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By JUSTIN MATTINGLY, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
A disgruntled Virginia Board of Elections voted Tuesday to allow eight congressional candidates around the state, including four vying to unseat Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-7th, to appear on the November ballot if nominated, despite not filing paperwork on time last month.
By PETER COUTU, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
With Virginia Beach still weighing three options for how to return to school this fall, a group of roughly 50 parents, students and teachers gathered Tuesday outside of the school administration building to push for in person classes five days a week. They wanted all families to at least have the choice.
By JUSTIN MATTINGLY, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
Virginia students could be as close as 3 feet apart when they return to schools. State officials have quietly updated guidance on reopening schools this fall, including new recommendations from the American Academy of Pediatrics that say students can be as close as 3 feet apart if they wear face masks and are not showing symptoms of the virus.
By MICHELLE MURILLO, WTOP
A letter heading to Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam urges him to shift millions in the budget away from school resource officers. The letter to Northam, signed by over a dozen organizations across Virginia, was authored by NAACP Fairfax President Sean Perryman and state Del. Kaye Kory, D-Fairfax. It asks the governor to use the upcoming special session to take over $9 million away from SROs.
By LAURENCE HAMMACK, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 18 articles a month)
One day after the surprise announcement that plans for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline had been dropped, an attorney for the Sierra Club was asked about the fate of a similar natural gas pipeline being built through Southwest Virginia. Elly Benson replied that the same regulatory labyrinth that entangled Atlantic Coast confronts the Mountain Valley Pipeline. “MVP is facing a similar uphill climb,” Benson told reporters during a teleconference. Just a few hours later, that climb did not appear as steep.
By GREGORY S. SCHNEIDER AND LAURA VOZZELLA, Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)
Beth Almore played the cello as J.E.B. Stuart fell. Sitting on a shady median along Monument Avenue Tuesday morning, Almore refused to look at the bronze Confederate statue as a crane hoisted it from the base where it had stood since 1907. She played Bach, and the haunting “Spiegel im Spiegel” by Arvo Pärt, and afterward wouldn’t even say the name of the man whose bronze likeness now lay on its side on a flatbed truck to be hauled away. “That’s a person who deserves to be a footnote in history,” said Almore, 53, a public school music teacher in Richmond.
By RYAN MURPHY, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
It’s June 12, 2020. It’s been almost three weeks since Silena and Sean Chapman brought home their third baby, Kevin. Silena, a doctor who specializes in caring for sick and premature infants, is full of energy and says she’s always getting into some idea or another. Sean is reserved and gentle. He spends most of his days taking care of their two other young children.
The Full Report
47 articles, 22 publications
Read Online10 Most Clicked
The Virginia Public Access Project
Our COVID-19 dashboard makes it easy to track the latest available data for tests performed, infections, deaths and hospital capacity. There's a filter for each city and county, plus an exclusive per-capita ZIP Code map. Updated each morning around 10:00 am.
By MATT JONES, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
Gov. Ralph Northam is asking school boards across the state to rename schools named for Confederates and Confederate sympathizers. Northam’s letter to school board chairs, dated July 6, compares renaming schools to the recent removal of statues dedicated to Confederates around the country.
By JUSTIN MATTINGLY, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
Gov. Ralph Northam wants school systems across Virginia to change the names of schools honoring Confederate leaders. In a July 6 letter to the heads of school boards in the state, Northam says the names and mascots have a "traumatizing impact on students, families, teachers and staff of all backgrounds."
By KATE ANDREWS, Va Business Magazine
The governor announced Tuesday the Clean Energy Virginia initiative, a project that aims to generate 100% of Virginia’s electricity from carbon-free sources by 2045 while investing in solar and wind energy and battery storage. “Virginia has a unique opportunity to fundamentally transform the state’s electric grid in a way that powers our COVID-19 economic recovery and drives down harmful carbon pollution,” Gov. Ralph Northam said in a statement Tuesday.
By JASON MARKS, WAVY
The festive atmosphere last month at the dismantling of the Portsmouth Confederate monument came to an abrupt halt when a protester was severely injured after part of the statue was pulled down and landed on top of him. Since then, city and state officials have been pointing fingers at each other trying to figure out how things got to that point.
By AMY FRIEDENBERGER, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 18 articles a month)
The Virginia Board of Elections voted Tuesday to allow several candidates running for Congress — including Republican Bob Good — the ability to have their names appear on the November ballot despite them failing to file paperwork on time. The board granted an extension to all eight candidates — seven of whom were Republicans — on a vote of 2-1.
By LAURA VOZZELLA, Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)
Virginia's State Board of Elections on Tuesday granted Republican state Del. Nicholas J. Freitas and seven other congressional hopefuls more time to file candidate paperwork, sparing them from having to run costly write-in campaigns. Freitas, a state lawmaker from Culpeper hoping to take on freshman Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D) in November, missed the registration deadline this year — as he did last year when he ran for his third term in the General Assembly.
Associated Press
Two prominent Republican congressional candidates were given a reprieve by the Virginia State Board of Elections for not filing candidate paperwork on time. The board voted 2-1 Tuesday to extend a filing deadline for Republicans Bob Good and Nick Freitas, as well as handful of other candidates, that will allow them to have their names on the ballot this fall.
By MATT JONES, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
Guidelines issued Monday by the Virginia Department of Education recommend that schools keep at least 3 feet between people when they enter Phase 3 of reopening. The department cites guidelines from the World Health Organization and the American Academy of Pediatrics for the recommendation, a slight relaxation of earlier guidelines recommending at least 6 feet.
By WAYNE EPPS JR., Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
When the clock struck midnight on July 1, the state of Virginia moved, somewhat quietly, one step closer toward legal sports betting and casino gambling. New legislation enabling both went into effect that day, after approval this spring. The Virginia Lottery is handling the regulation of the measures.
By NATHANIEL CLINE, Loudoun Times
Loudoun County Board of Supervisors Chairwoman Phyllis Randall (D-At Large) and Vice Chairman Koran Saines (D-Sterling) are supporting a name change for the Washington Redskins. At Tuesday's business meeting, Randall and Saines will be recommending the board send a letter encouraging Washington owner Dan Snyder to rename the NFL team.
By SARAH RANKIN, Associated Press
Richard Averitt and his wife have spent six years and more than six figures fighting to keep the Atlantic Coast Pipeline off their picturesque central Virginia property. In all that time, Averitt said he couldn’t recall meeting a single person who thought they would succeed.
By MICHAEL MARTZ, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
Rhododendron and mountain laurel are growing back on the slope of Piney Mountain as the summer forest covers the litter of logs left by tree-felling for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline across from the entrance to Wintergreen Resort in Nelson County. Two and a half years after the trees fell, so did plans to build the 605-mile pipeline.
By KIMBERLY PIERCEALL, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
A federal loan program intended to help small businesses as they struggled to survive and pay their employees amid the COVID-19 pandemic brought millions of dollars to large or well-known Hampton Roads companies. They were among 16,173 businesses across Virginia to receive a Paycheck Protection Program loan worth at least $150,000, according to data released Monday by the U.S. Department of Treasury and U.S. Small Business Administration.
By JEFF STURGEON, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 18 articles a month)
The federal government has spent well over $250 million on emergency relief for businesses and nonprofits in the Roanoke and New River valleys, ranging from Main Street pizza shops to manufacturers employing hundreds of people. This week, the Small Business Administration identified about 730 area companies and organizations as recipients of COVID-19 economic relief loans of at least $150,000.
By RICHARD CHUMNEY AND RACHEL SMITH, News & Advance (Metered Paywall - 18 articles a month)
At least $223 million poured into thousands of Lynchburg-area businesses and nonprofits this spring as part of the federal government’s $660 billion Paycheck Protection Program, an emergency lending program aimed at helping small businesses make payroll during the coronavirus pandemic.
By CALEB AYERS, Danville Register & Bee
Businesses throughout the Dan River Region received somewhere between $70.7 million and $128.3 million in federal coronavirus aid, according to data released by the Small Business Administration. The recipients, which crossed all sectors and even included some nonprofits, received payments ranging from as little as $1,000 to possibly as much as $5 million.
By JONATHAN CAPRIEL, Washington Business Journal (Subscription required for some articles)
Amazon.com Inc. won't receive any direct cash payments from Arlington County, this year at least, for its HQ2 office leases. It’s not because the company didn’t keep up its end of the bargain or turned away incentive dollars during a pandemic that has hit local government budgets particularly hard. Rather, it’s because Amazon's incentive payments are tied to Arlington's tourism industry. And most rooms remain empty due to the coronavirus pandemic.
By JOHN REID BLACKWELL, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
A Henrico County-based laboratory company said Tuesday that it is planning to hire about 400 employees as it ramps up its testing capability for the virus that causes COVID-19. Genetworx, a molecular diagnostic testing lab, said it has “immediate” hiring needs for jobs such as data entry, lab technicians, tech assistants, project managers, business managers, hiring managers and other work at its facility in the Innsbrook Corporate Center in western Henrico.
By KARRI PEIFER, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Access to this article limited to subscribers)
Wegmans Food Markets has permanently closed The Pub restaurants in its stores across the country, including the two in the Richmond area. “We are focused on applying our culinary expertise to the increasing demand for fast, casual meal solutions available in our stores, for pickup, and through delivery,” Wegmans spokeswoman Marcie Rivera said.
By VIVIAN O'BRIEN, South Boston News & Record
A downtown South Boston landmark with an iconic retail history, Lantor’s outlived two world wars, a Great Depression and a Great Recession, but time has finally caught up to the women’s apparel shop, which will close this summer after a final liquidation sale. John Lantor, the third generation owner of the Main Street business, said his decision to retire wasn’t an easy one.
By JUSTIN MATTINGLY, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
James Madison University is renaming three buildings that had been named to honor Confederate leaders. The university’s board of visitors on Tuesday unanimously voted to change the names of Ashby, Jackson and Maury halls, a move students, campus organizations and alumni had called for. JMU immediately removed signs for the buildings on the university’s Quad, and assigned temporary names.
By GRACE MAMON, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 18 articles a month)
Washington and Lee University’s board of trustees on Tuesday announced the creation of a board committee to review the school’s Confederate ties, including the school’s name. This announcement comes after support from many campus groups, including the student government and a majority of the faculty, to drop Robert E. Lee from the university’s name.
By SUSAN SVRLUGA, Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)
When Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee died in 1870, the faculty of Washington College called for the school’s name to be changed to reflect the contributions Lee had made as its president. The trustees agreed and renamed the school Washington and Lee University. On Monday, faculty again asked trustees of the prestigious Virginia university to change its name.
By ELIZABETH BELL, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
Washington and Lee University’s board of trustees has formed a committee to review the school’s name, after faculty, students and alumni called for the small liberal arts college in Lexington to change it. “The board recognizes the dissonance between our namesakes’ connections to slavery and their significant contributions to the university,” the board said in an email sent to the W&L community.
Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
The Virginia Department of Health reported Tuesday that the statewide total for COVID-19 cases is 66,740 — an increase of 638 from the 66,102 reported Monday. The 66,740 cases consist of 63,950 confirmed cases and 2,790 probable cases. There are 1,881 COVID-19 deaths in Virginia — 1,775 confirmed and 106 probable. That’s an increase of 28 from the 1,853 reported Monday.
By ALI WEATHERTON, WVEC
Virginia Beach Emergency Management Director Erin Sutton provided a COVID-19 update to council members on Tuesday. COVID-19 cases are increasing in Virginia Beach and city leaders said they believe it's because people are not social distancing and not wearing face masks while indoors.
By CATHY DYSON, Free Lance-Star (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)
After she recovered from the momentary, and uncomfortable, sensation of having a swab stuck up her nose, Felicia Allen started to applaud. She clapped, not just for the National Guard members who administered the COVID-19 test Tuesday in a parking lot at Stafford Hospital, but for others who made the community event possible.
By NEIL HARVEY, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 18 articles a month)
Prosecutors have dropped a misdemeanor charge against a Roanoke gym owner accused of violating a statewide order to close his doors against COVID-19. Thomas Milton, who runs Titan Fit, was cited April 19 for keeping his northwest Roanoke business open in defiance of Executive Order 53.
By STEVE HELBER AND DENISE LAVOIE, Associated Press
Work crews on Tuesday took down a monument to Confederate Gen. J.E.B. Stuart, the third major statue to be cleared away in less than a week as the Confederacy’s former capital rushes to remove symbols of oppression in response to protests against police brutality and racism. As a crowd cheered, crews strapped the huge bronze equestrian statue in harnesses and used a crane to lift it from its granite base to be trucked away.
By ALI SULLIVAN, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
The J.E.B. Stuart statue on Monument Avenue is the latest to be removed since the city began hauling away Confederate sculptures on July 1. The statue’s removal on Tuesday marks the third Confederate statue to be taken down since the first of the month.
By PATRICIA SULLIVAN, Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)
Democrat Takis Karantonis won the special election for a vacant Arlington County Board seat Tuesday, cementing the party’s control over top offices in the liberal Northern Virginia community.
ArlNow
Most people arrested in Arlington are Black and most do not reside in Arlington. That’s according to 2019 arrest data shared by the Arlington County Police Department, at the request of ARLnow and a local community group. Its release follows calls for police reform and nationwide protests over the deaths of Black men and women at the hands of law enforcement.
By HANNAH SCHUSTER, DCist
Amid concerns about a lack of clarity in reopening plans, Fairfax County Public Schools will extend the deadline for families and staff to decide between the district’s two options for the coming school year. FCPS is offering a choice between all-virtual learning or a hybrid model where kids would have some amount of in-person learning mixed with online work. The deadline to choose between one or the other has been extended from July 10 to July 15, Superintendent Scott Braband announced Monday night during a virtual town hall.
By CATHERINE DOUGLAS MORAN, Reston Now
Superintendent Scott Brabrand said during a town hall Monday night that he plans to ask the Fairfax County School Board this week to delay the start of the school year to after Labor Day. Brabrand kicked off the town hall by saying that families will now have until Wednesday, July 15, instead of Friday, July 10, to pick whether they prefer four days of synchronous online learning or two days of in-person learning with asynchronous online learning.
By JOSH JANNEY, Winchester Star (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)
Hiring continues at the $135 million, state-of-the-art FBI Central Records Complex, which quietly opened in Frederick County in March. Manali Basu, public affairs specialist with the FBI’s national press office, provided a statement from the FBI saying the complex opened on schedule on March 9. “Due to the steadfast efforts of FBI personnel and project partners, the [coronavirus] pandemic did not delay the opening and operations began shortly after occupancy,” the statement said.
By RANDI B. HAGI, Harrisonburg Citizen
The plan for reopening Harrisonburg city schools in the fall by having students alternate days in the buildings won the school board’s unanimous approval Tuesday. The “return to school plan,” which was first publicly presented in a special meeting last week, changed only slightly, such a few minor wording edits, but Superintendent Michael Richards told the board that given the shifting landscape of the COVID-19 pandemic, further changes are likely before the first day of school on Aug. 31.
Fauquier Now
Deciding how Fauquier public schools open the fall term remains extremely challenging, Superintendent David Jeck said Tuesday. For example, the Virginia Department of Education on Monday amended social distancing recommendations for schools, from 6 feet to 3 feet — “if everyone’s wearing masks,” Dr. Jeck said in his weekly video update on the pandemic response.
By DAVID MCGEE, Bristol Herald Courier (Metered Paywall - 15 articles a month)
Plans totaling 50 pages are being developed to bring students back into Bristol, Virginia classrooms and they feature extensive COVID-19 precautions and layers of learning options. Administrators, teachers and staff members are crafting detailed plans to reopen city schools on schedule Aug. 20, allowing for social distancing, increased cleaning and sanitation, minimizing grouping of students, offering remote learning and a dramatically modified transportation schedule.
Roanoke Times Editorial (Metered Paywall - 18 articles a month)
When state Sen. Amanda Chase announced in February that she would seek the Republican nomination for governor in 2021, a senior Republican legislator put out an unusual statement: “Amanda just doesn’t have a level of substance, maturity or seriousness that Virginians expect in a gubernatorial candidate,” said state Sen. Mark Obenshain, R-Rockingham County.
Free Lance-Star Editorial (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)
A four-year-long conflict over a proposed Muslim cemetery in Stafford County is now the subject of a federal lawsuit filed against the county by the U.S. Department of Justice. It’s time for Stafford supervisors to admit they made a mistake and settle the case before it goes to court.
Virginian-Pilot Editorial (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
Good thing we’re building these gargantuan wind turbines just off the coast of Virginia Beach, because the vaunted Atlantic Coast Pipeline abruptly went away on Sunday. Faced with an “unacceptable layer of uncertainty and anticipated delays,” Dominion Energy and Duke Energy, the backers of the project, pulled the plug and that was that.
Richmond Times-Dispatch Editorial (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
It has been a bad week for energy production in the United States. On Sunday, Dominion Energy Inc. and Duke Energy Corp. announced they were scrapping plans to build a 600-mile natural gas pipeline that had been in the works since 2014. The decision to cancel construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) ends a six-year battle between the two companies and scores of environmental groups.
By ISRAEL ZOBERMAN, published in Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
I was awakened early in the morning by my mom, an almost 100-year-old Holocaust survivor who lives in Israel. She was deeply concerned for America. Amid a devastating and debilitating pandemic with more than 128,000 American lives lost and widespread economic hardships exposing dangerous social fissures and inequities, we are now also facing a massive civil eruption which resonates globally.
Rabbi Israel Zoberman is the founder of Temple Lev Tikvah in Virginia Beach. He is past national interfaith chair of Jewish Council for Public Affairs.
By ALAN SMITH, published in Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
On July 15, Virginia’s Lottery Board will decide whether to grant the Pamunkey Indian tribe a gaming license for their planned casino development in Norfolk. If you’re interested in learning more about the potential impact of the casino and would like to see what the Pamunkey put in their application just go online. That’s where you’ll have to file your FOIA request, because just like every other step in the casino process, the Pamunkey don’t want you looking too closely at what they have planned.
Alan Smith is a resident of downtown Norfolk and a member of the Downtown Norfolk Civic League.
By YARON MILLER AND NIKKI ROVNER, published in Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 25 articles a month)
Flooding is Virginia’s most common and costly natural disaster, affecting every corner of the state. Already in 2020, communities from Southside to the Southwest and Hampton Roads, to Roanoke have grappled with floods, which in many cases disrupt lives, force evacuations and damage property.
Yaron Miller leads state policy for The Pew Charitable Trusts’ flood-prepared communities initiative. Nikki Rovner is associate state director for The Nature Conservancy in Virginia.
By MELODY BARNES, published in Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)
I live on Richmond’s Monument Avenue, but Monument Avenue wasn’t meant for me. My grandmother was born in this city and so was my father, when Jim Crow was king. Reminded of the laws and customs of his youth, my father recounted his personal acts of protest. When working, he wouldn’t enter homes in the tonier sections of the city through the back door, nor would he stand in the “colored only” lines to pick up lunch.
Melody Barnes, co-director of the Democracy Initiative at the University of Virginia, was director of the White House Domestic Policy Council under President Barack Obama.
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