Chesterfield County, Virginia's Weekly E-Newsletter
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Stay Connected with Chesterfield!
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Scroll to the bottom for more helpful links and resources to stay up to date on all things Chesterfield!
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County Response to COVID-19
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The
Chesterfield County Response to COVID-19 webpage
has links to many resources for citizens during this situation. If you are looking for information in any of the following topic areas, please click the links below to be directed to additional resources:
Other important information and updates on resources for Virginians can be found at:
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Governor Announces New Tools for
Virginia Workers and Job Seekers
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Governor Ralph Northam announced a new suite of technology tools to help Virginians take full advantage of the supportive services available through the Commonwealth’s workforce system. The
Virginia Career Works Referral Portal
is a statewide platform designed to streamline intake processes across state agencies and connect individuals with training, certification, education and employment services to help them find a job or advance a career path. The new
Virginia Career Works Dashboard
is an innovative data visualization tool that makes information about Virginia’s labor market and workforce system more accessible to workers, businesses, and policymakers.
Building up Virginia’s workforce development system has long been a priority of the Northam administration. While these tools were in development before the COVID-19 crisis began, the Commonwealth worked to accelerate their rollout to ensure the resources would be available to Virginians who need them during an extremely difficult time.
Consistent with the requirements of
Executive Order Nineteen
, the cloud-based system leverages open-source software supported by the Apache Foundation, expediting development and reducing long-term operational costs.
The new technology tools were developed in collaboration with the Chief Workforce Development Advisor, the Commonwealth’s Chief Data Officer and six state agencies: the Virginia Community College System, the Virginia Employment Commission, the Virginia Department of Education, the Virginia Department of Social Services, the Virginia Department for Aging and Rehabilitative Services and the Virginia Department for the Blind and Vision Impaired. Technology partners that supported the development and implementation of the Virginia Career Works Referral Portal and Virginia Career Works Dashboard include Qlarion, BrightHive and PAIRIN.
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Chesterfield Safely Reopening Additional County Facilities and Offices
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Additional Health Guidelines and Information
- Establishing policies and practices for physical distancing between co-workers and between members of the public.
- Installing signage and floor markings to remind personnel of new health and safety procedures, including a need for a minimum of 6 feet of physical distancing in areas where individuals may congregate, especially at entrances, in seating areas and in check-out lines.
- Limiting the occupancy of physical spaces to ensure that adequate physical distancing can be maintained at all times.
- Implementing enhanced and frequent cleaning and disinfection of frequently-touched surfaces.
- Establishing designated work entrances to buildings to control pedestrian flow, maintaining spatial distancing and reducing employee and citizen person-to-person physical contact.
- Requiring facial coverings to be worn by all personnel in the public spaces of the building. Members of the public not wearing a facial covering inside a public building as required the Governor’s Executive Order 63 will be asked by county staff to leave until they are able to secure one.
- Requiring employees to certify that they will perform a self-assessment of their health and exposure status, including monitoring their symptoms and checking their temperature at the beginning of each day before coming to work. If they present any symptoms or feel ill, they are not to come to work.
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In this video
, Chesterfield
Parks and Recreation
Director James Worsley provides information about the facilities that are reopening to the public, including the Bensley, Ettrick and Stonebridge recreation centers, Rockwood Nature Center and athletic fields and courts for recreational sports practices and training only. Select recreation programs will also be available. For more information, visit
chesterfield.gov/parks
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$5M Back in Business Grant Program Applications Open
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The application period for the grants began at noon on Monday, June 15, 2020 and will close at noon on Thursday, June 18, 2020.
Applications are being accepted through a secure online portal, available at
www.ChesterfieldBIB.com
; a
dditional information including a list of Frequently Asked Questions and the Terms and Conditions of the program are also available.
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Chesterfield County Public Schools Updates
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Chesterfield Health Department -
Free COVID-19 Testing
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Wednesday, June 17, 2020, 9–11 a.m.
Stonebridge Recreation Center
230 Karl Linn Drive
Testing is for individuals who have COVID-19 symptoms and is free for uninsured or underinsured persons.
While some appointments will be reserved for walk-ups that morning, testing is limited and appointments should be made prior to arriving.
Spanish speaking staff also will be present during the testing event.
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Additional Resources During COVID-19
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Staying Active - Fitness, Crafts, Learning Opportunities and More!
Mental Health and Coping
Access to the Internet During COVID-19
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Celebrate the Fourth of July in Chesterfield
with Fireworks Show
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A long-standing Chesterfield celebration of everything red, white and blue will be booming back to glory next month – although the event will take on a
different look and feel from previous years
because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Unlike previous years, there will be no activities, food booths or entertainment during the fireworks show to keep patrons safe and to further prevent the spread of COVID-19 in Chesterfield. No glass, alcohol, fireworks or pets are allowed on public property.
While residents who wish to attend in-person are encouraged to arrive early, there is no guarantee those at the event will get a full view of the fireworks presentation because of the number of high trees and buildings that could obstruct the show. Therefore, the Parks and Recreation Department is asking people, if they can, to view the fireworks show from the comfort of their homes if they live within the vicinity of the county fairgrounds.
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Chesterfield
Parks and Recreation Director Receives National Award
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Each year, NRPA National Awards are presented to individuals and agencies across the U.S. to honor their efforts, both professional and personal, in the field of parks and recreation. Recipients are selected from a pool of applicants based on excellence in a variety of topics, including professional and voluntary service, programming, leadership, research and public outreach. The National Distinguished Professional Award is presented to an individual who has made outstanding contributions to the field through their leadership, research, advocacy, community outreach and program development.
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Chesterfield - Employee Excellence:
Treasurer's Office;
Parks and Recreation - Redeployments
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These unprecedented times have forced innovative adaptations in how Chesterfield County continues to keep resources and services available for our citizens, businesses and employees. Those adaptations have taken multiple forms, from teleworking to completely new processes, and many employees are being redeployed in other areas to keep essential functions operating.
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Treasurer’s Office and the Department of Real Estate Assessments
When the scope of the COVID-19 pandemic became clear, Chesterfield County Government was forced to quickly formulate a plan to provide telework capabilities to a huge number of its employees to ensure residents, workers and businesses continued to receive the services they needed.
And though those efforts were – and continue to be – successful, the closure of county buildings and facilities was temporary. The county’s Reopening Taskforce and administration have since worked together to plan for Chesterfield County’s phased reopening, and on Monday, June 1, the
Treasurer’s Office
became one of Chesterfields’ first to reopen its doors to the public as it began to accept in-person payments of personal property and real estate taxes.
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Clockwise, from top: Joanne Parm (left) and Tanya Rosser (right); Mary Hartsell (left) and Lorrie McKesson (right); (from left) Lisa Leland, A.J. Eavey, Debbie Durham, Brandi Hand and Samantha Branzelle
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From
June 1 through Friday, June 5
, the due date for personal property taxes and the first half of real estate taxes, employees with the Treasurer’s Office worked tirelessly to assist nearly one thousand in-person taxpayers while observing public health guidelines. To stand out to visitors seeking professional guidance on their taxes, Treasurer’s Office staff color coordinated their clothing and their facial coverings.
In addition, the Treasurer’s Office received a boost when four employees with the
Department of Real Estate Assessments
, Jonathan Adie, Paul Berkley, Tanya Rosser and Youjin Ro, volunteered to help answer taxpayer questions.
The reopening also required several safety precautions to be put in place, including the installation of plexiglass dividers at cashier stations and the use of an additional drop box for drive-through tax payments. Many other precautions mirrored or were modeled after Gov. Ralph Northam’s Forward Virginia
Guidelines for All Business Sectors
, and included such safeguards as:
- Establishing policies and practices for physical distancing between co-workers and between members of the public.
- Limiting the occupancy of physical spaces to ensure that adequate physical distancing can be maintained at all times.
- Requiring facial coverings to be worn by all personnel in the public spaces of the building. Members of the public not wearing a facial covering inside a public building as required the Governor’s Executive Order 63 will be asked by county staff to leave until they are able to secure one.
The due date for personal property taxes and real estate taxes was June 5, 2020, but on May 27 the Board of Supervisors granted a grace period through July 31, 2020 during which penalties and interest will not be assessed for late personal property taxes.
Now that it has reopened, the Treasurer’s Office has resumed its normal hours, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. However, taxpayers are still urged to pay via non-cash, remote methods if possible. Taxpayers who wish to apply for a tax payment plan may still do so either online or by calling 804-748-1201.
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Clockwise, from top left: Lynn Hall with turf and nets at River City Sportsplex; Mark McCoy assists with landscaping at Marguerite Christian Elementary School and Rockwood Park; Mark Pinney (left) and Jonathan Furrow (right) of Fleet Services organize the transport of supplies
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Parks and Recreation: Redeployments
Crafting a successful response to the problems posed by the COVID-19 pandemic forced Chesterfield County Government to make innumerable changes, including operational innovations, planning adaptations and – perhaps most importantly – employee redeployments. As some employees were furloughed or as new needs presented themselves, employees throughout the county government began performing completely new job functions. The
Department of Parks and Recreation
provides a microcosm of these redeployments, with the stories of three such employees: Lynn Hall and Mark Pinney with Parks and Recreation and Mark McCoy with the
Learning and Performance Center
.
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Lynn Hall is Parks and Recreation’s athletics specialist in charge of organizing sports classes, camps, co-sponsored groups and supervising the youth basketball program. As many in-person group and sporting events became too dangerous to hold during the COVID-19 pandemic, Hall began working with
River City Sportsplex
and the complex’s 12 artificial turf fields. Though he had little experience with turf management or the sports played at the facility, Hall learned how to change the nets of five different types of goals, how to groom and sweep fields and how to move turf.
A certified festival and event associate, Mark Pinney is the special event coordinator for Parks and Recreation. Normally, Pinney is responsible for planning, organizing and supervising county-wide special events like the Fourth of July Celebration and Trunk-or-Treat in October. Currently, however, Pinney has redeployed to the
Central Virginia All-Hazards Incidents Management Team
(CVAHIMT), whose stated mission is “to respond upon request, providing a trained and qualified team capable of supporting and assisting in the management of natural and manmade disasters, emergencies, planned events or acts of terrorism.” As a logistics supervisor with CVAHIMT, Pinney’s team traveled out of state to secure personal protective equipment (PPE) for use throughout the Richmond area. In addition, Pinney is currently serving on the county’s Incident Management Team and has provided logistical support at all COVID-19 community testing sites in Chesterfield since May.
But Parks and Recreation has itself received a boost from redeployed employees, including Mark McCoy. As a senior training analyst with the county’s Learning and Performance Center, McCoy is tasked in normal circumstances with training other county employees on environmental and operational safety. After nearly 22 years of working desk jobs with the county, McCoy joined those he had previously trained in the field. With Parks and Recreation’s Trades Division, McCoy has assisted in landscaping facilities across the county, including Rockwood Park and Gordon and Marguerite Christian elementary schools. And though McCoy’s new role may require more sweat and manual labor than his safety training work with the Learning and Performance Center, he said he is grateful for the opportunity to give back to the community in such tangible ways. Plus, he expects his new first-hand experience will strengthen his training sessions in the future.
For more information about Parks and Recreation including the department’s response to COVID-19, visit their
department webpage
.
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Remember to Complete Your U.S. Census!
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While April 1 was Census Day, Chesterfield encourages residents who have not yet completed their
2020 U.S. Census
to do so as soon as possible.
Completing the Census is easy!
Households should have received official U.S. Census Bureau mail with detailed information on how to respond to the 2020 U.S. Census
online, by phone or by mail.
Pay close to attention to the unique number given to your household and be prepared to use it during your response.
The 2020 U.S. Census is mandatory and responses are based upon the members of a household as of April 1 (Census Day).
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To learn more about the 2020 U.S. Census, visit the official website at
my2020census.gov
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Learn More About Your District
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