In brief

Honors of honor Throughout last weekend’s Final Exercises, the University of Virginia honored the victims of November’s fatal shooting. In his opening remarks, President Jim Ryan spoke about how the loss of Devin Chandler, D’Sean Perry, and Lavel Davis Jr. has impacted the university community. However, one of the most powerful tributes was paid by […]

PCOB plans

As the Executive Director of the Police Civilian Oversight Board, Inez M. Gonzalez is working to improve policing and police-civilian relations in Charlottesville.  Since its conception following the deadly 2017 Unite the Right Rally, the PCOB—formerly known as the Police Civilian Review Board—has been a source of contention. While many believe in the board’s goal […]

Pipeline politics

The United States Forest Service has approved passage of the Mountain Valley Pipeline through Jefferson National Forest.  First proposed in 2014, the 304-mile pipeline spans from West Virginia into Virginia, with a possible 75-mile Southgate Extension into North Carolina. While proponents of the MVP argue that the natural gas pipeline is a “critical infrastructure project,” […]

Questioning the zoning

Voting in this year’s Democratic primary has already begun, but the five candidates seeking three nominations for Charlottesville City Council will continue to answer questions at forums between now and primary day, June 20.   That was the case at a May 17 forum put on by the Greenbrier Neighborhood Association, which featured many questions […]

Why did the bobcat cross the road?

Albemarle County is in the midst of a two-year process to update its Comprehensive Plan, a guidance document to set goals and priorities for the county for the next 20 years. The plan covers programs for growth and development, education, transportation planning, housing and land use, and protection of natural resources. However, the last Comprehensive […]

Down the foxhole

Meet two of the Rockfish Wildlife Sanctuary’s newest, and cutest, patients. These fluffy red fox kits were rescued and brought to the sanctuary after their mother was shot by a property owner. They’ve joined one of the largest cohorts of orphaned fox kits in RWS’s history—19 kits! RWS is one of the few wildlife rehabilitation […]

In brief

Staffers attacked Two staffers were attacked with a metal bat in Virginia Rep. Gerry Connolly’s district office on Monday, May 15. While police are still unsure of the attacker’s motive, the suspect was identified as Xuan Kha Tran Pham, a 49-year-old man from Fairfax. The assailant reportedly entered the congressman’s office, hit the staffers, and […]

‘Crying out for help’

Since the beginning of the pandemic, people incarcerated at the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail have called attention to poor COVID containment procedures and unhygienic living conditions at the nearly 50-year-old facility—conditions that reportedly have been significantly worsened by employee negligence and misconduct. Today, staff continue to mistreat the jail’s population, claims Cletorious Rose.  “The officers antagonize […]

They’re no scrubs

Nursing students in the University of Virginia’s Class of 2023 have lived through the full breadth of the COVID-19 pandemic—from the first cases being detected overseas in 2019 to the end of the federal public health emergency in May. It’s been a long and rugged road for the entire world, but the nursing students experienced […]

Connective dissonance

The City of Charlottesville is in the process of purchasing property to build a 1,700-foot shared-use path on Barracks Road from Emmet Street to Buckingham Road. That’s about halfway up the hill, and drew questions from one long-time observer of local government.   “What are we thinking?” says Rugby Road resident John Pfaltz. “It’s too […]