Tackling a county budget may seem daunting, but Smart Cville tactfully lays out Albemarle’s budget in a spread of colors with its new budget visualization tool that illustrates how your money helps the county. Smart Cville, a locally based nonprofit, aims to open up data, plain and simple. Creator Lucas Ames, 35, sent out a […]
Modern-day ‘debtors’ prison’? The Legal Aid Justice Center sued the Department of Motor Vehicles July 6 in federal court in Charlottesville, claiming that suspending the licenses of nearly 1 million low-income Virginians for failure to pay unreasonable court costs and fines traps them in debt, makes it impossible for them to legally drive to work […]
The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors voted 4-2 July 6 to hold a $35 million bond referendum for school improvements in November, and some locals think county officials will not be able to educate the public about the new ballot item without advocating for it. Virginia Code allows local governments to clarify a referendum, but […]
In a town where parking is already sparse, two unlimited-time parking spaces have been removed from South Street to “improve traffic operations and safety,” according to the city—two years after residents complained about the sight lines there. Residents from the Midway Manor neighborhood approached the city May 20 with concerns about the parking spots, says […]
In May, members of a Wintergreen nonprofit organization submitted four requests to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to reroute the Atlantic Coast Pipeline out of their town. One of their ideas? Run it through Albemarle County, instead. The 600-mile, 42-inch natural gas line is currently proposed to slice through the outskirts of the Wintergreen community […]
A group of Friendship Court residents is pushing back against redevelopment plans, calling for more inclusion as developers move forward with attempts to revamp downtown Charlottesville’s largest subsidized housing neighborhood. The Piedmont Housing Alliance announced last fall that it was purchasing the property with 150 low-income units in 2018 and was transforming it into a large-scale, […]
The June 29 Downtown Mall fire that started in Ike’s Underground Vintage Clothing and Strange Cargo also has temporarily closed Miso Sweet Ramen + Donut Shop and Twisted Branch Tea Bazaar. The Tea Bazaar suffered from “a fine layer of smoke dust over all of the restaurant including the office and hookah lounge,” says owner […]
Mayor Mike Signer and City Councilor Kathy Galvin insist there is nothing personal in the city’s dispute with Mark Brown over control of the Water Street Parking Garage. In meetings with reporters July 6 after the city rejected Charlottesville Parking Center’s June 24 proposed settlement of the escalating controversy over the fate of the garage the city co-owns with Brown, […]
There is more to pouring the perfect glass of cabernet franc than one may think—it starts not with the grape, but with the soil in which it grew. One local expert and his team, who are not afraid to get their hands dirty, will soon receive international acclaim for work that revolutionized industry-wide fertilizer recommendations […]