Budget talk is heating up (well, as much as budget talk ever heats up): Should the city and the county lower the tax rates in the wake of double-digit rises in real estate assessments? If so, what should get cut? What should the government do to help middle-class homeowners? Are the schools getting all the […]
Budget talk is heating up (well, as much as budget talk ever heats up): Should the city and the county lower the tax rates in the wake of double-digit rises in real estate assessments? If so, what should get cut? What should the government do to help middle-class homeowners? Are the schools getting all the […]
Six years after the Rivanna Village at Glenmore was first proposed, the project to add up to 521 new residential units and 125,000 square feet of commercial space to the community in eastern Albemarle is at last going before the Board of Supervisors. The county Planning Commission voted 5-1 to approve the project, with numerous […]
A little over a year ago, photographer Michael Higgins opened the front door of his house to see local farmer George Cason standing there. “He said I want to be a good neighbor,” remembers Higgins. “He brought over pumpkins and gave apples to my kids.” A month later, Higgins says Cason was hurling inflammatory threats […]
Can destructive development be stopped by a well-crafted essay? Janisse Ray thinks it’s worth a try. Along with fellow Southern writer John Lane, she’ll lead a discussion on March
Dear Ace: On a recent trip to Richmond, I noticed that all the state buildings were flying the Commonwealth flag at half-staff while the U.S. flag was at full-staff. Isn’t this a deviation from flag-display protocol?—Fannie Flagg Fannie: No offense, but prior to receiving this question, when Ace heard phrases like “deviation from flag-display protocol,” […]
Let it never be said that we here at Odd Dominion HQ (hidden deep beneath the streets of Belmont, with just a modem, a cable-news feed and a donut-delivering pneumatic tube from Spudnuts to sustain us) refuse to acknowledge when our fine Commonwealth’s elected representatives get something right for a change. So kudos to our […]
cd The Arcade Fire’s actual music can get lost in the unusual media frenzy that has surrounded the band over the past three years. On the eve of the release of their second album, Neon Bible, both The New Yorker and The New York Times ran lengthy profiles. (Not to mention the adoration that extends […]
cd In the quest for authentic world musics, few labels support young white teenagers eager to re-live other cultures. Not all traditions (so they assume) have a universal code that can be broken without living the history embedded in the lyrics. Beirut channel the spirits of gypsies, tramps and thieves on the worldly debut, Gulag […]
London’s Bloc Party offer a classier celebration on their second album, A Weekend in the City. Not on the guest list: hipsters. cd Bloc Party avoids the sophomore curse by doing what too few alternative bands do well—improving their original energy level while finding the delicate point between its core sound and the need for […]
games As anyone who regularly saunters into the JPJ on a Saturday in March knows, college hoops is all about the atmosphere—the crowd, the mascots, the madness. And, unfortunately, Dick Vitale. If Electronic Arts’ first next-gen version of its NCAA March Madness series was only about bottling the supercharged experience of a home game against […]