During a heated one-day veto session last week, the Virginia General Assembly killed Governor Glenn Youngkin’s amendments that would have created two new misdemeanor crimes for possessing more than two ounces of marijuana, accompanied by potential fines and jail time. The controversial legislation also would have banned the sale of Delta-8—a popular form of THC […]
It’s been more than a year since statues began coming down in Charlottesville—where are they now? Johnny Reb In August 2020, the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to take down Charlottesville’s first Confederate monument: a bronze statue of a Confederate soldier known as “Johnny Reb,” who stood outside the county courthouse for 111 […]
In 1808, the trans-Atlantic slave trade was abolished in the United States, but the horrors of slavery raged on for nearly six more decades. Between 1810 and 1860, approximately 1 million enslaved people in the Upper South were forcibly relocated to newly established plantations in the Deep South, fueled by the booming cotton industry. This […]
It’s been over two years since a local resident threw the Court Square slave auction marker into the James River, and Charlottesville is slowly—yet surely—moving toward erecting a new memorial. Since 2020, the city’s Historic Resources Committee has met with several dozen descendants, gathering their input on how to properly memorialize the thousands of enslaved […]
For more than a decade, Charlottesville’s school reconfiguration has remained in limbo, thanks to a plethora of financial setbacks. As the city works to finalize its budget for fiscal year 2023, leadership has struggled to figure out how to fund the $75 million project, which would move fifth grade from Walker Upper Elementary—currently home to […]
After years of public debate over Charlottesville’s housing woes, City Council adopted a new Future Land Use Map last fall, which advocates for increasing housing density across the city—and in turn, creating more affordable housing. Last month, city staff began the lengthy process of rewriting an outdated zoning ordinance, something that could take a year […]
Charlottesville’s Police Civilian Oversight Board met last week to discuss procedures for how the board can investigate complaints against the police—and how board members can investigate complaints against each other, an all-too-relevant process given the fractious history between recent members. At the meeting, board members voted to send a final draft of their operating procedures […]
After years of public outcry, the James River Water Authority has abandoned its plans to build a water intake and pump station at Rassawek, the historic capital of the Monacan Indian Nation. Last week, the authority—a partnership between Fluvanna and Louisa counties—unanimously voted to apply for permits for an alternative project site, located about two […]
Since defeating Dr. Cameron Webb in 2020, 5th District Representative Bob Good has stayed true to his Trump-loving, Bible-thumping platform. In addition to introducing bills attacking abortion rights, criminal justice reform, gun control, and refugees, the Republican has rejected the 2020 presidential election results, voted against investigating the Capitol insurrection, and supported fellow far-right conservatives, […]
Since the beginning of the pandemic, inmates at the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail have called attention to a host of health and sanitary issues at the facility, including black mold, faulty wiring, leaky ceilings, poor plumbing, freezing temperatures, bug infestations, standing water, and shoddy COVID containment procedures. The jail’s leadership has begun taking steps to improve […]