Judge Bob Downer knows something about what it’s like to appear before a judge as a defendant. He’s been there. And it’s a story he’s told in court. As a UVA graduate in 1970, Downer and some frat brothers, clearly under the influence of that era’s Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters, decided to swipe […]
Print is dead. Print is dying. Newspapers are “toast.” We’ve all heard some iteration of this, and it makes print journalists think about jumping ship. But as more media becomes concentrated online, and local and national newspaper prices soar to make up for a loss in advertising revenue, at least one media expert is encouraging […]
Primary day is June 11, and there’s more on the ballot than the 57th District race between Kathy Galvin and Sally Hudson. If you live in the city, the three people who win the Democratic nomination will likely be the ones to fill the three empty seats on City Council in November because of the […]
More than a year and a half after a freelance reporter requested the Virginia State Police and the Office of Public Safety turn over its Unite the Right public safety plans, a judge ruled today that it’s time for the state to cough them up—although with some confusion about redaction and release. Natalie Jacobsen worked […]
The reliably Democratic 57th District rarely makes for an exciting horse race. Once a delegate, always a delegate, as David Toscano and Mitch Van Yahres before him proved, each easily holding on to the seat representing Charlottesville and the Albemarle urban ring as long as he chose. Not this year. Newcomer Sally Hudson upended the […]
By Shrey Dua Just months out from the blackface scandal that rocked Virginia’s Democratic leadership and threatened Ralph Northam’s governorship, all of 10 people showed up May 15 to learn about UVA’s history of blackface. At a talk that was one of several held last week as part of the city’s Unity Days series on […]
When a church in the Belmont neighborhood proposed converting underused space into 15 apartments, with a third of them specifically for people with disabilities, some community members were quick to call it a development idea that they could finally get behind. Others? Eh, not so much. “Public feedback has not been supportive,” planning commissioner Lyle […]
By Carroll Trainum On Thursday, May 16, at least a hundred people stood in line at the demolition site of University Hall—the former hub of UVA basketball—to get a brick. They all had their own memories of U-Hall, known to some as “the house that Ralph built,” and they wanted a piece of history. I […]
By Ali Sullivan After four months of surveys, conversations, community gatherings and focus groups, the committee formed by University of Virginia President Jim Ryan to evaluate the relationship between the university and the surrounding community released its final report in February. UVA faculty members, a UVA law student, and Charlottesville community leaders comprised the 16-member […]
Tucked on the fourth floor of Newcomb Hall in back of UVA’s Academical Village are offices of the student-run committee that investigates, charges, and tries fellow students accused of lying, cheating, or stealing. Its bylaws require panels to hand down the same punishment for any single conviction: permanent expulsion from the university. That harsh mandate, […]
By Abby Clukey In all the debate over Confederate monuments in Charlottesville, one often-overlooked example has lasted since 1893, and it sits mostly unnoticed by one of the most populated places on UVA Grounds. “I tend to describe it as ‘hidden in plain sight,’” says history Professor Kirt von Daacke, of the looming statue in […]
Another Tar-jay? Local mogul Coran Capshaw’s Riverbend Development has plans for the former Kmart shopping center on Hydraulic, now known as Hillsdale Place. The company went before the Planning Commission May 14 for entrance corridor approval (after C-VILLE went to press). The plans keep the existing footprint of the center that’s been closed since 2017. […]
By Ben Hitchcock At 10:30pm on May 4, 1970, approximately 1,500 UVA students gathered on the Lawn to protest the murder of four student activists at Kent State University earlier that day. On April 28, 1983, a group of 100 students marched up to the office of Student Affairs Vice President Ernest Ern and presented […]
Two men convicted of malicious wounding for attacking DeAndre Harris in a downtown parking garage on August 12, 2017, are appealing their convictions, and the Virginia Attorney General’s office will now prosecute their cases. Jacob Goodwin and Alex Ramos were sentenced to eight and six years in prison, respectively, for their part in the brutal […]
Some issues don’t just go away if you ignore them. Aside from a brief appearance at the May 6 City Council meeting, the last time we heard from UVA alum Guy Lopez was 2002, when the university was considering whether to invest $4 million in the University of Arizona’s Mount Graham Observatory to build a […]
It’s National Bike Month, and Peter Krebs is fired up. Krebs, who’s the community outreach coordinator at the Piedmont Environmental Council, uses the word “exciting” more than any other when talking about the new bicycle and pedestrian plan he’s helped develop with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. The plan, which is being presented to […]
Charlottesville is a growing city. We’ve added 5,000 residents since 2010, with another 10,000 in the county. And by 2040, projections from the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service show an additional 6,000 people in Charlottesville and 33,500 in the county (roughly), bringing our total population to more than 196,000. Now imagine if all of […]
They appeared overnight the first Monday in December of 2018, long-necked robots on wheels, lurking in neat rows of three or four on street corners all over town. Within a few days, the motorized scooters, which don’t have designated docking stations, were everywhere, and wherever. Now, about five months in to the City of Charlottesville’s […]
More than 100 people representing a dozen organizations rallied and marched in support of residents of Belmont Apartments May 5, the same day tenants whose leases have expired were told to vacate their apartments at 1000 Monticello Rd. The Charlottesville Low-Income Housing Coalition gathered representatives from activist and faith groups to march from Belmont to […]
Judge Rick Moore got one big issue out of the way in the two-years-long lawsuit against the city and City Council for its 2017 vote to remove statues of Confederate generals: The monuments of generals Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson are indeed war memorials under state code, which prohibits their removal. In court May […]
Though the gifted education program in Charlottesville City Schools has recently come under fire for its racial disparities, such gaps have existed since the program was created in 1976, and may have even been part of its intention. At tonight’s School Board meeting, former Charlottesville High School teacher and Ph.D. student Margaret Thornton will present […]
Governor Ralph Northam approved the University of Virginia’s proposal to renovate Alderman Library on March 24, sending the $160 million project into development. The renovation, which has been planned since 2016, involves removing a significant percentage of the library’s books and turning its cramped 10-floor layout into a more spacious five floors to meet modern […]
To the list of racial disparities in Charlottesville and Albemarle County, we can add arrest rates: According to a new study, African Americans are booked at significantly higher rates than whites at the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail, and the greatest disproportionality occurs during felony arrests. This is a national problem—black adults are 5.9 times more likely […]