Monthly Archive for April, 2009

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Foxfield and Dogwood Parade Tomorrow

Foxfield and the Dogwood Parade are tomorrow. So don’t drive, y’know, anywhere. Alternately, head to town around 9:00 AM, find a spot downtown, and watch the parade. The weather should be perfect. But don’t go to Foxfield—spring is when we cede it to the students. Wait for the fall running.

Progress Alumna Wins a Pulitzer Prize

The St. Petersburg Times’ Lane DeGregory, who won a Pulitzer Prize for feature writing yesterday, is an alumna of the Daily Progress, Bob Gibson writes on Facebook. DeGregory won for “The Girl in the Window,” which the judges describe as a “moving, richly detailed story of a neglected little girl, found in a roach-infested room, unable to talk or feed herself, who was adopted by a new family committed to her nurturing.”

The paper won a second Pulitzer yesterday, for their popular Truth-O-Meter website, which evaluates the accuracy of claims made by political leaders. The nationally-respected paper has racked up eight Pulitzers since 1964, surely in part because they are owned and operated by a non-profit journalism school, The Poynter Institute. And though there’s no Pulitzer in it, I highly recommend wasting some time on their their Tampa Bay Mug Shots website. I like to use it to play a game I call “Guess the Crime,” based on the photos.

Sizable Illegal Dump Found in Batesville

A 3/4 acre illegal dump has been found on Henry Chiles’ land in Batesville, Brandon Shulleeta reports in today’s Daily Progress. The pile—eight feet tall in places—contains thousands of bags of trash, large appliances, batteries, and tires. The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality is investigating, and they suspect that there’s a severe amount of resulting pollution of the soil and water. Mr. Chiles—the owner of Crown Orchard, best known for its peaches—says that he doesn’t know anything about a dump. It’s not unusual for conveniently-located vacant land to end up as an illegal dump for third parties, though something of this scale would have to be unusual.

Lucia Phinney Running for BoS

Batesville Democrat Lucia Phinney is running for the Democratic nomination for the Samuel Miller District seat on the Board of Supervisors, Fania Gordon writes for Charlottesville Tomorrow. The architecture school lecturer and Batesville resident is running for Sally Thomas’ old seat “because she has a strong background in the issues facing the County.” Phinney will face off against Madison Cummings, the other Democrat in the race, for the nomination for their party. The winner of that will go on to run against Republican(-ish) John Lowry in the general election.

Second Body Found in Louisa Woman’s Yard

Remember the Louisa woman whose dead boyfriend was found stuffed in her well last month? Well, her second husband was just found in her backyard, too, the Progress reports. Ulisa Chavers has confessed to burying her 68-year-old husband in her backyard in 1994. As with her deceased boyfriend, Chavers provided different stories to different people about what had become of her husband. At this point there doesn’t seem to be any cause to suspect her of murder—it just looks like Social Security fraud, with Chavers continuing to collect checks from a federal agency that had no reason to believe that the men were dead.

There’s no word on what became of her first husband. Maybe somebody should check the front yard. 04/12 Update: Her first husband is (ostensibly) still alive. Given this woman’s history, somebody ought to check up on him, just in case.

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