VaNews Aug. 26, 2019
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** EXECUTIVE BRANCH
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** NORTHAM: STATE WILL REVIEW STANDARDS FOR TEACHING BLACK HISTORY ([link removed])
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Associated Press

Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam announced Saturday a new state commission to review educational standards for teaching black history in the state, as officials observed the arrival of enslaved Africans to what is now Virginia 400 years ago.


** THESE 34 PEOPLE ARE TASKED WITH REVIEWING VIRGINIA'S AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY EDUCATION ([link removed])
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By JUSTIN MATTINGLY, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

Gov. Ralph Northam signed an executive order Saturday creating the Commission on African American History Education. “The full history of Virginia is complex, contradictory, and often untold — and we must do a better job of making sure that every Virginia graduate enters adult life with an accurate and thorough understanding of our past, and the pivotal role that African Americans have played in building and perfecting our commonwealth,” Northam said in a statement.


** NORTHAM APPOINTEE MADE ANTI-CATHOLIC JOKES AND DEROGATORY ATTACKS ON SOCIAL MEDIA ([link removed])
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By PATRICK WILSON, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

One of Gov. Ralph Northam’s new appointees to a state council that advises him on women’s issues has a history of making derogatory attacks on Twitter, including telling author Cornel West to “f--- off and die,” and making jokes about Catholics and Catholic priests and pedophilia.


** ATTORNEY GENERAL: LOCALITIES CAN REGULATE LOCATIONS OF GUN SHOPS ([link removed])
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By AMY FRIEDENBERGER, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

Local governments have the authority to enact zoning ordinances to regulate the location of businesses that sell firearms, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring wrote Friday in an opinion spurred by a gun shop that opened in Roanoke County. Herring issued the opinion in response to an inquiry from Del. Sam Rasoul, D-Roanoke


** GENERAL ASSEMBLY
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** PIONEERING BLACK LAWMAKERS SHARE FIRST CALLING, WISDOM DURING PANEL ON RACE AND POLITICS. ([link removed])
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By LISA VERNON SPARKS, Daily Press (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

State Sen. Mamie Locke’s life in public service began in high school, when she did something she was explicitly told not to. She and other classmates wanted to protest the 1970 shooting involving the National Guard at Jackson State, Mississippi, that left two dead and 12 injured.


** A STUDENT LOAN SURPRISE — AND A LIKELY LEGISLATIVE BATTLE NEXT YEAR ([link removed])
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By DAVE RESS, Daily Press (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

For 12 years, cutting a mortgage-payment-sized monthly check to pay down his law school debt, Del. Mike Mullin, D-Newport News, and his wife Laura were relying on what they thought was a promise that his public service work would eventually mean some of the remaining balance would be forgiven. Turns out, not.


** STATE ELECTIONS
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** GUN DEBATE RAISES STAKES IN BATTLE FOR VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE ([link removed])
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By REBECCA KLAR, The Hill

A high-stakes state election in Virginia this year is set to get even more heated as both sides of the gun control debate pour money and resources to reshape an almost evenly split legislature in the wake of recent mass shootings across the country. At the center of the upcoming battle is a set of comprehensive gun control bills, including universal background checks and a ban on assault weapons, that failed to pass the legislature last month after Gov. Ralph Northam (D) called for a special session following a Virginia Beach shooting that killed 12 people in May.


** RIDGEWAY WANTS TO IMPROVE QUALITY OF LIFE FOR 30TH DISTRICT RESIDENTS ([link removed])
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By ALLISON BROPHY CHAMPION, Culpeper Star Exponent (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

The Democratic nominee for the House of Delegates’ 30th District hopes that her message will break through the drama surrounding the reelection campaign of Republican Del. Nick Freitas. “The theme of my campaign is ‘We the people,’” said Ann Ridgeway. “I need the people of this district to understand who I am, what I stand for


** STATE GOVERNMENT
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** ONLY STATE MENTAL HEALTH HOSPITAL FOR CHILDREN REMAINS STRAINED IN SPITE OF NEW STATE-OF-THE-ART VCU FACILITY ([link removed])
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By BRIDGET BALCH, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

Every year around the time that school starts, staff at the only state children’s psychiatric hospital in Virginia know to expect a surge in admissions. As workers at the Commonwealth Center for Children and Adolescents prepare for the new patients, which come as the stress of school begins to pick up, state officials worry that the system that has already been pushed to its limits will face even more significant challenges.


** REPORT OUTLINES IMPROVEMENTS FOR AN UNDERFUNDED, STRUGGLING DEQ ([link removed])
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By LAURENCE HAMMACK, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

Virginia’s environmental agency has a daunting to-do list: dealing with climate change, offsetting regulatory rollbacks at the federal level, cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay and monitoring work on the largest natural gas pipeline ever built in the state, to name just a few. Yet the Department of Environmental Quality is being asked to do more with less state funding, fewer employees, and an outdated set of regulations.


** CONGRESS
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** WARNER AND KAINE LIKE THE DEFENSE SPENDING BLUEPRINT ([link removed])
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By HUGH LESSIG, Daily Press (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

Virginia’s two senators dished out equal portions of optimism and concern Friday at a lunchtime forum with the Hampton Roads Chamber, part of a two-day swing through the region.


** SEN. MARK WARNER AND DEL. MIKE MULLIN TAKE QUESTIONS, OFFER ANSWERS AT WILLIAMSBURG LIBRARY EVENT ([link removed])
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By SEAN KORSGAARD, Virginia Gazette (Metered Paywall - 5 Articles per Month)

U.S. Sen. Mark Warner and Del. Mike Mullin, D-Newport News, met with a group of more than 100 people at the Williamsburg Regional Library on Saturday afternoon, tackling topics from the school-to-prison pipeline to tensions with China. Both Warner and Mullin offered attendees updates on legislation they’re working on on the federal and state levels and discussed both the upcoming 2019 state elections in Virginia and the 2020 Presidential race before fielding questions from the audience.


** WEXTON ANNOUNCES BIPARTISAN AGRITOURISM CAUCUS ([link removed])
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By RENSS GREENE, Loudoun Now

The day before taking a tour of some of western Loudoun’s agribusiness draws, Rep. Jennifer T. Wexton (D-VA-10) announced the creation of the Congressional Agritourism Caucus with co-chairman Rep. David Rouzer (R-NC-7). “There are a lot of districts like mine you have this suburban component going to rural


** ECONOMY/BUSINESS
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** REPORT FINDS COST OF CHILD CARE IN VIRGINIA HAS RISEN 7 TIMES MORE THAN WOMEN'S WAGE GROWTH ([link removed])
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By ADELE UPHAUS–CONNER, Free Lance-Star (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

Cortnee Smith’s monthly salary as a part-time event associate at a Fredericksburg wedding venue is $1,200. The cost of full-time, home-based child care for the Stafford County resident’s three children—ages 7, 3 and 2—is $1,550.


** BALLAD LOOKS TO CONSOLIDATION TO SOLVE PROBLEM OF TOO FEW PATIENTS, NOT ENOUGH STAFF ([link removed])
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By LUANNE RIFE, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

On a Friday morning in early August, nursing supervisors enter a conference room at Norton Community Hospital, where they’re joined over video by their counterparts at the other two hospitals in Wise County and one in Dickenson County. For nearly a year, the former competitors have gathered daily to share information on patients and staffing.


** JUDGE ISSUES TEMPORARY RESTRAINING ORDER TO PREVENT MOVEMENT OF BLACKJEWEL COAL ([link removed])
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By TIM DODSON, Bristol Herald Courier (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

A federal district court judge issued a temporary restraining order Friday afternoon to prevent bankrupt coal producer Blackjewel LLC and a marketing company from moving thousands of tons of coal in Southwest Virginia that U.S. Department of Labor officials say were produced by unpaid employees in violation of the law.


** TRANSPORTATION
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** VDOT SCALING BACK NORTHBOUND RAPPAHANNOCK RIVER CROSSING PROJECT ([link removed])
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By SCOTT SHENK, Free Lance-Star (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

Higher costs have forced transportation officials to shrink the size of the northbound Rappahannock River Crossing project, the third leg in a trio of major Interstate 95 projects aimed at easing congestion problems.


** HIGHER EDUCATION
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** ONE YEAR IN, JIM RYAN IS READY TO BUILD ON HIS PLANS FOR UVA ([link removed])
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By RUTH SERVEN SMITH, Daily Progress (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

After a year in office, Jim Ryan has momentum at the University of Virginia. “It feels like we’re at the end of the beginning; it’s a relief in some respects to have an agreed-upon roadmap, but there’s a tremendous amount of work to do,” he said in his office at the beginning of August.


** VIRGINIA OTHER
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** 'MOST OF OUR HISTORY IS NOT WRITTEN:' VIRGINIA MARKS 400 YEARS SINCE FIRST AFRICANS' ARRIVAL IN U.S. ([link removed])
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By MEL LEONOR, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

Feet from the shores that saw the arrival of the first Africans to English North America, Lynise Perry said the history and culture of her ancestors is one often overlooked or discounted. The search for more led her to Fort Monroe in Hampton on Saturday with her two teenage boys, whom she said have also grown thirsty for knowledge of their background — something they said is lacking at school.


** 1619 COMMEMORATION BRINGS THOUSANDS SEEKING TO LEARN TRUE HISTORY OF FIRST AFRICANS IN VIRGINIA ([link removed])
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By LISA VERNON SPARKS AND JOSH REYES, Daily Press (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

A parade of speakers delivered inspired messages and calls for change Saturday to launch Fort Monroe’s commemoration ceremony honoring the first Africans’ arrival in Virginia in 1619.


** VIRGINIA MARKS THE DAWN OF AMERICAN SLAVERY IN 1619 WITH SOLEMN SPEECHES AND SONGS ([link removed])
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By GREGORY S. SCHNEIDER, Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)

They faced the sunrise to the rhythm of drums and waves on a windswept beach, dozens wearing white, near the spot where the first enslaved Africans arrived at the English colony of Virginia in 1619. On Saturday morning, they would release those spirits. The cleansing and naming ritual, presided over by visiting chiefs from Cameroon, kicked off a weekend of events marking the 400th anniversary of the Africans’ arrival and the dawn of American slavery.


** A TOUR OF PAINFUL MONUMENTS, FOR ALL CONFEDERATE STATUE TOUR IS NOW ONLINE ([link removed])
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By HANNAH NATANSON, Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)

Once a month, the two African American women walk to the former slave auction block in Charlottesville. They stand before a crowd that often numbers in the dozens. University of Virginia professor Jalane Schmidt gestures toward the ground, pointing out a small concrete marker, flush with the brick sidewalk, that declares: “On this site, slaves were bought and sold.” Beside her, Andrea Douglas, executive director of the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, clears her throat.


** SERVICE WANTS TO FACILITATE MINING, LOGGING AND GRAZING IN NATIONAL FORESTS ([link removed])
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By SANDY HAUSMAN, WVTF

Unlike National Parks, the federal government considers places like the Washington and Jefferson National Forests suitable for mining, grazing and logging – but first, the Forest Service must do an environmental assessment and allow the public to weigh in. Critics say it’s taking too long to get sign-off, and the Forest Service now says it agrees.


** LOCAL
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** PORTSMOUTH’S HOUSING AUTHORITY SPARRING WITH CITY — AGAIN ([link removed])
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By ANA LEY, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)

More than two years ago, the Portsmouth City Council forced out most members of the city’s housing authority board amid a federal investigation. Relations between the two bodies don’t seem to have improved much since.


** ROANOKE'S NEW MEDIAN STRIP SIGNS OFFER BOTH HELP AND A WARNING TO PANHANDLERS ([link removed])
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By MATT CHITTUM, Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

Roanoke police have handed out hundreds of citations to people standing on median strips in the city since the practice was outlawed two years ago. But the city, police and a local nonprofit are partnering to send a message to those offenders that goes beyond a court date, or even a “move along.”


** EDITORIALS
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** THE HISTORY WE WEREN'T TAUGHT ABOUT THE FIRST AFRICANS IN VIRGINIA ([link removed])
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Roanoke Times Editorial (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

We don’t know their names, but they are as much our nation’s founders as ones we learned in history books —just unwilling ones. We do know where they came from: Modern-day Angola. They were most likely members of either the Kongo or Ndongo people, two nations that found themselves invaded (some would say colonized) by Portugal in the 1500s.


** LAWMAKERS MUST FOCUS TO WHITTLE DOWN VARIED GUN CONTROL OPTIONS ([link removed])
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Daily Progress Editorial (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

The Virginia State Crime Commission certainly got an earful during its two days of hearings on possible gun reform. Whether that information will translate into action is an open question.


** TARIFFS, TRADE WARS THREATEN VIRGINIA ECONOMY ([link removed])
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News & Advance Editorial (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

Speaking Tuesday to the powerful money committees of the General Assembly — the Senate Finance Committee and the House of Delegates Appropriations Committee, Gov. Ralph Northam gave a lay of the land to legislators as work is set to begin soon on the state’s new, two-year budget.


** KENDI CONNECTS 1919 AND 2019 ([link removed])
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Roanoke Times Editorial (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

The odds seem good that most of you have never heard of Ibram X. Kendi. Today we set out to fix that. We know that some of you have heard of him. Back in March, not long after Gov. Ralph Northam’s blackface scandal broke, and not long after he pledged to read up on African American history as a form of penance, we published a reading list for the governor. Three of them, actually.


** WANTED: AN INTERNAL AUDITOR FOR SPOTSY ([link removed])
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Free Lance-Star Editorial (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

After hearing the shocking news that Spotsylvania County Public Schools unwittingly paid a still-unidentified person or persons $600,000 based on a phony invoice, county supervisors and taxpayers were left wondering how such a thing could happen.


** THE LAY OF THE LAND ([link removed])
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Richmond Times-Dispatch Editorial (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

Shortly before 9 a.m. on Friday, Fifth Street in downtown Richmond was noticeably quiet. Bellhops pushed a tourist’s belongings inside the Hilton Downtown Richmond. Across the street, two taxi cab drivers sat in front of the Richmond Marriott, one smoking a cigarette while the other scrolled through his cellphone, each earnestly waiting for their next fare.


** COLUMNISTS
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** SCHAPIRO: ON SPENDING, VA. POLITICIANS DUCK THE BAD NEWS ([link removed])
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By JEFF E. SCHAPIRO, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

The castor-oil approach to politics is a rarity in contemporary Virginia. In 2001, Democrat Mark Warner won for governor on a promise to repair the state’s battered finances. A slowing economy and a standoff among Republicans over expanding the car-tax rollback had led to a troubling first: That year, the legislature failed to act on the budget, leaving it to a peevish GOP governor, Jim Gilmore, to implement it unilaterally.


** OP-ED
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** HERNANDEZ: DIVERSITY HAS MADE VIRGINIA TECH BETTER ([link removed])
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By JENNIFER HERNANDEZ, Published in the Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

Recently, I read a letter from a concerned mother about her son attending what she called a “leftist propaganda” orientation at Virginia Tech (“Conservative activist rebukes Virginia Tech’s ‘leftist’ freshman orientation,” Aug. 16 news story). I am currently a rising senior at Virginia Tech, and I found this opinion to be false and misleading.


** SHERLOCK: COPN LAW ACTS AS AN IMPEDIMENT TO CARE ([link removed])
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By JAMES SHERLOCK, Published in the Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)

In the famous fable, “The Scorpion and the Frog,” the scorpion stings frog mid-stream and both die. On July 25, a meeting convened by Gov. Ralph Northam considered changes to Virginia’s Certificate of Public Need law.

James Sherlock is a retired naval officer living in Virginia Beach. He is writing a book about the business of health care in Virginia.


** NASH: CLIMATE CHANGE IS THE NEXT WORLD WAR. GIVE IT THE COVERAGE IT DESERVES. ([link removed])
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By STEPHEN NASH, Published in the Washington Post (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)

I’ve been looking at newspaper front pages from 75 years ago, and they make me wonder. On most of those days in 1944, about four out of five of the Page 1 headlines charted the progress of World War II, month in and month out. Our heads were full of news from strange places in middle Europe or the Pacific — Lwow, Saipan, St. Lo. Absolutely appropriate. What could have been more important for the world or Virginia? It was a common thing for families to mount world maps and use pushpins to mark the battle lines each day of the war.

Stephen Nash, a visiting senior research scholar at the University of Richmond, is the author of “Virginia Climate Fever: How Global Warming Will Transform Our Cities, Shorelines, and Forests.”


** WOLL: OFFSHORE WIND PROJECT SHOWS POWER, POTENTIAL ([link removed])
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By EILEEN WOLL, Published in the Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)

Next year, Virginia will make history with the first offshore wind turbines in federal waters anywhere in the United States. It has been a long, slow journey to bring us to the launch of this new industry, but we are now in a position to make this clean energy resource a significant part of our energy supply in the coming years.

Eileen Woll is offshore energy program director of the Sierra Club’s Virginia Chapter, based in Norfolk.


** RASOUL: CELEBRATE WOMEN’S EQUALITY DAY BY RATIFYING THE ERA ([link removed])
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By SAM RASOUL, Published in the Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

On August 26, we recognize Women’s Equality Day, celebrating the addition ninety-nine years ago of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution granting women the right to vote. This year we also should recognize that Virginia stands at a historic crossroads.

Rasoul represents most of Roanoke and part of Roanoke County in the House of Delegates. He is a Democrat.


** HOEFT: THROWING STONES ONLY BREAKS GLASS ([link removed])
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By J.R. HOEFT, Published in the Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

A recent column by Penny Nance of Concerned Women for America has received some attention for its criticism of Virginia Tech’s orientation. She attended this year with her son, an incoming cadet.

Hoeft, a retired Naval officer, has been writing about Virginia policy and politics for nearly two decades. He hosts a podcast “The J. R. Hoeft Show” at jrhoeft.com. He lives in Chesapeake.


** MORSE: DEMOCRATS PUSH FOR POWER MISSING A FAMILIAR INGREDIENT ([link removed])
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By GORDON C. MORSE, Published in the Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)

The fall state elections beckon and Virginia has become an object of national interest. So says The New York Times.

After writing editorials for The Daily Press and The Virginian-Pilot in the 1980s, Gordon C. Morse wrote speeches for Gov. Gerald L. Baliles,


** GORDON: RICHMOND IS RIPE FOR A COMPASSION MOVEMENT ([link removed])
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By REGGIE GORDON, Published in the Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

A couple of years ago, two Richmond women approached me when I was director of the Office of Community Wealth Building and stated that they were ready to volunteer their time and take bolder action to solve poverty.

Reggie Gordon is deputy chief administrative officer for Human Services for the city of Richmond and former director of the Office of Community Wealth Building.


** GIBSON: THE RIGHT TO A FREE PRESS SHOULD BELONG TO STUDENTS, TOO ([link removed])
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Published in the Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 10 articles a month)

One of the greatest freedoms that Americans enjoy was born in Virginia 243 years ago but still is not fully shared with the state’s high school and college students. Freedom of the press and free speech rights drafted in 1776 as part of the Virginia Declaration of Rights later were incorporated in the nation’s First Amendment to the Constitution

Gibson is communications director and senior researcher at the University of Virginia’s Cooper Center for Public Service.


** REIMER: VIRGINIA SHOULD BECOME A CRYPTOCURRENCY INCUBATOR ([link removed])
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By ERICH REIMER, Published in the Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

Virginia was recently ranked by CNBC as the top state for business in the nation in 2019, up from fifth place the year prior. CNBC cited the commonwealth’s highly educated and innovative workforce, its pro-business regulatory regime and strong current base of company infrastructure. Cryptocurrency was and is a large contributor to Virginia’s economic success.

Erich Reimer is the host of “Tech Investment Insights” at Seeking Alpha. He previously served as a Washington, D.C.-area government affairs lawyer.


** LEE-HEART: FOR COLORED GIRLS WHOSE HIGH TEST SCORES ARE NEVER ENOUGH ([link removed])
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By KIARA LEE-HEART, Published in the Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

An ambitious student takes the SAT without preparation and receives a low score. Her parents spend $2,000 on test preparation to help her increase her score. After test two, an authority cross-examines her, implying that she cheated on the exam, as her score substantially increased.

Kiara Lee-Heart teaches writing at Virginia Commonwealth University and is the founder of #SCHOOLGIRLHUSTLE, a T-shirt line and movement supporting girls and women in school.
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