A small grocery store is coming to downtown, Tracy Clemons reports for NBC-29, the unfortunately-named Market Street Market. In the old Unlimited Vitality space (“more cheese for your money” / “if you love me, don’t feed me junk food”), it’s being started by a father-and-son pair who are shooting to open their doors in early September. They name local meat and produce as two of the types of food they’ll be stocking. It’s not a particularly large space, but Unlimited Vitality always managed to stuff a lot in there, so presumably these folks can do likewise.
News and meta-news about Charlottesville, VA, since 2001.
Monthly Archive for July, 2009
Page 2 of 3
The Army Corps of Engineers has refused to issue a permit for one of the segments of the Meadowcreek Parkway, NBC-29 reports, saying that they’re not about to allow the construction of a road to nowhere. Officially, the Meadowcreek Parkway is three projects—a road in Albemarle, a road in Charlottesville, and an interchange at 250. Critics charge that local officials are only taking that approach to skirt state and federal rules, and there is good reason to think that the road would be infeasible to construct if treated as a single entity. The Army Corps of Engineers is looking at the proposal for the Charlottesville portion of the road and balking at a road that simply stops in the middle of a park. This leaves the city and the county between a rock and hard place—they can’t build it as one road, and they also can’t build it in segments. Albemarle County is probably feeling pretty dumb right now—they’re 12% finished with building their segment, having deliberately jumped the gun in anticipating that no obstacles would arise. If this latest obstacle proves insurmountable, the county will prove to have wasted an enormous sum of money.
Where things go from here is anybody’s guess.
C-Ville Weekly‘s cover story this week (an AAN wire story, incidentally) is about big business’ efforts to co-opt the term “local,” like they did “organic.” The definition that they’re going for is that any business that has a location in the vicinity is “local”—Wal-Mart is local to Charlottesville, in that they have a location here, while walmart.com is not. Never mind that Wal-Mart contributes basically nothing to the local economy, other than lousy wages, while a local business would likely hire a local attorney, accountant, cleaning service, etc., and its profits would go to the owner, who would presumably spend much of that money here, too. Economics consultant Civil Economics has found that of $100 spent at a chain, $13 will stay in the area, while $100 spent at a local store will leave $45 circulating in the local economy. (See their recent “Local Works!” study for more on this contrast.) The suggestion incorporated by the author—a proponent of supporting local businesses—is to describe them as “independent local businesses,” though presumably a business willing to bend the definition of “local” is also willing to do the same for “independent.”
When folks started pushing the idea of shopping local a decade ago, it was a tough sell. These days, with a rough economy, people get it. Maybe a better line is “buy stuff from people you know.” Maybe you’re getting a home built by your carpenter friend, or maybe you’re just buying a dozen eggs from your neighbor, but unless you’re friends with the Waltons, that should be a pretty good guide.
The Charlottesville Planning Commission is considering capping people at three yard sales per year—charging you $5 for a permit for every time you hold one—Jenn McDaniel writes for NBC-29. Director of Neighborhood Development Jim Tolbert says that the need for this arises from people buying and reselling stuff every weekend, running an ongoing business out of their residentially-zoned front yard. Julia Glendening at Charlottesville Tomorrow provides a whole lot more detail. Two of the cited reasons to enact this requirement are that yard sales often result in large numbers of signs being posted around the neighborhood (which the city ends up having to take down weeks later) and that the folks abusing the yard sale concept are basically running an illegal business. Planning commissioners raised the sorts of objections one would expect: this is an onerous regulation of an activity that’s part of a healthy local economy, people can’t be expected to actually bother getting a permit, and that perhaps there are better ways to deal with this problem. Also, since posting signs in the right-of-way is already illegal, as is running a business without a license, it’s probably best to use existing legal processes to deal with habitual offenders, rather than passing a new law to stop people from doing things that are already illegal.
The Planning Commission has asked staff to study up on this and report back in a few months.
- Fireworks explode over the tree line between CHS and McIntire Park.
Gray Television and StellarOne have agreed to sponsor a local Independence Day event for the next two years, The Daily Progress reports. Gray Television—owner of ABC-16, CBS-19, and Fox-27—will organize and sponsor the event, while the bank will pay for the fireworks. It’s not clear from the coverage right now, but I gather that StellarOne has signed up for just a two-year hitch, but that Gray intends to continue overseeing the event indefinitely. If that’s true, this will end the limbo that the celebration has occupied for since the Jaycees stopped putting on the event, as they had for some years.
Sideblog
Police announced this afternoon that their investigation into what was initially believed to be a fatal fire on Rugby Avenue is now a homicide investigation. #
The Virginia Supreme Court has denied George Huguely’s appeal. His second-degree murder conviction will stand, WRIC reports. #
In a carefully worded story, and not citing specific sources, WTVR reports that forensic evidence belonging to Jesse Matthew Jr., the main suspect in the disappearance of Hannah Graham, matches forensic evidence collected during the investigation of Morgan Harrington’s 2009 murder. #
In the wake of Hannah Graham’s disappearance, and the evidence that came from private security footage, city officials are revisiting the question of installing security cameras on the downtown mall. #
Both Charlottesville Registrar Sheri Iachetta and former Electoral Board member Stephanie Commander have turned themselves in to the police on
foursix and four felony counts of embezzlement, respectively. #Ten years ago, the National Institutes of Health budget doubled and schools like the University of Virginia built massive new research facilities. A decade later, those buildings remain largely underutilized. NPR visits UVA in this story on the effect of federal binge and spurge spending in the sciences. #
In 2012, Council approved a new student housing complex on West Main—now some council members are questioning whether what they were shown matches what was built. #
The Architectural Review Board has approved a bike-themed mural on West Market, below the McGuffey Art Center, although at least one member expressed concerns that it might look like the bicyclists were riding away from Charlottesville’s downtown. #
City Police Chief Tim Longo is meeting with city leaders to work on protocols regarding the use of military surplus police weapons in Charlottesville. #
A 100-year-old Colonnades resident received military honors for her service in the WWII Women’s Army Corps #
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