LETTER: Make Old Library Available to Community Groups

March 12, 2013

DEAR EDITOR,

Cape Charles is about to have a beautiful new library. The old library building and excess computers should be provided to organizations that are focused on community activities, both educational and recreational.

Concerned Citizens of Cape Charles, a non-profit organization, was formed by local residents in 1989. The working class community organized to be better informed, educated, and empowered to become a part of the civic decision-making process, and to accept responsibility for self improvement and in turn community improvements at a time when the Town did not have the human or financial resources to sustain itself.

The organization’s mission is to improve the lives and living conditions of the working class residents through human development and the creation and development of a sustainable community.

Concerned Citizens became the advocate and the voice for the disenfranchised. The organization brought many resources to Cape Charles, including hundreds of student volunteers who worked on community projects including installing shelves in the Library, painting a senior’s house, moving scenery at Arts Enter, and gardening at the Museum.

The group also fought for changes to promote community stability such as zoning laws that allowed in-fill housing development and other laws favorable to improving the quality of life.

Channel 10 was on our side when the Town wanted to use $1.2 million in Community Development Block Grants for infrastructure improvements instead of the most critical need of housing rehabilitation.

Concerned Citizens also brought national media attention to its fight to save the predominantly African-American Northeast neighborhood when a developer’s plan for a resort retirement community would have destroyed the neighborhood and displaced its residents. [Read more…]

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