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By DAVE RESS,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
Google plans a $1 billion investment in Northern Virginia data centers, and in welcoming the move, Gov. Glenn Youngkin said it underscores the need for his “all of the above” energy plan, citing a controversial proposal for a gas-fired power plant in Chesterfield County as an example. Google’s investment will include expanding its two Loudoun County data centers and building a third facility in Prince William County, said Ruth Porat, president and chief investment officer of Google and its parent firm Alphabet.
VaNews April 29, 2024
Virginian-Pilot
Editorial
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Gov. Glenn Youngkin and Democratic leaders in the General Assembly are finally talking to each other — instead of about each other — as they work to build a new state budget. That’s good news. While there is plenty of mistrust for the two sides to overcome given the months of partisan grandstanding which preceded it, a thaw in this frigid relationship bodes well for Virginia. It gives rise to optimism, however cautious, that they can deliver an agreement that serves the many needs of the commonwealth.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By JEFF E. SCHAPIRO,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
It’s no secret that Gov. Glenn Youngkin — a creature of the corpocracy who came to Richmond with nary a nanosecond in politics and government — has attempted to run Virginia as he did the publicly traded investment behemoth in which he spent nearly all of his private career, amassing a $400 million-plus fortune.
It’s no secret that top-down approach — to the annoyance of Democratic and Republicans legislators accustomed to collaboration — hasn’t always worked.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By BEN PETERS,
Inside NOVA
Google on Friday announced a $1 billion investment to expand its Virginia data centers, including two Loudoun County sites and a newly opened Prince William County campus.
Google President and CEO Ruth Porat was joined by Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin at the company’s Reston headquarters to announce the initiative, which brings Google’s total investment in the state to more than $4.2 billion.
The company also announced two new AI workforce development initiatives — a $75 million AI opportunity fund and a new Google AI essentials Coursera course — to help workers lean about the new technology.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By ALFRED ABUHAMAD,
published in
Virginian-Pilot
(Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
For the past 32 years, I have had the privilege of being associated with one of the finest medical and research institutions in the country. For 29 of those years, I have also been on the front lines, delivering babies and caring for mothers. Witnessing the repercussions of serious pregnancy complications on mothers and babies has been among the most challenging and emotionally wrenching aspects of my career, and I have dedicated my clinical and research practice at Eastern Virginia Medical School (EVMS) to finding a way to prevent these tragedies.
Abuhamad is president, provost and dean of the EVMS School of Medicine.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By MICHAEL MARTZ,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney may have spared Virginia Democrats a costly primary fight, but his quick exit from the governor's race raises the temperature in the escalating competition for the lieutenant governor's nomination next year. Stoney's departure clears the field for Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-7th, who had raised too much money and developed too high a political profile for the two-term mayor to overcome, even 14 months before a party primary that would have forced him to defeat the three-term congresswoman in a likely one-on-one matchup.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By STEVEN T. CORNELIUSSEN,
published in
Virginian-Pilot
(Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
Virginia is considering a great idea: restoring the original name of the place where the arc of the moral universe bent toward emancipation. In 1619 as “Point Comfort,” that historic landscape saw the dawn of British North America’s slavery. In 1861 as “Fort Monroe,” it saw the dawn of U.S. slavery’s demise. True, dropping the military name could offend people such as me — a former Navyman, son of a Navyman, married in Fort Monroe’s chapel to a soldier’s daughter. But way more importantly, that Chesapeake Bay landscape uniquely commemorates the struggles of the planet’s first nation to found itself on freedom.
Corneliussen of Poquoson publishes the free-subscription Substack newsletter The Self-Emancipator, named in the spirit of the antebellum abolitionist publication The Emancipator.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By BRAD KUTNER,
WVTF-FM
Virginia wasn’t an outlier in learning or teacher loss in the wake of the pandemic. But new teacher licensure programs, backed with state funds, are hoping to curb the shortage of educators parts of the Commonwealth are facing.
Turner Penton is a tech ed teacher at Tucker High School in Henrico County. In the past he was a prison guard, worked in retail but had his longest stint working in a daycare center. But now, helping kids get socially and mentally adjusted to the real world, he’s thrilled to be working in a space where he feels like he’s making real impacts.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By ROLYNN WILSON,
WRIC-TV
Virginia Senator Mark Warner is weighing in as students at Virginia Tech become the first at a major university in the Commonwealth to set up an encampment to protest Israel’s military action in Gaza.
According to Virginia Tech, a group of pro-Palestinian protestors from the university community gathered on campus and placed tents on the lawn at the Graduate Life Center. School officials say the small gathering was not affiliated with the university or a registered university event.
VaNews April 29, 2024
By VYSHNAVI TATTA,
Cavalier Daily
Politician and Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares spoke at an event titled “An Afternoon with Attorney General Jason Miyares” hosted by the Blue Ridge Center, an organization devoted to promoting free speech and debate on Grounds, and the Jefferson Council — a conservative alumni group dedicated to preserving the legacy of Thomas Jefferson — in collaboration with the Center for Politics on Grounds Wednesday.
VaNews April 29, 2024
