Good morning, RVA! It's 58 °F, and maybe a little rainy. Today you can expect clouds and slightly cooler temperatures—but still pretty warm for March. Highs in the 60s for most of the weekend. Enjoy!
Water cooler
As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 1,250 new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 53 new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 107 new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 58, Henrico: 33, and Richmond: 16). Since this pandemic began, 1,146 people have died in the Richmond region. Here's this week's stacked chart of new reported cases, hospitalizations, and deaths. The deaths chart may be useable again in the next week or two, and the hospitalizations chart still shows a worryingly large number of people sent to the hospital every day. Locally, the number of new cases continues to decrease, but maybe has started to plateau a bit. I'm hoping warmer weather, more time outside, and more humans vaccinated means those numbers will continue to tick downwards.
I think President Biden's speech last night is worth watching if you didn't catch it live—not only for the coronavirus updates but just to remember what it's like to have a real president again. Over the course of about 20 minutes, Biden set out a few goals applicable to this section of the newsletter. First, all states will open eligibility for vaccination to all adults by May 1st. That doesn't mean everyone will have the opportunity to be vaccinated by May 1st, just they they'll be eligible for vaccination. Depending on supply of the vaccine, this could be really great or it could further infuriate folks already stressed out about a confusing process. The last thing we want to do is declare everyone eligible but not have enough vaccine for all of those everyones. Remember when the governor did exactly that a bunch of weeks back? Yeah, not great. Second, Biden thinks we'll have made enough progress on vaccinating the general population that small, safe backyard hangs will be possible by July 4th. Huge if true, and I shall make Alton Brown's soft pretzels in celebration. Third, he mentioned a new website to help folks find vaccination appointments near them. I don't know what that last thing means, but I do know the technology behind letting folks know they're eligible for vaccination and getting them registered for an appointment currently sucks.
Also, given the reactions in a couple of my group texts, Slacks, and on my Twitter time line, it looks like the Richmond and Henrico Health Districts open up a bunch of appointments to frontline essential workers and folks aged 16–64 with underlying conditions and disabilities. If you're in either of those categories and waiting on a vaccination appointment: Check your email!
The Richmond Times-Dispatch's Chris Suarez has a wide-ranging piece about development, community engagement, and casinos on Richmond's Southside. The piece is not really about the ongoing casino discussion, but this quote from organizer Sean Crippen is great "It doesn’t help us. If someone came to you and said, ‘Hey, what does your community need?’ A casino would be at the very bottom. You wouldn’t even think about it...It makes no sense. But if you’re going to do it, at least provide jobs, let us help."
Wyatt Gordon at the Virginia Mercury reports on a new bill the General Assembly passed this year allowing localities to lower their speed limits to 15 miles per hour. Speed kills, plain and simple. Check out these graphs from Pro Publica showing the dramatic rise in risk when you're involved in a 20mph crash vs. a 40mph crash. And while the best way to slow drivers down is to change the physical design of our streets, Gordon quotes author Angie Schmitt on the impact of speed limits: "Folks often think that just changing the signs won’t make any difference, but that’s not true...Research shows lower speed limits reduce average speeds. Lowering the speed people are struck by even just 5 mph can make a huge difference, especially if the victim is older"
Also for the Virginia Mercury, Graham Moomaw explains Virginia's version of the Voting Rights Act—a first for a Southern state. While still needing the Governor's signature, the bill would "require local election officials to go through a review process before making election-related decisions like consolidating or closing polling places, changing district boundaries, creating at-large seats on local governing bodies or school boards or affecting the ability of non-English speakers to vote." Moomaw even mentions how a law like this maybe could have prevented the City's decision to move the registrar's office to a location only accessible by car—or at least required some more public conversation around that decision.
Via /r/rva, take a look at these pictures of a Seward trunk that one of the redditors found at a Colonial Heights Goodwill. Then read the top comment for a fun history of the Seward Trunk Co. which was based out of Petersburg.
This morning's longread
I Used to Insist I Didn’t Get Angry. Not Anymore.
I loved this piece about women's anger, and it helped me process some of the anger I've been feeling lately. I mean, a lot of us have been angry about a lot of different things over the last year, and that's OK.
Confronting my own aversion to anger asked me to shift from seeing it simply as an emotion to be felt, and toward understanding it as a tool to be used: part of a well-stocked arsenal. When I walked in the Women’s March in Washington a year ago — one body among thousands — the act of marching didn’t just mean claiming the right to a voice; it meant publicly declaring my resolve to use it. I’ve come to think of anger in similar terms: not as a claiming of victimhood but as an owning of accountability. As I write this essay eight months pregnant, I don’t hope that my daughter never gets angry. I hope that she lives in a world that can recognize the ways anger and sadness live together, and the ways rage and responsibility, so often seen as natural enemies, can live together as well.
If you’d like your longread to show up here, go chip in a couple bucks on the ol’ Patreon.
