Good morning, RVA! It's 61 °F, and highs will settle in around 75 °F. Expect those clouds to stick around, though.
Water cooler
It’s primary day in Virginia! If you’re a Richmond City resident and looking to vote for a democrat, I have bad news: They’re all running unopposed (PDF). I mean, maybe that’s not bad news, but there’s no one for you to vote for today. If, however, you live in the 7th Congressional District, you’ve got the opportunity to vote for either Abigail Spanberger or Daniel Ward. Not sure what’s your situation? You can check your voter registration information here, which includes info on all of your various districts.
City Council met last night and approved the creation of a Human Rights Commission (and now I wonder how the nomination process for this commission works). They also heard public comment from community advocates and family members of Marcus-David Peters. Folks on Twitter were not happy about the lack of response from Council, and RVA Mag has a quick recap of some of those public comments. Since I’m a little confused about what exactly did or did not happened at the meeting, I’ll get the audio up over on The Boring Show as soon as it hits the City’s website.
While we’re talking City Council, Mark Robinson at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has an update on the Intermediate Terminal building. Council has pushed pause on any decision related to the demolition of the building while they wait on a National Register of Historic Places status update. I don’t know anything about this process, but it does not sound like a quick one.
I meant to link to this yesterday but totally forgot: Superintendent Jason Kamras’s regularly scheduled email from this past Friday breaks down RPS’s budget by operating and capital—and then explains the difference between the two! Basic municipal budget knowledge is not a thing a normal person should be expected to just know, and as a result folks often advocate for impossible things. Civics lessons, like this one from our educator in chief, that move everyone toward a better understand of how government works are an excellent idea, and I’m surprised no one had thought of doing it before.
Bart Hinkle, editor of the editorial pages at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has left to take a job at Dominion Energy. Patrick Wilson, political reporter at the RTD, has this to say...!
Tomorrow at 6:00 PM, Housing Opportunities Made Equal and the VCU Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs will host a lecture by Richard Rothstein, author of _The Color of Law_, one of the books about redlining and systemic residential segregation. This event is free, open to the public, and guaranteed to be fascinating.
Reminder: The Carytown itteration of the Richmond 300 parking meetings takes place this morning at 8:00 AM at Studio Two Three (3300 W. Clay Street).
There are many things of which I know nothing about, but diplomatic relations on the Korean Peninsula has to be close to the top of that list. That said, here’s a Twitter thread about Trump’s meeting with Kim Jong-un that feels like it makes sense. CNN has the full text of the document the two of them signed.
Sports!
- Squirrels host Portland tonight at 6:35 PM and tickets are, of course, available online.
- Kickers take on Penn FC tonight at 7:00 PM. You can join other fans locally and watch at Vasen Brewing.
- Nats begin a series against the Yankees tonight at 7:05 PM.
This morning's longread
Recommendations for Reporting on Suicide (PDF)
While most of y’all are not reporters, I still think reporting guidelines are useful for normal folks. When you read local or national reporting on suicide, how many of these guidelines are followed? How many are disregarded for the sake of more clicks?
Suicide is a public health issue. Media and online coverage of suicide should be informed by using best practices. Some suicide deaths may be newsworthy. However, the way media cover suicide can influence behavior negatively by contributing to contagion or positively by encouraging help-seeking.
If you’d like your longread to show up here, go chip in a couple bucks on the ol’ Patreon.