Good morning, RVA! It's 34 °F, and we've got a cold, clear day ahead of us today. Expect sunshine and highs in the mid 40s. Enjoy it, because big rain moves into the region tomorrow—if only it were slightly colder!
Water cooler
Richmond Police are reporting that Allen Frazier, a man in his 50s, was shot to death on the 2300 block of Concord Avenue Saturday morning. According to RPD's major crimes page, he was the 62nd person murdered in Richmond in 2020.
As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 3,240↗️ new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 3↗️ new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 235↗️ new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 69, Henrico: 98, and Richmond: 68). Since this pandemic began, 503 people have died in the Richmond region. This is not a drill: Vaccines are go! Meet Sandra Lindsay, a Black nurse in Queens and the first person in the United States to be vaccinated. So exciting. Down this way, the Governor received Virginia's first shipment of the Pfizer vaccine right here in Richmond. Here's a picture of Northam and Kelly Sweet, Director of Pharmacy for Bon Secours, opening up a box of vaccine and looking into it like the briefcase from Pulp Fiction. Vaccination for health care workers in hospitals begins today, and then, as more vaccines roll out, we'll—fingers crossed—see most health care workers and residents of long-term care facilities receive their first round of vaccination by the end of the year. Sabrina Moreno at the Richmond Times-Dispatch has a good look at how yesterday's rollout went across the state. It feels so weird that we're finally at this point in what is surely one of the weirdest timeline.
As foretold, City Council voted 9-0 to adopt Richmond 300 last night. Congratulations to the Richmond 300 team, to the City staff that put tons of hours into meetings and presentations, and to the thousands of citizens that took time out of their lives to engage in a potential wonky urban planning process. Great work, everyone! A bunch of folks were on hand last night to give comments for and against the plan, with most of the opposition—among public commenters and council alike—citing the need for stronger/more specific housing components (you can read through the housing goals on page 145 of the aforelinked PDF). Luckily for everyone, master plans can be amended. In fact, Council President Newbille set a January 8th goal for councilmembers to either submit their amendments or start pulling together the process for drawing up their amendments—I didn't catch which. First, I would not be surprised to just not see any amendments submitted. Second, the reason Richmond 300 was a yearslong process and not a weekslong process was that over 7,000 people put their hands on the plan in some way, shape, or form. I'm going to be fairly skeptical of some hasty change to our brand new master plan that has not gone through a deep and wide community engagement process. So, what's next? Personally, I think we can all take a quick breather before moving on to Phase 4: Implementation. How and when do all the parts of Richmond 300 get implemented? That's up to City Council, the Mayor, and you and me. But, like I said: Quick breather first, and then back to work!
Oh, also! Council passed ORD. 2020-153, renaming the portion of Jefferson Davis Highway within the city limits to Richmond Highway. We've been making quick work of these, but, of course, there are many, many more streets to rename.
Ana Edwards and Phil Wilayto have a column in the RTD about the Governor's plan to include $9 million in his upcoming budget for improvements to the Slave Trail and "efforts to preserve the area known as the Devil's Half-Acre." Not mentioned, of course, is the African Burial Ground or other sites important to Richmond's role in the American history of slavery. Edwards and Wilayto have been fighting this battle—to tell the whole story—for decades now. It must be exhausting.
Quick update: The second round of the Richmond Recovers grant program has had its deadline extended to 11:59 PM on Friday. Also: "The city also updated the grant guidelines to clarify that small businesses other than restaurants, retail, and beverage production are eligible to receive grant funds." If either of those two sentences impact your life, you can apply for the program here.
Richard Hayes has a bunch of bird photos he took while on a Discover the James tour. I'm not going to lie, huge, carnivorous birds that just live downtown like that's fine and normal freak me out.
The Richmond and Henrico Health Districts will host another free COVID-19 testing event today at the Eastern Henrico Health Department (1400 N. Laburnum Avenue) from 10:00 AM–12:00 PM. Looks like there are just a couple more of these before the winter holidays roll around.
This morning's longread
We apologize for endorsing U.S. Rep. Michael Waltz, who wants to overturn the election
Read this great apology in the Orlando Sentinel for an endorsement the editorial board gave to one of the morons who signed on to that absolutely bananas Texas lawsuit. I love seeing press make public apologies like this and saying out loud that, no, there are not two sides to this garbage Republicans keep trying to pull.
But endorsements also serve as a way to take stock of a candidate’s values and beliefs. We now know what we didn’t then — that Waltz, a U.S. Army Green Beret who served his country, is willing to undermine the nation to ensure his political party remains in control of the White House. Every American should be appalled at the attempted usurpation, and at elected officials taking part in this terrifying fiasco and violating their oath to protect the country from enemies, foreign and domestic. Everyone who supported Michael Waltz for Congress should feel a deep sense of remorse and regret. We do.
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