Good morning, RVA! It's 60 °F, and today’s weather forecast looks wonderful. Expect highs in the upper 70s and low humidity. It’s a great Wednesday to get outside!
Water cooler
As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports the seven-day average of new COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths as: 137, 22, and 5.6, respectively. VDH reports a seven-day average of 18.9 new cases in and around Richmond (Richmond: 2.7; Henrico: 9.6, and Chesterfield: 6.6). Since this pandemic began, 1,353 people have died in the Richmond region. 45.9%, 57.3%, and 53.8% of the population in Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterfield have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
OK, the VDH dashboard caught up with the Governor, and, as of yesterday morning, now reports that 70.0% of Virginians 18 and older have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Unfortunately, America as a whole has not caught up, and yesterday the president’s team announced that the U.S. will not hit his 70% goal by July 4th. Like I’ve said many times over the last couple of weeks, this particular goal is fairly arbitrary anyway, and, even now, we’re pretty dang close (65.4% of Americans have received at least one dose). We’ll get there—and we’ll get even further—but it’ll take more time and a lot of hard work.
The Governor announced that he wants to replace the 134-year-old time capsule embedded in the plinth of the Robert E. Lee statue with something less racist. Check out this article from October 26, 1887 in the Richmond Dispatch which describes some of the things included in the Very Lost Cause Time Capsule currently embedded in the monument: some Virginia Confederate buttons, a battle-flag and square and compass made from the tree over Stonewall Jackson’s grave, and a $100,000 Confederate bond. The coolest part of this whole thing, is that you can submit an artifact for consideration for the new, less-racist time capsule by filling out a form on the aforelinked website. Your item should, of course, represent Virginia, and I personally think it would be more interesting if it represented this present moment, as well. Maybe a vaccine card? Something Marcus-David Peters related? A tear gas canister that the RPD used against protestors around the Lee Monument itself? And, in case you were wondering like I was, “On March 22, 2021, Historic Jamestown, an entity of Preservation Virginia, conducted a scan of the pedestal and identified a void in the base where the time capsule is likely housed. The Department of General Services analyzed the results of the scan and concluded that the time capsule can be removed and replaced without damaging the fidelity of the structure.” So just because the Governor wants to replace the time capsule does NOT mean that he’ll (necessarily) be taking down the plinth to do so.
Pulitzer Prize Winning Columnist Michael Paul Williams ties together two issues from the last couple of days—the Gilpin Court pool and the Chesterfield School Board’s Critical Race Theory statement—as examples of regional failures. I don’t think those things are quite the same magnitude. The former is systemic and needs about a billion dollars to really address while the latter was an individual choice made by a handful of elected officials. But, as Williams says, the message sent by both of these failures to our communities is pretty clear.
Noah Daboul at Richmond BizSense has this wild story about a 3D-printed house over on the city’s Southside. Instead of plastic filament, this giant 3D printer uses concrete and “almost looks like if you’re squeezing a tube of toothpaste.” Amazing. Double amazing is that this home will hit the market at a generally affordable $200,000. Science!
This might be boring, but City Council’s Governmental Operations committee meets today and will consider ORD. 2021-180, which would extend the deadline the Civilian Review Board Taskforce has to submit their recommendations to Council until August 30th. It also asks that the task force present a status report to the Gov Ops committee on July 28th. Both of those dates are right around the corner, which makes me think Council is ready to move on to the next step of the CRB process.
Cool civic opportunity alert! Richmond City Council is looking for seven members (and four non-voting alternate members) to serve on the Participatory Budgeting Steering Commission. Participatory Budgeting is when you, the public, participate in spending a portion of the City’s budget on whatever you see fit. This commission would shepherd that process from start to finish, which seems like rewarding work. You can fill out an application here and read through the PB ordinance here (ORD. 2020-256) to learn more about the process (I recommend skipping to the very-readable Background section at the bottom). You’ve got until July 1st to fill out your application!
This morning's longread
Hype House and the Los Angeles TikTok Mansion Gold Rush
This was published pre-pandemic, and now I simply must know what all these TikTok houses did when things began to shut down.
In 2014 members of an early collab channel called Our Second Life lived and worked together in what they called the 02L Mansion. The next year, nearly all the top talent on Vine moved into a large apartment complex at 1600 Vine Street. Soon after, YouTuber mansions were popping up all over the city. The Vlog Squad shacked up in Studio City, while Team 10, Jake Paul’s infamous YouTuber collective, rented a giant house in West Hollywood before eventually decamping to a mansion in Calabasas. Another group of YouTubers rented a $12 million mansion in the Hollywood Hills and deemed it the Clout House. Now, the TikTokers have arrived — and everything about TikTok happens faster than it does anywhere else.
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