Mac MacDonald Leaving WINA Morning Show

Published by Waldo Jaquith on May 17, 2006 in Meta News. 3 Comments

The Hook has an interesting report on Mac MacDonald’s on-air announcement this morning that he’s leaving WINA’s morning show. Turns out that MacDonald doesn’t actually work for WINA but, in fact, UVa. It also seems that this may be part of frosty relationship between WINA’s new owners, Saga Communications, and UVa—it’s not clear that the station will retain the contract to broadcast the games, presumably due to Saga’s demands on UVa. Finally, it sounded like MacDonald’s announcement took morning co-host Jane Foy by surprise, if their on-air reactions were any indicator.

MacDonald says that he intends to put his time into blogging and podcasting on behalf of the Cavaliers. WINA might do well to catch up and start doing more of that themselves.

Paying for the Privilege of Jail?

Published by Waldo Jaquith on May 16, 2006 in Law and Justice. 23 Comments

The authority that oversees the local jail is considering charging inmates for their stay, Liesel Nowak reports in today’s Daily Progress. There are enough Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail board members that are concerned about the proposed $1/day fee that the proposal has been tabled, though it may still happen. Board member and Charlottesville Sheriff Cornelia Johnson counts herself as an opponent, pointing out that it’s not the inmates that end up paying, but their families, which is particularly harsh if the inmate is the primary breadwinner. Note, too, that this is a jail, not a prison — many inmates haven’t been convicted of any crime.

Blog Carnival: Anoop Ranganath Hosts

Published by Waldo Jaquith on May 16, 2006 in Blogs. Closed

Anoop Ranganath hosts this week’s Charlottesville Blog Carnival. (Or, rather, last week’s. Time flies.)

Friday, I’m hosting on my blog, which should expose C’ville blogs to a whole different audience.

Bloods in Charlottesville

Published by Waldo Jaquith on May 13, 2006 in Crime. 31 Comments

Gangland: not actually an amusement park. (I’m not making that mistake again; sorry, kids.) Also not a word used in Charlottesville newspapers until a few weeks ago, when there was a “gangland-style beating of two teenage boys,” to quote from the Daily Progress. Now the police’s Capt. Chip Harding says that two of the six kids arrested in the attack were not just wannabes, but actual members of the Bloods, John Yellig and Bryan McKenzie write in today’s Progress. As gang activity has spread south from D.C., police around the state have become increasingly vigilant about violent groups like the Crips, the Latin Kings, Mara Salvatrucha. Gangs are nothing new to Charlottesville, but particularly violent gangs or gangs with ties outside of town certainly are.

Kuttner Buys Central Fidelity Building from Danielson

Published by Waldo Jaquith on May 12, 2006 in Development. Closed

Developer Lee Danielson announced in 2003 he’d be building a nine-story hotel downtown, on the site of the old Central Fidelity building (and briefly Boxer Learning’s headquarters) at the corner of 2nd and East Main. It was his only remaining entanglements in Charlottesville after he was all but ridden out of town on a rail. By all accounts he never actually did anything to make the hotel happen, and now area developer Oliver Kuttner is buying the 22,000 square foot building for $3.7M, Courteney Stuart reports in this week’s Hook. Kuttner had sworn off any more developments in Charlottesville, having bought up a good chunk of downtown Lynchburg (an area poised for a real renaissance) in the past few years, but he’s apparently changed his mind. He intends to keep the exterior intact, while gutting the interior for restaurant and retail space.

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