Archive (Page 7) • Good Morning, RVA • Buttondown

🪗 Good morning, RVA: Frustration and anger, new digs, and our biggest event

Good morning, RVA! It’s 50 °F, and today looks exactly like yesterday with highs right around 70 °F, plus a few more clouds. Things warm up tomorrow and Friday. After that, though, I’m gonna have a much harder time convincing my family to keep the heat cut off once the weekend’s cooler temperatures roll through.

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I don’t know what to make of this piece by Jahd Khalil at VPM about how Unite Here, a union representing hospitality workers and on the record opposing Casino 1.0, is now knocking on doors in support of Casino 2.0. Khalil reports a bunch of interesting details that I encourage you to tap through and read, but I’ll just quote two. First, “Unite Here and the developers of Richmond Grand Resort & Casino — Urban One and Churchill Downs — signed a labor peace agreement ‘earlier this year’…[the] vice president and Mid-Atlantic regional manager of the Laborers’ International Union of North America, said in a statement that this sets strong labor standards to protect Richmond’s workers and ensures that the development of Richmond Grand Resort & Casino will drive economic prosperity for the entire Richmond community.” Second, “Unite Here has a strong presence in the political ground game for Richmond’s casino question, bolstered by an $800,000 donation from the developers’ $8 million political war chest — and $250,000 from other groups, including other unions.”

Pulitzer Prize Winner Michael Paul Williams writes about Susanna Gibson and, more specifically, about an opinion piece from The Family Foundation of Virginia that the Richmond Times-Dispatch decided to run this past weekend. It’s been a while since I’ve seen Williams write with this much frustration and anger, and I’m here for it. I, Email Newsletter Haver Ross Catrow, haven’t written about Gibson yet, mostly because the whole thing also makes me frustrated and angry—plus I haven’t loved any of the coverage I’ve seen thus far. So, lacking something perfect to link to, I’ll say this: If I lived in the 57th District, which includes portions of Henrico, I would vote for Gibson in November, and I’d feel great about it. I wouldn’t even think twice about checking the box next to her name!

#590

October 11, 2023

💵 Good morning, RVA: Densifiying Willow Lawn, the Family Crisis Fund, and Outstanding Women

Good morning, RVA! It’s 47 °F, and I’ve got both a beanie and a hoodie on as I wait for my house to warm up this morning. Later today, though, looks lovely with sunshine and highs in the 70s. Expect more of the same—maybe even some slightly warmer temperatures—for the rest of the week.

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Joseph Maltby at the Henrico Citizen reports that The Densifiying of Willow Lawn, proposed by the site’s developer a while back, has cleared the County’s planning commission and will head to a public hearing on October 12th. The proposal stretches across multiple decades, but, over time, would fill in the surface-level parking lots, reconnect the street grid, and install some much needed pedestrian infrastructure. According to the Citizen, “eventually Willow Lawn would contain approximately 2,000 residential units and more than 500,000 square feet of commercial and office space.”—think Libbie Mill, but with more retail and a more urban feel. Seems cool, and gets me thinking about a thousand different ways to improve pedestrian, bike, and transit options in that area. How can we: Connect Willow Lawn to Libbie Mill? Add dedicated bus lanes to Broad Street, thereby narrowing and slowing that section? Widen sidewalks and improve street crossings? There’s all kinds of work to be done!

City Council gathers today for their regularly-scheduled-but-slightly-shifted-due-to-holiday meeting, and you can find their full agenda here. Of note to GMRVA readers: ORD. 2023–271, which upzones a section of N. Lombardy, sits on the consent agenda; the ordinance to establish a Public Utilities and Services Commission (ORD. 2023–188) has been continued until November 13th; and the process of the City acquiring Evergreen and East End Cemeteries has stalled out until at least December 11th (RES. 2023-R011). Pretty standard stuff this week! At least during their informal meeting, Council will get up to some interesting business and discuss contracts related to the Diamond District in a closed session.

#863

October 10, 2023

🔍 Good morning, RVA: You found the article!, Goochland growth, and e-bikes

Good morning, RVA! It’s 63 °F, and you can expect another foggy morning followed by a cloudy day with highs in the upper 70s. Cooler weather moves in tomorrow, and we’ll get to remember what temperatures in the 60s feel like. Other than a small chance for rain Saturday morning, I think this weekend looks pretty nice!

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Thank you to everyone who wrote in pointing me to this article in Richmond Magazine by Harry Kollatz Jr about the artist who designed the Greek-style columns currently marking Richmond’s city limits. I knew it existed! Y’all are so helpful, and almost everyone had a kind thing to say in addition to passing along the link. Thank you, again!

Jack Jacobs in Richmond BizSense reports that, this week, the Goochland Board of Supervisors rejected a small area plan that would have recommended some “mixed-use, commercial and residential development as well as road, pedestrian and recreational improvements for the area that sits just across the Goochland-Henrico line from Short Pump.” A while back I wrote about Goochland’s pending and important decision on how to plan for growth out that way, and, at the time, I said maybe they should just not and instead force development back into the already-sprawly parts of Henrico. That’s not exactly what’s happening here, and I’m nervous that, with the Board punting on making any decision at all, we’ll end up with unintentional sprawl—a big downgrade from what the small area plan recommended. I’m going to keep an eye on this, as three out of five Board members aren’t seeking reelection this November, and that new-look Board may have some stronger feelings about growth and development for the county moving forward.

#173

October 6, 2023

🔍 Good morning, RVA: You found the article!, Goochland growth, and e-bikes

Good morning, RVA! It’s 63 °F, and you can expect another foggy morning followed by a cloudy day with highs in the upper 70s. Cooler weather moves in tomorrow, and we’ll get to remember what temperatures in the 60s feel like. Other than a small chance for rain Saturday morning, I think this weekend looks pretty nice!

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Thank you to everyone who wrote in pointing me to this article in Richmond Magazine by Harry Kollatz Jr about the artist who designed the Greek-style columns currently marking Richmond’s city limits. I knew it existed! Y’all are so helpful, and almost everyone had a kind thing to say in addition to passing along the link. Thank you, again!

Jack Jacobs in Richmond BizSense reports that, this week, the Goochland Board of Supervisors rejected a small area plan that would have recommended some “mixed-use, commercial and residential development as well as road, pedestrian and recreational improvements for the area that sits just across the Goochland-Henrico line from Short Pump.” A while back I wrote about Goochland’s pending and important decision on how to plan for growth out that way, and, at the time, I said maybe they should just not and instead force development back into the already-sprawly parts of Henrico. That’s not exactly what’s happening here, and I’m nervous that, with the Board punting on making any decision at all, we’ll end up with unintentional sprawl—a big downgrade from what the small area plan recommended. I’m going to keep an eye on this, as three out of five Board members aren’t seeking reelection this November, and that new-look Board may have some stronger feelings about growth and development for the county moving forward.

#173

October 6, 2023

🤬 Good morning, RVA: New Southside signage, grinding the gears of government, and leaf blowers

Good morning, RVA! It’s 57 °F, and, when I woke up this morning, fog had blanketed my entire world. It looked so peaceful out there but also a lot like the horror franchise Silent Hill, so I made my tea and quickly moved away from the window—you know, just in case. Today you can once again expect highs in the 80s with maybe a few more clouds than earlier in the week. We’ve got one more day of this perfect weather before cooler temperatures move in!

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Today the City’s Urban Design Committee meets to consider a single paper—UDC 2023–18—the final location, character, and extent review for a Gateway Sign on Hull Street Road near the Chippenham Parkway interchange. I, like you probably, thought “boring!”, but then tapped through to check out the proposed signage and was surprised to see the City’s newish logo incorporated into the design. Then, reading the staff report, I learned that “staff is currently working (but has not finalized) with other City departments to expand that signage package throughout the City to create a set of unified signage themes across wayfinding, gateway, neighborhood identification, and other types of specialized signage.” This sounds cool and rings a vague bell! Also ringing a vague bell is an article that I am nearly positive exists about the artist who created the Greek columns that currently mark some of the City’s gateway—send me a link if you can find it, please! Finally, several large, square planters sit in the concrete media today, and I wonder how we could repurpose those? Harden a right turn? Protect a bike lane? Lots of options if we’re willing to be creative!

Not about Richmond, but this article, originally in the Daily Progress by Jason Armesto, is absolutely bananas: Racist remarks flood Charlottesville City Council meeting. The headline undercuts the intensity of remarks, which are, maybe?, related to Charlottesville’s recent decisions around people experiencing homelessness: “it is worth noting that several of the speakers, when they weren’t using slurs or heiling Hitler, mentioned the city’s recent decision to remove the curfew at Market Street Park, where many homeless people have now set up tents.” I’m glad the Council’s attorney agreed they could end the public comments and close the meeting, but you can totally see a situation where a city’s legislators (and its residents) are forced to endure hours of racist monologues used as a tactic to grind the work of government to a halt. Scary and frustrating stuff.

#26

October 5, 2023

🤬 Good morning, RVA: New Southside signage, grinding the gears of government, and leaf blowers

Good morning, RVA! It’s 57 °F, and, when I woke up this morning, fog had blanketed my entire world. It looked so peaceful out there but also a lot like the horror franchise Silent Hill, so I made my tea and quickly moved away from the window—you know, just in case. Today you can once again expect highs in the 80s with maybe a few more clouds than earlier in the week. We’ve got one more day of this perfect weather before cooler temperatures move in!

Water cooler

Today the City’s Urban Design Committee meets to consider a single paper—UDC 2023–18—the final location, character, and extent review for a Gateway Sign on Hull Street Road near the Chippenham Parkway interchange. I, like you probably, thought “boring!”, but then tapped through to check out the proposed signage and was surprised to see the City’s newish logo incorporated into the design. Then, reading the staff report, I learned that “staff is currently working (but has not finalized) with other City departments to expand that signage package throughout the City to create a set of unified signage themes across wayfinding, gateway, neighborhood identification, and other types of specialized signage.” This sounds cool and rings a vague bell! Also ringing a vague bell is an article that I am nearly positive exists about the artist who created the Greek columns that currently mark some of the City’s gateway—send me a link if you can find it, please! Finally, several large, square planters sit in the concrete media today, and I wonder how we could repurpose those? Harden a right turn? Protect a bike lane? Lots of options if we’re willing to be creative!

Not about Richmond, but this article, originally in the Daily Progress by Jason Armesto, is absolutely bananas: Racist remarks flood Charlottesville City Council meeting. The headline undercuts the intensity of remarks, which are, maybe?, related to Charlottesville’s recent decisions around people experiencing homelessness: “it is worth noting that several of the speakers, when they weren’t using slurs or heiling Hitler, mentioned the city’s recent decision to remove the curfew at Market Street Park, where many homeless people have now set up tents.” I’m glad the Council’s attorney agreed they could end the public comments and close the meeting, but you can totally see a situation where a city’s legislators (and its residents) are forced to endure hours of racist monologues used as a tactic to grind the work of government to a halt. Scary and frustrating stuff.

#26

October 5, 2023

🥚🛢️ Good morning, RVA: A nationwide test, Walk to School Day, and mayonnaise tattoos

Good morning, RVA! It’s 59 °F, and today you can expect highs around 80 °F and sunshiney skies. It’s another beautiful day in Richmond—take advantage of it! Next week may be the first official boots-and-flannel week, which is exciting, sure, but, until then, I’m going to celebrate every opportunity to not wear socks and there are at least a few of those left in 2023.

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Today at 2:20 PM FEMA will conduct a nationwide test of both the Emergency Alert System and the Wireless Emergency Alerts system. This means that around 2:20 PM every single cellphone that’s turned on will play some sort of shocking alert tone and display a message reading “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.” This should be especially alarming—which is totally the point—in congregate settings with a lot of people and phones like schools or offices or cellphone factories. I will definitely forget this is happening, be dramatically startled, possibly drop whatever I am holding, and probably make some sort of unintentional and embarrassing noise. Maybe the rest of you will remember and keep your cool!

Ben Paviour at VPM reports that “the state is working to resolve an issue that caused an unknown number of eligible voters to be removed from the state’s rolls.” This seems bad, and I agree with Sen. Surovell who finds the response to this issue from the Virginia Department of Elections plausible but says the new situation is “part of a pattern of mistakes” at the agency. While this particular mistake most likely effects people with previous felony convictions, I will (once again) recommend that everyone check their voter registration status (again).

#654

October 4, 2023

🚦 Good morning, RVA: A pedestrian safety plan, a spicy article, and a local grocery store sale

Good morning, RVA! It’s 60 °F, and you can expect highs in the 80s with lots of sunshine. Yesterday, I took some time to go get after it in the forest on my bike, and the weather was just so, so perfect—and we have more of the same lined up for this afternoon! I hope you can block off at least a little bit of time today to spend outside enjoying another wonderful October day in Richmond.

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After traffic violence killed two students in two separate incidents on VCU’s Monroe Park campus, the University commissioned a pedestrian safety study. That study has now wrapped up and you can read the press release about it or dig into the full, 41-page study. I confess that I pulled up the PDF with a pretty skeptical tap, but, turns out, there are some really great recommendations in there: Banning right turns on red, upgrading crosswalks, adding curb extensions, hardening left turns, and even closing some streets to vehicular traffic. I’m honestly surprised at how hard some of these recommendations go! However, each set of improvements comes with a bunch of implementations steps, most of which involve the City evaluating the recommendation and deciding if it is “justified.” We’ll just have to see what happens if the Department of Public Works dumps a bunch of cold water on some of these (pretty progressive) VCU-backed infrastructure plans. If VCU does manage to raise crosswalks, extend curbs, ban right-on-reds, the City should treat it as a pilot and begin extending the same treatments to its other pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods.

This piece in Richmond BizSense by Jonathan Spiers about VCU’s botched real estate deal with the City is so spicy. Save it for when you’ve got time to text quotes back and forth to your most fun local government group chat.

#710

October 3, 2023

📚 Good morning, RVA: More density, transportation funding, and banning books

Good morning, RVA! It’s 60 °F, and today we’ve got a beautiful day ahead of us with sunny highs in the 80s. October is far and away my favorite time in Richmond, and it looks like this week—at least as far as the weather goes—will live up to my expectations!

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The City’s Planning Commission and City Council’s Organizational Development committee will both meet today. The former will tackle an interesting rezoning on N. Lombardy Street (ORD. 2023–271) which would allow for increased density and height along the block of N. Lombardy just west of Chamberlayne Avenue. Looks like the developers want to build a six-story apartment building, some first-floor retail, and shove the parking in the back. Then, later in the day, the Gov Ops committee will hear a presentation on the City’s legislative priorities for this upcoming General Assembly session. On the budget side of things, the City would like its $100 million in combined sewer overflow money back, thank you very much; alongside $15 million for Ancarrow’s Landing; and a separate bucket of funding from the State for street maintenance since Richmond functions as “the steat of state government and the capital city of the Commonwealth.” On the legislative side you’ll see some familiar items: a desperate plea for inclusionary zoning, a long-term owner occupancy program, a tweak to existing legislation that would allow “photo speed monitoring devices” on college campuses, and whatever changes to the Charter City Council decides to move forward on. It’s all good stuff, but I have no idea the likelihood of any of it making progress in the General Assembly this winter. Oh, also, OrgDev will consider that Public Utilities and Services Commission I’ve been on about for a while now (ORD. 2023–188).

Nathaniel Cline at the Virginia Mercury reports on possible changes to SMART SCALE—Virginia’s transportation funding process—that sound like a bunch of steps in the wrong direction. In fact, the State’s own Office of Intermodal Planning and Investment says that if the new changes were put in place today “75% of the bike and pedestrian projects recently funded through SMART SCALE would have gone unfunded.” Seems bad! It’s wild, in this, the year 2023, to read about the commonwealth doubling down on “new capacity highways” and “new interchanges.” If it were me, of course, I’d ban funding new interchanges and highway expansions for just a couple of years and, instead, pay for 100% of every locality’s bike and pedestrian plans.

#741

October 2, 2023

🥾 Good morning, RVA: A trails survey, donating to a good cause, and fried food

Good morning, RVA! It’s 62 °F, and today looks a lot like the day before it and the day before that: Cloudy with highs in the 70s. However, things start to warm up over the weekend, and by the time Sunday rolls around we should, once again, see the sun in the sky and feel temperatures up near 80 °F. Next week looks like a great week of weather.

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I just linked to a bus survey earlier this week, but doesn’t it feel like we’ve been a little light on the transportation surveys lately? Certainly does to me, and this new survey from the State Trails Office comes at just the right time to fill that survey-shaped hole in my heart. They’d like your feedback on multi-use paths—like the Capital Trail and forthcoming Fall Line Trail—and what your priorities would be should we build a bunch of new trails. For me it’s always: More trails to more places with more safe connections to and from those trails.

The Richmond Public Schools Education Foundation’s Trauma Response Fund supports RPS students, families, and staff after they experience a horrible, traumatic event. Over the past three months, the Fund has “supported school communities impacted by neighborhood or household violence, including providing resources for grief and bereavement; provided direct financial assistance for families facing hardships due to fires and other crises; and funded essential counseling services for RPS employees.” It’s a really critical resource, and you can donate online this morning.

#520

September 29, 2023

📧 Good morning, RVA: Another mess, a vote by mail error, and invasives

Good morning, RVA! It’s 54 °F, and, by now, you know the deal: Expect cloudy skies and temperatures around 70 °F. I’m definitely feeling the gloom—the sun popped up for a minute last night, and I ran outside to recharge quietly on the stoop like a plant. Don’t worry, just a couple more days of this persistent gray!

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The Richmond Times-Dispatch’s Anna Bryson reports on another mess at the Virginia Department of Education, this time with the approval of a “new partnership with iTeach, a for-profit company offering online teacher training…[including] authorization to certify special education teachers.” The Board of Education approved the new partnership, but, turns out, at the time they didn’t know that iTeach’s special ed courses for teachers failed to meet the state’s standards! Double turns out: VDOE staff, though, knew about iTeach’s shortcomings and “pushed back against department leadership for pressing ahead with the special education courses even though they did not meet the state’s standards.” Triple turns out: “the Youngkin administration did not provide this document to members of the state Board of Education before they unanimously voted in June to approve partnerships with iTeach.” The whole matter’s made worse when the State Superintendent asks her FOIA officer to redact more information from the RTD’s public records request (which then becomes part of the public records request). Oof.

Fellow vote-by-mail aficionados, Dave Ress, also at the RTD, reports that the ballot you recently received may contain an error in the instructions! Ress says that the ballot still reminds you to have a witness sign the envelope, which is no longer required due to a recent change in state law. Annoying! Errors in voting-related materials have the potential to disenfranchise folks, so that’s not great (especially for a registrar that’s been in the news a bit too much over the past couple of years). Luckily(?) this error seems fairly minor and shouldn’t prevent most folks from getting their ballot filled out and sent back correctly.

#782

September 28, 2023

🚮 Good morning, RVA: Run for something, BRT survey, and union jobs

Good morning, RVA! It’s 59 °F, and today we’ve got more of the same—which is not so bad. Expect highs right around 70 °F and more of those cloudy skies. Temperatures will start to creep up tomorrow, and the sun has tentative plans to return this weekend. As of right now, next week looks stunning.

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Yesterday, I got my mail-in ballot for this coming November’s election, which is, of course, very exciting. I really enjoy voting by mail: Filling out the piece of paper, carefully following all the instructions—you don’t get to join your fellow citizens in the corporate moment of Election Day, but, to me, it still feels like an important ceremony. It’s nice, and if you’d like to join me in voting by mail (separately, from our own homes), you have until October 27th to request your ballot from the Virginia Department of Elections.

But voting is just one part of participating in democracy! We need good, progressive candidates to vote for, too (preferably ones that constantly think about zoning and rezoning and love nothing more than a good public work survey). That candidate could be you! Yes, literally you! Every great candidate was, at some point, a person standing in their kitchen shouting about some issue and wondering aloud, “Fine, maybe I should just run!”

#233

September 27, 2023

🚲📈 Good morning, RVA: Casino jobs, ADUs and Airbnbs pass, and RVA’s bike trips

Good morning, RVA! It’s 61 °F, and today we’ve got more of the same: Highs near 70 °F and a cloudy sky. I’m sure by Saturday, when the weather does start to shift, I’ll be tired of the gray and the gloom, but, until then, I’m still just stoked on the cooler temperatures and the lack of a tropical storm!

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@pastorhodge over on Twitter has pulled the average salaries for the Casino 2.0 project, and I think everyone should tap through and take a look. Super important note / caveat / thing to keep in mind: I couldn’t find the original PDF from which these screenshots come, but I still think it’s interesting enough dig into. Over the last couple of months, one of the narratives about the proposed Casino 2.0 has been that it will create lots of well-paying jobs. Depending on who’s speaking and who’s reporting, those jobs are sometimes described differently. Take a look at how the City’s Economic Development Director Leonard Sledge describes them in an NBC12 interview back in May: “‘1,300 great paying, direct jobs hired by the resort casino…’ The average pay, Sledge says, is around $55,000.” And now compare that with the text from Casino 2.0’s website: “The resort will create 1,300 new union backed careers that provide a pathway to the middle class with an average of more than $55,000 in annual compensation including benefits like healthcare and retirement.” Compensation does not equal Salary! What a critical distinction! In fact, the average salary for a Casino 2.0 job, according to these screenshots, is $42,195 in the first year, which then reduces to $35,600 in the following years. Only with the benefits package and only in the first year do you get anywhere close to $55,000. Just some quick context on those salaries, pulled from The Partnership for Housing Affordability: The Area Median Income in Richmond is $109,404, so these casino jobs might pay just 33% of the AMI. The average rent in South Richmond? $1,268! The math seems pretty brutal, with an individual’s rent possibly accounting for 42% of their living expenses. Maybe these are out of date numbers? Maybe the City has negotiated those higher wages out past the first year of operations (even though $42,000 is still just 39% of the AMI)? Maybe we’ll learn more today, because I keep getting press releases about an announcement this morning detailing a “significant development” related to casino jobs (press releases which, by the way, describe the jobs as “1,300 well-paying permanent careers averaging $55,000 in annual compensation”). I’d love to get the details straight, and if anyone has a link to this actual PDF, please send it along!

Last night City Council adopted all three of the papers I had my eyes on: ADUs everywhere (ORD. 2023–196), the new Airbnb regulations (ORD. 2023–235), and the resolution that gives Council’s support to using any theoretical Casino 2.0 money for childcare-related projects (including a Child Care and Education Trust Fund) (RES. 2023-R048). Those first two are pretty progressive pieces of legislation—especially for a city like Richmond which has sometimes tripped over itself while trying to take steps forward. I’m pretty happy about it all! It feels like Richmond’s got some serious momentum in the Planning department, and I hope they turn their hot hand to the next big project: Rewriting the zoning ordinance.

#815

September 26, 2023

👃 Good morning, RVA: Free COVID-19 tests, corrections, and exciting ordinances

Good morning, RVA! It’s 63 °F, and for today, like most of the week, we’ve got cloudy skies and highs in the 70s. I’m not complaining—this sort of gray and temperate day is better than this past Saturday’s soaking and way preferred to the scorching summer that was.

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As of this morning you can once again order four free COVID-19 test from the USPS—a process that will take less than one minute out of your morning. I hope everyone reading along taps the previous link and fills out the form because 1) who doesn’t like free stuff, but also 2) we are definitely headed directly toward fall respiratory disease season. Luckily for us, and due to science, we’ve got vaccines to help protect against the flu, COVID-19 and RSV—sort of the big three of respiratory crud floating around at the moment. Katelyn Jetelina has put together a really nice Fall 2023 Vaccines chart that will tell you what the options are for each of the three vaccines, who is eligible, how well they work, and when you should get them. Testing and vaccination are just two of the tools in our public health toolbox, and we should take full advantage of them to keep ourselves and others healthy.

Corrections! I made two errors last week that I want to clean up. First, this cool-sounding City job, which I linked to because I thought it will fill the huge hole left by Maritza Pechin in the Department of Planning and Review, is actually in a different department (the Department of Public Works) and only open to internal candidates. It says both of these things right at the top of the page—one is even bold and underlined! Oops! Second, I made a joke about how hard it is for Richmonders to get to the Office of Elections down at the end of Laburnum Avenue for early voting, when I know full well that the City has two other locations for folks to turn in their ballots: City Hall (900 E. Broad Street) and the Hickory Hill Community Center (3000 E. Belt Boulevard).

#902

September 25, 2023

🤖 Good morning, RVA: An AI Directive, Finance Committee resolutions, and a trailhead facility

Good morning, RVA! It’s 62 °F, and today looks like another great weather day. Expect highs around 80 °F with maybe less sunshine than yesterday’s stunner. We’ve got at least another day and a half of excellent weather, so enjoy it before weekend weather rolls in and dumps buckets on us.

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Yesterday, Governor Youngkin signed Executive Directive Number Five which starts the process of ensuring “the responsible, ethical and transparent use of artificial intelligence technology by state government in order to protect the rights of Virginians and develop targeted, innovative uses for this emerging technology to help deliver a best-in-class state government.” The directive is short and worth reading, but if PDFs scare you, you can read the press release instead. Basically, it does two things: It asks the Office of Regulatory Management to, first, come up with some AI best uses and practices for state government, and, second, to identify some areas for piloting and testing AI—all by mid December. I think this is fascinating! The directive focuses mostly on state agencies and employees but also wants to how AI impacts K–12 education, too. And also this weird sentence, which sounds like a way to sneak more fossil-fuel power plants into unrelated recommendations: “Work with the Virginia Department of Energy to better understand the impact of Al on our power generation requirements within the Commonwealth resulting from the expected increase in energy demands due to the growing computing capacity requirements necessitated by increased adoption of AI.” Anyway, really interesting stuff, and, with a report due out right before winter break, I can’t wait!

Ben Paviour at VPM reports on the commonwealth’s new voter data-sharing agreement, a sort of haphazard thing cobbled together after the Governor forced Virginia out of its partnership with the Electronic Registration Information Center. I like the way Paviour tees it up: “The Virginia Department of Elections announced Wednesday it signed agreements with five states and the District of Columbia to share voter data. The move comes after the commonwealth quit a multistate partnership that is the target of right-wing conspiracy theories.” After reading through this piece, I definitely recommend that everyone check their vote registration status over on the Virginia Department of Elections website.

#302

September 21, 2023

🌳 Good morning, RVA: School Board follow up, ADUs, and planting trees

Good morning, RVA! It’s 61 °F, and what a beautiful day we’ve got ahead of us! Expect highs around 80 °F, sunshine, and an overwhelming urge to spend at least 30 minutes zoned out in the shade of a tree. Soak it up for the next few days, because it looks like rain will move in on Saturday.

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OK, a day later and we’ve got some follow up on the RPS School Board’s decision to modify the specialty school selection process to prioritize economically disadvantaged students. First, the Superintendent himself, in last night’s RPS Direct, says, “Then, when it comes time to apply for anything selective – like specialty high schools – we pretend the educational race is fair. But it’s not. In truth, low income children begin the race several yards behind the starting line. The changes adopted last night will make it a bit fairer by giving a small boost to the very talented low-income students who’ve been working themselves to the bone to win the race – despite starting well behind their higher income peers.” Second, Tracy Sears at WTVR has a recap of the School Board meeting with video of a couple public comments.

VPM’s Connor Scribner reminds me that City Council punted their decision on the ADUs Everywhere ordinance (ORD. 2023–196) to this fall so it’d better line up with the AirBnb ordinance (ORD. 2023–235). Scribner reports that Planning Commission recommended the ADU ordinance for approval, and it now sits on full Council’s agenda for their September 25th meeting. Should this ordinance pass, and I think it will, folks could build a small, additional unit in their back yards without having to ask the City for a Special Use Permit—a process that can take forever and involves both Planning Commission and full City Council. It’s an easy policy change that will give more people more places to live, and, as we learned in yesterday’s longread, that’s one of the best ways to keep housing affordable.

#640

September 20, 2023

💰 Good morning, RVA: A specialty school discussion, casino developer cash, and big baseball

Good morning, RVA! It’s 56 °F, and today looks absolutely wonderful. Expect highs right around 80 °F, sunshine, and, then, at least two more days of the same. A sure sign of fall: Last night, for the first time in a long time, I spent part of my evening watching TV in the hammock. It was glorious.

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Alright, as per the ancient and time-honored tradition, RVADirt has the only coverage I could find this morning on last night’s RPS School Board meeting at which they discussed specialty school admissions. You can read through the entire thread on the smoking remains of Twitter. If I’m reading the details correctly, the Board adopted Option 3, the one suggested by the administration, with a 7–1–1 vote. That sort of blows my mind! I didn’t watch the meeting, so I have 1,000 questions, but will now patiently wait for some more reporting about details, timeline, and weird edge cases—like, for example, do economically disadvantaged kids who attend a private school count towards the five total seats allotted towards private and homeschool students?

Axios Richmond reports that the Casino 2.0 developers have “dumped a record $8.1 million into this year’s referendum campaign.” Tap through, because I just want to quote the whole piece at you, like this part: “The donations funding the pro-casino PAC are the largest single corporate contributions in Virginia history…the total contributions so far are more than three times the $2.6 million casino supporters spent during the 2021 referendum.” EIGHT MILLION DOLLARS! That’s bananas! Whatever we’re asking for in return should this thing pass is clearly orders of magnitude too small. For what it’s worth, I am still voting NO on Casino 2.0, regardless of how many ads I see on YouTube in the coming months.

#327

September 19, 2023

👋 Good morning, RVA: School Board meeting, bittersweet news, and tortillas

Good morning, RVA! It’s 63 °F, and this morning we may need to wait for some rain to clear out before the beautiful weather shows up. After all that, expect highs near 80 °F and, fingers crossed, plenty of sunshine. Looks like a great start to a great week.

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The RPS School Board will discuss the proposed changes to the speciality school application process at their 6:00 PM meeting tonight. You can find the full agenda here and a great PDF explaining the potential changes here. Each proposed option hopes to achieve the following goal, which I will quote right from the PDF: “Make our specialty schools more reflective of the percentage of economically disadvantaged students in RPS while maintaining their rigor and unique characteristics.” Option 3, the option preferred by the RPS administration, is a bold set of changes. It would prioritize 50% of the seats at each speciality school for economically disadvantaged students, as well as offering seats to the top three scoring applicants from each of the eight RPS middle schools (and the top three private/homeschool students). I think the part of this proposal that will draw an intense amount of public comment is the second to last sentence on slide 31: “Any remaining seats would go to the next highest scoring application — regardless of RPS middle school or [economically disadvantaged] status — with a cap of 5 seats for private school/homeschool students.” That cap of five seats for private school kids will disrupt the future (and financial) plans of a lot of families who hope to send their kids to an RPS speciality school after some time away in one of the region’s private schools. Things to watch for at tonight’s meeting: If families of private school students show up for public comment and if the School Board starts to lean toward Option 1, which lacks the cap on private school students. Megan Pauly at VPM reports on an important timing detail: The speciality school application process begins next months, so the Board doesn’t have much time if it wants to impact this coming round of admissions.

Jonathan Spiers at Richmond BizSense reports some bittersweet news for fans of zoning and rezoning: Maritza Pechin, Richmond’s deputy planning director, is leaving the City this week to take a job with the U.S. Department of Transportation. Pechin has absolutely crushed her time at the City’s Department of Planning, heading up planning processes for Richmond 300, the Diamond District, and probably a million other things. So while, on one hand, we’ll definitely miss her expertise and capacity, it is always nice to have folks looking out for Richmond at the federal level. Definitely keep an eye out for who gets tapped to fill Pechin’s role and pick up her full plate of really important work.

#593

September 18, 2023

😮‍💨 Good morning, RVA: Speciality schools, the Fall Line Trail, and a budget signed

Good morning, RVA! It’s 58 °F, and, whoa, that number starts with a five! Today you can expect a beautiful, sunny day with highs in the upper 70s—like, with a seven! The weekend forecast looks wonderful, too, but maybe keep an eye out for some rain on Sunday and into Monday. For the next couple of days, if you’re looking, you can find me sitting on a bicycle with a big smile on my face. Have a great weekend!

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1st District School Boardmember Liz Doerr has put together a really nice email explaining the proposed changes to RPS’s specialty school selection process. Currently, the enrollment of the student bodies at the local speciality schools (think: the two governor’s schools, Franklin Military Academy, Open High, Community High) does not match the demographics of Richmond or its school district. To quote Boardmember Doerr, the goal with these proposed changes “is to make our specialty schools more reflective of the percentage of economically disadvantaged students in RPS while maintaining their rigor and unique characteristics.” To that end, the RPS administration has proposed to prioritize economically disadvantaged students for about half of the seats available at these specialty schools. That may seem like a lot, but about 70% of RPS students are categorized as economically disadvantaged. The superintendent lays out the whole process leading up to his preferred proposal (“Option 3”) and how it would impact enrollment in this really excellent presentation from this past Monday. Full disclosure: My child definitely benefited from the current, inequitable selection process and is now included in the numbers dramatically skewing Maggie Walker’s student body deeply toward well-off, white kids. Honestly, it’s hard for me to know how I’d write about this proposal if my son were a couple years younger and facing a change in the high school application process that would make it harder for him to get into the school of his choice. But that’s the whole point, right? 70% of his peers, neighbors, and fellow classmates already face decades-old, systemic challenges that make it harder for them to get into the school of their choice! It’s tough stuff and will involve a lot of really challenging conversations, but we must do what we can to break these entrenched and calcified systems and remake them in more equitable ways. That’s never easy. School Board will, theoretically, consider this proposal at their upcoming September 18th meeting.

Exciting news from the Virginia Mercury via the Capital News Service: Henrico County will break ground on their portion of the Fall Line Trail next month! Mostly this involves installing some infrastructure to make it a bit safer to cross from Bryan Park over Hermitage Road to Spring Park, but still! Progress!

#717

September 15, 2023

🥫 Good morning, RVA: Running T-Rexes, animal walkways, and canned beer

Good morning, RVA! It’s 66 °F, and today you can expect highs around 80 °F, sunshine, and a decent drop in the humidity. I wore socks yesterday, which was the wrong decision, but maybe I’ll give it another go today.

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Patrick Larsen at VPM reports on a recent public meeting about that new methane-fired power plant Dominion wants to build in Chesterfield. First, I think advocates are doing a great job at consistently highlighting the ridiculousness of building new fossil-fuel infrastructure as our planet burns to death. Second, the picture at the top of this article is incredible—multiple inflatable T-Rexes with one ridden by a big-head Governor Youngkin and the other by a big-head Dominion CEO. The two apparently had a “race to climate oblivion.” This is amazing and, also, when did inflatable T-Rexes become so associated with running?

This morning at 10:00 AM, the City’s Urban Design Committee meets with a short agenda and will consider a single topic: The “expanded animal enclosure walkways at Maymont Park.” When I first read this, I pictured new enclosed paths designed specifically for the animals, with goats marching up and down walkways as hawks glided by. I wasn’t sure where those animals were going, but, as we all know, safe, protected infrastructure is really important. Unfortunately, these are just regular old paths for boring humans—ones that would update the existing wood paths with new, long-lasting, low-maintenance materials. You can read the project narrative and the staff report if you want more (disappointing!) info.

#258

September 14, 2023