Good morning, RVA! It's 29 °F and gross out there. It's raining or sleeting or snowing or some combination of all three, and the forecast says you should expect that to continue until at least tomorrow. We are still under a Winter Storm Warning until 7:00 AM tomorrow, and the National Weather Service at Wakefield says "a crippling ice accumulation is expected across the hardest hit areas from the previous system."
As you'd expect, all the normal thing are closed: schools, local governments, and VCU. The City has even posted a list of steep streets preemptively closed due to potential ice build up. Basically, this is serious biz, you shouldn't leave your home if you don't have to, and, if you must, plan to take it way, way slow.
Water cooler
As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 2,284 new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 38 new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 289 new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 102, Henrico: 126, and Richmond: 61). Since this pandemic began, 723 people have died in the Richmond region. The seven-day averages of both cases and deaths continues to fall while the seven-day average of hospitalizations continues to stay pretty flat. I continue to not know what that means.
Yesterday, the Governor did announce the new statewide COVID-19 vaccine call center, which you can reach at 1.877.VAX.IN.VA (1.877.829.4682). The new call center can answer basic vaccine questions and help you or a loved one fill out the new statewide pre-registration form. Local health district call centers do still exist, though, so if you've got a burning question about a specific local thing, you may want to start there (the Richmond and Henrico Health Districts call center number is 804.205.3501). Ana Ley, a reporter with the Virginian Pilot, says 69 of the 750 call center staff speak Spanish, and, as of this morning, it does look like the new pre-registration form has been translated into Spanish by an actual human, rather than relying on the Google Translate bot. One other update: The search to see if you're in the State's system is no longer case sensitive. Iterative progress!
Unfortunately, today's gross weather has cancelled a bunch of regional vaccination events, too. If you had an appointment today, check out this page on the Richmond and Henrico Health District's website and this page on the Chesterfield Health District's website to learn more about when you should expect to have your appointment rescheduled.
I don't know what to make of this blossoming relationship between Councilmember Jones, who's running for the 69th House District seat, and the City's 8th District Councilmember Trammell. Here they are out front of the CVS on Walmsley demanding that that location begin vaccinating individuals, reports Sabrina Moreno and Chris Suarez in the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Unpopular opinion, maybe, but the Walmsley location (4715 Walmsley Boulevard) is pretty tough to get to unless you have a car. Yeah, it sits right on the #86 bus line, but that bus only comes once an hour—which means lots of waiting either before or after vaccination appointments for seniors. The Forest Hill location (5001 Forest Hill Avenue), is, undeniably, in a more affluent neighborhood, but at least it's accessible by a 30-minute bus route and a 15-minute bus route (the #20 and #2). Plus it's within walking distance from the apartments along Westover Hills Boulevard near George Wythe High School. As Councilmember Trammell says, "We represent some of the poorest of the poor...They don’t have cars, they can’t drive. They’re elderly. They don’t want to cross the river." At some point, I'd love to see our City's leadership, planners, advocates, everybody, move past the idea that bus service just existing is good enough. Critical and essential services should be located along and accessible by useful bus service.
Density! Mike Platania at Richmond BizSense reports that City Council has granted a special use permit for a co-housing project on Arthur Ashe Boulevard. This project will bring 148 homes to what is currently a parking lot. Co-housing means shared living space, but it also means rent around $800 per month. Also! Check out this amazing quote from an actual REAL ESTATE DEVELOPER: "I worry that the parking decks that I’m building will become an albatross around my neck in 15 years...With Uber, Lyft, and scooters—whatever it is, there’s a lot of pressure being taken off the need to own a car. All these neighborhoods are walkable; everything is going in that direction.” Yes, yes it is!
Assuming folks have power this evening, here's a Zoom worth hopping on to: STAY RVA's monthly STAY CHAT will host Genevieve Siegel-Hawley and Danny Greene for a discussion on "the history, the legacy, and the current state of segregation/integration in our schools." The event is free, but you need to go sign up on the Eventbrite. If you have time, your optional homework ahead of the chat is to listen to this episode of the Revisionist History podcast about Brown v. Board of Education.
This morning's longread
The Nightmare Share
This is a story about a horrible roommate, but, really, it's a story about a housing crisis.
New York roommate stories often begin with a kind of claustrophobic, reluctant symbiosis: Two people, linked solely by necessity, now also have to share the same bathroom. Here, finding a place to live is so notoriously difficult, the hunt so mythologically cutthroat, that the parties tend also to be united in desperation. Agreements are forged hastily via text message, in the DMs of third-party apps, as last-minute promises. Owners, renters, subletters, sub-subletters, Airbnb hosts, and Craigslist couch surfers alike learn to size one another up in relation to their own needs; how red the flags appear often depends on how broke you are.
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