Some clever new traffic signals have been installed along 250 on Pantops Mountain, Courtney Beale writes for Charlottesville Tomorrow. They’re Rhythm Engineering’s InSync traffic signal controllers, which use video cameras and a small computer to tally the rate of traffic on both streets at an intersection and, in collaboration with nearby traffic signals that are similarly equipped, adapts the light timing to get the most cars through the intersection as efficiently as possible. Technologically, it’s no fancier than the standard hardware in an Xbox 360, but the application of this concept to a $30,000 traffic light controller stands to save a lot of people a lot of time. Beale doesn’t say exactly which intersections are now equipped with an InSync controller, but since VDOT’s impetus for the change was the move of Martha Jefferson, presumably it includes the major three intersections between the intersection with 20 and the turn for Martha Jefferson.
cvillenews.com
Governor Bob McDonnell has named six new members of the UVA Board of Visitors, and the big news is that reviled Rector Helen Dragas has been reappointed, as a source in the governor’s office said would happen, last Saturday. The announcement came in an e-mail, in which he also named Johns Hopkins Medical CEO Edward Miller, who you’ll recall was Dragas’ pick for interim president, but wound up not the BOV’s pick, presumably as a result of the firestorm of protest to Sullivan’s removal. The remaining four new members are outgoing JMU president Linwood Rose, Northern Virginia Tech Council CEO and Republican political operative Bobbie Kilberg, Gannett CFO and UVA Alumni Association chair Victoria Harker, and McGuire Woods Consulting chairman Frank Atkinson.
McDonnell defended his reappointment of Dragas in his statement, writing:
Just as I was disappointed to see the lack of transparency and communication surrounding the request for the resignation of the first female president of UVa, I am also concerned that the first female rector seemed to become the sole target of recent criticism. While there is no doubt that the board made several mistakes in its actions, which it has publicly admitted, this is not a time for recrimination. It’s a time for reconciliation. I have been heartened by recent statements made by president Sullivan, the Board of Visitors and by the faculty senate chair about their ability to work with the rector. As Faculty Senate Chairman George Cohen said to The Richmond Times-Dispatch, “She (Dr. Sullivan) said she can work with the rector. I think we can work with the rector as well.” That kind of commitment to unity, healing and advancement is crucial to the university’s success in maintaining itself as a pillar of higher education to pursue the growth of knowledge and advance the human condition. Today’s reappointment is made in that spirit and with that purpose. I look forward to the board and administration moving forward together. The university’s tradition is the embrace of inquiry, critical thinking and change, which the rector and many others bring to the table. Ms. Dragas’s serious critique of the challenges facing the university is a voice that must be heard, and can help, in ensuring UVa remains one of the world’s foremost institutions of higher learning.
McDonnell conveniently ignores that Dragas was the sole target of criticism because she was the sole person to screw up terribly. Vice Rector Mark Kington was a close second, but he resigned from the board, insulating him from much further criticism just as the story went national. Complaining that Dragas was singled out for criticism would be like complaining that Katrina was singled out for destruction in New Orleans in September of 2005. Yes, of course she was.
The press release follows.
Continue reading ‘Governor Names BOV Appointees; Dragas Among Them’
While I was busy fussing about the Hoo d’Etat, the Commonwealth Transportation Board awarded a $135M contract to build the Western Bypass, Sean Tubbs writes for Charlottesville Tomorrow. The design-build contract went to a company called Skanska/Branch Highways. Simultaneous to the award of the contract was the unveiling of the company’s proposed plan, a 300 page behemoth that folks are still working their way through, to figure out what, exactly, is being built.
In a unanimous vote, the Board of Visitors rescinded Teresa Sullivan’s resignation and returned her employment as the president of the University of Virginia to its five-year contract. In another unanimous vote held immediately afterwards, the BOV passed a vote of confidence for Rector Helen Dragas who started the whole mess. Sullivan remains president, and Dragas now has the political clearance for a re-appointment to her seat on July 1. A cheering crowd of thousands greeted Sullivan as she emerged from the brief BOV meeting, who gave a short speech. After joining in for the first verse of the Good Old Song, the cheerful throngs dissipated.
In tomorrow morning’s Wall Street Journal there will appear an unsigned editorial that any right-minded individual would agree with. It’s about a university board who tried mightily to convince their new president to cut spending and modernize the school, but the president refused, instead kow-towing to powerful faculty interests. So the university board fired her. And the fat-cat faculty members all but rioted, while the president gave a speech to them. It’s a hell of a story and, of course, it’s not true. Almost none of it is true. What we’re seeing happen before our very eyes is the nationalization of the narrative.
Virginians know the real story: a pair of rogue members of the UVA Board of Visitors secretly engineered a coup against the university president, illegally declaring an “emergency” meeting at which just three members were present to accept the forced resignation. The president was never given a negative performance evaluation, and had been on the job for less than two years, with less than a year of her own budget cycle under her belt. Those board members refused to explain why the president had been fired until many days later, when a strange and illogical list was ginned up that appeared to have no relation to reality.
The facts are not convenient for those who oppose the existence of public education, so the lead intellectual mouthpiece of that group has created some new facts. This new story is one that’s more like the story of Governor Scott Walker and the Wisconsin unions, one with which half of the country may well sympathize, far more than those rare souls who are liable to sympathize with Dragas at the moment.
Although I suppose it’s possible that the Journal’s talented reporters simply misinformed the editorial board, mangling all of the basic facts of this matter, it’s rather more realistic to assume that this was a narrative dreamed up by Hill and Knowlton, Rector Helen Dragas’ personal PR firm (and paid for by the University of Virginia).
It’s the “why” part of this that’s more interesting. Why would they publish a wildly inaccurate editorial the day before the Board of Visitors convene to settle this matter? (Ignore the governor’s claim that this is the third time they will have met to address this. Assuming they actually hold a vote as to whether they want to retain Teresa Sullivan, it will be the first such vote that they’ve held, at least that anybody knows about.) It’s difficult to believe that such an editorial would sway any members of the BOV. (I’d write that “they’re not going to learn anything new from the editorial” but, in fact, they’d find themselves facing a wholly unfamiliar set of facts.) They know far more about the matter than any editorial board. I think it’s more likely that this exists to set the tone for national coverage after Tuesday’s vote. Now if Sullivan wins, right-wing interest groups across the country will claim that a powerful faculty union has won out against common sense in support of their hand-picked toady of a president. And if Sullivan loses, they’ll claim it as a Wisconsin-style victory against tax-wasting academic elites who have been suckling from the public teat for too long. These angles aren’t at all true, but it doesn’t matter.
The best thing that you and I can do about this editorial? Nothing. Nothing at all. This is a sign that national forces more powerful than any of us are getting involved, and facts clearly do not matter to them. I’m sure that UVA would love to push back mightily, but there’s no doubt that the university’s PR staff has been forbidden from doing so. Only Hill and Knowlton speak for UVA now, and their budget is going entirely to saying awful things about the university. Those who want to affect the outcome of Tuesday’s vote will do better to focus their attentions locally.
A sad, little-acknowledged aspect of this situation is that there are fourteen members of the Board of Visitors who aren’t saying a word. If they wanted, they could push back against this WSJ article mightily. Instead, they are silent which means that, implicitly, Dragas speaks for them. These people who claim to love the University of Virginia apparently regard it like one Army Major did the Vietnamese town of Bến Tre in 1968: “It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.”
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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