The parent company of The Colonnades is facing bankruptcy, Reuters reports. Sunrise Senior Living is looking to reorganize, not go out of business, though they’re going to need some real accommodation from their creditors, since they’ve only got enough money to make it through the end of the month. They’ve got something like half a billion dollars in debt coming due in the next couple of years. The Colonnades is on Barracks Road, on the northern edge of town. I was visiting somebody there a few weeks ago, and it certainly seemed like one of the nicer senior living facilities in the area. Though it’s not clear how they’ll be affected at this point, this isn’t likely to be good for the place. Thanks to FM for the tip.
Archive for March, 2009
Mayor Dave Norris is running for reelection to City Council, he announced in an e-mail this evening. His first term expires at the end of this year. He’s seeking renomination as a Democrat, and then the general election will be held in November. Vice Mayor Julian Taliaferro has not yet said whether he intends to seek a second term. His e-mail announcement follows.
Child molester Jonathan Spivey is due to be released from the Buckingham Correctional Center on Tuesday, I see on the Virginia Department of Corrections’ site. The 49-year-old Charlottesville High School choral director and Mount Zion Baptist Church minister of music pleaded guilty to taking indecent sexual liberties with a minor, in his own office at CHS, and was sentenced to twenty years in prison in 2007. All but 21 months was suspended; perhaps the 4.5 month shortfall is from time served prior to sentencing. He was sentenced to five years probation after his release, and he’ll have to register as a sex offender.
Charlottesville police sergeant Phillip Brown intends to run for Charlottesville sheriff, Scott Shenk reported in the Daily Progress on Friday. Not to be confused with James E. Brown, also a candidate, Phillip Brown has been with the Charlottesville PD since 1992. Brown is the third candidate to announce in the month and a half since Democratic incumbent Cornelia Johnson announced that she won’t seek a third term. All are seeking the Democratic nomination.
In Sunday’s Washington Post, Gene Weingarten has a long, detailed, nuanced look at how 15-20 young children die each year after being left in a car accidentally. The main subject of the article is Lyn Balfour, the JAG school employee who accidentally left her nine-month old in the car two years ago. She was found not guilty of involuntary manslaughter by a Charlottesville jury last year, after just ninety minutes of deliberation (including a lunch break). Weingarten explains the perfect storm of circumstances that made her forget, including emergency babysitting duty for a friend, staying up with her sick baby, the baby being in a different car seat than usual (and not visible in the mirror), driving her husband to work that day (unusually), dealing with two small crises via mobile phone on the way to work that morning, and her babysitter having a new phone. Balfour simply believed that she had dropped off her son at the babysitter’s, as she did every morning.
I’m ashamed and upset to have discovered that the author even quotes the single worst comment ever posted to cvillenews.com, one that I’d managed to forget, and now hope that I can forget again:
If she had too many things on her mind then she should have kept her legs closed and not had any kids. they should lock her in a car during a hot day and see what happens.
stupid people need to no longer exist when they do stupid things like this. she killed her kid, she should be punished and put away.
This article is awfully hard to read; consider yourself warned.
Federal agents raided the Water Street offices of John M. Donnelly today, Lindsay Barnes writes in The Hook, seeking evidence to support the indictment brought against him for stealing $11M from 31 investors in a Ponzi scheme. Tower Analysis Inc., located in the old train station next to the amphitheater, had agents descend on it and haul off evidence this morning. Donnelly approached some friends a decade ago, had them make small investments, and then used that money to raise more money. Each round brought more money, which he used to pay faux investment income to lower-level investors. (And if you can figure out how that practice can possibly end in anything other than ruin, you might have a future in running financial scams.) Along the way he made a million bucks in the past three years, claiming, awesomely that “using his background in astrophysics, Donnelly developed a proprietary model of financial markets using algorithms derived from the quantification of a fractal wave frequency model which he named Blue Logic.” See the SEC complaint for the nitty-gritty.
Incidentally, Donnelly’s wife is Deborah Donnelly, the fundraiser for UVa’s Curry School of Education. She’s not been accused of any wrongdoing, but given the nature of her job, that’s got to be awkward.
Albemarle County is considering a significant increase on the cost of development, Brian McNeill wrote in the Progress yesterday. For example, right now they charge $720 to review a preliminary plat submitted by a developer. But a study of their own staff time has found that the real cost of that time is much higher, and so now they intend to charge $4,100 for the same procedure. The county went to the Planning Commission to get approval to raise those rates, hoping to cover 50% the costs incurred by developers, but the Planning Commission ended up approving covering 75% of those costs via fees, with the rest being made up by you and me in the form of taxes. Jay Willer, of the Blue Ridge Home Builders, complains to the Progress that developers shouldn’t have to pay for those costs, but that the rest of us should bear that cost on their behalf, which is rather the opposite of the libertarian stance generally taken by developers.
The Planning Commission only approved these increases by a one-vote margin. Now the matter goes before the Board of Supervisors.
The whole of the Board of Supervisors has come together to support a 74.2¢ real estate tax rate, Brandon Shulleeta writes in the Daily Progress today. The original debate was between starting with a 74.5¢ rate or a 90¢ rate, and whittling down from there, with Ken Boyd wanting the former and David Slutzky wanting the latter. (The existing rate is 71¢ per $100 of assessed value.) Slutzky had wanted at least 80¢ in the final rate, but told reporters after last night’s meeting that his constituents had told him, overwhelmingly, that taxes shouldn’t be raised now. Setting the rate at 74.2¢ keeps the dollar value of county revenues the same, as well as the dollar cost of taxes to property owners. Note that this wasn’t a vote to set the rate, just to determine the rate that they’ll advertise for a public hearing, after which they’ll set the rate.
A local Democrat intends to challenge Del. Rob Bell in this fall’s election, Brian McNeill writes for the Progress. Cynthia Neff retired to Charlottesville from IBM a few years ago, and says that she’s running against the Republican incumbent because she’s frustrated with his attention to brochure bills while ignoring weightier matters. Bell has almost half a million dollars in his campaign coffers, far and away the largest war chest of any member of the Virginia legislature. Neff serves on the board of the Albemarle County Democratic Committee, and managed Marcia Joseph’s challenge to BoS member Ken Boyd a couple of years ago.
A public service announcement: Whisper Ridge, née Brown Schools, née Millmont Center, has changed their name again, presumably to escape their reputation, which is why they’ve done it every time before. They’re now The Jefferson Trail Treatment Center for Children. Every couple of years they’re caught for some sort of reprehensible abuse of the children in their care. (For examples, see any of these: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.) For the record, I called this 21 months ago.
And as long as I’m reminding people about disreputable companies with new names, remember that Lethal Wrecker is now Cavalier Towing, a name that I only now realize is as intentionally ironic as their old name.
An independent candidate is joining the race for City Council, Rachana Dixit writes in today’s Daily Progress. Andrew Williams, 22-year-old State Farm employee and part-time PVCC student, is interested in government efficiency, affordable housing, and the water supply plan. As an independent, he’s got to get 125 signatures from C’ville voters to get on the ballot for the November election. There are three Democrats vying for their party’s nomination: incumbents Dave Norris and Julian Taliaferro, plus challenger Kristen Szakos. Charlottesville Democratic Party chair Jennifer McKeever says that she expects more independents to step up to the plate.
The Albemarle School Board has signed off on some changes in the central office that were requested by school superintendent Pam Moran, Scott Schenk writes in the Daily Progress today. They’re creating a new position—assistant superintendent for planning and operations—and cutting 15.3 full-time positions’ worth of jobs, saving $875k annually. The changes are said to be similar to those taking place in schools nationwide.
For C-Ville Weekly, Erika Howsare calls out a new housing development for generally sucking, something that ought to be done more often. Brookwood, off Fifth Street Extended, is being built by Southern Development, and appears to be particularly badly sited. Built on the side of a steep hill, they caused some significant erosion that left Rivanna Trail joggers having to wade through muck. Howsare writes that “the site has to be literally hacked out of a cliffside, which is then shored up with massive ugly retaining walls, which in turn face directly into people’s tiny bedroom windows.” Infill development is a good and necessary thing, but there are some places where it just doesn’t make sense to build. (Via Lonnie Murray)
Charlottesville and Albemarle have, at long last, been included in Google’s Street View photography within their maps. The county coverage isn’t exactly exhaustive, but just about every street in the city has been photographed. I figure their truck came through sometime late last summer, based on the cues that I can pick up within the photos. I’ve already found my car parked in front of my office, though the graveled mountain pass that I live on didn’t make the cut. Collectively, the area’s businesses are going to lose a lot of work hours tomorrow as people scope out the town through the eyes of Google. Thanks to Kyle C. for the news.
North Garden Democrat Madison Cummings intends to run for the Samuel Miller seat on the Board of Supervisors, Brian Wheeler reports for Charlottesville Tomorrow. That’s the seat currently held by independent Sally Thomas, who hasn’t yet said whether or not she intends to run for reelection. Lisa Provence talked to Thomas for The Hook, and Thomas reiterated that she isn’t going to say a thing until after the budget is finalized on April 8. It seems unlikely that Cummings would run against Thomas, so either this means that he’s got some inside knowledge that she won’t be running for reelection, or he’d drop out if she decided to run after all. Wheeler asked the retired pharmacist that most important of questions for a candidate—why he’s running—and Cummings responded:
I love Albemarle. I think it is a great place. We have a lot of great things going on and I don’t want to see us go backwards. Education and social service issues are very important to me, but so are public safety matters. I want to see us keep making progress and going forward
You’ll recall that Republican John Lowry is already in the race, though he’s not said if he’ll be affiliated with a party. Thomas told The Hook that “there are at least three Democrats” considering running for her seat, and that a Republican may be thinking about running, too. This may prove to be a very lively race.
The city is having second thoughts about shutting down the McIntire Park wading pool, Rachana Dixit writes in today’s Daily Progress, in response to citizen complaints. It’s all because of the The Virginia Graeme Baker Pool and Spa Safety Act, a 2007 bill that actually failed in congress, but passed when lumped into a comprehensive energy bill. The new law requires “anti-entrapment drain covers” in pools and spas, addressing the approximately one death annually from children who get hung up in the drains. Pools around the country are hustling to upgrade their drains to be compliant, since the law went into effect in December. The city figured it’d cost $15,000-$20,000 to make the upgrades. In addition, the ancient pool has a serious leak (the 67,000 gallon pool had 275,000 gallons put into it last year), and it’s going to be awfully close to the planned bypass/McIntire interchange.
Mayor Dave Norris wants to reconsider the whole thing, though, and is putting it up for discussion and a vote at an upcoming City Council meeting. Hawes Spencer, of The Hook, was apparently dubious of the cost of the drain upgrade, and did a little shopping around—he found that the hardware should cost closer to $2,000. That still leaves the questions of the proximity to the interchange and the leak, which is presumably what Council will be sorting out at their next meeting.
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