News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Fittingly, the Chinese mystery snail took its time getting to Virginia. In the late 19th century, food markets in San Francisco imported the creatures; within 20 years, perhaps due to merchants breeding them in area waters, they’d reached the San Francisco Bay

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Four months before Democrat Cynthia Neff launched her official bid to unseat Republican Supervisor Ken Boyd, the two squared off at Hollymead Elementary School over expanding the Albemarle County growth area. The room was filled with residents of Forest Lakes—the 1,400-unit development that houses roughly 5,000 people, many of them voters in the Hollymead precinct

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Thomas Jefferson’s Great Clock is, perhaps, not a good clock. The timepiece, which hangs in the Monticello entrance hall, has kept steady time, with some exceptions, since 1805. 

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Since the 2009 election that replaced Democrats David Slutzky and four-term supe Sally Thomas with Republicans Rodney Thomas and Duane Snow, the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors (BOS) has learned a thing or two about 4-2 votes.  Cynthia Neff, the Democratic challenger for Boyd’s Rivanna seat, says a different Board of Supervisors would have held more discus-sions [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

On Saturday, August 27, as Hurricane Irene began to lick the Virginia coast, the employees of Showmasters, Inc., were setting up 470 tables at the Richmond International Raceway. In fact, Showmasters—“the largest continuous running gun show in the state of Virginia,” according to its website—cancelled a show in Fishersville scheduled for the same weekend, so as not to conflict with its Richmond event. Rather than drive further inland toward Staunton, any Charlottesville resident bent on a gun show had to head towards the storm.

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Do students that meet federal poverty guidelines have less access to advanced studies? The nonprofit news website ProPublica recently released what it calls the “Civil Rights Data Set,” gathered from 2009-2010 school year reports. The data includes numbers on gifted enrollment, free and reduced lunches, and race for every school district with more than 3,000 [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

 Daniel Willingham thinks of his education as typical. His family moved, so Willingham spent time in different school districts. He went to primary school in New York, and completed junior high and high schools in New Jersey. Ironically, Willingham—now a cognitive scientist in UVA’s Department of Psychology—didn’t love the classroom. Daniel Willingham, a cognitive psychologist [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

When I entered elementary school in Tampa, Florida, I flunked my first gifted enrollment test, and had to take it again. Nerves? Socioeconomic status? It wasn’t the most embarrassing moment of my scholastic career; that was likely the day I fell down a hill during cross country practice. But I was invested in my education [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Days before Ramadan, Islam’s month-long holy fast, the ACLU of Virginia sent letters to sheriffs and jail superintendents throughout the state to reiterate the religious rights of Muslim inmates. Each year, writes ACLU fellow Thomas Fitzpatrick, Muslim inmates complain about meals served during the hours when they are required to fast. The letters remind superintendents that the Department of Corrections provides meals before sunrise and after sunset, as well as a third meal for the late night hours.

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Crimes that involve dogs aren’t treated too differently from those that involve humans. When Blackberry, a 9-year-old Labrador, attacked a neighbor dog, police collected details from witnesses and medical experts. A court date was arranged for August 16. And the defendant, Crozet resident Rich Olin, began thinking about his defense. “The vet said that Blackberry [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Before a botched January 22 robbery at Mountain View Mobile Home Park, Antonio Grooms told his cousin that he needed money.

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

“O.K., I have had enough. What else can you show me?” —Bob Dylan, “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleedin’)”   One night in 1973, Russ Warren went to his Houston home, pulled a large sheet of paper from a stack, and composed a grid—dozens and dozens of 1.5" squares. He sharpened one pencil, another, another. [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Don’t expect a hotel overhaul at the former Kluge Estate Winery & Vineyard, which will reopen in September as Trump Vineyard Estates—the family’s first winery, run by the youngest of Donald and Ivana’s three children, Eric Trump. Winery employees Tim Rausse and Gregory Brun, former director of winery and vineyard operations at Kluge Estate, were [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

When the Commonwealth Transportation Board (CTB) voted to earmark $230 million for a 6.2-mile Western Bypass in Albemarle County and Charlottesville that’s been stuck in the planning queue for decades, the obvious question was: Why now?

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

If majority rules, then which majority will decide the fate of the Western Bypass? The $200 million-plus roadway was conceived decades ago and shelved in 2002, but was recently revived by Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) officials and four Albemarle County supervisors, and awaits a vote from the Charlottesville-Albemarle Metropolitan Planning Organization (CAMPO) that will [...]

News | Brendan Fitzgerald

Three months after the bulk of the Kluge Estate Winery & Vineyard sold at auction for $6.2 million, Donald Trump has his name attached to a part of Albemarle County. His son, Eric, has a wine business to call his own, and has begun to spruce up the new Trump Vineyard Estates, slated to open [...]