FitzHerald-Tribune

Goodbye, C-VILLE Weekly! February 3, 2012

Fri, 03 Feb 2012 16:37:44 -0500

Goodbye, C-VILLE Weekly!

February 3, 2012

In October 2006, I was hired as a full-time calendar editor at...

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 16:17:42 -0500

In October 2006, I was hired as a full-time calendar editor at C-VILLE Weekly. In more than five years, I wrote two columns, served as editor of both the arts and news sections, was the “unofficial sex correspondent,” and became better neighbors with loads of Charlottesville and Albemarle County residents.

The week I was hired, a llama named London Ray escaped from a farm in Scottsville. I kept this photo above my desk through the duration of my time here.

Now, it’s time for me to make my escape. I start a job at the Columbia Journalism Review on February 13. So, much like London Ray, I’m hopping the fence and heading for the hills. Fortunately, the FitzHerald-Tribune is highly portable; I’ll keep posting here.

Despite inquiries into climate scientist Michael Mann’s research...

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 01:26:00 -0500

Despite inquiries into climate scientist Michael Mann’s research that have supported his conclusions, some coverage suggests it may be harder for the scientist to clear his name. Following his appearance at UVA, one local TV report described climate research itself as “controversial.” The Hook opened a story about Mann’s appearance with this quote from the scientist: “There’s nothing wrong with being wrong.”

That quote, however, was ripped from context. Mann’s comment referred to Berkeley Professor Richard Muller, not to himself—something not clarified in the paper’s coverage, and labeled “misleading” by one commenter. In an October interview, Muller said that “everybody should have been a skeptic two years ago,” but he concluded in a separate study that a rise in temperature was confirmed “without bias.”

C-VILLE Weekly

January 24

Photo by John Robinson

After two years on the market and a few unrealized developments,...

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 12:21:13 -0500

After two years on the market and a few unrealized developments, the properties at 301 W. Main St. are under contract with a West Virginia hotel management firm called Virginia Inn Management, Inc., to build a Marriott franchise on the corner of West Main and Ridge/McIntire roads. The hotel chain confirmed that the site is tentatively slated for a 2014 opening.

C-VILLE Weekly

January 17

Photo by Eric Kelley

Bypass vote may haunt Albemarle supervisors

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 01:25:13 -0500

Albemarle Supervisor Duane Snow (pictured) recapped his April meeting with Supervisor Rodney Thomas and Secretary of Transportation Sean Connaughton, and told the board that he had pledged support for the Western Bypass in return for state funds to local transportation priorities. Rooker replied that Snow failed to adequately inform the board, and had the minutes from a previous meeting to prove it. So, C-VILLE called Snow for his response.

“I don’t know if I just failed to say it,” Snow told C-VILLE.

C-VILLE Weekly

January 10

Boy, oh, Boyd!

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:58:56 -0500

This year, leading Republican Albemarle Supervisor Ken Boyd won reelection against a Democratic opponent, following the resurrection of a $200M-plus road project thought long-gone, but resurrected by the state. Here’s how it happened, why it happened, and how Boyd benefitted.

Time after time

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:48:00 -0500

Arguably my favorite interview of 2011. Meet the charming, eloquent David Todd—the man who fixes Thomas Jefferson’s clocks.

C-VILLE Weekly

September 13

"God doesn’t strike somebody dead if there’s a criminal crossing a property with a gun. No, he can..."

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 23:31:48 -0500

““God doesn’t strike somebody dead if there’s a criminal crossing a property with a gun. No, he can cross right there and, as Cho proved, do whatever he wants.””

- This year, Virginia set a record for firearm sales. In Albemarle County, the number of gun dealers also rose. And a firearms advocate from Northern Virginia (quoted above, weeks before another Virginia Tech shooting) planned a protest at UVA, which promptly banned concealed carry among faculty and students.

While C-VILLE pushed Biscuit Run back into the headlines, I also...

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 23:19:00 -0500

While C-VILLE pushed Biscuit Run back into the headlines, I also took on a smaller land deal—namely, a 19-acre site in northern Albemarle’s hot-to-develop stretch. Here’s a two-parter on how development plans fell apart.

C-VILLE Weekly

December 13

"Disorder in the court: Are UVA Law’s gossip headlines self-inflicted?"

Tue, 27 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0500

“Disorder in the court: Are UVA Law’s gossip headlines self-inflicted?”

- Click here to read more.

C-VILLE Weekly

December 27

Where students, tourists and townspeople met

Tue, 20 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0500

During his 30 years as owner and manager of The Tavern, Shelly Gordon served three types of people at his lodge-style, UVA-bedazzled diner: students, tourists, and townspeople. Last week, when I stopped in for my final Tavern breakfast—pecan pancakes, salty bacon, a gallon of coffee—Gordon’s crowd seemed largely unchanged.

The building, located in a prominent UVA entrance corridor, may change yet.

C-VILLE Weekly

December 20

Silt happens

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0500

$3.5 million lawsuit against Hollymead Town Center developers may grow.

C-VILLE Weekly

November 22

UVA's free speech guru gets mouthful of praise at gala

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0400

Two weeks after his 77th birthday, Bob O’Neil —UVA’s sixth president, former director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection for Free Expression, and wise old bird—returned to Charlottesville for a gala in his honor. O’Neil, who retired from the Thomas Jefferson Center in May and now lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland, spent the first 90 minutes of his celebration standing 10’ from the front door of UVA Law School’s Caplin Pavilion greeting guests.

“Happy Bar Mitzvah,” one remarked. O’Neil smiled and shook his hand.

C-VILLE Weekly

November 1

“Roughly one year ago, A.A. Bondy’s instincts brough...

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 13:15:27 -0400

“Roughly one year ago, A.A. Bondy’s instincts brough him to Los Angeles, Caliornia. They led him to venice Beach, where the Pacific Ocean breaks along Bay Street. They taught him to surf, and urged him to stay afloat while the ocean followed its own instinct and tried to pull him under. They also led him to record Believers, the third album recorded under his own name…”

My interview with A.A. Bondy

PopMatters

October 24

Garrett Hall, $12.2 million later

Sun, 23 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0400

So, I read E.L. Doctorow’s Ragtime, loosely based around the murder of architect Stanford White. Shortly after I finished the book, UVA finished renovations on White’s last building for the ~~campus~~ grounds. One thing led to another, and…

C-VILLE Weekly

October 23

C-VILLE Food & Drink Annual

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0400

For C-VILLE’s Food & Drink annual, I wrote about:

The aesthetic pleasures of weird salts

Eating invasive species, like lionfish

My favorite (relatively) late-night menu

Kale’s kick-ass nutrient density

Homemade kombucha

All-you-can-eat gelato

The next neighborhood

Tue, 11 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0400

The tale of the Martha Jefferson neighborhood, through two houses.

The two-story homes at 509 and 513 Locust Ave. were built in 1903. The same year, Dr. Halstead Hedges and six local doctors decided to build a sanatorium at 919 High St.—Hedges’ home, located less than a quarter-mile from the Locust houses and, until then, the site of his medical practice.

C-VILLE Weekly

October 11

A snail's pace; or, Charlottesville's new invasive

Tue, 04 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0400

In the tradition of buzzards and ferocious dogs, here’s another in what I consider to be a formidable collection of strange animal stories. Meet Charlottesville’s newest invasive species: the Chinese Mystery snail!

Fittingly, the Chinese mystery snail took its time getting to Virginia. In the late 19th century, food markets in San Francisco imported the creatures; within 20 years, perhaps due to merchants breeding them in area waters, they’d reached the San Francisco Bay. “This snail is readily imported for Asian food markets,” reads a report from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources, which documented the snails in 2004. Some releases, according to the report, “may have been intentional in an effort to create a local food source.”

C-VILLE Weekly

October 4

“In early 2010, I interviewed painter Russ Warren at his...

Mon, 05 Sep 2011 23:32:24 -0400

“In early 2010, I interviewed painter Russ Warren at his home, a brick building on 30 acres of land, atop a wooded hill in northern Albemarle. During our talk, he mentioned a gig opening for Texas blues legend Lightning Hopkins. After my initial reaction—shock, sure, but also envy and curiosity—I tried to steer us back to the interview and to focus my attention on something other than the well-kept, dustless Martin guitar in his studio corner.

“’I don’t want to waste your time on non-art things,’ Warren told me at the time. ‘But my amp, over there…’ And we were lost.”

C-VILLE Weekly

August 9

Ramadan in jail

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0400

Days before Ramadan, Islam’s month-long holy fast, the ACLU of Virginia sent letters to sheriffs and jail superintendents throughout the state to reiterate the religious rights of Muslim inmates. Each year, writes ACLU fellow Thomas Fitzpatrick, Muslim inmates complain about meals served during the hours when they are required to fast.

C-VILLE Weekly

August 23