Good morning, RVA! It’s 37 °F, and there’s a dang freeze warning in effect tonight through 9:00 AM tomorrow morning. Today, you can expect highs in the mid 50s, but tonight temperatures could dip below freezing and threaten all the hard work you put in to your spring plantings. Again: Good luck, outside plants!
Water cooler
Alright, it’s Tuesday, and while the CDC’s COVID-19 Community Level is low across the region, case rates have crept upwards over the last couple of weeks. Currently, the seven day average of cases per 100,000 people in Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterfield is 152, 123, and 84 respectively—with all localities seeing increases over the last week. Once those case rate numbers pass 200 per 100,000, we’ll start to see localities in our region flip to yellow (or medium) on the CDC’s map. Meanwhile, as cases increase across the country, a federal judge in Florida struck down the mask requirement on public transportation. The NYT reports in the aforelinked article that “the ruling left it up to individual airlines and local transit agencies to decide what to do, and by late Monday, the nation’s largest airlines had dropped their mask requirements for domestic flights.” If you want to search them out, there are some pretty gross videos floating around of airline employees and passengers gleefully celebrating the end of the mandate mid-flight—sometimes with cheers and song. Vomit. This decision applies not only to planes, which I don’t have a lot of feelings on, but also buses, which provide essential transportation to millions of workers every day—and, at least in Richmond, to mostly folks with lower incomes. We’ll have to wait and see how GRTC decides to move forward with masks, but remember: You can totally keep wearing your own mask, and there are lots of great reasons other folks may want to stay masked. Maybe someone lives with a person who can’t get vaccinated (like a baby!) or spends a lot of time with an older, immunocompromised person (like grandma!). Maybe they just don’t want to inhale other folks' germs, COVID or otherwise.
Wyatt Gordon at Greater Greater Washington has an absolutely fascinating article about the future of the Mayor’s promise to keep GRTC fare-free in Richmond. Some background: The money to subsidize Richmond’s zero-fare program comes from a Department of Rail and Transportation grant which requires a $1 million match. Turns out, none of that $1 million is included in the Mayor’s proposed budget, despite several very public statements in support of zero fares, like this one: “As long as I am Mayor of @CityRichmondVA, I pledge to maintain fare-free @GRTCTransit in the City!” Seems bad, but I imagine the Mayor and his administration don’t feel like it’s solely Richmond’s responsibility to subsidize free fares for the entire region. Instead, Gordon reports that “City officials insist GRTC should fill the $1 million gap itself using federal funds leftover from the initial pandemic response, but such a move would be considered an increase to the transit provider’s budget and thus require the approval of GRTC’s full board.” This isn’t the worst idea, but it doesn’t seem sustainable and feels like it’s setting GRTC up to cover the ever-increasing costs of free fares (which means the transit agency will be able to provide less and less frequent service, one of the arguments I originally made against moving the system entirely fare-free). As of today, GRTC’s board includes, for the first time, representatives from Henrico, and, as of last night, includes Richmond’s CAO Lincoln Saunders. I think it’s a pretty safe bet that the newly comprised Board will vote to cover the million bucks, thus saving localities from doing so. But what happens when the required match increases to $3 million and then $5 million? Who will pay for that? Localities? GRTC? Will we spend even more of the CVTA’s money, which was intended to bring fast, frequent, and reliable transit to the entire region? You can watch the GRTC Board’s discussion over on their YouTube at 8:00 AM.
