⭕️ Good morning, RVA: 952 • 63 • 14.1; stupid math; and a stupid sign

Good morning, RVA! It’s 64 °F, and you can expect another day like yesterday: Hot highs, a chance for brief-but-severe weather, and cooler temperatures following. Looking at the forecast for the next couple of days and it’s highs in the 70s as far as the eye can see!
 

Water cooler

As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 771 new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 16 new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 87 new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 44, Henrico: 30, and Richmond: 13). Since this pandemic began, 1,288 people have died in the Richmond region. The seven-day average of new reported cases across the state sits at 952. Another day, another report of even fewer new cases of COVID-19—this is great news. I am a little skeptical of these numbers—not a ton! just a little!—if only because we’ve seen big fluctuations in the past due to Data Reporting Issues. Plus, the number of vaccines administered reported locally lately is real, real low, which makes me go hmmmm.
 

The New York Times has good coverage of President Biden’s announcement that he’ll shift the country’s vaccination strategy in hopes to get 70% of adults at least one dose of the vaccine by July 4th. As demand for the vaccine falls, Biden wants to focus on walk-ups, pop-ups, and mobile events. Lucky for us, locally, the Richmond and Henrico Health District are already doing all of these things. In fact, there’s a walk-up event today at George Wythe High School from 11:00 AM–4:00 PM. Just show up, no appointment required, and get your one-and-done Johnson & Johnson vaccine. I think we’ll need to continue this focus on clever, proactive, and methodical outreach over the next few months—I mean, look at this graph of new people in Virginia with at least one dose.
 

Speaking of, and because I can’t help myself, let me do some inaccurate math to see how we can reach Biden’s 70% goal in Virginia. According to the Census we’ve got about 6,674,775 adults in the Commonwealth, so 70% of our adult population would be around 4,672,342. Next, according to VDH’s dashboard, 3,865,951 people have received at least one dose of a vaccine (although some of those people are not from Virginia or did not report their address). Of those, just 133,409 are 19 and younger. So let’s say 3,750,000 adults, or 56%, in Virginia have had at least one dose. With 60 days remaining until July 4th, we’d need to vaccinate 15,372 new people per day to hit the president’s goal. The state’s seven-day average of new people vaccinated per day is 25,098—but quickly dropping. If I knew slightly more math I could take the current rate of decay and see if whether or not we’re projected to hit that 70% goal. This has been a fascinating but extremely impractical paragraph!
 

I put both of Monday’s budget sessions up on The Boring Show and will add yesterday’s session at some point today. I didn’t get a chance to listen live and haven’t found anyone writing about it locally, but I think there was discussion (and maybe action?) on funding something to do with gun violence? I feel so out of the loop!
 

The Richmond Times-Dispatch’s Michael Paul Williams writes about a dumb sign on the Henrico-Hanover border. These sorts of stupid, poorly-written signs only seem to spring forth from the minds of conservative property owners, right? I’m trying to imagine what would happen if someone hung a banner from an apartment in the City that said something like “CONSERVATIVES…?….BYE 👋”. We’d probably see a boatload of national articles decrying cancel culture while gently soothing some of the more fragile conservative egos.
 

From my inbox: “Iconic Restaurant Property Sold in Downtown Richmond. Thalhimer is pleased to announce the sale of the former 3rd Street Diner property located at 218 East Main Street in the City of Richmond, Virginia.” Iconic indeed! I spent a lot of my youthful late nights wandering back and forth between 3rd Street and 4th Street Diners. The new owners will operate the space as a restaurant—but will it be as iconic??
 

Friday Cheers, the outdoor concert series on Brown’s Island, exists and is already mostly sold out. I don’t know that I’m at the place where I feel comfortable attending a large event with hundreds of people—even if it is outside, distanced, and masked. I am fascinated by their COVID-19 protocols, though, and I think they’re worth scrolling through to get an idea for how our slow return to pre-pandemic routines could look. Selling tickets for “pods” of two, four, or eight people is a clever idea.
 

This morning’s longread

Millions Are Saying No to the Vaccines. What Are They Thinking?

This is a very anecdotal, small-sample-size, sourced-from-Twitter report of why some folks are unwilling to get the COVID-19 vaccine. Still, though, interesting to see into a little bit of their reasoning.
 

So what will change their minds? I cannot imagine that any amount of hectoring or shaming, or proclamations from the public-health or Democratic communities, will make much of a difference for this group. “I’ve lost all faith in the media and public-health officials,”said Myles Pindus, a 24-year-old in Brooklyn, who told me he is skeptical of the mRNA vaccines and is interested in the Johnson & Johnson shot. “It might sound crazy, but I’d rather go to Twitter and check out a few people I trust than take guidance from the CDC, or WHO, or Fauci,” Baca, the Colorado truck driver, told me. Other no-vaxxers offered similar appraisals of various Democrats and liberals, but they were typically less printable. From my conversations, I see three ways to persuade no-vaxxers: make it more convenient to get a shot; make it less convenient to not get a shot; or encourage them to think more socially.
 

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Picture of the Day

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