Good morning, RVA! It's 48 °F, and whoa did the sun come out last night for a spectacular sunset. Great work, everyone involved! Today you can expect fog in the morning, clouds following, and possibly some rain later this evening. Temperatures should hover around 60 °F, though.
Water cooler
The Richmond Times-Dispatch's Mel Leonor says the General Assembly is having a hard time making up its mind about how to reform redistricting and stop with all of the partisan gerrymandering 💸. It sounds like the Senate wants to move forward with the constitutional amendment we've all been talking about for a couple of years now, yet the House of Delegates thinks that amendment wouldn't ensure people of color having enough membership in the process. For now, they're at an impasse. Surely, though, we'll end the first season of New Democratic Majority with some kind of redistricting reform, right? Like, the redistricting advocacy group is called One Virginia 2021 for a reason, and post-Census redistricting is right around the corner. Status quo on this is unacceptable!
C. Suarez Rojas, also in the RTD, has the details on Henrico's new short-term rental (aka Airbnb) legislation 💸. The City has toiled away on their on short-term rental ordinance (ORD. 2019-343) for a while now, and it currently sits on Council's March 9th agenda. Operators in both localities hate the clause that requires them to live in the Airbnb-able property for a significant portion of the year. This prevents folks from buying up houses to use solely as Airbnbs, which depletes the available housing stock, which exacerbates our housing crisis. I'm OK with this restriction. I should say, however, that I have read conflicting studies on the impact of short-term rentals. This study out of Seattle says that allowing short-term rentals has no effect on the number of commercial landlords in an area and may even support home ownership. While, in Santa Fe (PDF), they found that "the conversion of houses and apartments into short-term rentals reduces the supply of housing, putting upward pressure on rents and home prices citywide." Better safe than sorry, I think, and Council should pass the ordinance with the owner-occupancy restriction.
I haven't been up by the Armstrong redevelopment site in a while, but, dang, these pictures from Jonathan Spiers at Richmond BizSense of the first phase are impressive! Spiers says they've got about 40% of the 256 planned rental and for-sale homes built, which are part of a larger plan to build one-for-one replacement homes for everyone living in Creighton Court.
Jack Jacobs, also at Richmond BizSense, has a sweet Brookland Park Boulevard update: D.C.-based, Black-owned, woman-owned Ruby Scoops will open a shop at 300 W. Brookland Park Boulevard in April or May. Local ice cream on the Northside! This is good news for me personally! Here's a little more on owner Rabia Kamara.
I...don't know what the heck is going on in this story from Mark Robinson at the RTD. Councilmember Trammell announced, by reading a written statement during this past Monday's City Council meeting, that she was "requesting the FBI to investigate" the permitting department and Mayor Stoney because of, what she views as, corrupt delays on a development in the 8the District. First, what? Second, there would be far fewer delays in the permitting department if City Council would fully fund vacancies in the permitting department. Third, Robinson provides some startling context: The developer in question gave Councilmember Trammell $8,500 in 2019 which "is twice what any other donor has given her, and by far the largest donation reported by a council member last year." Yikes. My personal opinion: This kind of behavior is not a great use of the public's time and only further breaks the already broken relationship between City Council and the Mayor. If we want to move the City forward in a progressive way, we need less of this garbage and more willingness to work hard on fixing boring issues that don't make headlines—things like permitting department vacancies. Remember: Every Councilmember is up for reelection this November, and Amy Wentz is also running in the 8th District.
This morning's longread
Tampon wars: the battle to overthrow the Tampax empire
Did you know that almost every single tampon in the entire world is made on machines built by a single company??
In threat No 2 – abundance of options – Tampax is reckoning with the possible fate of any long-time ruler: the rising howl of revolution, a potential coup. Over the past few years, an array of new tampon brands and period products have appeared on the market. Obeying some unwritten law, they all seem to have cute, single-word names – Lola, Cora, Callaly, Ohne, Freda, Flo, Thinx, Modibodi, Flex, Flux, Dame, Daye. And they all want to topple Tampax, offering women what they see as more ethical and ecological options to replace Tampax’s single-use plastic applicators and a marketing strategy that often emphasises discretion, as though a period should be something to hide.
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