Good morning, RVA! It's 58 °F, and warmer weather continues from now through the foreseeable future. Today, you can expect highs in the mid 70s and most likely no rain for a couple of days. Enjoy!
Water cooler
As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 1,483 new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 37 new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 81 new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 7, Henrico: 46, and Richmond: 28). Since this pandemic began, 168 people have died in the Richmond region. Statewide, those are big numbers, however VDH has this alert pinned to the top of their data dashboard: "VDH performed maintenance on its disease reporting system yesterday. COVID-19 data reported during that time were added to today's numbers." ...OK. Anyway, it's a big week for coronavirus-related announcements from elected officials. Richmond's stay on moving into Phase One of recovery ends this week, plus the soonest the rest of the state could move into Phase Two would be this Friday. About the former, I'm really interested in what the Mayor decided to do. Richmond's percent positivity on May 14th, when the Governor granted the two-week delay, was 22.8%. The latest data has it at 25%. That's certainly not a 14-day decrease. Plus, that particular percent positivity is pretty dang high when compared to the state's 14.3%. I'm sure there's enormous pressure on the Mayor to do something after this two week delay, but, honestly, I don't know what the data would tell him to do other than keep folks at home and do more testing. Good luck, I guess. Just a hop, skip, and a jump across Broad Street, look for the Governor to make some sort of announcement about mask requirements today. Mel Leonor at the Richmond Times-Dispatch, who will probably win some sort of award for her reporting on VDH's testing data, said that on Friday "Northam is weighing the details of a statewide order requiring people to wear face masks to contain the spread of COVID-19, with an announcement planned for Tuesday." Sounds great to me. Unfortunately, in an incredible own-goal, the Governor was caught on camera with a bunch of folks, maskless, over the weekend. Laura Ingraham picked it up and said "REMEMBER THIS image if this man mandates masks at all time in Virginia." I don't really understand why wearing a mask has become a political statement, but here we are.
City Council meets today for their regularly scheduled meeting, and you can find the entire agenda—as it stands at this present moment—here (PDF). It's a lengthy agenda and Council could, although one can never be certain, take action on a bunch of items that I'm keeping an eye on: the restaurant-only coronagrants resolution has been withdrawn (RES. 2020-R026); Council will decide whether or not to surplus a bunch of Downtown property so they can move forward with some sort of redevelopment following NoBro (RES. 2020-R034); the short-term rentals aka Airbnb ordinance, remember this old chestnut?, has a chance to pass after kicking around the planning department for years (ORD. 2019-343); Council might could disagree with Commission of Architectural Review—in public—over demolishing George Mason Elementary (RES. 2020-R015); and, finally, RES. 2020-R035, which sets up the two-stage budget review process. I wrote a ton of words about the two-stage budget review process over the weekend, so if you're deeply interested in how this new process will work moving forward into the next fiscal year, make sure you check it out. And that's not even everything on the agenda! It almost feels like we're getting back into some sort of civic rhythm. Good for us!
Jonathan Spiers at Richmond BizSense says a deal is in the works to bring more apartments along Brook Road south of Lombardy Street near VUU. I kept tweeting about this part of town over the weekend (thanks to @everylot_rva), and with more humans moving into the area there's a need for more neighborhood-scale retail. You know, places to get toothpaste, toilet paper, and beer—the essentials. You can flip through the VUU / Chamberlayne plan (big PDF) if you'd like to see the approved and adopted vision for the neighborhood.
Alright people, if you want an open/slow street in your neighborhood—so folks have the necessary space to safely walk, bike, roll, get some exercise, make their way to the nearest bus stop, or just get out of their dang homes for a minute—you should fill out this form. This is the official form, and your feedback will get passed along to the team the City has working on creating more safe space for people in our City. Seriously though, fill out the form, it'll take two minutes.
It's nearly summer, and this thread on /r/rva has me missing hot days hanging out around a big table with friends and family, eating crabs, and drinking cheap beer—now this is definitely the essentials, forget toothpaste.
This morning's longread
I am a simple potato guardian who needs my Second Amendment rights
Alexandra Petri is just the best.
The farmer’s daughter brought me another glass of milk and watched me as I sipped it. I think it is too late to tell her that milk is not a good drink when you are hot in the middle of the day. I think we have gotten into a pattern now, which I regret. She is nice. She has kind eyes, like I imagine a potato would have, though she only has two, which is low for a potato. After drinking the milk, I dozed a little, and when I awoke there were more footprints at the edge of the field. I must be more vigilant. If I do not protect the potatoes, who will?
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