12 The Hampton Roads Messenger


Volume 14 Number 6


Around Hampton Roads Burns & McDonnell Expanding


in Chesapeake CHESAPEAKE, Va., -- To make room for significant expansion — doubling the size of its local workforce within the next three years — Burns & McDonnell has relocated operations in Chesapeake, Virginia.


Part of an international team of 7,600 professionals, the Burns & McDonnell office in Chesapeake performs engineering, consulting, architecture, construction


and and environmental environmental services infrastructure needs in the Mid-Atlantic region. services to support facilities infrastructure needs in the Mid-Atlantic region.


The engineering, construction and architecture firm's new office is within the Liberty Executive Office Park at 1317 Executive Boulevard. The new 27,000-square-foot office occupies the entire third floor of the Liberty III building. Featuring state-of-the-art conference centers and digital design areas, the space has room to accommodate 125 professionals. The expansion in Chesapeake is part of the firm's overall growth nationwide — hiring approximately 1,000 professionals annually.


Part of an international team of 7,600 professionals, the Burns & McDonnell office in Chesapeake performs engineering, construction, architecture, consulting and environmental services to support facilities and infrastructure needs in the Mid-Atlantic region. Burns & McDonnell first opened its doors locally in 2010 and has since supported hundreds of projects for utility, healthcare, higher education, commercial, manufacturing, aviation and government clients.


"We've proudly called Chesapeake home for nearly a decade, supporting critical infrastructure project needs throughout the region," says Jeffrey Ganthner, AIA, vice president and general manager of Mid-Atlantic offices for Burns & McDonnell. "We're expanding our presence here and along the east coast to continue strengthening our communities and delivering top- notch, comprehensive solutions to our clients."


Hampton Revenues Projected to Grow 3.2%


City Council got some good news about revenue growth, and then tackled a long list of projects that could use that money — and then some — for strategic priorities.


Karl Daughtrey, finance director, projected that revenue for next year would increase by $11.2 million, or 3.2 percent. That would be the biggest revenue increase the city has seen since 2008 without a tax rate increase, Daughtrey said.


While that’s a “significant increase” from the recession and post-recession years, Daughtrey said 3 percent annual growth is the amount a city really needs for a sustainable budget.


“This is really big news,” said City Manager Mary Bunting. With growth projected in most revenue categories, Bunting said it showed that Council’s economic vision of reinvestment in commercial, retail and hotel strategies was reaping benefits. Among the areas with projected growth: property taxes (led by commercial property), meals tax, sales tax, and business license tax.


Daughtrey cautioned that city leaders won’t get to decide how to spend the entire $11.4 million for fiscal year 2022, which begins July 1. About $2.4 million is already allocated. That includes an additional $1.3 million for schools, according to the funding formula. Not all mandatory spending has been calculated yet, he said. The General Assembly is considering several mandates that would pass costs to localities.


City Council reviewed more than 60 funding requests — some one-time capital costs and others annual operating costs — sorting them into priority groupings.


Among the priorities: competitive compensation and raises to retain and attract talented staff, putting artificial turf at Darling Stadium, staffing and operating costs for neighborhood centers in Fox Hill and Olde Hampton when they open, expanding the summer youth employment program and the workforce initiative, increased police staffing and equipment, relocating the police firing range, infrastructure improvements, housing investments, Resilient Hampton projects, bus stop improvements, blight abatement funds and increased staffing for codes enforcement.


Bunting said that, as staff develops recommended budgets for capital and operating expenses, they will try to meet as many of the priorities as is financially possible.


Bunting will also reach out to city residents and businesses and give them a chance to talk about their priorities, in a variety of settings and times of day:


March 12, 6:30 – 8 p.m. will be an online opportunity to ask questions via Facebook Live online


March 14, 9:30 – 11:30 a.m. will be an in-person meeting at Sandy Bottom Nature Park meeting room


to support facilities


Part of an international team of 7,600 professionals, the Burns & McDonnell office in Chesapeake performs engineering, consulting, architecture, construction


and


March 2020


March 17, 11:30 a.m. – 1 p.m., Facebook Live online


Two smaller and more informal chats give residents the opportunity to sit down with the city manager in more casual settings. Residents are invited to purchase a beverage and join her:


March 10, 8:30 – 10 a.m., over coffee at the Willow Oaks McDonald’s March 19, 5:30 – 7 p.m., at Oozlefinch brewery on Fort Monroe


and Students Showcase Computer


Science Skills Challenge Teams of fourth and fifth grade students from all Newport News elementary schools recently participated in an Engineering Design Challenge. The design challenge, Coding Our Freedom, was held in partnership with the U.S. Navy and required teams to progress through four increasingly complex challenges using integrated computer science, technology and math skills. The challenges were designed to mirror tasks required by jobs in the Navy.


The first challenge was to build a prototype of an unmanned submarine using LEGOs, which had to pass inspection. Students then had to decipher a secret password using Binary Code. With the correct password in hand, teams worked to code an Unmanned Surface Vehicle through a maze. The last step in the design challenge required teams to use a computer to code and navigate an object to a target and lead it back to safety.


Congratulations to the first place winners from Saunders Elementary School! Students from Dutrow Elementary placed second and the team from Richneck Elementary came in a close third. Thank you to the U.S. Navy for partnering with Newport News Public Schools for this innovative competition, which helps Newport News students become college, career and citizen ready!


Daughter Keeps Evelyn Butts’


Civil Rights Legacy Alive NORFOLK, VA – In partnership with Norfolk State University, the Norfolk Public Library is honored to host Charlene Butts Ligon for Women’s History Month on Tuesday, March 24, at noon at the Lyman Beecher Brooks Library Rotunda. Ligon will discuss the book she wrote about her late mother, Evelyn Thomas Butts of Norfolk, FEARLESS: How a poor Virginia seamstress took on Jim Crow, beat the poll tax and changed her city forever.


The date is the 54th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court striking down poll taxes for state and local elections on March 24, 1966, a case that began when Butts filed a lawsuit in 1963 with her attorney, Norfolk’s Joseph A. Jordan Jr.


The book tells the courageous story of Butts (1924-1993), the wife of a disabled World War II Army veteran and mother of three children who became a powerful civil rights activist and voting rights champion. Butts’ 1963 lawsuit eventually was combined with a similar complaint from several individuals in Fairfax County, Virginia, and argued before the U.S. Supreme Court as Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections (1966).


Poll taxes emerged as part of a package of laws throughout the post- Reconstruction South in the late 1800s and early 1900s and were used by white Southern politicians to bypass the 14th and 15th amendments to the U.S. Constitution, which secured civil liberties and voting rights for African Americans.


Under Virginia’s poll tax, any person who wished to register to vote had to pay a poll tax of $1.50 every year for three years preceding an election. Consequently, most blacks were denied the right to vote, but many poor whites became disenfranchised as well because they, too, could not afford the levy. In 1964, the 24th Amendment to the Constitution outlawed poll taxes as a prerequisite for voting in federal elections, but five states retained taxes for state and local elections: Alabama, Mississippi, Texas, Arkansas and Virginia.


On March 24, 1966, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that poll taxes were an unconstitutional violation of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment and that “Voter qualifications have no relation to wealth nor to paying or not paying this or any other tax.” After the ruling, Butts stepped up her voter-participation efforts by helping thousands of African Americans register to vote for the first time. She also spearheaded a variety of voter- education and voter-turnout initiatives and helped found the Concerned Citizens for Political Education, the most influential African American political organization in Norfolk during the 1970s. By the end of the 1970s, Butts was considered one of the region’s most important African American political leaders.


FEARLESS is a story about having the courage to speak your mind and act. The book includes a foreword by Mayor Kenneth Cooper Alexander, Ph.D., the first African American to be elected mayor of Norfolk. Alexander writes of Evelyn Butts, "What she accomplished as a voting rights champion truly


spans the generations and deserves our continued recognition.”


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