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Hampton Roads jobless claims up this year, but economists say region faring better than Northern Virginia
Hampton Roads’ economic reliance on the military has been seen as a crutch by business and community leaders hoping to diversify its economy and compete with thriving metro areas such as Richmond and Raleigh, North Carolina. But that same pillar of the economy is also a major reason why federal workforce cuts by President Donald Trump’s administration haven’t sent local unemployment claims soaring, an Old Dominion University economist said Friday.
Amherst Job Corps students, staff scramble to find new homes, jobs after closure
After a nearly 50-year stint in Amherst County, the Old Dominion Job Corps in Monroe is wrapping up operations and more than 100 employees are looking for new jobs — an abrupt measure that caught many in the Lynchburg region by surprise. Layoffs from the U.S. Department of Labor’s decision to close the center on Father Judge Road, one of 99 contractor-run Job Corps centers across the country, will affect 130-plus staff, according to Virginia Works, a Virginia Workforce Development and Advancement equal opportunity employer/program.
Amazon Web Services proposes 1,370-acre Louisa data campus
Amazon Web Services is planning a substantial data center campus inside of Louisa County’s Technology Overlay District. The campus would be spread across 1,370 acres and feature up to 7.2 million square feet of data center space and seven electrical substations. Plans submitted to the county show four total buildings to house data center equipment. They are assembled on a site adjacent to the county’s Northeast Creek Reservoir.
Yorktown Naval Weapons Station, Dominion exploring energy projects, including nuclear reactor
Leadership of Naval Weapons Station Yorktown and Dominion Energy signed an agreement to work together to build energy resiliency at the station. Potential projects at the weapons station could include solar farms, turbine energy or a small modular nuclear reactor. Cpt. Dan Patrick said it has been a goal to have more sustainable power sources for the station. Over the next decade, power demand in Virginia will increase, so having a diverse source of power is necessary for the station to continue providing weapons support to other military installations across the East Coast, he said.
With DEI under attack, here’s how Virginia’s diverse slate of candidates talk about identity
It’s the most diverse Republican ticket in Virginia history. In her bid for the commonwealth’s top seat, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears could become the country’s first Black woman governor. John Reid, as the nominee for lieutenant governor, is the first openly gay person on the state’s ticket. And Jason Miyares, running for a second term as attorney general, was the first Hispanic man elected to statewide office in 2021. But while Earle-Sears and Reid have spoken openly about their identities, they, alongside the Republican party, have distanced themselves from diversity efforts more broadly.
Group attacks Stoney for taking money from donors who give to other Democrats
The Working Families Party is criticizing Democratic lieutenant governor candidate Levar Stoney for the donations he has received for his campaign with a digital ad. However, donors that WFP cited in its criticism of Stoney also give substantial amounts to a long list of Democrats. “These donors have funded Republicans who advance Trump’s agenda, like Gov. Glenn Youngkin and Attorney General Jason Miyares, and even a Republican candidate for the same position,” WFP said in a news release.
Republicans worry DOGE cuts will sink them in Virginia governor’s race
Republicans are increasingly worried that budget cuts by Elon Musk's DOGE could cost them dearly in November's vote for Virginia governor — an early electoral test of President Trump's policies. Virginia has one of the highest percentages of federal employees in the country — more than 5% of the state's workforce by some estimates — and Republicans' internal polls are starting to show the damage from tens of thousands of federal layoffs. The University of Virginia's Weldon Cooper Center has projected that 32,000 jobs could be lost in the state this year, many of them federal positions.
Spanberger announces plan to reduce housing costs in Va.
Democratic nominee for governor Abigail Spanberger announced a plan on Friday to lower housing costs in Virginia by eliminating arduous regulatory requirements that drive up production costs and incentivizing new housing construction for first-time homeowners and middle-class families. Spanberger announced her plan at Parkside Townes, a housing development under construction in eastern Henrico County that uses a land trust model to lower costs by separating ownership of the home from the land beneath it.
Earle-Sears pushes to end car tax, and so does Spanberger
Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears is trying to ride a familiar Republican campaign slogan to victory in the governor’s race: no car tax. Nearly 30 years after former Attorney General Jim Gilmore, a Republican, used the slogan to reach the Executive Mansion, Earle-Sears resurrected it in a brief speech to cheering volunteers before a campaign training session in Fairfax County on Tuesday. ... Spanberger, who stepped down from Congress after three terms to run for governor, said through a campaign spokesman on Thursday that she, too, would like to get rid of the car tax by finding a bipartisan way to get it done.
A Virginia Democrat hunts for votes in rural pockets where MAGA has strengthened its grip
Democratic politics in rural Virginia are not of a bygone era, according to Abigail Spanberger. The former congressional representative, now the Democratic nominee in the race to be Virginia’s next governor, posts videos online of herself sitting in a car on an interstate highway that goes up and down the Appalachian Mountains. She has toured a small, family-owned oyster shucking and packaging operation along a quiet boat haven on the northern neck of Virginia. And last month, the nominee held a news conference at a small pharmacy in an agrarian hamlet outside of Richmond.