Cathy Reynolds, Roanoke City Council Candidate, Answers Our 9 Burning Questions for 2024

Ahead of Roanoke’s municipal elections on Nov. 5, The Rambler once again sits down with each of the candidates — this time with a twist.

Three candidates for mayor and seven City Council candidates agreed to videotaped chats as we probed them on Roanoke’s past, present and future. To distinguish our questions from those frequently asked of the candidates, we focused on budgets, segregation, climate, housing and more. (Of course, we also had to touch on where they like to dine out.)

For mayor, Vice Mayor Joe Cobb is running as a Democrat, Councilwoman Stephanie Moon Reynolds as an independent and former mayor David Bowers as a Republican. For City Council, the candidates are Democrats Terry McGuire, Phazhon Nash and Benjamin Woods; independents Evelyn Powers and Cathy Reynolds; and Republicans Jim Garrett and Nick Hagen. Voters can choose up to three Council candidates.

This interview features Reynolds, a 46 -year-old Alleghany County native who lives in the Melrose-Rugby neighborhood. Reynolds works as a defense attorney focused on serious traffic and criminal matters. This her first run for public office.

Candidates did not receive copies of the questions beforehand. Transcripts of the interviews have been condensed and edited for length and clarity.

View the candidate's full video interview here:

Why do you want to serve Roanoke as a City Council member?

Well, before I get into why I want to serve, I do want to make it known that Roanoke is and always will be a great place to raise a family and retire. I feel like it offers a variety of different options for individuals, regardless of who he or she may be. I feel like Roanoke has a great deal of potential, and I want to lock in to, tap into that potential. I want to ensure that every resident of Roanoke has the opportunity to thrive. As a practicing attorney and a member of the community, I've seen up close and personal what opportunities Roanoke does offer as well as what challenges we face. So I want to take a community-engagement approach to fix the problems.

Let’s talk policy priorities. If you’re elected, what’s one of the first actions you would push for City Council to take?

Well, my campaign stands on the shoulders of bridging the gap between under-resourced and affluent communities. So in my first 30 days, if elected, I would familiarize myself with Roanoke City Council legal framework and policies. I would meet with city departments, city staff, look from a legal perspective to see if there are any legal challenges that we can iron out. I would also engage the community. I always want to engage the community. I want to attend as many neighborhood association meetings as possible. And it's all about community engagement for me. So that's what the first 30 days of my time would look like if elected. 

A main priority of Council is overseeing a roughly $380 million annual budget. What do you want to see happen with the city’s budget over your four-year term? 

Over my four-year term, I would like to first do a thorough review of the budget and cut any sort of wasteful spending. I'm not sure what that wasteful spending is right now, because I'm not a sitting Council member, but I can guarantee that there is wasteful spending going on, so we need to cut that. 

There are several different projects that I would actually like to interact in and support and make sure that the funding is available. Parks and Rec, they are the driving force of the tourism portion of our economy. They deserve to have, you know, proper funding to be able to maintain our Greenways, the trees on Melrose that were planted, I think maybe, like a few years ago, several of them are broken at the bottom. So that's not going to increase our tree canopy at all. So we need to make sure funding is available for Parks and Rec. We need to make sure that funding is available for the organizations that drive the economy via tourism. Reopening the campground, I feel like that would be very beneficial for Roanoke. It would definitely drive tourism. We've been named a metro mountain destination. It means people come here for our mountains, they come here for our Greenways. They come here to hike, bike. So we need to make sure that that continues to happen. 

We have a couple of other foundations that I feel drive tourism, such as our arts foundation. We definitely need to focus on investing more in education and making sure that Roanoke City, there's education equality across the board. And I do believe that the Roanoke City Public Schools, they're on the right track to do that. I took an in-depth look at the strategic plan that they have in place, and it's great. You can actually read it and follow it and see the vision and see where they're going. I love the emphasis that it places on the availability of pre-K for all students, because I believe that pre-K is where it all starts. I believe that studies would suggest that children that attend pre-K get better grades, they graduate, they have a higher earning potential, and there's a reduction in crime rate associated with that. 

So just briefly, I went on vacation and took a tour, and the tour guide said that their children started pre-K at the age of two. So, you know, that's something that we, not just in Virginia and Roanoke but in the United States in general, need to focus more on if we want a solid foundation for our future. That makes me passionate. Neighborhood revitalization, I want to jump on that immediately, particularly in these under-resourced neighborhoods. Give the under-resourced neighborhoods the opportunity and a good quality of life. 

Roanoke’s residential neighborhoods remain highly racially segregated. What role should city government play in dismantling that legacy? 

I will tell you what they shouldn't do is go against what the community is asking them to do. If you hear the majority of the community crying out at something that you're doing, take a minute and listen and say, is there another way to do this? Talk to the community. Don't talk at them. Talk to them. Listen to them. Engage. And there will be some common ground there. But you cannot expect to find common ground when you're talking at people instead of to them. You're talking over them and not listening to what they have to say. We can work this out. 

I, as well as the plaintiffs in the zoning amendment lawsuits, everywhere, everyone is aware that we need more housing. We need to go about it in an efficient way that does not upset the majority of Roanoke, which is what I'm seeing right now. I took an in-depth look at the zoning amendments, and I see why the residents are upset. I do. There are several ways to combat it. The first way would be to use what we have. There are several homes, multifamily properties sitting around, boarded up, vacant. Let’s use them. There are several vacant lots. Let's use them. There are several vacant parking lots. Let's use them. Let's pool our resources there first before we start changing the character of these neighborhoods. It can be done.

How would you work to implement the city’s climate action plan? Or do you disagree with its recommendations?

The Climate Action Plan? I'm not going to say I necessarily disagree with any of the plans that City Council has. Things need to be ironed out, let’s just put it that way. I believe further research needs to be done. Further engagement with the community needs to be done. Voices need to be heard.  Well, I would hope we would pick up and go from there.

Again, I'll go back to the issue of community engagement. What are we here for if it's not to serve the community? We put these action plans in motion, and the majority of it, you know, comes from consultants. People who come from outside come in, do these observations, where these plans are, and the plans that they're writing will not impact their lives one way or another. They come in, they do their job, give us the plan, and then leave. 

So that said, you know, in terms of the climate action, I think they're on the right path. Increasing the tree canopy — talked about that earlier — they're doing it, right, but maintaining it is an issue. They put great deference on the urban heat island. I would hope by now that everybody is aware of global warming. If it's not, then there's a bigger issue. They've done it by, you know, resistance with the Evan Spring plan. I'm not in disagreement with the plan. I think we just need to do what I said, stop listening to people that it won't impact and let's get some more feedback from the community and move forward from there.

You’re on record opposing current policies that ended exclusively single-family zoning. What’s your solution to encouraging the development of more affordable housing?

So I think we need to define what affordable housing is first of all. And I think we do that by going to the people that this is going to impact, the people that are, you know, so called this is going to benefit. A $450,000 townhome? That's not affordable housing, not even to me. 

Building multiple multifamily units on a corner lot, up to six in residential neighborhoods, that's not an option. The plaintiffs in these lawsuits are not opposed to change. Let's get that straight. I've spoken to a few of them. What they are opposed to is sitting here having to fight for the legacy that they built, okay? It wasn't right back in the 1960s, it's not right now. So I understand, I empathize. I do. Like I said, they're not opposed to change. They just don't want to be pushed out of something that they've taken years to build. I don't think that there would be an issue with a few multifamily properties going up in these neighborhoods, but you're putting six on one lot. Say that all six of those are duplexes, and each duplex has four occupants. Four times six is 24 people. Where are they going to park? You know, it's going to cause congestion for trash trucks, our buses. Those are issues that need to be thought through thoroughly. 

What I can say is there is a solution. I did look deeply into the Evans Spring plan. And as of right now, there are approximately 2,200 vacant for rent properties here in Roanoke, and there are another 2,300 vacant other, so there is housing here. What we need to look into doing is hitting these landlords with rent caps. You know, a lot of people were pushed out of their homes after Covid. It kind of shook up the whole world. People have bad credit scores and lost everything. So they're forced to rent. These landlords know that. So what other option do they have outside of paying the asking price for, you know, a unit that landowner has no business asking. So that's option one. Option two, I do not want to focus so much on affordable renting. I think we focus more on affordable home ownership. You touched briefly, you know, on kind of integrating some of the neighborhoods. I think we could probably do that through making homeownership affordable. Not having, you know, the minorities pay rent for an apartment to increase the generational wealth gap for the owner of the multifamily. That will put us on the path to close the generational wealth, that's what I want to do.

I have one unique question for you. You gained headlines locally — actually nationally, in a Washington Post story — in 2021, after suing Roanoke police in federal court over an invasive search of your home. That came days after successfully defending your stepson on a murder charge, and the city paid to settle that case. Has that experience led you to believe there exists any systemic issues at Roanoke’s police department?

I tried to prepare myself for this, because I figured I was going to get asked about it at some point. And let me start out by saying that the Roanoke City Police Department and myself, I think we have what I would call a love-hate relationship. I do not in any way, shape or form, you know— I moved away from it, what happened to me. I went to coffee with one of the other candidates who's aware — he's a colleague as well — and he asked me, Why don't I talk about it on the campaign trail? And you know, I looked at him, I said, Well, it's not for the reason that you think. I said, you know, it was a traumatic experience, and people tend to close traumatic experiences out and don't want to revisit them. 

But to answer your question, I think there's systemic racism in most all police departments. Want to know why? Because we're human and, you know, there are just bad people in the world, right? Some hatred is taught. A lot of us taught at home. The majority of it is taught/ We're not born not liking each other, right? So the way that we grow up, what we see growing up, our interactions with people, that's what shapes, you know, and some of the bad people end up on the police force, unfortunately. 

I do think, however, that our generations are, they're closing the gap in terms of cultural, what's the word that I'm looking for? Not knowing who we are because we look different. Society is shifting. You can see it. Look on social media. Everyone loves everyone now for the most part. You know, we have our outliers, we’ll always have those. So that said, I think that the majority of the officers on the Roanoke City Police Department are excellent at what they do. I have an enormous amount of respect for police. Without them, you know, we have some serious issues, not only here in Roanoke but the United States in general. They're here for a reason. 

You’re going out to dinner in Roanoke. Name just one place — where do you go?

Probably Billy’s.

Is there a particular thing you like there?

They have a great Caesar salad, and they have the best shrimp and grits that I've had here.

What books are on your night stand? What are you reading currently?

So I do the Kindle. But hard books, I have “The 48 Laws of Power.” There are several self help books that I've read. I read poetry books. All of them don't come to mind right now, because, to be honest with you, I have not had a lot of time to do a lot of reading between, you know, being a full-time attorney and campaigning, which I enjoy more so than other things. 

“The 48 Laws of Power” was the last book that I read. A lot of people, I think they misinterpret it. They try to use it for manipulation. You know, anything that is intended to be good falls into the wrong hands. They, you know, read it, and so I can do this and that, and the third, and make somebody believe this, that, and the third. So the book actually teaches you how to persuade people to believe in your way, which is what I do anyway, right? So I had a lot in common with the book, and I did not have any ill will while I was reading it. I just wanted to know — there was a lot of hype about the book some years ago. And during lockdown, I ordered the book on Amazon and started reading it, and it's a great book. It's a great book. I highly recommend it.