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Charlottesville residents reflect five years after Unite the Right

For Larry Sabato, the University of Virginia is home. As a professor of political science, he lives on the lawn -- the center of a campus where he arrived more than fifty years ago. For him it seemed an ideal place until white supremacists staged a torch-light march on August 11th of 2017.

"It was so horrible I was half serious when I called for an exorcism," he says. "I’m not especially religious, but I wanted to see an exorcism, because I had a hard time looking at the lawn without seeing them marching down the lawn and then attacking students and beating some of them up in front of the Rotunda."

An injured man is treated by medics during Unite the Right.
RadioIQ
An injured man is treated by medics during Unite the Right.

Since then, he’s watched as the university and the city worked to restore a sense of calm and community.

"We have had the problems placed on our plate in a very dramatic way, and many other college communities have not had that happen. If it does happen there, they’ll be surprised to discover how many problems are just under the surface that haven’t been addressed," he says.

Like affordable housing, equal educational opportunities and fair policing. Sabato thinks there has been progress, but he admits he’s a white guy, and the city’s Black residents may not agree.

One member of that community is Lisa Woolfork, also a professor at UVA, a community organizer and head of a group called Black Women Stitch.

"I founded it in the wake of these attacks, because my all white quilt group totally rejected me after these events.," she explains. "They were very much on the side of, ‘If you don’t want to get hit by a car, stay on the sidewalk.’

Some residents defied the city's advice and showed up to oppose white supremacists.
RadioIQ
Some residents defied the city's advice and showed up to oppose white supremacists.

Woolfork was dismayed by the city’s advice to its residents before Unite the Right.

"Don’t meet the Nazis in the street. Ignore them and they will go away. If you go to protest, you’re giving them what they want, which is attention."

She thinks Americans should stand up against white supremacy and fascism at every opportunity, but community activist Herb Dickerson isn’t so sure. He’s glad many of his friends and neighbors stayed away from Unite the Right.

“It probably would have been a slaughter had we gone down there," he says. "We had the sense not to go down there. That’s why you didn’t see a whole lot of black men at the event in Charlottesville."

At the time, Dickerson worked for the local homeless shelter right across the street from the rally site. That morning he saw eight men in military-style uniforms walking down Market Street and assumed they were with the national guard, but one of them set the record straight.

“He said. 'We are the white people who are here to protect the white people,' and of course I said to my self, “oh, s__t. I better get in this building, because they got AK47, they got pistols.'”

Hundreds of state police officers were sent to Charlottesville, but they did nothing to stop the violence.
RadioIQ
Hundreds of state police officers were sent to Charlottesville, but they did nothing to stop the violence.

Dickerson agrees with Sabato and Woolfork. Police could have prevented or stopped much of the violence that occurred.

“You had 300-400 state police in town and then you’ve got the regular police in town, so if they had just lined up on Market Street between the park and the parking lot where the protesters were, a lot of the violence would probably never have happened.”

And he doesn’t think the city has made much progress in hiring and training its cops. Lisa Woolfork is not surprised.

“And that’s because they have no remorse, and that’s why things aren’t going to change.”

She says too many people believe Unite the Right was an attack by outsiders on a community that was doing just fine.

"We were peaceful, loving people living our own lives, and then these naughty white supremacists just came out of nowhere and made us feel bad. That’s not the truth. The truth is the main organizers of this rally were graduates of the University of Virginia. They were escorted by university police. Concern seemed to only be for the safety of historic buildings, but the police weren’t available it seemed to help community members and students when these same torch-bearing bigots attacked them.”

She argues campus, city and state police faced no consequences for their failure to protect the public, and local government has failed to enact policies that would end racist behavior in law enforcement, housing and public schools.

"So many places are rolling back any discussion of black history, any discussion of a topic that makes white people feel uneasy."

Nichole Flores (L), Mariana Teles, Hudson Galino and Thais Teles observe a moment of silence at UVA for the victims of Unite the Right.
RadioIQ
Nichole Flores (L), Mariana Teles, Hudson Galino and Thais Teles observe a moment of silence at UVA for the victims of Unite the Right.

Former mayor and state delegate David Toscano sees things in a more positive light. He argues Charlottesville and the nation learned from what happened here.

“Charlottesville got people’s attention in terms of the degree to which we’ve got problems in this country, and I think that we understand a lot more about our history and have tried to put policies in place in many places to deal with these issues.”

Of course nothing happened right away. Angry residents disrupted meetings of city council for months, but as COVID took hold and people were forced to attend meetings online, the chance to disrupt disappeared. Toscano thinks the city is getting back on track and hopes it’s better prepared should extremists return to town.

“The city simply didn’t plan and as a result we were left with what we were left with, and that was a tragedy,” Toscano concludes.

Some residents, like Dickerson, say little has changed in Charlottesville.

“It’s still like it’s always been – the haves and the have nots, so who will suffer the most, right?”

But others point to what they see as improvements. Confederate monuments were removed, and the University of Virginia unveiled a large memorial to enslaved people. Herb Dickerson was not impressed, noting that a statue of the slave holder Thomas Jefferson stands nearby, and sculptures of Jefferson, Madison and Monroe grace city hall.

"How in the hell do you have a statue of th slave owner and the slaves who worked for him and call that progress?" he wonders.

But Nichole Flores, a Latinx professor of religious studies, sees the decision to get rid of Lee and Jackson as an important step forward.

“Before any of this happened I used to avoid going to those parks because I just felt that those spaces were not for me, so to see that work happen was really encouraging.”

UVA drafted new rules for any group wanting to demonstrate on campus and imposed a limit of fifty people. The school also created a team of ambassadors – unarmed staffers who keep an eye on grounds and notify police of any possible problems.

In the city, religious leaders report a new sense of unity. Alvin Edwards is senior pastor of Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church.

“The relationships and trust have deepened and various leaders of faith traditions have organized prayer vigils, we had worship services that would give hope and provide strength to the community, and we also encourage resistance against white supremacy,” Edwards says.

He looks forward to weekend events like a memorial march called Unite the Light and a weekend festival at Ix Park called Soul of Cville – a celebration of the city’s diverse population.

On the political front, every member of the city council at the time of Unite the Right is now out of office, state, local and campus police chiefs been replaced, the city has committed $10 million in next year’s budget for affordable homes and is rehabbing a large public housing project downtown. Our sources disagreed about how much progress there has been, but they agreed there’s more work left to do.

This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.

Sandy Hausman is Radio IQ's Charlottesville Bureau Chief