Monthly Archive for December, 2009

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Vinegar Hill History Researched, Distilled, Mapped

Published by Waldo Jaquith on December 9, 2009 in History. 20 Comments

Vinegar HillA UVA project has virtually recreated Vinegar Hill in its heyday, the university writes in a press release. (If you’re not from here: Vinegar Hill was a large, mostly black neighborhood around the McIntire/Main intersection that was demolished by the city for “urban renewal.” The city relocated people from their own homes into public housing.) Undergraduates researched archival records to look at who owned property, when and how it changed hands, what it was appraised for, where people went after they lost their homes, and lots of similar information, combining it all into a series of visualizations fronted by a website called The Vinegar Hill Project. I’ve spent a while exploring this website, and it’s just a treasure trove of data, veritable infoporn for local history buffs. Set aside an hour to pore over this site.

It’s a shame that the historical society is too stuffy to do this kind of thing. They prohibited their last executive director from blogging.

Biscuit Run May Become a State Park

Published by Waldo Jaquith on December 9, 2009 in Business, Government, Politics and Taxes. 32 Comments

Biscuit Run may become a state park, Brian Wheeler writes in the Daily Progress / Charlottesville Tomorrow.

Hunter Craig paid $46M for the 1,200 acre property in 2005, which he intended to develop as “Fox Ridge” (somewhere, I know, there’s a software program that just spits out random names for “upscale” housing developments). He’d planned on somewhere between 900 and 5,000 houses. The Planning Commission unanimously opposed it, but the Board of Supervisors OKd it anyway, allowing 3,100 houses, despite the $222M that you and I will have to pay in tax dollars to subsidize it. The project was put on hold in January, an unsurprising move in the face of a total collapse of the U.S. real estate market.

Presumably seeking the least financially harmful way to dispose of this property (because, really, where is the demand for 3,100 new houses?), Craig is talking with the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation about donating the whole affair to the state to join the network of 35 state parks. With the land assessed at $44M, presumably that could afford Craig a unique financial opportunity to write down those losses; a governor eager to increase protected land before his term expires in a month’s time may be able to offer some state tax incentives. Albemarle County isn’t thrilled at the prospect of losing the $325k in annual property taxes that Craig pays on the land now, which would be the effect of moving it into state ownership, but since the project is a significant net financial loss for the county, Biscuit Run as a park would seem to be a good outcome. The only other snag is that chunk of land is in the growth area, which doesn’t make sense as a location for a park. But that’s the land that Craig owns, that’s the only offer on the table, and it’s not clear that Albemarle County has any say in the matter, anyhow.

Salvation Army Upset About Location Limitations

Published by Waldo Jaquith on December 8, 2009 in Business. 21 Comments

Shopping centers that don’t allow soliciting aren’t allowing the Salvation Army to solicit, Liz Palka reports for CBS-19, and I get the impression that we’re supposed to be angry about that. The Salvation Army is singling out both CVS and Harris Teeter, neither of which allow solicitation on their property, saying that they’ve raised $22,000 less than last year as a result of having fewer locations to show up at. (Is $22,000 a lot? Palka tells us it’s “staggering,” but without knowing what percentage of the total that comprises, viewers can’t have any idea.) They’ve tried to set up at other places, but those places have also said that they’re not interested in having somebody ring a bell and ask for money next to their front door. Of course, there are lots of charities all over Charlottesville that would like your support, and the Salvation Army is set up in locations throughout town, so the fact this particular charity isn’t in front of these two particular stores shouldn’t be an obstacle to people helping the less fortunate this Christmas season.

Shopping centers are private property, and they don’t allow the sorts of things that are permitted on public property (like the Downtown Mall)—juggling, guitar playing, protesting, soliciting, or even just standing around. These places look public, but it’s a simulation of public property—you have no First Amendment rights there. Whether or not you think that the loss of that makes these places better or worse than real public space is up to you. You’ll recall that House of Delegates candidate Rich Collins was arrested for campaigning in a shopping center back in 2005 in a dispute over the same matter.

Comer Indicted for Embezzlement

Published by Waldo Jaquith on December 8, 2009 in Law and Justice. 9 Comments

Michael ComerFormer Glenmore treasurer Michael Comer has been indicted on charges of embezzling from them. You’ll remember that Comer went missing in July, it quickly emerged that he was dodging an audit of the community association’s finances, and a few weeks later he was arrested at Wintergreen, looking like something the cat dragged in. Glenmore wasn’t interested in pressing charges, which would have been a clear instance of the good-ol’-boy network at work, but the FBI and Albemarle Police Department got involved anyhow. Comer was indicted on five charges of embezzlement, and the case will be taken up in the new year.

London Named Coach of the Cavaliers

Published by Waldo Jaquith on December 7, 2009 in Sports. 4 Comments

Well, that didn’t take long: UVA named Mike London as the new head coach for the football program today. After just two seasons as University of Richmond’s head coach, the former UVA defense coordinator is back again. The 49-year-old one-time college football player is certainly popular among players who studied under him, who had lots of nice things to say about him. In his remarks, he emphasized the importance of academics, and asked fans to come back into the fold.

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