A week after a majority of Portsmouth City Council members signaled support for hiring former councilman and mayoral candidate Danny Meeks as city manager, a group of business, civic and religious leaders gathered Thursday to call him woefully unqualified and push the council to hire a more experienced person. A crowd of about 100 people listened to the speakers in a vacant lot near City Hall, with half cheering and clapping in agreement and half waiting for the speaker to stop so they could break into chants supporting Meeks.
This legislative session, we are hopeful that the Virginia General Assembly is planning to consider a governor’s schools bill — as we feel it is an important step toward transforming gifted education into a system that works for all. We are two alumnae of the commonwealth’s top governor’s schools, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology (TJHSST) and Maggie L. Walker Governor’s School for Government and International Studies (MLWGS), and the 2019 National Teacher of the Year. ... we say the status quo is untenable.
Yolanda Ross was happy to receive a check she had long awaited from Virginia's Medicaid program as hazard pay for working as a home health worker during the COVID-19 pandemic. But Ross, who makes less than $10 an hour while caring for her disabled adult son in their home in Henrico County, had expected a check for $1,500. After taxes, she received $971 - a 35% bite.
Matthew Savage was able to testify to a House committee because his Fairfax County high school has a policy to excuse students for participating in a civic activity. Savage, the chairman of the Virginia Young Democrats Teen Caucus, was speaking in support of a bill to ensure more students in Virginia have that same ability. The bill from Del. Sam Rasoul, D-Roanoke, would require the Virginia Department of Education to establish guidelines so that middle and high school students who are absent from school to attend a civic or political event can receive an excused absence.
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jennifer Carroll Foy’s campaign said a firm it hired to raise money inappropriately used data from a Democratic National Committee donor list. Carroll Foy’s campaign manager said the campaign had let the vendor go before learning of the infraction, which Carroll Foy takes “extremely seriously.” Campaigns are not allowed to use another campaign’s donor list without buying it or getting permission.
One week after the Blue Ridge Health District said it would open up the COVID-19 vaccine to more people, officials are cautioning that vaccinating all those currently eligible will take months and require patience from the community. In a series of media briefings Friday, local and state public health officials sought to clear up confusion about the vaccination program thus far, outline plans moving forward and update the community about COVID case numbers.
A House panel on Friday endorsed removing from Capitol Square a statue of former Sen. Harry Byrd Sr., architect of Massive Resistance to school desegregation. The House Rules Committee voted 13-5 along party lines to back a bill to remove the statue of the Democrat who was governor from 1926-30 and a U.S. senator from 1933 to 1965. The panel also voted 16-0 to endorse a state panel’s recommendation to erect a Virginia statue of teenage civil rights pioneer Barbara Johns at the U.S. Capitol, replacing the recently removed statue of Robert E. Lee. Both measures advance to the full House.
Three weeks after surpassing 5,000 total COVID-19 deaths, Virginia has reached its next grim milestone: More than 6,000 people dead because of the virus. And as cases continue to surge across the state, health care providers are warning patients that supplies of the vaccine won’t be able to keep up with demand for months. Since Jan. 1, the state has reported 970 deaths but due to the certification process, this number lags behind by nearly a month, according to data from the Virginia Department of Health.
Doctors, state officials and advocates in Virginia, which was home to the capital of the Confederacy and the birthplace of slavery in the U.S., endorsed legislation Friday that would declare racism a public health crisis. A quick 13-5 vote along party lines in the House Rules Committee sent HJ537, proposed by Del. Lashrecse Aird, D-Petersburg, to the largely Democratic House floor.
Virginia is distributing its limited supply of COVID-19 vaccines across the commonwealth based on how many people live in a particular area. Dr. Danny Avula, who is leading Virginia’s vaccine efforts, said Friday in a media conference call that local health departments will know how many of the state's 105,000 doses they will get from week to week, but that their doses will need to be shared with hospitals, pharmacies and providers.