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UVa president: ’Necessary to rely on assistance from the Virginia State Police’ to clear encampment
The organizers of an encampment in support of Palestine at the University of Virginia knew that pitching tents could trigger action against their protest. University officials made that clear when they first gathered Tuesday afternoon. What they and the faculty members who were helping them communicate with police and administrators did not anticipate was the force with which that action would come. Instead of citations and facilities management taking down the tents, they were met with a multi-agency, coordinated police action with officers wearing riot gear and military-grade equipment.
As new Roanoke recovery house opens, advocates say many more are needed
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that has flooded the United States and driven a surge in deadly drug overdoses. It’s also ballooned the demand for treatment and recovery services. Roanoke marked National Fentanyl Awareness Day Tuesday by dedicating a new recovery house. Before organizers and First Lady Suzanne Youngkin cut the ribbon on the Four Truths Recovery house on Staunton Avenue they laid out the troubling facts—Roanoke has one of the highest fatal overdose rates in the state, according to the Virginia Department of Health. And a recent study found the region needs more than 900 recovery program beds.
Loudoun Schools to Launch New Pathways Lab with George Mason, NOVA
George Mason University is partnering with Loudoun County Public Schools and the Northern Virginia Community College to launch a lab school to increase help for at-risk students as they transition from high school to college and on to high-demand careers. The Accelerated College and Employability Skills Academy, to be known as ACCESS, will be inside some Loudoun high schools with funding provided by the Virginia Board of Education. Chief Academic Officer Ashely Ellis said the partnership happened quickly, with GMU reaching out to the division about partnering with them.
Pro-Palestine protesters march to Kaine’s office, block Richmond intersection
Dozens of pro-Palestine protesters on Monday afternoon marched from Monroe Park to the intersection of Main and Ninth streets, where they blocked the road and read an open letter to Sen. Tim Kaine, calling on him to condemn the police response to the April 29 protest at Virginia Commonwealth University. Before the group departed the park, a medic led a training on how to respond to pepper spray and tear gas. At one point, a person hurled multiple eggs into the crowd from a second-story window.
Chesapeake Bay watershed not likely to meet some pollution reduction goals by 2025
Virginia did not reach its 2023 pollution reduction targets for nitrogen and phosphorus, according to modeling tools from the Chesapeake Bay Program, but the state is on track for reducing sediment in the bay. Too much nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment in the Chesapeake Bay contribute to poor quality of the water. Nitrogen and phosphorus fuel the growth of algae blooms, and sediment can block sunlight from reaching underwater grasses, suffocating shellfish. Between 2022 and 2023, pollution loads for nitrogen fell 3.3%, phosphorus fell 4.5% and overall sediment levels decreased by 1% across six states and DC. Those seven entities are part of the Chesapeake Clean Water Blueprint.
U.S. company fined $650,000 for illegally hiring children to clean meat processing plants
A Tennessee-based sanitation company has agreed to pay more than half a million dollars after a federal investigation found it illegally hired at least two dozen children to clean dangerous meat processing facilities in Iowa and Virginia. The U.S. Department of Labor announced Monday that Fayette Janitorial Service LLC entered into a consent judgment, in which the company agrees to nearly $650,000 in civil penalties and the court-ordered mandate that it no longer employs minors. The February filing indicated federal investigators believed at least four children had still been working at one Iowa slaughterhouse as of Dec. 12.
Youngkin and Vance: Fentanyl is a community threat. It’s time for the community to respond
Fentanyl has played a role in more than 75% of all drug overdose deaths in Virginia. In the last three years alone, some 6,000 people in our commonwealth have been killed by fentanyl. More than 300 of them lived in the Roanoke area. An estimated five Virginians will die from a fentanyl overdose every day this year: mothers, fathers, children, friends and coworkers. Each and every one of these losses is a tragedy. There’s no such thing as “not our problem” with fentanyl. It’s a Roanoke problem, a Virginia problem — an everyone problem.
VPAP Visual 2024 Top Legislator Stock Holdings
Virginia legislators are required to file conflict of interest forms each year disclosing their ownership of securities, including stock in publicly traded companies. See the companies that were reported in the stock portfolios of at least five members of the 2024 General Assembly.
Where is Jim Ryan?
University of Virginia President Jim Ryan would like you to know that he found the entire episode on Grounds this past Saturday “upsetting, frightening, and sad.” Only imagine how he might have felt if he had been there. But no one saw hide nor hair of Mr. Ryan Saturday, even though his official residence at Carr’s Hill is steps away from the epicenter of the violence that unfolded as state police encircled and then raided a quiet and, frankly, meager attempt at a protest on a soggy patch of grass by the University Chapel.
Interior Department defends Va. offshore wind farm in court
The Biden administration and the developer of a $9.8 billion wind farm off of Virginia Beach, Virginia, assured a federal court Friday that the project has all necessary approvals, amid claims that construction would harm the endangered North Atlantic right whale. The joint court filing from the Interior Department and Dominion Energy comes in response to a request to halt work on the massive Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project, which is slated to include 176 turbines and is the largest project of its kind currently under development in the United States.