RICHMOND, Va. — Denise Rimes was part of a group of city and community leaders, including Richmond Mayor Danny Avula, who recently toured Rudd’s Mobile Home Park on the city’s Southside.
“I personally was floored, no pun intended, with the fact that the floors were falling in. The ceilings were falling in. There was an electrical panel that was completely inoperative. There were homes with no heat and no air,” Rimes said.
Rimes serves on the Healthy Homes Committee under RISC, which stands for Richmonders Involved to Strengthen Our Communities.
The group is made up of 28 congregations across the area that share a belief in justice within their various faith traditions.
At their Tuesday night Action Assembly, RISC and 2,000 of their members are expected to press Mayor Avula and city leaders for commitments to address affordable housing, living conditions in mobile homes, and gun violence.
The RISC Action Assembly is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at St. Paul’s Baptist Church at 4247 Creighton Road.
RISC said there are 400 mobile homes in desperate need of repair across the city.
Over the last three years, RISC said the city has allocated a total of $1.6 million for a mobile home repair program, which will repair approximately 100 homes (30 homes have been repaired to date).
“We will ask Mayor Avula to commit to $6 million over the next three years to solve this problem once and for all,” according to a press release.
VPM News’s Keyris Manzanares first reported Avula’s tour of the mobile home park and pressed him on funding for the mobile home repair program.
“We have to address some of the housing needs of our community, and we need to be committed and consistent in putting money behind that,” Mayor Avula told Manzanares after his tour. “That is work I am going to do in the remaining weeks I have to mold the budget.”
Mayor Avula is scheduled to present his first budget proposal for fiscal year 2026 to City Council on Thursday at 3 p.m. at City Hall.
Marty Wegbreit serves as a member of the Affordable Housing Steering Committee under RISC.
“More than half of Richmond tenants are rent-burdened, which means they’re paying more than 30% of their income for rent. One in five is paying more than 50% of their income for rent. If you’re paying more than half of your income for rent, an eviction lawsuit is not just a possibility, it is an inevitability,” Wegbreit said. “I used to work for Central Virginia Legal Aid Society, and I would see that all the time.”
Wegbreit showed CBS 6 then-mayoral candidate Avula’s “plan to meet affordable housing needs in the City of Richmond.”
“We need policies that facilitate large-scale investments in expanding the supply in Richmond for all income levels, but with specific emphasis on affordable housing. Too few new housing units built in recent years have been truly affordable,” Avula wrote in his campaign materials.
Avula's plans also included a commitment to “substantially expand investments in the Affordable Housing Trust Fund, utilizing a sustainable, dedicated source of funding.”
RISC Co-President Rev. Marvin Gilliam said Richmond Police and City Hall have done good work to reduce the number of homicides compared to last year. Yet Gilliam said one death is one too many.
“Gun violence doesn't just impact the shooter and the person who's being shot, but also impacts our families. It impacts our communities, impacts our schools, and impacts everybody,” he stated.
At the Action Assembly, RISC will publicly ask Mayor Avula for a commitment to, within 90 days, contract with REAL Life and the National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform to implement the Gun Violence Reduction Strategy (GVRS).
Gilliam said they have done their research, and these programs are working in major cities like Philadelphia, Oakland, and Boston.
Part of those programs involves reaching out directly to offenders and getting to the root of their actions.
“Oftentimes, life coaches are those who have themselves been involved in gun violence and have chosen a different way. They really have an understanding and a unique perspective to be able to impact their lives,” Gilliam explained.
Their goal would be for the institute's employees to visit Richmond and train law enforcement, life coaches, and social service partners.
“We have a lot of the pieces in place here in Richmond. I think coordination is a real big part of how we can bring those things together so that folks can get connected with what they need,” Gilliam said.
Former Mayor Levar Stoney and His Prior Commitments to RISC
As RISC prepares to press Richmond’s new mayor, they mentioned in a press release that their demands weren’t fulfilled by the prior administration.
“RISC called upon [then-Mayor Levar Stoney] for four years to implement a proven, evidence-based gun violence intervention program. He refused all four years, even after local nonprofit REAL LIFE was awarded state and federal funding to implement the program,” the group wrote in the release.
Zach Marcus serves as Stoney’s campaign manager as the former mayor runs for Virginia lieutenant governor as a Democrat.
He wrote in a statement that Stoney is proud of his record of success during his eight years as mayor when it comes to addressing gun violence.
During that time, there was a 25% reduction in violent crime, a 64% decrease in gun violence affecting children, and a 40% decrease in violent incidents involving children, Marcus wrote.
“These achievements were enabled by a whole-government, whole-community Gun Violence Prevention and Intervention Framework created under Mayor Stoney’s watch. Some key components of the GVPI Framework include the Positive Youth Development Fund, Trauma Healing Response Network, ‘We Matter RVA’ program, Community Mediators, hot spot curves and camera technology through the police department, and hospital-based intervention. All these programs and services work in tandem to address neighborhood safety while simultaneously reaching the root causes of crime to improve opportunities available to the most underserved residents in the city,” Marcus’ statement read.
RISC also alleged that Mayor Stoney “ignored” an ordinance establishing a dedicated stream of funding for the Affordable Housing Trust Fund from revenue from expiring tax abatements.
“To date, no bonds have been sold, and no money has been put into the Trust Fund in the last three years,” RISC’s release stated.
Marcus responded that the Stoney administration created or preserved over 6,000 units of affordable housing since 2017 and invested more than $100 million into affordable housing, in addition to the creation of a successful Affordable Housing Performance Grant Program.
“Mayor Stoney is proud of the work that was accomplished but knows there is more that can be done. That is why he is running for lieutenant governor to bring additional opportunities from the state level so localities like Richmond can continue to invest in housing opportunities so all residents can afford to live and thrive in their communities,” Marcus said in the statement.
CBS 6 is committed to sharing community voices on this important topic. Email your thoughts to the CBS 6 Newsroom.
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