News
Race for 2nd District could indicate how far ‘blue wave’ can carry Democrats
Editor’s note: Whether Democrats can retake the House of Representatives is the big storyline of this fall’s midterm election cycle. Four competitive Virginia House races for seats currently held by Republicans, profiled this week in a series in the Mercury, could play a key role come Election Day. As a small business owner in Norfolk, […]
Virginia Department of Health sends nurses to North Carolina
The state’s Department of Health, along with local departments in Fairfax and Arlington counties, are sending 35 public health nurses to North Carolina to provide emergency shelters with medical support in the wake of Hurricane Florence, which has so far killed 23 people. The first 22 nurses left Virginia on Sunday, while the state’s remaining […]
FERC allows construction to resume on Atlantic Coast Pipeline
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission gave permission Monday for construction to resume on the Dominion Energy-led Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Work on the 600-mile natural gas pipeline, which is planned to run though West Virginia, Virginia and eastern North Carolina, had been halted after a pair of decisions by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the […]
Mandatory evacuation order drove state storm prep costs to $60 million; Virginia sheriffs sued for not heeding it
The state estimates that the cost of preparing for Hurricane Florence will total nearly $60 million, Virginia Secretary of Finance Aubrey Lane said Monday. He said that’s more than the most the state has ever spent up front on a storm response, a result of the decision to issue a mandatory evacuation order for about 240,000 […]
Flooding in Danville; the Macker tests the waters in Iowa; moving graves for a tech park; judges won’t take over redistricting now; and other news
NEWS TO KNOW Our daily roundup of headlines from Virginia and elsewhere. Officials in Danville are nervously watching the Dan River, which could surpass its major flood stage threshold this afternoon as a result of rain from Florence. — Danville Register & Bee Former Gov. Terry McAuliffe is planning a trip to Iowa this week to […]
Death by a thousand cuts: Newsroom staffing at Virginia’s biggest papers cut nearly in half since 2010
The Richmond Times-Dispatch quietly laid off another eight employees at the beginning of September, the paper’s second round of layoffs this year and just the latest in a string of reductions that have nearly cut newsroom staffing in half since 2010. The move comes less than two months after the Times-Dispatch’s owner, Warren Buffett’s BH […]
Thousands of Virginia inmates are believed to have hepatitis C and can’t access the cure
The state treated Elmo Augustus Reid’s hepatitis C once before. It didn’t work. An inmate at the Buckingham Correctional Center in Dillwyn, Reid was treated in 2013 once he had fibrosis, or scarring, on his liver. He was given drugs that had been used to treat hepatitis C for years, but with little likelihood of […]
Florence hits North Carolina; Albemarle jail will continue notifying ICE; State retirement system hands out bonuses and other news
NEWS TO KNOW Our daily roundup of headlines from Virginia and elsewhere. As storm hits N.C., prep winds down in Va As Florence makes landfall in North Carolina, storm preparations were winding down in Virginia, where forecasters now expect the storm to bring only three to six inches of rain. Officials in Hampton Roads began shutting down storm […]
Dominion’s community solar program approved by Virginia regulators
The State Corporation Commission has approved Dominion Energy Virginia’s so-called community solar pilot program, under which the utility will offer its residential and commercial customers the output of solar farms to be built by independent solar developers here in Virginia. Customers will have the option to meet either all or part of their entire electric […]
ABC and Va. Lottery, which delivered more than $1 billion in revenue last year, have never gotten a full review by legislative audit commission
Two state agencies that have grown to be major revenue sources have never been comprehensively reviewed by the 45-year-old legislative commission created to oversee Virginia government. And staff at the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission think it’s time for the Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority and Virginia Lottery to be the subjects of audits […]
Sexually-transmitted diseases make a comeback in Virginia, with a dangerous antibiotic-resistant twist
Cases of gonorrhea, chlamydia and syphilis have been rising in Virginia and across the country, with data showing sharp increases in these sexually-transmitted diseases year-over-year since 2013. And so far this year, that trend has yet to stop, according to Virginia’s preliminary 2018 data. Already the state has more gonorrhea cases this year than compared […]
NYT poll gives Brat slight edge over Spanberger, illustrates difficulty of polling
A New York Times-Siena College poll of the state’s 7th Congressional District says Republican U.S. Rep. Dave Brat has a slight edge over his Democratic challenger, former CIA operative Abigail Spanberger. The poll of 501 people puts Brat’s likely share of the vote at 47 percent and Spanberger’s at 43 percent. Of the respondents, 9 […]