with the storm debris this week because of the help from our sister cities.''
Meanwhile, Portsmouth firefighters, along with their counterparts from Norfolk and Virginia Beach, went to Chesapeake to man fire stations last week so Chesapeake firefighters could attend services for two of their colleagues who died in the line of duty.
It's all a quiet sort of regional spirit that we seldom hear about.
``Each time we do these little things, we are laying some groundwork for greater cooperation in the future,'' Massie said.
The agencies that have been created on a regional level - such as those that deal with trash, transportation and planning - were formed because of ``compelling needs,'' Massie said.
People do seem to be able to work together when they can see some immediate gain for themselves.
But, as Massie noted, the real challenge to regional cooperation is something like the proposed arena aimed at attracting a major league sports franchise. That, he said, is ``beyond compelling need.''
Yet there are many people who consider it very important to attract a major league team to the region. For sure, that won't happen unless the cities do get their act together.
The Hampton Roads Mayors and Chairs Caucus, meeting recently at the Children's Museum here, made a start in the right direction. Leaders of Peninsula cities promised cooperation, and only Virginia Beach representatives were hesitant to back the idea of a feasibility study and survey to determine what private support might be available for such a project.
Maybe the other cities on both sides of Hampton Roads need to just go ahead without official Virginia Beach support and see what happens.
Even if the Beach is Virginia's largest city in population, what the Beach wants may not always be the best thing for all of Hampton Roads.
At some point, the other cities need to stand up to the attitude of ``if we can't have it, nobody in Hampton Roads is going to have it.''
The proposed horse-racing track was a perfect example of the spoiler attitude. While I'm relieved that we didn't get picked to host the race track because I think it would have cost us too much money, I still get riled by what happened.
Portsmouth was way out front with its planning and proposal, and it offered other cities the opportunity to participate. Then Virginia Beach decided to go for a track instead of backing the neighboring proposal.
That put Norfolk and other regional cities in a strange position, and nobody openly supported either proposal. Subsequently, a location out of the region, but on its perimeters, was chosen.
No committee was going to get into the political tangle of picking Portsmouth over Virginia Beach, even though the site here certainly was more accessible than the site south of Oceana Naval Air Station. In less visible ways, that happens more than we know.
So it is refreshing when the cities do cooperate, as in the case of the assistance with trash pickup.
Now, if we the people can just get the message to the politicians that we want them to cooperate in bigger ways. by CNB