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Before picking Cordish casino, Petersburg letter said city preferred Bally’s

By GRAHAM MOOMAW, Virginia Mercury

A week before the Petersburg City Council voted unanimously to pick Cordish Companies to potentially build a casino, City Manager John Altman Jr. signed a letter saying the city council intended to pick a competing company, according to a copy of the document obtained by The Virginia Mercury. The April 17 letter of intent addressed to Bally’s, a national casino company that was one of five finalists for the Petersburg project, said the pending deal would still depend on outside factors. However, the letter clearly indicated Bally’s was the city’s initial choice … The city claims the letter was signed under duress as the General Assembly pressured local officials to pick a certain casino company or risk losing the project entirely.

VaNews April 26, 2024

Portsmouth submitting jail relocation plans to state with aim to move in by January

By NATALIE ANDERSON, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)

City leaders are submitting plans to the state to acquire the Hampton Roads Regional Jail for use as the new Portsmouth city jail and aim to make the transition no later than the start of 2025. The Hampton Roads Regional Jail Authority, which comprises city managers and other representatives from the five participating jurisdictions, voted unanimously last week to allow Portsmouth to purchase the facility. The move means the facility could serve as Portsmouth’s new city jail, allowing the city to convert the current aging waterfront jail facility into a tax-generating property — a goal the city has been working toward for years. It could also provide a safe place to accommodate juvenile detention services.

VaNews April 26, 2024

Yancey: Roanoke named ‘welcoming city’ for immigrants, 100 years after U.S. tried to shut the doors to many

By DWAYNE YANCEY, Cardinal News

Roanoke, a seven-time winner of the All-America City designation, recently won another title. The Star City was named a “Certified Welcoming” city by Welcoming America, a nonprofit dedicated to welcoming immigrants. Roanoke is the first locality in Virginia to earn this distinction and one of just 24 across the country. It’s also the fifth smallest community on that list, which is otherwise dominated by major metros. Given the tenor of the national conversation about immigration, you would not expect to find a small city on the edge of Appalachia to be an officially “welcoming” city for immigrants, yet there Roanoke is. This is just one of many data points about Roanoke that show how it’s different.

VaNews April 26, 2024

In Norfolk, Broken Neighborhoods And Broken Trust

By ELIZABETH MCGOWAN, Virginia Center for Investigative Journalism

The red brick apartment building Zenobia Wilson called home for a dozen years was a ringside seat to a noisy, polluting, 14-lane jumble of Interstate-264 overpasses, cloverleaf interchanges and ramps whizzing around the majority-Black St. Paul’s neighborhood. But when the mother of three moved out of Tidewater Gardens in August 2022, it wasn’t by choice. Norfolk was advancing another long-simmering initiative to “deconcentrate poverty,” christened the St. Paul’s Transformation Project. Its initial $400 million phase called for demolishing all 618 units of the deteriorating, barracks style public housing. Everybody had to relocate.

VaNews April 26, 2024

States, Including Virginia, Take On China in the Name of National Security

By JAMES T. AREDDY, Wall Street Journal (Subscription Required)

States have a new adversary: China. From Florida to Indiana and Montana, an expanding array of local proposals, bills, laws and regulations aim to block Chinese individuals and companies from acquiring land, winning contracts, working on research, setting up factories and otherwise participating in the U.S. economy. State officials, overriding traditional local interests such as drawing investment and creating jobs, say they are acting where Congress hasn’t to address grassroots American distrust of the Chinese Communist Party. … “There is a real responsibility on behalf of governors and state legislatures to look out for the safety and protection of our citizens,” said Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin ...

VaNews April 26, 2024

Loudoun County Public Schools officials criticize new state-mandated training

By EVAN GOODENOW, Loudoun Times (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

Training mandated by the Virginia Literacy Act, passed by the General Assembly in 2022, will keep Loudoun County Public Schools teachers busy over the next year. Jeff Rounsley, the LCPS director of teaching and learning, outlined the professional development requirements from the Virginia Department of Education to the School Board at its April 23 meeting. … For reading specialists for kindergarten through third grade, that means 27 to 54 hours of new training, Rounsley said. All elementary school teachers and all middle school English teachers must complete 18 to 27 hours. And other middle school teachers will be required to have nine to 18 hours of training in math, science and social studies.

VaNews April 26, 2024

Patel: I voted for Youngkin. Now he has turned his back on my business.

By DHARMENDRA PATEL, published in Roanoke Times (Metered Paywall - 5 articles a month)

As one of the leaders of the Asian American Business Owners Association (AABOA), I know firsthand how skill games have not only benefited Virginia small businesses but also helped them survive the onslaught of COVID, skyrocketing inflation, and higher-than-expected wages. AABOA represents more than 300 convenience stores, gas stations, and restaurants in Southwest Virginia. The survival of many of our locations depended on supplemental income from skill games before they were abruptly banned in October.

Patel lives in Salem.

VaNews April 26, 2024

Madison County School Board approves changing ‘winter break’ to ‘Christmas break’

By GRACIE HART BROOKS, Madison Eagle

Despite numerous resident objections, the Madison County School Board has approved changing “winter break” to “Christmas break” in the 2024-25 school calendar. In March, Madison County resident Mike Sharman made a comment suggesting the change of “winter break” to “Christmas break.” The board then suggested making that change in the 2024-25 draft school calendar. “Christmas is a cultural thing in our community,” board member Christopher Wingate said. “I support the idea.”

VaNews April 26, 2024

Rozell: For Democrats, ‘saving democracy’ is no silver bullet

By MARK J. ROZELL, published in Richmond Times-Dispatch (Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)

A drumbeat among many Democrats is to galvanize persuadable voters in a righteous movement to “save democracy” from a Republican Party now wholly ruled by former president Donald Trump. It’s an appeal to the founding tenet of our nation and one that has resonance for many voters, especially in light of the violent assault by Trump supporters on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Rozell is the dean of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University where he holds the Ruth D. and John T. Hazel Chair in Public Policy.

VaNews April 26, 2024

Zaccardelli: Troops-to-Teachers would address educator shortage

By ALEXANDER ZACCARDELLI, published in Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)

Virginia is facing a worsening teacher shortage. However, the focus on pure numbers has directed attention away from another problem: a shortage of diverse teachers. Troops-to-Teachers (TTT), a program that helps veterans obtain teaching licenses, offers solutions to both crises, bringing demographic and life experience diversity into our classrooms.

Zaccardelli is an elementary education undergraduate at William & Mary and an ALL-IN tutor at J. Blaine Blayton Elementary in Williamsburg.

VaNews April 26, 2024