The 2015 General Assembly session is in its final sprint, with talk of both houses agreeing to a budget and voting on it one day before the session ends February 27—a nearly unprecedented rapprochement. Contributing to the speedy resolution was taking Medicaid expansion off the table, despite Governor Terry McAuliffe setting that as a priority […]
A handful of bills to reform gerrymandering died February 12 in a seven-person House of Delegates subcommittee by voice vote. Delegate Steve Landes (R-25th) was one of those voting to kill the bills. “Our districts are not gerrymandered,” he said. “They’re approved by the Department of Justice.” The state constitution makes legislators responsible for drawing […]
A Missouri real estate investment trust, EPR Properties, has picked up Wintergreen Resort for an undisclosed price, it announced last week. Coal and resort baron Jim Justice, who bought Wintergreen for $16.5 million in June 2012, poured millions into infrastructure before putting the Nelson ski resort on the market a year ago. “Wintergreen is an […]
Accused Hannah Graham-murderer Jesse Matthew, who was convicted of trespassing in 2010, inspired three bills in the General Assembly to add misdemeanors to the crimes for which DNA samples are collected. However, the versions that passed would not have prevented Matthew from crossing paths with Graham last September. Had Matthew been buccal swabbed for DNA […]
Last summer a phalanx of cop cars lined up at Psychic Readings by Catherine on U.S. 29 and closed one lane of traffic. The Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement led the June 14 search warrant execution, removed four cars, and left a lot of locals wondering what was up. No charges have […]
When the Supreme Court ruled on Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, Charlottesville residents Eugene and Lorraine Williams could not have imagined the General Assembly that supported segregation would one day give them a standing ovation. Yet that’s what happened February 6, when the highly partisan House of Delegates rose in unison to applaud […]
Star guard Justin Anderson’s fractured finger did not stop Virginia from topping ninth-ranked Louisville 52-47 February 7, nor did it prevent Virginia from being ranked No. 2 in the country again this week. But what does it mean for the Cavaliers for the rest of the regular season, with Anderson out of commission for the […]
Jesse Matthew, the man charged in the abduction last fall of UVA student Hannah Graham, has been indicted for Graham’s murder, Albemarle Commonwealth’s Attorney Denise Lunsford announced at a press conference February 10. Matthew was indicted February 2 on first-degree murder, abduction and reckless driving charges in connection with Graham’s death, Lunsford said. He has […]
White Hall resident Angela Lynn knows she’s got an uphill battle challenging Republican Delegate Steve Landes for the 25th District seat, which he’s held since 1996. Most of the district is in more conservative Augusta and Rockingham counties, with a chunk of western Albemarle thrown in. It was the gerrymandering of the district that played […]
Charlottesville writer Charles Shields was not surprised to learn that more than 50 years after the publication of Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, To Kill a Mockingbird, a second novel has been discovered and will be published this summer. “I knew of its existence,” said Shields, who wrote Mockingbird, an unauthorized biography of Lee, in 2006. […]