Good morning, RVA! It’s 67 °F, and the high today is 80 °F. Not in the 80s, just regular 80. This is the first of three really temperate days before big heat comes back in to town on Sunday and sets up shop for at least an entire week. My recommendations is to get out there and spend some time enjoying the cooler temperatures! Maybe visit your closest park, take a couple pictures, and send me your favorites.
 

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Drivers, be aware that tolls on some local highways will change tonight at midnight, with the Downtown Expressway toll increasing from 70 cents to 90 cents (a full dollar if you pay with cash). This bit on the RMTA website, the group that owns and manages the DTE, stood out to me: “Driving the RMTA Expressway System is a choice. Therefore, we strive to be a safer and faster form of travel around the Richmond metropolitan community than the alternatives.” While it feels like a road wrote that sentence, I do agree. We should do everything we can to make commuting on the Downtown Expressway the preferred choice for drivers and make commuting on Main/Cary to avoid the tolls a bad time. It should be worth a dollar to hop on the Expressway and leave Main and Cary Streets to local traffic, buses, people on bikes, and the everyday pedestrian activity you find in a great urban neighborhood. The easiest way to do this, of course, is to narrow the two streets—heck, maybe even throw a bus-only lane and bike lane in there, too.
 

Yesterday, the Virginia Department of Health announced “a statewide outbreak of meningococcal disease,” which sounds scary, but VDH notes that the “risk to Virginia’s population is low.” Most folks have already been vaccinated against meningococcal disease, since it’s a school-required vaccine, but if for some reason you haven’t, or if you fall into one of the high-risk groups, you’ll want to talk to your medical provider about getting topped up. Tap through for some recommendations to help you stay safe that, luckily, are a lot of the same ways to keep yourself from catching COVID-19, too.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 67 °F, and the high today is 80 °F. Not in the 80s, just regular 80. This is the first of three really temperate days before big heat comes back in to town on Sunday and sets up shop for at least an entire week. My recommendations is to get out there and spend some time enjoying the cooler temperatures! Maybe visit your closest park, take a couple pictures, and send me your favorites.
 

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Drivers, be aware that tolls on some local highways will change tonight at midnight, with the Downtown Expressway toll increasing from 70 cents to 90 cents (a full dollar if you pay with cash). This bit on the RMTA website, the group that owns and manages the DTE, stood out to me: “Driving the RMTA Expressway System is a choice. Therefore, we strive to be a safer and faster form of travel around the Richmond metropolitan community than the alternatives.” While it feels like a road wrote that sentence, I do agree. We should do everything we can to make commuting on the Downtown Expressway the preferred choice for drivers and make commuting on Main/Cary to avoid the tolls a bad time. It should be worth a dollar to hop on the Expressway and leave Main and Cary Streets to local traffic, buses, people on bikes, and the everyday pedestrian activity you find in a great urban neighborhood. The easiest way to do this, of course, is to narrow the two streets—heck, maybe even throw a bus-only lane and bike lane in there, too.
 

Yesterday, the Virginia Department of Health announced “a statewide outbreak of meningococcal disease,” which sounds scary, but VDH notes that the “risk to Virginia’s population is low.” Most folks have already been vaccinated against meningococcal disease, since it’s a school-required vaccine, but if for some reason you haven’t, or if you fall into one of the high-risk groups, you’ll want to talk to your medical provider about getting topped up. Tap through for some recommendations to help you stay safe that, luckily, are a lot of the same ways to keep yourself from catching COVID-19, too.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 73 °F, and today you can expect highs in the mid 80s, cloudy skies, and, fingers crossed, a break in the humidity. Get excited, because today’s just the appetizer; the next couple of days look like real stunners.
 

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The horrible fencing surrounding the circle at Monument and Allen is officially down! I saw it with my own eyes yesterday, and you, too, can see it vicariously via today’s crappy Picture of the Day below. Now that the space no longer feels like a tiny, post-apocalyptic island, City leaders can and should start taking actual steps towards “reimagining Monument Avenue”—or whatever it is we want to call it. Richmond made a strategic misstep when we gave control of the process to the VMFA, a state agency, right before the governorship switched parties. That’s OK, we learned a lesson, put a temporary solution in place, and now have the time and space needed to put together a thoughtful, City-run engagement and planning process. It’d be an even bigger misstep to treat all 6,000 of the newly-installed plants (as much as I love plants) as the permanent future for this circle.
 

Megan Pauly at VPM reports on Hopewell City Public Schools’ pilot project to (sort of) ban cellphones at middle and high schools: “Last year, Hopewell City Public Schools started requiring middle and high school students to keep cellphones locked away in magnetic pouches during the school day.” I think I’m mostly against this, but Pauly does point to some interesting, specific issues that result from every kid having access to a phone all day long. But, like, this is the world we live in, and locking phones away in little pouches seems more like a bandaid fix than anything else. The Hopewell Superintendent knows this and gets to the real long-term goal near the bottom of the article, saying “he’d like students to be able to self-manage their cellphone use during the day without [the pouches].” Sounds great, and I guess we add “teach kids how to properly manage living in an always-connected world” to the giant list of things we’d like teachers to cover in addition to World History and Geometry.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 72 °F, and yesterday’s much needed, soaking rain has moved on. Today you can expect highs in the mid 80s, a cloudy sky, and, I think, a dry forecast. Dryish might be more a little more correct, because I’m sure the humidity will make going outside feel like curling up in an armpit.
 

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Anna Bryson at the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that Huguenot High School “was under a ‘lock and teach’ on Monday in response to a fight between students at the school.” Richmond Public Schools’ spokesperson said school officials “conducted a safety check in the building and parking lot areas and found that all was clear.” Yesterday’s “lock and teach” follows the cancellation of this past Friday’s Huguenot football game due to a shooting threat and, of course, the fatal shooting at the school’s graduation ceremony in June. I appreciate RPS taking every threat seriously and focusing on keeping the community safe. After this summer’s violence, these disruptions of the back-to-school rhythm must be really traumatic to students, staff, and teachers.
 

I don’t know enough about how the Virginia ABC works to comment intelligently on whether or not the state-run monopoly is making enough money or too much money, but I enjoyed the headline from this piece by Michael Martz in the RTD: “Youngkin-driven cuts at ABC has liquor industry wondering why.”
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 71 °F, and today looks a lot like yesterday: Cooler, cloudier, and rainier than last week. Ahead of us we’ve got sub-80 highs and a decent chance for rain most of the day. These less oppressive days should stick around until the weekend, so enjoy!
 

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Thad Green at the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that the horrible fencing around the circle at Monument and Allen (for which we really need to land on a more permanent name) could come down as soon as this week! Tap through for some drone photos from Daniel Sangjib to give you an idea of what 6,000 plants worth of landscaping looks like.
 

I found this report, in the RTD by Eric Kolenich, about the future of development in Goochland super fascinating. I’m all about building as many homes as we can, but I’m also about density and reducing sprawl—and Goochland is way, way out there. Building a bunch of low-density, disconnected neighborhoods and strip malls is not only an extremely inefficient use of land, but it’s also really expensive to run utilities and build roads to connect all of these once-rural places into the more developed parts of the region. I’m sure County officials see the impending development and have already started to count up those tax revenues, but what if they just said no to sprawl and enforced a sort of one-sided ubran growth boundary instead?
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 71 °F, and today looks a lot like yesterday: Cooler, cloudier, and rainier than last week. Ahead of us we’ve got sub-80 highs and a decent chance for rain most of the day. These less oppressive days should stick around until the weekend, so enjoy!
 

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Thad Green at the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that the horrible fencing around the circle at Monument and Allen (for which we really need to land on a more permanent name) could come down as soon as this week! Tap through for some drone photos from Daniel Sangjib to give you an idea of what 6,000 plants worth of landscaping looks like.
 

I found this report, in the RTD by Eric Kolenich, about the future of development in Goochland super fascinating. I’m all about building as many homes as we can, but I’m also about density and reducing sprawl—and Goochland is way, way out there. Building a bunch of low-density, disconnected neighborhoods and strip malls is not only an extremely inefficient use of land, but it’s also really expensive to run utilities and build roads to connect all of these once-rural places into the more developed parts of the region. I’m sure County officials see the impending development and have already started to count up those tax revenues, but what if they just said no to sprawl and enforced a sort of one-sided ubran growth boundary instead?
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 72 °F, and today is this week’s Big Weather Day. You can expect super hot highs in the mid 90s, lots of humidity, and an off chance of severe storms. Seriously: The Feels Likes today could reach 105 °F, which is a large number that demands your attention. Keep the bikes in the shed, take the bus, stay inside, drink water, and do all the things that make up a regular part of life in Richmond during the deep summer. Cooler weather returns on Sunday—I even see an early-morning low that starts with a five! Get excited!
 

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Former Virginia Mercury reporter Mechelle Hankerson, now at WHRO, reports that the Virginia Beach School Board has voted not to adopt Governor Youngkin’s anti-trans policies. This question of whether or not to adopt Youngkin’s harmful policies will end up on School Board agendas in our region, too—and soon. While it’s splashy to go first and make headlines, I’m content with letting a few large, progressive school districts set up a precedent for breaking from the Governor and protecting children in public schools. Unless I’ve missed it, I think only Spotsylvania County Public Schools has voted to adopt these policies, and, if I had to bet, I’d guess that Richmond and Henrico will follow Virginia Beach, with Chesterfield and Hanover following Spotsylvania.
 

Related, the Richmond Times-Dispatch’s Anna Bryson reports that “Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares has found that Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s K-12 transgender policies comply with state and federal law.” This is incredibly unsurprising, of course, and mostly a nothing burger designed to generate headlines—although we could, I guess, see some legal action brought against school districts that decide not to explicitly adopt the Governor’s anti-trans policies. Also, about large, progressive school districts setting precedents, Bryson notes that a bunch of Northern Virginia localities have issued statements saying they already have regulations in place to address the rights of trans kids and they’ll just continue to follow those existing regulations. I could definitely see Henrico choosing to do the same, avoiding a big, showy vote.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 66 °F, and yesterday was actually pretty lovely—so much so that I feel like I need to apologize for lumping it in with the rest of this summer’s sweltering Wednesdays. Today, though, we‘ll have temperatures back in the 90s and a chance for rain later this evening. Looking ahead, the NBC12 weather team says to watch out for tomorrow, when they expect near-record temperatures, triple-digit Feels Likes, and a chance for “an isolated strong late-day storm.” Seems like a lot, and I’m content with today’s comparatively boring forecast!
 

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VPM’s Meghan Moore tried to get out there and ride on the newly-relaunched RVA BikeShare system and reports on some difficulty with, well, everything. I think the headline speaks for itself: “RVA BikeShare 2.0 exists, but does not work.” Moore could not purchase a membership, couldn’t take advantage of the free rides offered by the City, couldn’t get the system to take a credit card, and got a bounce back from the support email address. Brutal. While I totally empathize with needing some time to work the kinks out of operating a once-shuttered system under a new vendor, I do wonder if the relaunch was unnecessarily rushed? Like, was anyone expecting an RVA BikeShare return this summer? I say we give the team some time to find their rhythm, and, if it’s still not working next week, I’ll probably have some more thoughts.
 

Wyatt Gordon at Greater Greater Washington looks at how Richmond’s Department of Public Works will spend millions of dollars from the Virginia Highway Safety Improvement Program, mostly through modifying stoplights and installing stop signs. I agree with Bike Walk RVA’s Brantley Tyndall who says “I would like to see more pedestrian focus on the use of Highway Safety Improvement Program dollars…Flashing yellow arrows and high visibility backplates should provide a significant pedestrian safety benefit at intersections due to increased driver awareness. They won’t be as effective as raised crosswalks or lane narrowing, but we will take what we can get.” Also, towards the end of the article, the City’s Vision Zero Coordinator falsely equates those flimsy stop for pedestrian signs to real pilot infrastructure projects built using temporary materials, saying “If I were to stop and focus on doing something with temporary materials, that doesn’t last very long — we’ve seen what happens with the stop for pedestrian signs, we could go around chasing those forever and never get around to the funding that makes a difference.” First, when I ask the City to pilot infrastructure projects, I’m not asking—and have never asked!—for those pedestrian signs. Second, I don’t get this intense resistance to pilot projects; it makes absolutely zero sense. There are many examples of how to slow traffic using temporary materials. It’s not like Richmond is some special infrastructure snowflake. We have barrels! We have barriers! Now let’s use them to quickly make our streets safer.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 66 °F, and yesterday was actually pretty lovely—so much so that I feel like I need to apologize for lumping it in with the rest of this summer’s sweltering Wednesdays. Today, though, we‘ll have temperatures back in the 90s and a chance for rain later this evening. Looking ahead, the NBC12 weather team says to watch out for tomorrow, when they expect near-record temperatures, triple-digit Feels Likes, and a chance for “an isolated strong late-day storm.” Seems like a lot, and I’m content with today’s comparatively boring forecast!
 

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VPM’s Meghan Moore tried to get out there and ride on the newly-relaunched RVA BikeShare system and reports on some difficulty with, well, everything. I think the headline speaks for itself: “RVA BikeShare 2.0 exists, but does not work.” Moore could not purchase a membership, couldn’t take advantage of the free rides offered by the City, couldn’t get the system to take a credit card, and got a bounce back from the support email address. Brutal. While I totally empathize with needing some time to work the kinks out of operating a once-shuttered system under a new vendor, I do wonder if the relaunch was unnecessarily rushed? Like, was anyone expecting an RVA BikeShare return this summer? I say we give the team some time to find their rhythm, and, if it’s still not working next week, I’ll probably have some more thoughts.
 

Wyatt Gordon at Greater Greater Washington looks at how Richmond’s Department of Public Works will spend millions of dollars from the Virginia Highway Safety Improvement Program, mostly through modifying stoplights and installing stop signs. I agree with Bike Walk RVA’s Brantley Tyndall who says “I would like to see more pedestrian focus on the use of Highway Safety Improvement Program dollars…Flashing yellow arrows and high visibility backplates should provide a significant pedestrian safety benefit at intersections due to increased driver awareness. They won’t be as effective as raised crosswalks or lane narrowing, but we will take what we can get.” Also, towards the end of the article, the City’s Vision Zero Coordinator falsely equates those flimsy stop for pedestrian signs to real pilot infrastructure projects built using temporary materials, saying “If I were to stop and focus on doing something with temporary materials, that doesn’t last very long — we’ve seen what happens with the stop for pedestrian signs, we could go around chasing those forever and never get around to the funding that makes a difference.” First, when I ask the City to pilot infrastructure projects, I’m not asking—and have never asked!—for those pedestrian signs. Second, I don’t get this intense resistance to pilot projects; it makes absolutely zero sense. There are many examples of how to slow traffic using temporary materials. It’s not like Richmond is some special infrastructure snowflake. We have barrels! We have barriers! Now let’s use them to quickly make our streets safer.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 61 °F, and etc etc more of the same. Honestly, for at least the rest of the week, you can expect hot, dry days with some number of clouds. After that, maybe we’ll stumble upon some cooler temperatures. Until then, best of luck, and you know the hot-weather drill!
 

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Thad Green at the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that Senators Tim Kaine and Mark Warner have “secured $750,000 toward reworking the natural buffer along the James River,” part of which includes rerouting the Virginia Capital Trail off of Dock Street and into the nearby wilderness. I don’t know if this was always the funding plan, but federal money is the best kind of money, so great work everyone involved! Related, I rode by the site of the under-construction James River Center the other day, and, whoa is it coming along!
 

Also in the RTD, Michael Martz reports that Virginia’s Senate and House budget negotiators may have finally reached a deal. Sounds like both parties plus the Governor will meet today, and, if everything looks copacetic, the Gov will call a special session to get the thing formally approved. Of course, during that special session, anyone is free to propose amendments and spin things off into an infinite number of distracting directions, but it really does sound like both sides are now close to compromise—just in time for the start of the 2024 budget season! Wooooooblerrrrrghh.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 73 °F, and today looks a lot like yesterday but with slightly cooler temperatures—which, honestly, describing highs around 90 °F as “slightly cooler” feels misleading. How about: It should be a little less hot today. Stay hydrated, wear a hat, stay inside if you can, because we’ve got a lot more of this ahead of us.
 

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Another day, another horde of young people returns to the city! Today marks VCU’s official first day of class and that means hustle, bustle, and life—especially in and around the university’s Monroe Park Campus. Welcome back students, I’m glad you’re here. To the rest of us, my warning from yesterday still stands: If you have to move through the area in a car, please be extra aware and doubly careful! You should expect an orders-of-magnitude increase in the number of people fully taking advantage of their rights as pedestrians (maybe to an extreme and slightly terrifying degree).
 

Last week, GRTC announced their planned service changes for Sunday, September 10th. The biggest change involves routing 17 different bus lines through the soon-to-open Downtown Transfer Station. It’s hard to believe, but, in just 20 days, Richmond will no longer have a Temporary Transfer Station for the first time in something like eight years. I have complicated feelings about the new DTS, but it exists and it definitely provides a more humane environment for bus riders to wait and make transfers should they need it. GRTC also has a few smaller but still rad changes planned, too: The Pulse will now run every 15-minutes all day long on Saturday (that’s an improvement from 30-minute service for most of the day); the #5, thankfully, returns to its 15-minute frequency until 7:00 PM; and the #7A/B both get four more hours of Sunday service. All good tweaks and steps toward restoring some of the bus service we’ve lost over the last couple of years. You can attend a public meeting about these changes a week from today, on August 29th at, at the Main Branch Library (101 E. Franklin Street) from 5:30–6:30 PM.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and today, unlike this past weekend’s absolutely beautiful Saturday, looks hot and cloudy. Expect highs in the mid 90s and a lot of very good reasons to just stay inside. Looking ahead, the rest of the week has a bunch of heat in store for us with maybe some cooler temperatures next week. August is a month of enduring!
 

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Students! Welcome back! Today marks the first day of the 2023–2024 school year for Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterfield public schools. Good luck to everyone headed back in to school this morning—kids, teachers, staff, administration, everyone. As for the rest of us carrying on about our regular business—especially if you’re driving—keep an eye out for children making their way to school as you move through the region. I know summer is great for all sorts of reasons, but I absolutely love the city’s awakening that’s marked by the return of fall.
 

Big news: Richmond’s Department of Public Works announced that the RVA BikeShare Program will return to action starting TODAY. To make up for the system’s sudden shut down earlier this year, “the city is providing all registered BikeShare users free rides through December 31, 2023.” That’s pretty awesome and way more than the originally planned 30 days of free rides. According to the release, DPW will also celebrate today’s return to service by opening a brand new station at the Dominion Energy Center. At 6th and Grace, this new station will fill a sizeable hole in RVA BikeShare’s coverage map, which, in my mind, is exactly the right way to expand. Up next: Adding, like, six new stations to The Fan please!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 73 °F, which is already pretty warm for this part of the day. Today you can, once again, expect sunshine and temperatures around 90 °F—with more of the same throughout the weekend. If you’ve got plans to go get rad, make sure they’re in the early morning or late evening, and make sure you stay hydrated.
 

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RVA Rapid Transit will host their third Mobility University this coming September, and the application is now open. This is a five-week course that meets on Wednesdays to “educated and empower bus riders to self-advocate for better public transportation.” Over the course of about a month, you’ll cover the history of transit, how the bus gets funded, tips on telling your own story at a public meeting, and learn how to build your own advocacy campaign from scratch. So, if you’re a bus rider and would like to dig deeper into making our public transit system better, go ahead and fill out the application form today. Added bonus: Every session comes with free dinner catered by Soul n’ Vinegar!
 

This article from NPR, syndicated on VPM, is the textual embodiment of the “This Is Fine” meme: “This summer’s crazy weather just can’t stop, won’t stop Americans from having fun.” The “crazy weather” is, of course, extreme heat and weather events set off by climate change, and the “fun” these Americans are having is literal heat stroke. It feels very American that we feel challenged by this summer’s apocalyptic weather not to do whatever we can to slow the death of our planet, but to prove that we can and will, by god, still go to a baseball game even if it means ending up in the ER.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 73 °F, which is already pretty warm for this part of the day. Today you can, once again, expect sunshine and temperatures around 90 °F—with more of the same throughout the weekend. If you’ve got plans to go get rad, make sure they’re in the early morning or late evening, and make sure you stay hydrated.
 

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RVA Rapid Transit will host their third Mobility University this coming September, and the application is now open. This is a five-week course that meets on Wednesdays to “educated and empower bus riders to self-advocate for better public transportation.” Over the course of about a month, you’ll cover the history of transit, how the bus gets funded, tips on telling your own story at a public meeting, and learn how to build your own advocacy campaign from scratch. So, if you’re a bus rider and would like to dig deeper into making our public transit system better, go ahead and fill out the application form today. Added bonus: Every session comes with free dinner catered by Soul n’ Vinegar!
 

This article from NPR, syndicated on VPM, is the textual embodiment of the “This Is Fine” meme: “This summer’s crazy weather just can’t stop, won’t stop Americans from having fun.” The “crazy weather” is, of course, extreme heat and weather events set off by climate change, and the “fun” these Americans are having is literal heat stroke. It feels very American that we feel challenged by this summer’s apocalyptic weather not to do whatever we can to slow the death of our planet, but to prove that we can and will, by god, still go to a baseball game even if it means ending up in the ER.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and it’s blerg-hot again. You should expect highs in the 90s, some sunshine, some rain this evening, and for every small-talk conversation you have to begin with a discussion of the heat. It’s summer in Richmond. This Is The Way.
 

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From the Capital Trail monthly newsletter comes this news about a half-mile bit of shared-use path connecting Varina High School to the Capital Trail itself. This is a cool project on its own, but it’s also a perfect example of the type of projects Richmond and Henrico should already be thinking about when it comes to the Fall Line Trail. The Fall Line should function as a thick, meaty spine, running from Ashland to Petersburg, with dozens of thin, pliable ribs branching off to connect schools, libraries, neighborhoods, breweries, ball parks, museums, government buildings, parks, rivers—every dang thing!
 

Over in The Hill, Mayor Levar Stoney and Climate Scientist Dr. Jeremy Hoffman, two names you’re probably familiar with, have a column about climate change, extreme heat, and how all levels of government can and should get involved in the work to keep us from burning alive. Just like with our aging sewer system (which is also a climate-adjacent issue), I think fully addressing climate change in Richmond will take more money and resources than we have available at the local level. We need massive, federal programs like the Inflation Reduction Act, but, like, a bunch of them year after year. That doesn’t seem like a realistic goal, but I don’t know how to actually impact the issue any other way.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and today looks the tiniest bit cooler than the last few days. You can expect highs right around 90 °F and Feels Likes in the same neighborhood. I don’t know about you, but that kind of heat still makes me sweat through my shirt after even just a quick walk or ride around the block—so, preemptive apologies if you happen to run across me this week and I’m soaked though and bedraggled!
 

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I never know what to make of RPS School Board meetings. Megan Pauly at VPM reports that the Board voted to consider hiring a 3rd-party to conduct an investigation into the shooting that took place during Huguenot High School’s graduation ceremony back in June. But, I also know, because of RVADirt’s citizen reporting on Twitter, that the Richmond Police Department has not yet finished their investigation, which seems like something you’d want to wrap up before launching your own. Also also, at that same meeting this past Monday, apparently 2nd District Boardmember Mariah White introduced a motion to suspend the Superintendent? One week before school starts? Seems…bad. I’ve said this before, but if most Richmonders forced themselves to watch one or two School Board meetings they would be shocked at the level of dysfunction and distraction. A lot of it goes unreported—I guess exactly because it’s so dysfunctional and distracting?—but, at some point, it’d be nice to start holding these elected officials accountable for both their actions and their behavior. Totally unrelated (just kidding, super related): School Board elections are right around the corner in 2024. I know there are multiple people reading this exact sentence right now that are half-heartedly thinking “hmm could I run for School Board?” Yes you can, and yes you should!
 

The Richmond Times-Dispatch’s Michael Martz has a small update on Casino 2.0, reporting that Richmond Lodge No. 1 of the Good Lions Inc. (not affiliated with the Lions Club International), has asked a judge to pump the brakes on putting the Casino redo on this November’s ballot. Good Lions argues that “the city improperly awarded a contract to the casino operator without undergoing a public bidding process first.” The judge will consider their argument and has (temporarily) suspended his earlier decision to allow adding a casino referendum to the ballot. Fascinatingly, Good Lions is represented by State Senator Chap Petersen, a Democrat out of Fairfax City, which I imagine does not make our Democrat and Governor-hopeful Mayor very happy. Anyway, I wouldn’t get too excited about this development if, like me, you plan on voting NO on Casino 2.0 in a couple months, because I’d wager that this all goes away. We’ll learn for sure later this month.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 77 °F, and, again, it’s hot. Today, you can expect highs in the low-to-mid 90s, Feels Likes in the 100s, and a potential for rain lasting most of the afternoon. We’ve got a bunch more weeks of summer left, so buckle up and pack an extra shirt for when you sweat through the first one.
 

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Should you want it, Michael Martz at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has another update on the General Assembly’s slow stumble toward a budget. Sounds like the House and Senate have crept closer to a compromise over the past week or so. Progress is good, but I agree with political commentator Bob Holsworth: “The challenge is that every day that goes by, it becomes closer to the election and that becomes more of an influence on what they’re doing.” I hope that influence is not to make big, huge campaign issues out of small, reasonably straightforward budget stuff.
 

This morning I learned about “The Rich Men North of Richmond,” from, of all places, the actual local newspaper. I think this means I’m either entirely out of the loop or I’ve successfully pared back my social media usage to a healthy level. I’m not going to link to it because parts of it are offensive, parts are dumb, and most of it is Republican propaganda. But this song exists and it mentions Richmond and I feel like there are lots of takes floating around of various temperatures. Here’s my extremely mild take: If any of the elected officials sharing this song wanted to address the issues it mentions—like, for example, livable wages—they could introduce legislation instead of posting American flag emojis on Twitter. They don’t actually want to solve these problems, so they won’t.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 68 °F, and temperatures will creep back up into the 90s today. Expect the warmening to continue through the weekend, with highs right around 95 °F on both Saturday and Sunday. It’s actually a little-known part of Richmond’s Charter that the Watermelon Festival must take place on one of the Summer’s most blazing-hot weekends.
 

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This Sunday, starting at 10:00 AM you can join thousands of watermelons and other people at the Carytown Watermelon Festival. First, I hope you got your Cars Ruin Carytown shirt ahead of time, because if ever there was a weekend to wear it, it’s this one. Second, the Watermelon Festival basically exists as an annual reminder that we can, in fact, close Carytown to vehicle traffic. Not only does the world keep on turning, but thousand of people—hundreds of thousands according to the website—manage to make their way in and out of the neighborhood, buy things, and have a generally good (if sweaty) time despite not driving or parking on actual Cary Street itself. See, it can be done! We do it on the regular! After reading that piece in BizSense the other day, I have some new-found optimism about making Carytown pedestrian-only. Check out this quote: “Erin Bottcher, who co-owns Bev’s Homemade Ice Cream at 2911 W. Cary Street, said she likes the once-a-month event idea but said it would require signage, informing residents and other hurdles.” Bottcher immediately goes to say she’d be against a full-closure because “people would just not come to Carytown anymore,” which, sigh, but I think this is progress!
 

David Ress at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has a long piece about the planners working for Chesterfield County. Yes, there’s a lot of roadchat in there but also a lot of paragraphs about progressive, dense development that I’m not sure I would have expected out in Chesterfield a decade ago. I typically don’t love person-on-the-street quotes, especially about development and housing, but this one is about as measured and thoughtful as they come: “I love these trees…I wish they wouldn’t take them down…but people need places to live, I guess. As long as we get more people on less land, I guess that’s the best we can hope for."
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 72 °F, and today’s forecast looks a bit cooler, cloudier, and maybe wetter than yesterday’s. You can expect temperatures in the low 80s, and the rain, if it shows up, will hit after lunch. Sounds like we’ve got a bit of a respite from the summer’s high heat!
 

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WTVR reports that this past Monday a driver hit and killed 17-year-old Geo Morton, who was riding his bike home from work on Williamsburg Road. Morton was involved in Richmond’s BMX scene, and tonight at 7:00 PM they’ll host a memorial ride and will collect donations to help Morton’s family pay for funeral costs. I’m tired of writing about memorial rides, and, while the specifics surrounding this tragedy are bizarre and horrible in all sorts of ways, no one should die while riding home from work. We need to do a better job of protecting the most vulnerable people out there just using our region’s roads to get around.
 

VPM’s Connor Scribner reports that Virginia Housing has denied RRHA’s application for “about $15 million in federal tax credits to build the second phase of new housing in Creighton Court,” one of Richmond’s large public housing neighborhoods. Creighton Court redevelopment—or maybe put more accurately, demolition of existing public housing and construction of new mixed-income housing—is ongoing as we speak, but this new money would have helped fund the 72-unit, second phase of the project. I am woefully underinformed on how the math for all of these new units works out, and I really need to read a simple explainer (if anyone has one, please let me know!). But, according to Scribner, the original 504 units of public housing at Creighton Court will be replaced with 681 units, 561 income-restricted units and 120 market-rate units. However, if I’m reading the reporting right, only 25% of those income-restricted units will be made available to folks making below 30% of the Area Median Income. That’s about 140 units for people with extremely low incomes, far short of the 504 original units. So are we shorting ourselves 360 units of deeply affordable housing? I don’t have enough information to say one way or the other. Public housing redevelopment is complex, with a handful of options available to existing residents, including one-for-one replacement, vouchers, and some opportunities to move to other public housing in the region. Like I said, I really need to learn more about how the math works out. There is a definitely a PDF floating around somewhere that I should have read years ago, and now I need to go digging.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 73 °F, and I think we mostly missed out on yesterday’s severe storms. That’s good news—I like to avoid 60 mph straight-line winds whenever I can. Today, though, you can expect very calm winds, clear skies, and highs in the 90s. As far as the current forecast goes, we’ve got nothing severe in our immediate future.
 

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Will Gonzalez at WRIC reports that a driver hit and killed a man riding a scooter at the intersection of Grove Avenue and N. Lombardy Street this past Sunday at 7:33 AM. I haven’t see any more details, but I would guess that speed was probably a factor. This is, I think, either the third or fourth person to be hit and killed by a driver on and around VCU’s campus in 2023. It’s upsetting that I can’t even remembering how many people have died using our streets in just that area, and I wonder when will we start to adress this problem with the seriousness it deserves. While I appreciate the City’s current efforts to rapidly install speed tables in a bunch of different neighborhoods (I’ve got two new ones up near me and they’re definitely working), we’ve got to do more. We need to pair tactical efforts that respond directly to a horrible incident like this with bigger, bolder, holistic citywide efforts to slow drivers down. How do we launch a fatality review board, but for crashes? Can we do something to discourage ownership of massive vehicles in the city? Where can we shunt traffic off of neighborhood streets and onto highways? Can we audit and eliminate every slip lane and sweeping, speedy turn? We know this work is not hopeless if we take it seriously. Cities across the country and the world have taken concrete—and successful!—steps towards making their streets safe for everyone. We should, too.
 

Speaking of, via /r/rva here’s a picture of how you can easily, quickly, and cheaply get rid of a dangerous slip lane (this is the intersection of 10th and Leigh, back behind VCU Health). I’m not sure if this is a permanent installation, a pilot, or some temporary infrastructure while waiting on nearby construction, but it does prove that this sort of thing is totally possible.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 72 °F, and today we’ll see highs in the 90s and, probably, rain at some point this evening. NBC12’s Andrew Freiden says we may need to even be on the lookout for severe summer storms. Keep an eye on the weather app of your choice for weather warnings, and maybe keep your devices charged just in case.
 

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As foretold: At their meeting this past Friday, the Richmond Electoral Board reversed course and will now, under pressure from the public and the City Attorney, open two satellite early voting locations—one at the Hickory Hill Community Center and one at City Hall. Graham Moomaw at the Virginia Mercury reports all of the details, including that, because they couldn’t just take the L, neither location will offer voting on Sundays. I’m sure requiring a majority of the Electoral Board to be partisan appointees from the current governor’s party is a policy designed to prevent some sort of voting shenanigans, but, in the current environment, it sure seems to cause unnecessary issues—especially when one of the parties consistently wants to make voting harder for folks.
 

They did it! The City’s Charter Review Commission has released its final recommendations, which you can download in full PDF glory here. They’ve sorted the recommendations into four buckets: Updating the Charter’s language to make it more modern and consistent; adjusting the current Mayor-Council form of government; considering a new Council-Manager form of government (while keeping an elected mayor); and staggering City Council’s terms. The first two buckets they recommend asking the General Assembly to approve this coming session, the third studied by a commission created before the end of this year, and the fourth implemented in time for the 2028 elections. I haven’t had the time to dive into the sure-to-be gory details of each bucket, but they all contain some fascinating ideas! I’m especially interested in bucket number two, which suggests big-but-achievable changes like: tweaking the budget process, requiring the Mayor to report out at Council monthly, and doubling City Council’s salaries (up from something like $25,000). If Council wants to follow any of these recommendations, there’s a ton of work to be done between now and the start of the 2024 General Assembly session. Unfortunately, we’ll have to wait until Council gets back from their August recess to gauge their interest and willingness to dig in.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 66 °F and rainy. The rain has a decent chance of sticking around through lunch, and then, after that, we’ll see cloudy skies with highs around 80 °F. Temperatures continue to climb through the weekend, though nothing like the triple-digit sweatfest from a week ago—just regular-type summer highs in the 90s. Saturday and Sunday mornings both look particularly lovely, so I hope you can find the time to enjoy them (maybe quietly with a warm beverage of your choice).
 

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VPM’s Ian M. Stewart reports that a Portuguese company has signed a $55,000 deal to relaunch Richmond’s shuttered bike share system. Well, to make sure I’m getting it right, Stewart says “A company called We Go Share will help relaunch RVA Bike Share’s software for $55,000.” Relaunching software might not be the same thing as relaunching the entire system, and $55,000 definitely won’t go very far when it comes to actually running and maintaining a bike share system. I’m excited to hear more. As of this morning, we still don’t have a reopening date for RVA Bike Share, but this definitely does seem like at least a first step in the right direction. Also interesting, the Portuguese company We Go Share, looks to have made a dedicated business out of relaunching abanadoned Bewegen bike share systems.
 

Today at 10:00 AM in their hard-to-reach office at the end of Laburnum Avenue, Richmond’s Electoral Board will host a special meeting to address that time they—maybe illegally—got rid of the City’s satellite early-voting locations. You can find their agenda here, but it’s a couple opportunities for public comment, “discussion regarding satellite voting locations in the City of Richmond,” and “discussion on Sunday voting.” Honestly, I feel weirdly optimistic about the Board reversing course and reinstating the two satellite voting locations, one at City Hall and one at the Hickory Hill Community Center. I certainly could be wrong, but the City has already allocated the money for running these locations and the City Attorney is on record questioning the Board’s decision-making. I’m sure we’ll hear more this afternoon, so keep an ear out!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 64 °F, and this week’s mid-summer respite from the dangerous heat continues. You can expect the cloudy sky to help keep temperatures in the mid-80s, which sounds great, and it looks like we’ll have a decent chance of rain tomorrow morning that will extend our streak of mild temperatures. I’m wondering if I should water the outside plants tonight or just let it ride?
 

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Ian M. Stewart at VPM reports on just how hard it is to get a shelter—or even a bench—installed at a bus stop in the Richmond region. Four things! First, I appreciate the ongoing coverage of this issue and do think it’s part of the reason we’ve seen more recent attention (and funding) to providing humane places to wait for the bus. Second, shout out to RVA Rapid Transit for constantly pushing this issue and generating that media coverage! Make sure you flip through their 2023 State of Transit report which highlights the need for more and better bus stop amenities. Third, this quote from a GRTC spokesperson is incredible/sad: “The Board voted to support — but did not provide funding for — the ‘Aspirational’ 28.6M Dollar investment…to install shelters or seating at 50% of stops." As to who should provide that nearly $30 million of funding, seems like localities should front the money required to install bus stop amenities within their own jurisdictions—not GRTC and certainly not the Central Virginia Transportation Authority. The latter shouldn’t be used to replace a city or county’s baseline investments into transportation infrastructure (although past history strongly disagrees with me). Fourth, it’s exciting to hear that GRTC is piloting pole-attached seating, which, while not the end-all-be-all of comfortable places to sit on a rainy day, is certainly better than nothing. The best thing about this particular type of seating is that you don’t need to get the City’s Department of Public Works to approve anything! You can just bolt the it right to an existing bus stop pole. Y’all know how I feel creative pilot projects, and the City should take GRTC’s lead and try out a few interesting projects of their own.
 

Michael Schwartz at Richmond BizSense reports that Genworth’s 45-acre Broad Street campus is under contract to a Baltimore-based developer. This is a huge piece of land with tons of potential—for housing, office space, retail, all kinds of things. In fact, a while back, Henrico County hosted some public design charettes to ask the public what they wanted from an eventual redevelopment of the space, and I was pretty optimistic about the results at the time! We’ll see if any of the public’s suggestions from 2019—BRT, walkable neighborhoods, and convertible parking garages—end up in this new developer’s plans.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 64 °F, and it looks like we’ve got another great day on tap with sunshine and highs in the mid 80s. I know we’re smack-dab in the middle of the week, and it’s way too early to look towards the weekend, but temperatures may start to creep up on Saturday. Enjoy this bit of cooler weather while you can; I spent about an hour puttering around in the garden last night and didn’t even break a sweat. Amazing!
 

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Hark! What’s this? A COVID-19 update! You’ve probably either heard rumblings of a new COVID-19 wave approaching or maybe just had more people in your life get sick and test positive. Well, the presence of a new Katelyn Jetelina email in my inbox confirms it: “We find ourselves in the middle of a COVID-19 wave. Again. If this summer follows the previous three, we should expect ₁₀–15% of Americans to get infected.” It’s early on, and, reading through her entire email will, I hope, help tamp down any panic you might start to feel creeping in around the edges. As for what’s going on locally, you can pull up Virginia’s hospital admissions data on the CDC’s website or poke around in the Virginia Department of Health’s COVID-19 dashboard, which just got an update yesterday. It looks like, at least here in the commonwealth, both hospital admissions numbers and wastewater surveillance continue to show low levels of COVID-19 in our communities. That’s good news, but keep an eye on things as the situation evolves. It’s been a while since I’ve written a sentence like this but: Make good decisions, test frequently, stay home if you’re sick, and maybe dig around in your cupboard for that old box of masks—just in case.
 

Look at what happens when people get involved! Em Holter at the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that “The City of Richmond is backing out of a deal to build a fire training facility at the Hickory Hill Community Center” Wyatt Gordon has a copy of a letter (Twitter) sent from the City’s CAO to Council President Mike Jones and Councilmember Reva Trammel saying that, as a compromise, Richmond Fire Department training classes will remain at Hickory Hill while “a new burn tower will be built in Sandston, VA to replace the current structure.” Southside ReLeaf put out the following statement, too: “The city made the right decision by listening to community members and finding an alternative location for the burn tower. Given the environmental racism Southside residents experience daily due to discriminatory policies and decisions, it’s important for city leaders to stand by their commitment to protect and expand green spaces…Southside ReLeaf encourages city leaders to keep an open dialogue with community members to determine the best path forward on how the community center should be used.” Great work, everyone—especially community members on the Southside who, without getting involved, would have seen some of their valuable green space literally burnt to the ground.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 65 °F, and today looks lovely. You can expect clear skies, highs in the mid 80s for most of the day, and a noticeable lack of oppressive humidity. It’s an excellent summer day, and I’m going to do my best to get out there and enjoy it (by going into the forest on a bike).
 

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Samantha Willis at the Virginia Mercury joins the chorus of reporters and columnists pointing out the backward inconsistencies of the City’s plans to build a fire training facility at the Hickory Hill Community Center. To quote a bit: “But the opposition to this particular fire facility isn’t rooted in dislike of or disrespect for fire departments; rather, it’s about holding our leaders accountable for their promises of environmental equity. It’s about defending a part of the city that, historically, has been marginalized, under-resourced and ignored time and time again. Yes, the city’s fire department needs a training facility, but why does it have to be at Hickory Hill? I don’t know the answer to that question because the fire department didn’t respond to my interview requests.” Tap through to read the whole thing, and, if you’d like to support the folks working to preserve this green space, drop your City Council rep, their liaison, and the Mayor an email.
 

I haven’t watched the entirety of this episode of VPM’s Virginia Home Grown, but fully intend to when I get a minute (or 52). Peggy Singlemann (former Director of Park Operations and Horticulture at Maymont), takes a tour of La Milpa’s garden/farm which looks incredible and just like the kind of huge garden I’d put together if I had a massive plot of land and a million hours of free time. They grow tomatoes, tomatillos, cucumber, zucchini, and, of course, peppers, all of which end up in the amazing food at their restaurant. It seems obvious, but growing food you’ll actually use and eat is gardening advice that I’m just now internalizing after many, many years. Anyway, check it out and get some inspiration for your 2024 garden plans!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and we’ve made it through the heatwave! Today you can expect highs in the upper 80s, mostly sunshine, and maybe a few clouds here and there to cool things off even further. For me, the worst part of last week’s unbearable weather was the hot wind? I’m not sure I’ve ever experienced full on wind that didn’t provide even the smallest amount of relief but instead felt like a giant standing too close and mouth-breathing on me. I could do without it in the future!
 

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Over the weekend, Pulitzer Prize Winner Michael Paul Williams put together this column on the City’s proposed fire training facility at the Hickory Hill Community Center. Snatching away part of the land that makes up a community center and replacing it with a stack of cargo containers that will literally be lit on fire over and over and over again has always seemed counter to a handful of Richmond’s long-term strategic PDFs. It’s not just me saying that either. First the City’s Urban Design Committee and Planning Commission voted against the facility (only to be overruled by City Council), and now MPW weighs in, saying “In a nonsensical perversion of public policy, the city is permitting a burn tower at this community center…For a half-dozen occasions a year, children and adults in this environmentally fragile area of South Richmond will be exposed to noxious fumes in a place of recreation and repose.” Not great. With Council’s approval in hand, the City seems unwilling to reconsider the location, leaving residents to appeal to state legislators and hope for a historic designation. If you’d like to advocate for the preservation of this space, I think you could email Sen. Hashmi in support of her work with creating a new historic designation, and, of course, you could also let the Mayor know you’d like his administration to find a better location for the fire training facility.
 

Mike Platania at Richmond BizSense reports on Sauer’s plans for the next phase of all that land they own on Broad Street surrounding the Whole Foods. Check it out: “In addition to buildings with residential, retail, office, hotel and other uses, Sauer is also planning to build parks, pedestrian walkways and public green spaces on the land, much of which is currently either industrial or undeveloped.” This is a TON of land—like, more than a half dozen city blocks—and, if done right, a new neighborhood could really connect everything that’s going on up by Hardywood, the proposed Diamond District project, and the Fan proper. But, because I’m me, I really want to see the proposed transportation plan that links all of these new and growing neighborhoods into our existing transportation systems.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and we’ve made it through the heatwave! Today you can expect highs in the upper 80s, mostly sunshine, and maybe a few clouds here and there to cool things off even further. For me, the worst part of last week’s unbearable weather was the hot wind? I’m not sure I’ve ever experienced full on wind that didn’t provide even the smallest amount of relief but instead felt like a giant standing too close and mouth-breathing on me. I could do without it in the future!
 

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Over the weekend, Pulitzer Prize Winner Michael Paul Williams put together this column on the City’s proposed fire training facility at the Hickory Hill Community Center. Snatching away part of the land that makes up a community center and replacing it with a stack of cargo containers that will literally be lit on fire over and over and over again has always seemed counter to a handful of Richmond’s long-term strategic PDFs. It’s not just me saying that either. First the City’s Urban Design Committee and Planning Commission voted against the facility (only to be overruled by City Council), and now MPW weighs in, saying “In a nonsensical perversion of public policy, the city is permitting a burn tower at this community center…For a half-dozen occasions a year, children and adults in this environmentally fragile area of South Richmond will be exposed to noxious fumes in a place of recreation and repose.” Not great. With Council’s approval in hand, the City seems unwilling to reconsider the location, leaving residents to appeal to state legislators and hope for a historic designation. If you’d like to advocate for the preservation of this space, I think you could email Sen. Hashmi in support of her work with creating a new historic designation, and, of course, you could also let the Mayor know you’d like his administration to find a better location for the fire training facility.
 

Mike Platania at Richmond BizSense reports on Sauer’s plans for the next phase of all that land they own on Broad Street surrounding the Whole Foods. Check it out: “In addition to buildings with residential, retail, office, hotel and other uses, Sauer is also planning to build parks, pedestrian walkways and public green spaces on the land, much of which is currently either industrial or undeveloped.” This is a TON of land—like, more than a half dozen city blocks—and, if done right, a new neighborhood could really connect everything that’s going on up by Hardywood, the proposed Diamond District project, and the Fan proper. But, because I’m me, I really want to see the proposed transportation plan that links all of these new and growing neighborhoods into our existing transportation systems.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 80 °F already, and that’s unpleasant. Today you can expect highs right around 100 °F—which is about 10 degrees warmer than today’s average high and brings with it an Excessive Heat Warning. Same deal from yesterday applies: Stay shut inside your home, if you can, make smart choices, and remember to hydrate. Cooler temperatures move in next week!
 

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Remember how Richmond’s Electoral Board eliminated all the early in-person voting locations other than their extremely hard-to-reach office at the end of Laburnum Avenue? Seems they may try to walk that back a bit, as the City Attorney says the Board doesn’t even have the authority (Twitter) to do that sort of thing. Graham Moomaw at the Virginia Mercury has all the details, including the juicy bit that Governor Youngkin’s office also thinks the Board may have overstepped. Yesterday, I didn’t think there was much to be done about the Board’s decision, but, today’s a new day, and, after the flurry of lawyer letters, press conferences, and social media posts, the Board may have had a slight change of heart: They announced they’ll meet on August 4th at 10:00 AM to (re)discuss satellite voting locations. P.S. I think this is the first major public move by the City’s new attorney, and I’m into it!
 

This morning, City Council’s Education and Human Services committee sent out a public memorandum to the City’s CAO outlining “clear recommendations to City Administration directly adressing increased challenges facing unhoused Richmond families, children, and vulnerable populations.” I think this memorandum—basically an open letter to the Mayor’s Administration from a Council committee with “the support of the full body of Council”—is fascinating and certainly not a tool you see councilmembers use frequently. The Committee sets out two recommendations that they’d like to see implemented immediately, three they’d like to work on in the near future, and reminds the Administration that they’ve got a full report due on September 14th. Council could definitely go about most of these things (other than the immediate actions) by passing an official resolution, so using this quicker, more public avenue is pretty interesting. Go read the whole thing for yourself, but I think there’s tension here between the Council and the Mayor and it probably involves how existing funding is being allocated among current partner organizations. The Committee asks that the Administration attend the September 5th Organizational Development committee meeting to “update Council on steps taken.”
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 75 °F, and we’ll most likely end up with triple digit highs today. Pile on the humidity and you’ve got a dangerous heat situation, giving you every reason to stay inside with the blinds drawn like some sort of handsome 18th Century vampire. Seriously though, with a Heat Advisory in effect until at least tomorrow, today is a good day to embrace the darkness.
 

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Yesterday, the Electoral Board of the City of Richmond voted to restrict early in-person voting in this November’s election to their incredibly hard to reach location at the end of Laburnum Avenue. Practically, this decision limits early in-person voting exclusively to people who can drive or get a ride to the Office of Elections, as their location is almost entirely inaccessible by foot, bike, or bus. This continues a recent trend: As the city has emerged from the pandemic, satellite early voting locations have mostly vanished—which is a real bummer. Axios Richmond has more and reports that the Board “balked at the $100,000 cost of staffing the [satellite] offices.” What I recommend, and what I do myself, is to sign up for permanent absentee voter status. Every election, the Department of Elections just mails my ballot ahead of time without me having to do a single thing. It’s so easy and convenient, and I love it.
 

Axios Richmond also pointed me to this story in the Washington Post about the Virginia High School League deciding not to implement the Governor’s new anti-trans policies in high school sports. Of course, local school districts are free to follow the new policies, but it doesn’t sound like VHSL, which regulates these sorts of things, will do any top-down, statewide enforcement beyond their own existing policy (which is maybe too intense).
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and temperatures continue to climb. Today you can expect sunshine (yay!) and highs in the mid 90s that feel closer to 100 °F (boo!). Actual temperatures reach triple digits tomorrow, and that heat will continue until Sunday when some relief arrives. It’s one of those weeks when I either need to ride the bus to work or bring an extra shirt since even 10 minutes spent on a bike will have me covered in sweat.
 

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Jahd Khalil has an early look at the City’s proposed short-term rental ordinance (ORD. 2023–235) which was introduced at this past Monday’s City Council meeting. Tap through to get a sense for how the City’s trying to delicately balance the need to create more housing while also making sure 100% of that housing doesn’t instantly become Airbnbs. It’s complicated, and I think I’ll need a minute to scroll through the text of the ordinance to see what’s actually going on.
 

One other quick note on City Council’s doings before they head out on their annual August vacation: Council’s Governmental Operations committee will meet today at 1:00 PM and consider two papers I’ve got my eyes on. First, RES. 2023-R011 asks the CAO to come up with a plan to acquire Evergreen and East End Cemeteries from the now-defunct EnRichmond Foundation. This paper has bounced back and forth between Council and this committee since February, and I’m starting to wonder what’s holding things up. Second, RES. 2023-R047 will realign all of the City’s boards, commissions, and committees and require them to report to specific City Council subcommittees. For example, the Green City Commission will report to the Governmental Operations committee. This is mostly a boring, administrative paper, but if you tap through to the actual text of the resolution you get a nice list of every board, commission, and committee sorted by interest area. Could be useful (to a very specific type of person)!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and temperatures continue to climb. Today you can expect sunshine (yay!) and highs in the mid 90s that feel closer to 100 °F (boo!). Actual temperatures reach triple digits tomorrow, and that heat will continue until Sunday when some relief arrives. It’s one of those weeks when I either need to ride the bus to work or bring an extra shirt since even 10 minutes spent on a bike will have me covered in sweat.
 

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Jahd Khalil has an early look at the City’s proposed short-term rental ordinance (ORD. 2023–235) which was introduced at this past Monday’s City Council meeting. Tap through to get a sense for how the City’s trying to delicately balance the need to create more housing while also making sure 100% of that housing doesn’t instantly become Airbnbs. It’s complicated, and I think I’ll need a minute to scroll through the text of the ordinance to see what’s actually going on.
 

One other quick note on City Council’s doings before they head out on their annual August vacation: Council’s Governmental Operations committee will meet today at 1:00 PM and consider two papers I’ve got my eyes on. First, RES. 2023-R011 asks the CAO to come up with a plan to acquire Evergreen and East End Cemeteries from the now-defunct EnRichmond Foundation. This paper has bounced back and forth between Council and this committee since February, and I’m starting to wonder what’s holding things up. Second, RES. 2023-R047 will realign all of the City’s boards, commissions, and committees and require them to report to specific City Council subcommittees. For example, the Green City Commission will report to the Governmental Operations committee. This is mostly a boring, administrative paper, but if you tap through to the actual text of the resolution you get a nice list of every board, commission, and committee sorted by interest area. Could be useful (to a very specific type of person)!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and today begins the hottening. You can expect sticky highs near 90 °F with plenty of sunshine—and this is just the beginning, too. Temperature forecasts increase to triple digits by the end of the week and overnight lows will hang around near 80 °F! You know the drill: Stay cool, stay hydrated, and make smart choices!
 

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The Urban Institute’s Yonah Freemark pulled new data from the FTA’s National Transit Database to check in on post-pandemic ridership at public transit agencies from across the country. Would you believe that Richmond is one of seven “large” transit agencies to exceed pre-pandemic ridership numbers (Twitter)?? This is a huge deal! I’m shocked, especially given the ongoing challenges GRTC faces with the operator shortage and its impact on service reliability. The region should take these impressive numbers as a signal to double down on its investment in public transportation! Don’t delay, don’t wait for years to invest in greater frequency on the highest-ridership routes. Keep planning for big, new infrastructure projects like the north-south BRT, sure, but do everything possible now to make our existing service better and more useful to riders.
 

City Council’s Public Safety committee meets today and will hear a presentation from Christie Chipps Peters, Director of Richmond Animal Care and Control. Definitely flip through this PDF to see how much has changed for this City department over the last decade. Check out page four for a dramatic set of pie charts showing the reduction in animals euthanized since 2012 and page 10 for how the RACC foundation has 43x’d their annual donations over that same time period. Incredible. Shout out to RACC’s communications team who makes a lot of this possible!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and today begins the hottening. You can expect sticky highs near 90 °F with plenty of sunshine—and this is just the beginning, too. Temperature forecasts increase to triple digits by the end of the week and overnight lows will hang around near 80 °F! You know the drill: Stay cool, stay hydrated, and make smart choices!
 

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The Urban Institute’s Yonah Freemark pulled new data from the FTA’s National Transit Database to check in on post-pandemic ridership at public transit agencies from across the country. Would you believe that Richmond is one of seven “large” transit agencies to exceed pre-pandemic ridership numbers (Twitter)?? This is a huge deal! I’m shocked, especially given the ongoing challenges GRTC faces with the operator shortage and its impact on service reliability. The region should take these impressive numbers as a signal to double down on its investment in public transportation! Don’t delay, don’t wait for years to invest in greater frequency on the highest-ridership routes. Keep planning for big, new infrastructure projects like the north-south BRT, sure, but do everything possible now to make our existing service better and more useful to riders.
 

City Council’s Public Safety committee meets today and will hear a presentation from Christie Chipps Peters, Director of Richmond Animal Care and Control. Definitely flip through this PDF to see how much has changed for this City department over the last decade. Check out page four for a dramatic set of pie charts showing the reduction in animals euthanized since 2012 and page 10 for how the RACC foundation has 43x’d their annual donations over that same time period. Incredible. Shout out to RACC’s communications team who makes a lot of this possible!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 70 °F, and this morning looks a lot like rain alongside some cooler temperatures with highs right around 80 °F. Then, this afternoon, you can expect the skies to dry out but that unseasonably cool weather to stick around. Get out there and get after it, because hot hot highs in the upper 90s return later this week!
 

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This past weekend, Cat Anthony, Executive Director of the Virginia Capital Trail Foundation, had a great piece in the Richmond Times-Dispatch titled “Poor street design, not happenstance, are responsible for pedestrian deaths.” I think this bit gets exactly at the problem and the solution: “Local leaders should take these gut-wrenching pedestrian fatalities as a wake-up call: Current street designs in our region do not prioritize the safety and well-being of anyone. Instead, much of our road network is designed for high speeds, which are far more likely to result in the deaths of drivers and pedestrians alike.” Our streets are broken and local leaders need to work up the courage to fix them—whether that’s by passing legislation to retrofit our streets with better, safer infrastructure, or by forcing existing staff to change their internal policies and procedures. Doing nothing—or meekly asking drivers to drive slower and pedestrians to wear bright clothing—is not a serious plan to save people’s lives.
 

City Council meets today for their last meeting until September, and you can find the full agenda here. Both the exotic animal ban (ORD. 2023–130) and the new utilitiy advisory commission ORD. 2023–188 sit on the Consent Agenda—along with a billion Special Use Permits, transportation funding papers, and other smaller items. In fact, Council has no Regular Agenda today, which should make for a quick meeting. One item of note from their informal meeting: Richmond Redevelopment and Housing Authority’s newish CEO will give a presentaiton on RRHA’s proposed homeownership program. This looks like a big deal, and I would like to learn more! We need to approach Richmond’s affordable housing crisis from every angle simultaneously, and making homeownership an option for current residents of public housing is definitely one angle (of many, many angles).
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 72 °F, and today we’ve got more of the same: Highs in the 90s, sunshine, and lots of sweat. This continues, with some slightly cooler temperatures, through the weekend and into next week. Remember to hydrate yourself, your loved ones, and your plants!
 

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This morning I woke up with two fun municipal press releases in my inbox. First, the City announced that they’ve hired Michael Webb as Richmond’s first Urban Forester. Webb will focus on building a comprehensive tree strategy (like how to equitably maintain, plant, and remove trees) with the ultimate goal of increasing the overall tree canopy in the city. Sounds like creating an Urban Forestry Master Plan (which I think we really, really need) is one of his first tasks. Second, the Department of Public Works and the Department of Public Utilities have installed “high water detection systems” at two locations prone to flooding (Magnolia Avenue on the Northside and Bainbridge Street on the Southside). From the release: “Once triggered, these advance warning stations will activate flashing beacons, message signs, and automatic road barrier gates.” Pretty neat! DPW’s Twitter account has posted some pictures of the flood conditions and the newly installed gates—which, if you squint, also function as curb extensions that narrow the road and slow drivers down. Good stuff all around.
 

Earlier this week, I wrote that reporters needed to come up with a better way to describe the Governor’s new anti-trans policies than defaulting to the Republican talking points—terminology that’s intentionally unclear and specifically designed to confuse the reader. Today, Whitney Evans and Dawnthea M. Price Lisco at VPM report on some reactions to Youngkin’s new anti-trans policies for public schools, and do a great job with this. “Parental rights” is mentioned just a single time in the entire piece, and only in this paragraph: “‘Parental rights’ is a reframing of public education that focuses on objecting to teaching cultural issues and sensitive topics—such as systemic racism, sexual orientation, climate change and gender diversity.” The reporters do not slip into the Republican trap of describing Youngkin’s offensive policies as a focus on “parental rights” and instead say the new rules “highlight the rights of ‘all’ students and the innate authority of their parents or legal guardians” (scare quotes theirs!). I’d go harder, of course, but I’m not an actual reporter. I think this shift in language—from reporting just earlier this week—is really wonderful. I’m thankful for it!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 72 °F, and today we’ve got more of the same: Highs in the 90s, sunshine, and lots of sweat. This continues, with some slightly cooler temperatures, through the weekend and into next week. Remember to hydrate yourself, your loved ones, and your plants!
 

Water cooler

This morning I woke up with two fun municipal press releases in my inbox. First, the City announced that they’ve hired Michael Webb as Richmond’s first Urban Forester. Webb will focus on building a comprehensive tree strategy (like how to equitably maintain, plant, and remove trees) with the ultimate goal of increasing the overall tree canopy in the city. Sounds like creating an Urban Forestry Master Plan (which I think we really, really need) is one of his first tasks. Second, the Department of Public Works and the Department of Public Utilities have installed “high water detection systems” at two locations prone to flooding (Magnolia Avenue on the Northside and Bainbridge Street on the Southside). From the release: “Once triggered, these advance warning stations will activate flashing beacons, message signs, and automatic road barrier gates.” Pretty neat! DPW’s Twitter account has posted some pictures of the flood conditions and the newly installed gates—which, if you squint, also function as curb extensions that narrow the road and slow drivers down. Good stuff all around.
 

Earlier this week, I wrote that reporters needed to come up with a better way to describe the Governor’s new anti-trans policies than defaulting to the Republican talking points—terminology that’s intentionally unclear and specifically designed to confuse the reader. Today, Whitney Evans and Dawnthea M. Price Lisco at VPM report on some reactions to Youngkin’s new anti-trans policies for public schools, and do a great job with this. “Parental rights” is mentioned just a single time in the entire piece, and only in this paragraph: “‘Parental rights’ is a reframing of public education that focuses on objecting to teaching cultural issues and sensitive topics—such as systemic racism, sexual orientation, climate change and gender diversity.” The reporters do not slip into the Republican trap of describing Youngkin’s offensive policies as a focus on “parental rights” and instead say the new rules “highlight the rights of ‘all’ students and the innate authority of their parents or legal guardians” (scare quotes theirs!). I’d go harder, of course, but I’m not an actual reporter. I think this shift in language—from reporting just earlier this week—is really wonderful. I’m thankful for it!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 71 °F, and today looks like regular summer stuff. You can expect highs right around 90 °F, sunshine, sticky humidity, and iffy air quality (OK, that last one is slightly irregular but probably part of the deal moving forward). I don’t see much rain in the extended forecast so maybe set some reminders to keep your plants watered!
 

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Jahd Khalil at VPM reports that Interim Police Chief Rick Edwards will become Actual Police Chief Rick Edwards at a swearing-in ceremony on Monday. You can read the City’s press release here, which, along with a ton of supportive quotes, details the process that lead to Edwards’s selection, which I appreciate. Out of 26 candidates, four made it past the initial screening, three accepted interviews, and Edwards was the hiring panel’s unanimous selection. James Millner of Virginia Pride said “Every candidate we interviewed was great, but Rick was exceptional. His deep love for the city, his understanding of its diversity, and his knowledge of the department make him the right choice for chief of police." RCOP, the police union, gave the most milquetoast quote (which, honestly, is probably a good sign) saying “RCOP looks forward to working with the new Chief in making the agency equitable and fair for our officers while developing better community relations. As with any Chief, RCOP will hold him to high standards and work together toward progress." Now Edwards will start pushing the department towards his own vision of policing in Richmond, and we’ll get to really see what he’s really all about. I’m keeping an open mind; during his time as interim chief he did not invent a fake mass shooting plot, so he’s got that going for him.
 

The Richmond Times-Dispatch’s Em Holter has a fascinating and confusing story about the future of the City’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund Board. I’ve read it a couple times now and still feel like I’m missing some of the pieces, but, at its core this seems like tension between the Mayor and City Council and their differing visions for how the City funds affordable housing.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 72 °F, and today you can expect cloudy skies, a small chance of rain throughout the day, and temperatures just under 90 °F. That sounds like an improvement over yesterday’s hot, humid, and hazy cocktail of sweaty sadness.
 

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Dawnthea M. Price Lisco at VPM reports on the Virginia Department of Education’s newly issued “Model Policies on Ensuring Privacy, Dignity, and Respect for All Students and Parents in Virginia’s Public Schools.” You can read the 18-page PDF for yourself here, but, as you might expect from the Youngkin administration, the intent of the document is mostly opposite the document’s name—a classic Republican technique used to obfuscate their actual, usually evil, intentions. For example, the policies require that “School Division personnel shall refer to each student using only the pronouns appropriate to the sex appearing in the student’s official record” unless parents provide written instruction otherwise—which sounds exactly the opposite of protecting privacy and dignity. This disrespect of students, specifically trans students, is, of course, one of the guiding lights of the contemporary Republican platform. It’s cruel and mean and exists for no other reason than to rile up their base and make their political opponents furious (Lisco notes that the policy “does not appear to include an enforcement mechanism, a time limit or obvious penalties”). Equality Virginia’s statement (on Twitter, ironically) reads, in part, “The Governor is showing what his priorities are through this policy: disregarding expert opinion, harming students and eroding trust between parents, educators and school personnel.” Stay tuned for how local school districts react and how—if at all—they’ll work on implementation.
 

Quick side note on the previous paragraph: Reporters and news organizations desperately need to come up with a better way to describe these hateful Republican policies. “Parental rights” is a partisan Republican talking point; is incredibly unclear; and does not, in anyway, help the reader understand the news. While I don’t believe reporters are unbiased, by using “parental rights” without giving context, they casually promote right-wing propaganda—something that I doubt any of them want to be associated with!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 71 °F, and today looks hot. Expect highs in the 90s with Feels Like temperatures approaching 100 °F. If you’ve got stuff to do outside, please be cautious and stay hydrated. Also, because climate change is a multifaceted horror, the Department of Environmental Quality forecasts “moderate” air quality for the Richmond region today. I’ve found that DEQ sometimes underforecasts air quality in Richmond proper, so make sure you keep an eye on the AQI, too. If you’ve got a recentish iPhone you can add the Weather app’s AQI widget to your phone’s lock screen, which I’ve found useful.
 

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It’s hot, and one of the best ways to stay safe and cool during extreme heat is to shun the outdoor sauna of Richmond summers and head back inside to wallow in the air conditioning (while chugging liters of water). If you can’t afford or don’t have air conditioning, though, it’s gonna be hot inside, too. The Virginia Department of Social Services offers cooling assistance—which applies to both your utility bills and air conditioning equipment—to a small subset of folks, and, with this week’s hot hot forecast I thought it worth mentioning. Eligible Virginians must have at least one vulnerable individual age 60 or older, disabled, or under age six in their household, and you’ve only got until August 15th to apply. If that’s you, tap through to DSS’s website to learn more about eligibility requirements and how to apply.
 

City Council’s Land Use, Housing and Transportation committee meets today with an absolutely packed agenda. They’ll hear four different and interesting presentations: a list of new property acquisitions by the Maggie Walker Community Land Trust, an overview of the Jackson Ward Community Plan draft, an update on Richmond Connects, and the Director of Planning will answer some questions about the proposed rental inspection program. Plus the committee will consider a bunch of resolutions asking the State to help fund cool transportation infrastructure projects over the next several years. None of these projects are a sure thing (yet) and many are several years in the future, but, I’m still pretty excited about plans to install permanent, concrete protection on the Franklin Street bike lane; extend the Patterson Avenue bike lane to Willow Lawn; and add two safe(r) crossings to Chamberlayne Avenue.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s been n a minute—let’s see if I remember how words even work! Today, you can expect highs in the 90s, some isolated thunderstorms early evening, and maybe some smokey haze (DEQ forecasts Richmond’s Air Quality today as “moderate”). Also, you should definitely stay out of the James River. All of yesterday’s rain has brought the river into a “minor” flood stage, and, while “minor” sounds like no big deal, the City’s Department of Parks and Rec says “excessive amounts of debris in the water will make water rescues extremely difficult, placing water rescue personnel in harms way. Additionally, the following areas will be closed due to flooding: Water Street at Dock Street, sections of Riverside Drive and River Road, Huguenot Flat Ramp, and The Capital Bike Trail also is expected to flood.” Also, the City’s Department of Public Utilities reports that several Combined Sewer Overflow sites are in the “overflow” status, if you needed another, more fecal reason to keep your body out of the river.
 

Water is scary and demands your respect!
 

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Today, Richmond’s Planning Commission will meet at 1:30 PM, and will consider the ordinance to legalize Accessory Dwelling Units everywhere (ORD. 2023–196)—well, sort of. What they’re really planning on doing is continuing that paper all the way until their September meeting, and that bums me out. According to Councilmember Jordan’s email newsletter (which you should sign up for), she’s lobbying to get the ADU ordinance considered in tandem with the Airbnb ordinance, writing, “I fully support allowing ADUs by-right, but I have requested the Planning Commission continue that paper until their next meeting, so that the ADU and short-term rental (STR) papers can be considered together.“ Her main reasoning for this paring is that “residents overwhelmingly support ADUs, but not if it results in a proliferation of short-term rentals” (aka Airbnbs). I mostly agree with that but do have some (perhaps misplaced) anxiety that we’ll lose out on a perfectly good ADU ordinance because of an imperfect Airbnb ordinance. I guess we’ll find out in a couple of months! Until then, you can remain cautiously optimistic while scrolling through this really helpful presentation about how the proposed ADU ordinance will work.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s been n a minute—let’s see if I remember how words even work! Today, you can expect highs in the 90s, some isolated thunderstorms early evening, and maybe some smokey haze (DEQ forecasts Richmond’s Air Quality today as “moderate”). Also, you should definitely stay out of the James River. All of yesterday’s rain has brought the river into a “minor” flood stage, and, while “minor” sounds like no big deal, the City’s Department of Parks and Rec says “excessive amounts of debris in the water will make water rescues extremely difficult, placing water rescue personnel in harms way. Additionally, the following areas will be closed due to flooding: Water Street at Dock Street, sections of Riverside Drive and River Road, Huguenot Flat Ramp, and The Capital Bike Trail also is expected to flood.” Also, the City’s Department of Public Utilities reports that several Combined Sewer Overflow sites are in the “overflow” status, if you needed another, more fecal reason to keep your body out of the river.
 

Water is scary and demands your respect!
 

Water cooler

Today, Richmond’s Planning Commission will meet at 1:30 PM, and will consider the ordinance to legalize Accessory Dwelling Units everywhere (ORD. 2023–196)—well, sort of. What they’re really planning on doing is continuing that paper all the way until their September meeting, and that bums me out. According to Councilmember Jordan’s email newsletter (which you should sign up for), she’s lobbying to get the ADU ordinance considered in tandem with the Airbnb ordinance, writing, “I fully support allowing ADUs by-right, but I have requested the Planning Commission continue that paper until their next meeting, so that the ADU and short-term rental (STR) papers can be considered together.“ Her main reasoning for this paring is that “residents overwhelmingly support ADUs, but not if it results in a proliferation of short-term rentals” (aka Airbnbs). I mostly agree with that but do have some (perhaps misplaced) anxiety that we’ll lose out on a perfectly good ADU ordinance because of an imperfect Airbnb ordinance. I guess we’ll find out in a couple of months! Until then, you can remain cautiously optimistic while scrolling through this really helpful presentation about how the proposed ADU ordinance will work.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 65 °F, and today you should expect highs near 90 °F, maybe a bit of rain this evening, and another round of bad air. DEQ has forecasted a yellow, or “moderate,” day ahead of us, with an AQI below 100. However, my current weather app shows 152, just over the edge into the red “unhealthy” zone and about where we ended up yesterday. Make smart decisions about exerting yourself outside, take lots of breaks, and remember: Hydrate or diedrate!
 

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Yesterday, the Supreme Court ended affirmative action in college admissions with a 6–3 vote. SCOTUSblog has the easy-to-understand analysis that I was looking for, and quotes Justice Sotomayor, in the dissenting opinion, saying, the decision had rolled “back decades of precedent and momentous progress" and "cement[ed] a superficial rule of colorblindness as a constitutional principle in an endemically segregated society.” The Washington Post put together some data visualizations on how banning affirmative action has impacted enrollment diversity in the handful of sates that have done so at the state level. Also, Connor Scribner at VPM talked to some local universities about the impact the decision will have on their admission policies. It’s all very bleak. You have to wonder how long President Biden will allow the Supreme Court to grind important American systems into dust without taking a single step to reform the Court—or even threatening to do so!
 

David Ress at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has a long list of just some of the laws that go into effect tomorrow, July 1st. Related, the Virginia Mercury’s Meghan McIntyre reports that Pornhub has blocked all of Virginia ahead of the Commonwealth’s new age-verification law.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 62 °F, and today you can expect highs around 90 °F, cloudless skies, and…fine particulate matter filling the air from Canadian wildfires. The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality has issued a Code Orange Air Quality alert (that’s “unhealthy for sensitive groups”) until midnight tonight. Keep an eye on the weather app of your choice, though, because, as of right now, mine reports an AQI of 159 which would put us in the red zone (or “unhealthy” for everyone). If we do end up spending most of the day at the red level level, sensitive groups—people with lung disease, older folks, children, minority populations, and outdoor workers—should avoid long or intense outdoor activities and consider rescheduling or moving those activities indoors. Everyone else should keep it breezy and take more breaks. Keep this Air Quality Guide for Particle Pollution handy, it’s the best resource I’ve found for remembering how to stay safe and healthy during bad air days—which are sure to continue throughout the summer.
 

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City Council update: The Public Utilities and Services Commission paper, which I’m now officially obsessed with (ORD. 2023–188), cleared the Governmental Operations committee and will now (theoretically) show up on full Council’s July 24th agenda. The paper has three patrons (Addison, Jordan, and Lambert), and to become a real boy/law it needs to find two additional votes out of the group of Nye, Lynch, Robertson, Newbille, Trammell, and Jones. Lynch sits on the Governmental Operations committee, but I’m not sure how she voted yesterday (and I can’t get the video to load). It’ll be interesting to see how the rest of the group goes—especially someone like Councilmember Trammell who values keeping an eye on rising utility rates, but would not, I assume, be a strong supporter of removing methane gas sales from DPU’s service portfolio. Stay tuned!
 

Related, Patrick Larsen at VPM reports on this past Tuesday’s rally against Dominion’s plans to build a new methane power plant in Chesterfield. I’ll tell you what, I’m pretty tired of Dominion’s circular talking points about how to meet rising electricity demands. If Dominion wanted to, they could build clean power facilities to crank out more power during peak periods. Nothing says that we’ve got to burn methane gas to make sure people have enough juice to run their air conditioners in the summer (which are hotter due to climate change) and heaters in the winter (which will have more severe storms due to climate change). We shouldn’t make the long term problem worse trying to meet the short term needs.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 62 °F, and today you can expect highs around 90 °F, cloudless skies, and…fine particulate matter filling the air from Canadian wildfires. The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality has issued a Code Orange Air Quality alert (that’s “unhealthy for sensitive groups”) until midnight tonight. Keep an eye on the weather app of your choice, though, because, as of right now, mine reports an AQI of 159 which would put us in the red zone (or “unhealthy” for everyone). If we do end up spending most of the day at the red level level, sensitive groups—people with lung disease, older folks, children, minority populations, and outdoor workers—should avoid long or intense outdoor activities and consider rescheduling or moving those activities indoors. Everyone else should keep it breezy and take more breaks. Keep this Air Quality Guide for Particle Pollution handy, it’s the best resource I’ve found for remembering how to stay safe and healthy during bad air days—which are sure to continue throughout the summer.
 

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City Council update: The Public Utilities and Services Commission paper, which I’m now officially obsessed with (ORD. 2023–188), cleared the Governmental Operations committee and will now (theoretically) show up on full Council’s July 24th agenda. The paper has three patrons (Addison, Jordan, and Lambert), and to become a real boy/law it needs to find two additional votes out of the group of Nye, Lynch, Robertson, Newbille, Trammell, and Jones. Lynch sits on the Governmental Operations committee, but I’m not sure how she voted yesterday (and I can’t get the video to load). It’ll be interesting to see how the rest of the group goes—especially someone like Councilmember Trammell who values keeping an eye on rising utility rates, but would not, I assume, be a strong supporter of removing methane gas sales from DPU’s service portfolio. Stay tuned!
 

Related, Patrick Larsen at VPM reports on this past Tuesday’s rally against Dominion’s plans to build a new methane power plant in Chesterfield. I’ll tell you what, I’m pretty tired of Dominion’s circular talking points about how to meet rising electricity demands. If Dominion wanted to, they could build clean power facilities to crank out more power during peak periods. Nothing says that we’ve got to burn methane gas to make sure people have enough juice to run their air conditioners in the summer (which are hotter due to climate change) and heaters in the winter (which will have more severe storms due to climate change). We shouldn’t make the long term problem worse trying to meet the short term needs.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 66 °F, and today looks charming and wonderful from start to finish, with highs in the mid 80s and lots of sunshine. The three-day forecast says we’ve got a couple more days of this, so make some plans to get out there and enjoy it! Maybe explore a part of the James River Park that you’ve never experienced before?
 

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Yesterday’s longread highlighted the success of Denver’s municipal e-bike subsidy program, which I think is fascinating and something Richmond should learn from and implement instantly. Folks from PlanRVA, one of our regional planning bodies, then pointed me to a pretty cool map they maintain that catalogs e-bike financial incentive programs across the country. So far, PlanRVA has marked 111 programs, in various states of implementation, with the average rebate value just over $800. This seems like another great resource for folks wanting to advocate for Richmond to create its own e-bike incentive program!
 

Michael Martz and David Ress at the Richmond Times-Dispatch report that state budget negotiations appear to have broken down just days ahead of the new fiscal year. Since Virginia operates on a biennial budget, which the General Assembly passed last year, you don’t need to worry about a government shutdown. However, any changes or updates—like tax rebates or state employee raises—are on hold until legislators figure out a compromise. The Governor, who doesn’t seem interested in rolling up his sleeves and getting involved in the negotiation work, said of his original, unrealistic proposal, “I put a reasonable budget in front of them…They should just send back to me what I sent to them and let’s get this done.”
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 66 °F, and, dang, that was some weather! I hope you made it through the night dry and connected to the electrical grid—looks like a couple hundred people across the region are still without power this morning. Today, though, is a vast improvement over all that wind and rain, with highs in the mid 80s, sunshine until the afternoon, and then a chance for more storms this evening (but mostly likely nothing as severe as last night).
 

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Yesterday, I mentioned how transformative it would be to have the federal government commit to recurring investments in our local communities at the scale of the American Rescue Plan Act—consistent support rather than this once-in-a-generation windfall. Turns out, Mallory Noe-Payne at Radio IQ was a mile ahead of me and reported four separate stories from Virginia towns where ARPA or CARES Act funding made transformational projects a reality. In Roanoke they built a grocery store in a neighborhood once leveled by Urban Renewal. In Bristol they started construction on a new school, replacing one declared functionally obsolete in 2011. In Afton they launched a public bus line over the mountain, connecting Staunton, Waynesboro, and Charlottesville. And, finally, in Scottsville they added DMV services to their Town Hall which serves a large, rural surrounding area. None of these are glitzy projects, wasting tax payer dollars so elected officials can have something big and shiny to point at when the next election cycle comes around. They are all great examples of things that—in a country not obsessively focused on cutting public services down to the bone—should make up some of the core functions of government. Just think about what your neighborhood would be if we had enough money for the basic of civilization—things like roads, sewers, and schools!
 

Ben Paviour at VPM reports that residents who “want to browse online pornography in Virginia will have to identify their age using unspecified technology under a new law that goes into effect Saturday.” I have so many thoughts! First, its fascinating what things Republicans want to paternalistically legislate and what things they think should be left up to parents to handle (although this bill did pass with large, bipartisan support). Second, the language in this bill (SB 1515) is wild! It defines “content harmful to minors” as “any description or representation of nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or sadomasochistic abuse when it (i) appeals to the prurient, shameful, or morbid interest of minors; (ii) is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community as a whole with respect to what is suitable material for minors; and (iii) is, when taken as a whole, lacking in serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors." Prurient, shameful interest of minors?? What the heck, did The Scarlet Letter write this legislation!? Third, Wirecutter has a decent list of VPN’s that will allow you to shift the location of your internet traffic to wherever you’d like and circumvent any sort of geographic-based age verification. Makes sure you read “the competition” section for a ton more options. Fourth, what you browse is your own personal business, not the General Assembly’s and certainly not some random internet company! This whole thing certainly seems like a slippery slope we’re about to slide down right into some protracted court cases. Until then, I await the digital privacy experts out there to send me a good longread!
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 71 °F, and today looks hot, with highs in the 90s plus a chance for some severe weather. NBC12’s Andrew Freiden has declared today a First Alert Weather Day with a decent chance for wind, rain, hail, and flooding later this afternoon. Keep an eye on the sky, and make smart decisions! It’s never too late to starting making an emergency plan for you and yours.
 

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City Council will get together today for their regularly scheduled meeting and has a few items on their agenda that got my brain thinking. First, ORD. 2023–180 authorizes the CAO to accept the second tranche of American Rescue Plan Act money from the federal government—that’s a $10 million deposit into the City’s bank account! I can’t help but think about what it’d be like if this sort of transformative investment in communities across the country was a regularly occurrence instead of a once-in-a-generation lottery windfall. Second, ORD. 2023–177 will dedicate $80,000 to a second Gun Buy Back program, this one in conjunction with The Liberation Church. I hadn’t heard anything about this second round of Gun Buy Backs until I saw it floating around on the City’s legislative website, so I’m not sure about any date and time details. I’m for it though! My thoughts on Gun Buy Backs remain unchanged from the last go around: While maybe not the most effective gun control strategy, it’s one of the very few things the City has the authority to do on its own. Unfortunately, localities (especially in Virginia) are mostly held hostage by the inability of our state and federal legislators to pass even the most modest of gun control legislation. Third, ORD. 2023–145 will convert a two-way stop at Nottoway and Fauquier Avenues into a four-way stop. This sort of ordinance shows up pretty regularly on Council’s agendas, almost always in the non-controversial “Consent” portion. That seems like a symptom of a broken process to me—it’s wild that City Council is required to pass a law to put up two stop signs! Why is Council involved in this sort of thing at all? Shouldn’t we leave the implementation of safe transportation infrastructure in our neighborhoods to experts? Corollary: Shouldn’t we hire experts at implementing safe infrastructure in our neighborhoods?
 

This past Friday, the Richmond Police Department had a press briefing scheduled to update media about the mass shooting at Huguenot High School’s graduation ceremony. After talking to the Commonwealth’s Attorney, they scrubbed the update and put out this statement instead. I’m not sure how much of this is new news, but notable items for me were: one of the victims will be released from this hospital this week, police have confirmed that a second suspect was not involved in the shooting, and, in the RPD’s words, “based on what we know, this is not gang-related.”
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 64 °F, and, guess what, today looks wet and rainy! You can expect a shower or a drizzle for pretty much the entire day, and you should definitely keep an eye out for potentially severe thunderstorms later this afternoon. Maybe cancel your after-dinner stroll. I think we’ve got at least another day of this soggy situation, and then, on Saturday, things should start to warm up and dry out a bit.
 

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Alec MacGillis at ProPublica has a long story about learning loss caused by the pandemic, Richmond Public Schools, the nascent teacher’s union, the RPS School Board, and the Board’s stumbly attempts to launch a year-round school pilot. There’s a lot in here! I always get nervous when an out-of-town reporter does a deep dive on something so very local and nuanced. On the one hand, it’s great to have national attention brought to some of the challenges facing Richmond, pressuring leaders to act (think Emily Badger’s reporting on eviction rates in Richmond for the NYT). On the other hand, can anyone who hasn’t spent the last forever living here really understand why we are the way we are? I’m not the only one to have complicated feelings: A quick scroll through the Horrible Bird Site shows that people have lots of thoughts and opinions on this piece, including the Mayor himself who said: “But, instead of leading boldly and doing whatever it takes to support our kids' post-pandemic recovery, leaders on the School Board and in the Richmond Education Association choose to sit idly by & maintain the status quo.” Yikes. I’ve got plenty to say about the School Board and their dysfunctional performance over the last handful of years, but I’m not the mayor! It’s definitely an intense quote from Richmond’s top elected official, with some surprisingly anti-union vibes. Anyway, I probably need to read the whole thing again before I have more coherent thoughts, but I did want to assign it as homework and put it in your queue for this weekend.
 

Richard Hayes at RVAHub reports that Richmond Animal Care and Control will close for two weeks due to an outbreak of canine flu. That means you can’t drop off any stray animals for the next 14 days (you remember how quarantine works, right??). However, before you go all Outbreak, Wikipedia says that “the H3N2 virus as a stand-alone virus is deemed harmless to humans.”
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 66 °F, and it’s rainy. In fact, the current weather forecast suggests that it’ll continue to rain for most of the day and then straight on through most of the weekend, too. It’s gonna be a soggy next couple of days—keep an eye out for breaks in the weather to get outside or do your best mushroom impression and start working on your backlog of movies and TV shows.
 

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The election results are in, and some of them are fascinating. The Virginia Public Access Project is, as always, the best place to find and explore yesterday’s election data, and they’ve got all of the results nicely sorted into Close Races, Senate, House, and Local. Of note in our region: Current 3rd District Councilmember Anne Francis Lambert lost her House of Delegates race to Rae Cousins by a wide margin, Glenn Sturtevant edged out Virginia’s Trumpyiest senator Amanda Chase, Lamont Bagby coasted to victory over Katie Gooch, and Lashrecse Aird absolutely dominated Joe Morrissey. That last one in particular is big, good news. Assuming Democrats hold on to all the necessary seats in the Senate, the one anti-choice (and tie-breaking) Democrat likely to side with Republicans on bills restricting abortions just got the boot. Graham Moomaw at the Virginia Mercury has some more flavor from last night’s elections, including this lovely quote from a Petersburg resident about Aird: “She’s just an overall better human being.”
 

Jahd Khalil at VPM reports that VPM has plans to move its headquarters downtown and build a new facility on the southern side of Broad Street between 1st and Foushee Streets. Tap through to see some really beautiful renderings of what could take the place of a currently wasteful surface-level parking lot (see below about “places vs. non-places”). VPM hopes to raise funds to break ground by early 2024, so, unfortunately, we still have to live with the parking lot for a while longer.
 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 68 °F, and today you can expect cloudy skies with highs right around 80 °F. I’d keep an eye out for rain throughout the day—which is probably good advice for the rest of the week, too. Summer is here and, as often as possible, I plan on enjoying its random, pop-up storms from the my screen porch. How good does a summer shower smell—can’t beat it!
 

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It’s Election Day! If you haven’t already, you have until 7:00 PM to make your way out to your polling place and cast a ballot in this very important Primary Election. If you need to get grounded and do a quick bit of day-of research, that’s OK, and the Virginia Department of Elections has all the information you need, including candidate lists and polling locations. Do make sure you double and triple check your polling place, though, because a handful of the regular sites are closed due to RPS’s summer school. Ned Oliver at Axios Richmond details some of the drama in a lot of these races, but, starting tomorrow, after the votes are counted and winners declared, we put the drama aside and get serious about taking back the majority in the House of Delegates and preserving the Senate’s Democratic Brick Wall . As we’ve seen over the last couple of years, elections are important!
 

The RPS School Board meets tonight, and you can find their full agenda here, which includes final votes on a bunch of school renamings. Related, RVA Dirt has a recap of the Board’s June 5th meeting, where they discussed an array of topics, but I think you should tap through to read a perfect example of why I keep saying we should only rename schools after plants or places.