Last year, Virginia Senator George Allen received six trips, with destinations ranging from Las Vegas to Virginia Beach, from various nongovernmental organizations, according to the personal financial disclosure report he filed for 2005. The report ws released last week.
In lieu of tarot cards and ouija boards, Charlottesville and Albemarle predict the future with multitudinous boards and commissions. Below is a guide for the uninitiated to help slog through the bog of local plans and boards.
It\’s a done dealâexcept for the deal. Both Charlottesville City Council and the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors last week approved Ragged Mountain Reservoir as the preferred alternative to meet water needs until 2055. However, the tougher questions about mitigation, money and phasing remain unresolved.
If you were afraid of losing the 7-Eleven on the corner of Hydraulic Road and Route 29N to the massive development known as Albemarle Place, rejoice (for a while at least): Even though the “New Urbanist” developmentâwith its mixed-use zoning for retail and residentialâwill surround the property, developer Landonomics and 7-Eleven property owners cannot reach an agreement. But it\’s not for lack of effort\-hey\’ve been trying for six years.
Soon The Jefferson Theater building will become another piece of Coran Capshaw’s empire. And when the theater closes for extensive renovations this summer, there will no longer be room for basement tenants like Better Than Television (BTTV), which must leave by June 30.
BTTV, an all-volunteer “radical” community center, has occupied 2,000 square feet in the basement for approximately one year, where they operate a lending library, a free store, a ‘zine rack, and a stage room for plays, music shows, films and sundry other eclectic projects geared particularly toward teens. Along with Tibetan street vendors who sell their wares outside during the day, BTTV subleases their basement space from a photographer. According to Sam Schuyler, a project assistant with Capshaw’s Red Light Management, that photographer’s lease has recently expired.
Qroe Farms, the company developing Bundoran Farm just south of Charlottesville, positions itself as an agriculture- and environment-friendly developerâone that often sacrifices housing lots in order to preserve surrounding forests, fields, streams and views.
City police set the baitâan unlocked vehicle with obvious iPod, cell phone, camera and watchâalong Madison Avenue. Three minutes later they sprung the trap, after two teens on bikes swiped the iPod and cell phone, making it 30 yards before police arrested them. Police found two more iPods after a search. Both juveniles were convicted last week of petty larceny.
If UVA really wants to be a top-notch school, it needs to show grad students the money. At least according to a policy presentation to the Board of Visitors on Friday, June 9, detailing the path of an outstanding research university. The message? Top schools attract top graduate students by paying them top stipends.
“We do a lot of planning in Charlottesville.” With this statement of the obvious, Jim Tolbert opened the Charlottesville strategic planning forum Wednesday night. He then proceeded to lay out various City blueprints: neighborhood plans, department plans, a comprehensive plan, and-he plan for which this brainstorming session for local concerns and ideas was calledâa strategic plan for 2011.
Even though Andrew Alston will be released nearly five months early, the former UVA student convicted of voluntary manslaughter for killing volunteer firefighter Walter Sisk is appealing the terms of his June 21 release.