Former Charlottesville superintendent Scottie Griffin has been denied the top post in the Fall River, MA school system, the Herald News reports. Griffin was named a finalist for the job, raising the ire of many Charlottesvillians with her glib dismissal of the regular coincidence of her resumé and subsequent lawsuits. The job went to Nicholas Fischer, former assistant superintendent for the Fairfax County school system.
News and meta-news about Charlottesville, VA, since 2001.
Author Archive for Waldo Jaquith
Page 315 of 549
Train whistles will be silenced once again, WINA reports. In June, the Federal Railroad Administration enacted new regulations on the use of train horns, requiring Norfolk Southern to blow their whistle at all public grade crossings in 13 communities around Virginia, including Charlottesville. The loud whistles annoyed people across the state, particularly folks living near tracks who found themselves woken several times each night by the whistling. The return of quiet in town is a result of Charlottesville gaining status as a quiet zone, which takes effect on August 12.
After 80 years of business, C’ville furniture business Gilmore, Hamm & Snyder is shutting down this month. Owner Greg Hamm died of cancer earlier this year, and his wife, Ann, just can’t do it alone. Of its history, Annie Johnson writes in today’s Daily Progress:
Gilmore, Hamm & Snyder was created in 1925 when Strothers F. Hamm and William H. Snyder became partners in a furniture business with John Gilmore, who had founded the business in 1902. The company moved to its current location in Seminole Square from the Downtown Mall in 1989, seeking a better space to display furniture.
The store is closed now, but it will reopen on Friday morning, selling off all of their furniture and they close down.
I wonder if there are any future Gilmore, Hamm & Snyders just now starting up, companies that we’ll look back on fondly in 2085, or if the rise of niche megacorporations in the past few decades has made such companies a thing of the past.
We recently witnessed the closure of the last free downtown parking lot, which took a chunk out of the ever-dwindling available on-street free spaces. Today comes the news that Charlottesville Parking Center (a private corporation) is negotiating to sell their open lot on Water Street, which would remove another 125 parking spaces from the paid pool of spaces. (David Hendrick and John Yellig write about it in today’s Daily Progress.) The lot is assessed at $7M, so a sale is certainly the right thing for the corporation, but not so great for parking downtown.
Bob Stroh, manager of CPC lots, points out that there are generally about 100 spaces free in the Water Street parking garage (with Market St. often near or at capacity). That sounds good, except that this would still be a net loss of 25 paid spaces, and doesn’t allow for growth. With the amphitheater having their grand opening on Saturday night, 3,800 people are about to start wanting a place to park. I don’t think those 25 spaces are going to do it.
I got a parking ticket for no apparent reason today, parking in the metered lot on Water Street, so perhaps I’m just in a bad parking mood.
Approved or not, it’s long looked like the Meadowcreek Parkway would never happen — state transportation dollars are stretched far too thin to be used to build a big new road not strongly supported by the community. Today, that’s all changed: Bob Gibson reports in today’s Daily Progress that Sen. John Warner has secured $25M in federal funds to fund the new road. (Exactly where this money is coming from and how it has been secured isn’t clear to me.) With only $6M remaining to be secured, there’s little standing in the way of paving two miles of McIntire Park. Sen. Warner, a UVa Law School graduate, describes the funding as “an old student’s expression of gratefulness to the community.”
07/29 Update: Big Al points out that this funding is a part of a $300B highway bill currently under consideration in Congress, with the purpose of the bill being to fund projects like the Meadowcreek Parkway nationwide. The Post writes that it “will send nearly $300 billion to the states to build and fix roads, create thousands of new jobs and — lawmakers hope — save lives and cut hours wasted in traffic.”
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 #
-
Archive for Sideblog »
Recent Comments