New federal food safety regs won’t impact small farms

For the better part of a decade, members of the Virginia Independent Consumer and Farmers Association (VICFA) have been bringing local attention to what they say are grave threats to small farmers—namely, excessive government regulation. Locavores may have raised their hackles last week when reading that the Obama administration released a series of new proposals […]

Twenty years of local news and arts in the spotlight

Some bouts mean more than others. The struggle against bulldozers and development is no laughing matter. It concerns the look and temperament of a place, and if a battle is lost, hardly anyone can call for a do-over. What would that even mean? In light of major changes underway in McIntire Park, we consider the […]

Walking the route that will become the Meadowcreek Parkway

On the day that I set out to walk the future route of the Meadowcreek Parkway, a friend and I spoke about the old Vinegar Hill neighborhood. The vibrant Black community was razed in the early 1960s to make way for Charlottesville’s expanding business district and a north/south road that would connect Ridge Street to […]

Wilco (The Album); Wilco; Nonesuch

“Clearly, they’re waiting for a party to start,” said David Letterman before introducing Wilco for a recent performance on “The Late Show.” He gestured at the table pictured on the cover of the band’s seventh studio release, Wilco (The Album). Abracadabra! The new Wilco record is a smaller bag of tricks, but still has its […]

Virginia Quarterly Review; Summer 2009

Mahmoud Darwish was a young Palestinian poet living in Haifa, effectively in exile, when he published these words: “I do not hate people/Nor do I encroach/But if I become hungry/The usurper’s flesh will be my food.” It was 1964 when this poem, “Identity Card,” was published, the same year that the Palestine Liberation Organization was […]

Lone read

Dear Ace: Why haven’t your devoted readers asked you any questions this week?-Ace Ace, Recently Ace has become frustrated by the lack of authentic reader questions. This week he was forced to pick his brain to come up with some burning question of his own. Unfortunately Ace is too wise to have his own inquiries […]

Splat

Ace: Every day I walk past the construction site on Maury Avenue for the Jefferson Scholars’ new building at UVA. One day, I looked up and saw a good size log—yes, log—hanging on an electric line that runs in front of the site. Every day as I walk underneath it I think: If that log […]