Good morning, RVA! It's 51 °F, and our run of spectacular weather continues. Expect highs in the 70s today and an irresistible desire to sit quietly in a chair outside listening to the world around you. Rain moves in Saturday and Sunday, though.
Water cooler
Richmond Police are reporting a murder on the 3600 block of Chamberlayne Avenue. On the morning of October 6th, officers were called to an apartment in the area and found Estelle D. Pugh, a woman in her 60s, "suffering from trauma."
As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 1,844↗️ new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 25↘️ new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 148↗️ new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 59, Henrico: 42, and Richmond: 47). Since this pandemic began, 380 people have died in the Richmond region. That’s a lot of new cases, but, as you might have excepted, VDH posted this notice on the dashboard: “The case count reported on Thursday, October 8, includes 689 cases that should have been reported on Wednesday, October 7, but were not because of a surveillance system reporting issue. A reminder: cases are not reported on the day the patient became ill, but on the day they have been classified as meeting the case definition for COVID-19. In order to observe the spread of illness most effectively, please review the charts that show cases by date of symptom onset.” Here’s that chart for all of Virginia, and here’s the same chart for just the Central Region. When looking at both of these graphs, please keep in mind that the data get less and less complete as you move toward the right. In other coronanews, the University of Richmond announced their spring schedule which includes a later start and no spring break. This makes virus-sense but does seem like it would make the semester a heckuva long slog, from January to May. As for K–12 schools, the Governor announced he'll distribute an additional $220 million of CARES Act money to "all 132 public school districts using an allocation formula of $175 per pupil based on fall enrollment, with a minimum of $100,000 for each school division." Richmond will get $4.1 million, Henrico $8.8 million, and Chesterfield $10.9 million (full PDF of a spreadsheet here). While I'm sure every district welcomes the influx of any cash ahead of what's sure to be an incredibly stressful budget season, this is a great example of equality instead of equity. Big, wealthy school districts end up with more resources than smaller, less wealthy districts that most likely have more need.
Marc Cheatham at the Cheats Movement has the second post up in his series about the mayoral candidates, "Who's Got Next." This one's about Councilmember Kim Gray. A couple years ago, I stumbled across this quote from the Isaacson Steve Jobs biography: "'You’re blowing it with Fox News,' Jobs told [Murdoch] over dinner. 'The axis today is not liberal and conservative, the axis is constructive-destructive, and you’ve cast your lot with the destructive people.'" This idea—of a political spectrum aligned with constructive at one and destructive at the other—maps perfectly onto local politics in Richmond, where the issues are often not clearly partisan (and the offices are technically entirely nonpartisan). Councilmember Grey sits on the far end of the destructive side of the spectrum. She excels at stopping projects, voting no, raising hell, and turning out opposition. As Marc puts it, "Gray objects to a proposal—gives a press statement, and either kills it or moves on, leaving a void where there may have been an opportunity to improve the outcome." Without digging into voting records, Grey has: Voted against the meals tax to fund building new schools, voted against removing confederate monuments multiple times, banned local-service buses from a city block forcing them to detour away from the Pulse, and tried (and failed) to remove bike lanes—forever!—from Brook Road. This role, the Nosayer, works on Council. It doesn't make for a great or efficient or effective City Council, but it is _a_ role for a councilmember to play. But you can't lead from no. When Marc asks "But back to my big question, who is Kim Gray?" this is what I think about: What does it look like for someone who's natural position is "destruction" to lead a city forward?
I'm just going to quote the title of this article by Jack Jacobs at Richmond BizSense and you can decide how to feel about it: "Regency's first new anchor—an indoor trampoline park co-owned by Drew Brees—opens Saturday."
I wanted to shoutout the Big List of 2020 Candidate Events, which has started to dwindle a bit. If you know about candidate events—Council, School Board, or Mayoral—let me know! Also, if you haven't yet voted and are still undecided, check out the "recorded replays available" section this weekend to watch and learn about the candidate of your choice. I have to say, this document has turned into a pretty great resource!
The virtual Richmond Folk Festival kicks off tonight at 6:00 PM. You can cut on the radio or live stream tonight—or even the dang TV tomorrow and Sunday. Check out the full schedule here and fill your entire weekend with some great tunes.
Vaccine reminder! The Children's Hospital of Richmond at VCU will host a family flu and Tdap vaccine clinic this weekend on October 10th, from 8:00 AM–3:30 PM, at 1000 E. Broad Street. No appointment needed! Additionally, the Richmond and Henrico Health Districts will host a free flu vaccination clinic for uninsured and underinsured folks, also on Saturday, at the Hotchkiss Community Center (701 E. Brookland Park Boulevard) from 10:00 AM–1:00 PM. Lots of opportunity to get your vax!
This morning's longread
Periwinkle, the Color of Poison, Modernism, and Dusk
Kathy Kelleher at the Paris Review has a whole column about colors called “Hue’s Hue”!
Periwinkle’s first known appearance in English as a color-word was in the 1920s, but it has been in the painter’s toolbox for far longer, nestled under the violet umbrella. Periwinkle is a Modernist word for a Modernist color. It’s a word that has several meanings—in addition to being a flowering plant, a periwinkle is also a type of snail, though not, confusingly, one that secretes purple liquid. It’s a nature word for a color most often found in nature. A dreamy word for a color that exists at the edges of the night.
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