Avula administration pushes back hard against plan to toughen residency rules for high-ranking City Hall officials
Mayor Danny Avula’s administration made it crystal clear Wednesday that it strongly opposes a City Council proposal to force more high-ranking City Hall officials to live in city limits going forward instead of allowing them to live in Richmond’s neighboring counties.
A pending ordinance sponsored by six of the Council’s nine members would expand and strengthen an existing residency rule requiring top city officials to live in the city they serve.
The proposal has been championed by first-term Councilor Sarah Abubaker (4th District), who has described it as an effort to bring more accountability to City Hall by forcing its highest-paid administrators to live in the community they serve.
At Wednesday’s hearing on the plan before the Council’s Governmental Operations Committee, Abubaker said some policies are driven by data, and others are driven by “heart.”
“This is one of those things that is heart,” she said. “This is what the people have asked for.”
Ahead of Wednesday’s hearing, the Avula administration sent Council members a four-page memo declaring its opposition, saying the policy would impede the city government's ability to recruit qualified managers. Even though the policy is backed by a majority of the Council, Avula’s memo called the legislation “inappropriate and counterproductive.”
“Fundamentally, we must ask ourselves this question: is the City of Richmond truly serious about obtaining the strongest and most qualified candidates possible for its crucial leadership positions?,” the administration’s memo said.
“If the answer is yes, then we should avoid taking policy steps which hinder our ability to recruit and retain the best talent. That is why the Avula administration respectfully but firmly opposes the proposed ordinance in its current form.”
The pending ordinance — which is expected to be put to a vote at Monday’s regular Council meeting — would expand the list of Richmond officials subject to the city residency rule from 12 officials to 43. People currently working at City Hall would be grandfathered in, meaning the expanded rule would only apply to employees hired or promoted after July 1.
Employees with unique circumstances that may require them to live elsewhere — such as caring for a family member or needing to keep access to educational or medical resources not available in Richmond — would still be allowed to seek a waiver from the residency rule. However, the ordinance would shrink the geographic distance from Richmond allowable under those waivers, dropping it from a 100-mile radius to a 60-mile radius.
Anyone with a child enrolled in elementary or secondary school within a 60-mile radius would also be eligible for a waiver, which would be a new addition to the city’s waiver policy under Abubaker’s proposal.
Recently, city policymakers have watered down the residency rules in an effort to recruit from as broad a talent pool as possible in the greater Richmond area. The pending ordinance would sharply reverse that trend.
“I appreciate that there was a time we felt that Richmond was somehow less than, that we needed to beg people to live here,” said Councilor Kenya Gibson (3rd District) said at the hearing. “And certainly that's no longer the case, if it ever was. This is a wonderful city. We win awards. It's a growing city.”
The Avula administration emphasized Richmond’s housing affordability crisis as a reason to retain flexibility on where top employees can choose to live. Abubaker stressed the rule would only apply to senior officials making healthy six-figure salaries far above what most Richmonders make.
Graham Moomaw
Interim Chief Administrative Officer Sharon Ebert also appeared before the council’s Governmental Operations Committee to speak against the measure, as did Human Resources Director Tyrome Alexander.
“When I came here, there were a lot of people in high-level positions, directorships, that did live in the city that were unfortunately not the most competent people,” Ebert said. “And I think the city has worked very hard over the last four or five years to create an environment and a culture where we support our employees. And most importantly, where we’ve tried to level the playing field so that we are competing in the region and across the entire state and sometimes basically across the nation.”
Ebert said some potential hires may want to live outside Richmond for “personal reasons.”
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Alexander said over 80% of the Richmond region’s population lives outside city limits, and stricter residency rules would eliminate many people who might be interested in applying for director-level jobs.
Abubaker — who led Wednesday’s meeting in the absence of Councilor Katherine Jordan (2nd District, the committee’s regular chair) — showed no signs of backing down.
“It feels disingenuous and verging on disparaging to say that we do not have the ability as a city of recruiting top talent who want to live here,” Abubaker said. “What does that say that we believe about our city? We all choose to live here and to be participants in this community. And it makes us better civil servants and public servants because of that.”
Avula’s opposition to the Council proposal comes just days after the legislative body approved the mayor’s appointee to be the city’s next chief administrative officer, the top unelected role at City Hall. On Monday, the Council approved the hire of Atlanta official Odie Donald II, even though some members voiced frustration that Avula had given them only a few days to confirm the selection. Donald, who starts his Richmond job on July 9, will be required to live in the city.
Abubaker and Gibson voted to advance the proposal to the full Council with a recommendation to approve it.
For Avula to block the proposal, it appears he would need to flip some of the Council members who have signed onto it as patrons.
In addition to Abubaker and Gibson, the other patrons are Councilors Nicole Jones (9th District), Reva Trammell (8th District), Andrew Breton (1st District) and Stephanie Lynch (5th District).
After the meeting, Ebert told The Richmonder she lives in the city. Alexander, the HR director, said he lives in the Varina area of Henrico County.
Contact Reporter Graham Moomaw at gmoomaw@richmonder.org
