Good morning, RVA! It's 58 °F, and, whoa, today looks lovely. Expect sunshine, highs in the low 70s, and every reason to spend some time on the porch or in a park.
Water cooler
Richmond Police are reporting that Shaheem King, a man in his 20s, was found shot to death on the 1200 block of Admiral Gravely Boulevard. According to the RPD's website, this is the fifth murder in 10 days.
As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 923↘️ new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 15↘️ new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 64↘️ new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 36, Henrico: 26, and Richmond: 2). Since this pandemic began, 368 people have died in the Richmond region. VDH's pandemic dashboard overcame whatever technical issues it faced yesterday and has now returned to the internet. You can see that the Central Region, where we all live, currently is experiencing "Moderate Community Transmission" with "moderate burden" and a "fluctuating trend." Remember, community transmission is a combination of a bunch of metrics and trends and exists so we'll have a single phrase to say to describe the overall coronapicture in our region. Notably, community transmission in the Central Region dropped to "moderate" after spending six weeks at "substantial." Also, remember to check out the CDC School Metrics tab, where you can filter some of this data by locality. For Richmond City, the number of new cases per 100,000 people within the last 14 days is orange or "higher risk" (135.9), and the percentage of PCR tests that are positive during the last 14 days is light green or "lower risk" (3.4%). How schools—and individuals—interpret this data remains to be seen!
The Richmond Times-Dispatch's Jessica Nocera reports that, in Chesterfield, "prekindergarten through third-graders will return to classrooms in two weeks"—that's October 12th. As Chesterfield attempts a hybrid return to in-person instruction model, the rest of the region, including myself, looks on with interest! Epidemiologically speaking, I feel like this plan could work. Pedagogically speaking, I have no idea!
Yesterday, City Council's Public Safety Committee took up RES. 2020-R048, the last of Council's summertime police reform legislation. This paper asks the Richmond Police Department to "revise its policies to ban the use of certain non-lethal weapons to control unlawful assemblies" aka asks the police to stop using chemical weapons on protestors. I didn't bring up this paper yesterday because I assumed the Committee would just continue it, and I was pretty bummed about the continuation of the Pulse Corridor rezoning (which, by the way, is continued until after the election—fascinating!). Public Safety did not continue RES. 2020-R048, and, in fact, recommended to full Council that it be stricken. If I recall my Council procedure correctly, I think this means that a majority of Council must now vote to put this item back on the agenda—otherwise that's that. Bummer. Looking forward, theoretically, in the future, a properly empowered and progressively staffed Civilian Review Board could take up the RPD's chemical weapons policy and get it changed. But that's a lot of Ifs. Also, remember that RES. 2020-R048 is just that, a non-binding resolution. The Mayor could, at any moment, just demand that the police department change their policies. I guess we'll wait on that. So what are police doing to limit the use of chemical weapons against protestors right now? Roberto Roldan at VPM has this audio clip of Chief Gerald Smith talking through the Department's updated policy which is not nothing. However, I remain unconvinced that RPD needs these weapons at all or that they understand why folks want them banned from our city. Whatever the case, I would like to hear more empathy from our leaders on this topic.
Speaking of, CNU's Judy Ford Wason Center released two statewide polls in the past couple of weeks, and yesterday's asked a couple of questions about police reform. 98% of Virginia voters support de-escalation training for cops, 95% support requiring body cameras, 70% support establishing civilian oversight boards. Unsurprisingly, folks are split along party lines about more progressive police reform measures. For example, 68% of Democrats support prohibiting police from buying military-grade weapons, while only 26% of Republicans do.
Sometimes I wonder how we're going to do all of these surveys after the pandemic ends and we all aren't sitting around with tons of survey time on our hands. Maybe we'll meet in bars and restaurants just to pal around and fill out some surveys—I can think of worse ways to spend an evening. Anyway, you should take some time today to fill out this COVID-19 Needs Assessment Survey coordinated by the Peter Paul Community Action Network in partnership with the VCU Department of Family Medicine and Population Health. I do hope a lot of folks fill this one out. It's fascinating to learn from these broad surveys what the most important issue people are facing during coronatimes. In the last six months have you stockpiled food? Isolated from other people? Taken a COVID-19 test? I want to see the results of this survey so bad.
Richmond Magazine's Piet Jones somehow convinced a couple area chefs to disclose how much their restaurants spend on ingredients and labor for a handful of dishes. What would you guess is the second most expensive component of Brenner Pass's Fondue Burger? The bun? The lettuce-y stuff? The fries?
The Henrico and Richmond City Health Districts will host another community testing event today, this one at St. Paul's Baptist Church North (4247 Creighton Road) from 10:00 AM–12:00 PM. This event is drive-thru only! If you don't have a car and need to find a test, call the coronavirus hotline at 804.205.3501.
Well, the presidential debate happened, and, as foretold, it was a spectacle. I do want to be clear, though: There's no both-sides-did-it to what happened last night. Donald Trump abused the rules, Joe Biden, the moderator, and the audience. I don't know what we expect Biden—or any human—to do when put in a situation like that, but, whatever it is, it's unfair to frame it as "fiery squabbling" or "trading barbs." It's just not an honest or accurate way to describe what happened. Also: Trump refused to condemn white supremacists and told the Proud Boys, an actual white supremacist group, to "stand back and stand by." I kind of can't even believe there's more of these on the schedule.
This morning's longread
The Cheating Scandal That Ripped the Poker World Apart
I will read about anything that rips a world that I have no familiarity with apart. Someone point me to the scandal the ripped the professional LEGO builders world apart.
Most seasoned players would call or raise in his situation: The statistical likelihood that his hand would yield a favorable monetary outcome was high enough to make proceeding to the river an easy choice. But Postle had an unorthodox style of play, and he often made decisions that his rivals deemed either wildly aggressive or inexplicably meek. Those instincts had served him well in recent months: He was in the midst of an epic winning streak—a “heater”—that had turned him into a local folk hero. He'd become such a force on Stones' livestream, in fact, that casino regulars had taken to calling him the Messiah and even God. Postle spent half a minute in quiet contemplation, almost motionless in his black leather chair. Then, pursing his lips in resignation, he chucked his cards forward to fold.
If you’d like your longread to show up here, go chip in a couple bucks on the ol’ Patreon.