Tag Archives: meetings

Witherspoon to share state of city schools, tax increase proposal

Craig Witherspoon speaking at TechFridayBirmingham City Schools superintendent Craig Witherspoon‘s been answering a lot of questions about the current state of the school system in recent weeks.

This photo was taken on Friday morning, May 11, during his remarks at the monthly TechFriday event at Innovation Depot downtown. Earlier in the week he’d appeared with Mayor William Bell at the first of three community meetings where he’s updating parents and concerned citizens about the state of the school system and plans for its future. It’s also been an opportunity for him to explain his proposal for raising property taxes in the city by 3 mills (generating approximately $9 million/year).

Witherspoon will be holding two more of those informational meetings this week. Monday evening, May 14, will take place at the Davis Center, 417 29th St. S. (between Pepper Place and the Lakeview commercial district). Tuesday evening, May 15, will take place at the Don Hawkins Recreation Center, 8920 Roebuck Blvd. with Mayor Bell once again participating and talking about his bond proposal. Both meetings start at 6 p.m.

Meetings to discuss BJCTA service changes continue

BJCTA February 2012 meetingApproximately a dozen regular users of the BJCTA gathered in the transit authority’s board room at Central Station on Friday evening to learn more about proposed service changes.

It was the second of four meetings scheduled through the middle of this week to go over the changes and to receive additional public input. The last two meetings will take place February 21 at the Hawkins Park Recreation Center (8920 Roebuck Blvd., Birmingham – map) from 5:30-7 p.m. and February 22 at the Bessemer Public Library (400 19th St., N., Bessemer – map) from 10-11:30 a.m. The changes will then be voted upon by the transit authority’s board on the afternoon of the 22nd.

Proposed changes (PDF) include: the renumbering and combining of Route 1 (as Routes 10 and 11); the simplification of Route 20 (essentially creating an airport shuttle that runs hourly along Messer Airport Highway, including Saturdays); modifications to Routes 17, 25, 26, 28 44, and 45 that will enable them to stop directly in front of Walmarts located on their routes; and a change in DART service that will provide service up to Vulcan Park.

That abbreviated list of the proposed changes is probably making you want to read about the rest of them as described on the detailed attachment handed out at the meeting, isn’t it? We’ve also got photos of the maps showing the proposed changes in the downtown, western, and eastern sections of the county.

Langford to host town hall meetings

There are actually two stories that are taking place at the same time. First of all is the fact that The City of Birmingham’s Office of Public Information is on Facebook. The group is the latest move by the city to reach out to residents online.

Larry LangfordNow onto the reason for the post – Mayor Larry Langford is hosting a series of town hall meetings throughout the city. The first one, called “Why Birmingham Can’t Wait,” will take place on Thursday evening at Boutwell Auditorium beginning at 6 p.m. Additional ones will be held at area churches in the coming weeks, providing residents with the opportunity to ask the mayor and other representatives about current initiatives and learn about projects such as the planned repaving of neighborhood streets. You get to submit your questions for the mayor to ask as well in advance – via email to opi@birminghamal.gov. If you can’t make it to Boutwell, Fox 6 is scheduled to stream the event on its website.

Photo: Bob Farley/f8Photo

UPDATE: Good viewing for city council’s possible online debut

UPDATE #2: This week’s meeting is now streaming live on the city’s website – and as of 12:39 p.m. they were currently hearing public comments about the Glen Iris item.

UPDATE #1: A quick check of the city’s website now lets us know that meetings will begin streaming next week Tuesday, March 11. Today’s meeting appears as though it will be available in the archives later today though.

As we first shared with you in December, the City of Birmingham’s new website would allow them to do some new things – including giving residents the opportunity to watch live streams of city council meetings from the comfort of their computer monitors. The Birmingham Business Journal reported yesterday that today would be the first time that this feature will be used. A current check of the site though shows only last week’s meeting available in the archives. It will definitely be a good day to watch online if it is in fact available (though it is not currently available as of the posting of this item).

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