Month: June 2009

UVA baseball will be heading to its first College World Series after defeating Ole Miss 5-1 this past Sunday in the NCAA Oxford Super Regional at the Oxford-University Stadium/Swayze Field.

The Rebels started the game off strong, bringing in one run in the first inning, but left the scoreboard empty for the next eight innings as the Cavaliers’ pitching managed to hold Ole Miss to one run and seven hits.

While sophomore pitcher Tyler Wilson mounted a strong defense after relieving senior Robert Poutier, UVA offense joined the Rebels on the scoreboard in the fourth inning. With sophomores Dan Grovatt on second and Phil Gosselin on third, freshman John Hicks hit a sacrifice fly to bring Gosselin home for the run.

The fifth inning saw three more Virginia runs by sophomore John Barr, junior Franco Valdes and freshman Steven Proscia.

To seal the win in the eight inning, UVA junior pitcher Matt Packer kept the Rebels off the scoreboard.

The Cavaliers now head to coach Brian O’Connor’s hometown of Omaha, Nebraska to face off against LSU for the title at Rosenblatt Stadium next weekend.
 

The Democratic primaries are upon us. Here is a summary of who is running for what:

Virginia Governor:
Senator Creigh Deeds, who seems to be leading the polls; former Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAuliffe, who has raised the most money; and former Delegate Brian Moran.

The winner will face Republican candidate Bob McDonnell in November.

Virginia Lieutenant Governor:
Michael Signer, former Deputy Counselor to Governor Mark Warner;                            Jody Wagner, former State Treasurer and Secretary of Finance.

Jon Bowerbank, the third Democratic candidate, withdrew from the race last month.

Polling places are open tomorrow from 6am to 7pm.

Bad news got worse for Halsey Minor, owner of the Landmark Hotel on the Downtown Mall.

Today, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) announced that it will not sell the Atlanta-based Silverton Bank, from which Minor took out a $23.7 million loan to finance the hotel, and will stop efforts to find eligible buyers.

On May 1, the FDIC had seized the failing bank with the hope of finding buyers.

For a timeline of the Landmark Hotel, click here.

Just a weekend away from the Gubernatorial primaries on June 9, the newest Suffolk University poll is showing Senator Creigh Deeds leading the pack.

Deeds tops the list with 29 percent, a slight margin over money powerhouse Terry McAuliffe, with 26 percent. Brian Moran trails with 23 percent. A good 22 percent of people polled remain undecided.

On June 1, the Virginia Public Access Project released the campaign finance reports for the period that covered April 1 through May 27.

McAuliffe raised $1.8 million during the period, followed by Moran with $844,242 and Deeds with $678,428.

Deeds’ surge in popularity may have something to do with the endorsement by the Washington Post a couple of weeks ago.

Just yesterday, in an editorial, the Post deemed Deeds the best candidate to tackle transportation issues.

“Mr. Deeds, from Bath County in west-central Virginia, has consistently taken the political risk of supporting transportation packages that would help Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads. As a moderate, rural lawmaker, he is best positioned to attract broad, statewide support for a transportation package. He’s also the only candidate to make clear that passing a statewide transportation package would be his top priority. Long-suffering commuters should keep that in mind when they cast ballots in Tuesday’s Democratic primary,” reads the editorial.

Well, the weather outside is frightful…

 …but Lily Allen’s "Smile" is so gosh-darned delightful.

 And, since there’s no place to go…or run to, baby…

 …well, you’re pretty much a captive audience, aren’t you? Your weekend plans, below. You can’t get away from ’em, baby, no matter how hard you try:

John Lowry, Independent candidate for the Samuel Miller District seat on the County Board of Supervisors, released a statement on the much-debated water supply plan.

Lowry, who has officially declared his candidacy for the seat, said, via a press statement, that he supports the 50-year water plan.

According to Lowry, the Ragged Mountain reservoir can either be fixed of its deficiencies or be rebuilt. The same should be done with the water pipeline coming from Sugar Hollow.

Because of population growth in the community, Lowry believes in “more capacity AND dredging AND conservation. I have no objections to considering dredging the Rivanna Reservoir, particularly if the goal is to extend its lifespan. But dredging is not the alternative,” he said.

The financing of the plan, says Lowry, will be done using debt.
 

According to a report, the UVA endowment has begun to recover after months of significant losses.

In March, UVIMCO, a foundation charged with providing investment management services to the University, recorded a positive investment return of $78.3 million.

In April, returns netted $115.6 million for an overall value of $3.9 billion.

Prior to this, the UVA endowment suffered heavy losses: In the first quarter of the 2008 fiscal year the University’s multibillion dollar investments lost $600 million, or 11 percent.

By mid-October 2008, the policy benchmark had declined by another 20 percent.
 

The finest songs from our favorite rock rebel, Steve Earle, tend to impart some hard-wrought, bruised ‘n’ battered lesson. Earle’s struggles with drug addiction during the early portion of his career and his subsequent recovery—which has yielded some of his best music—makes the man something of a teacher of hard truths, a role he’s played across albums including 2007’s Washington Square Serenade and in his role as a Narcotics Anonymous mentor on "The Wire."

But it’s worth noting that Earle learned a good deal of his lessons from another teacher. Earle returns to The Paramount Theater on Saturday night in support of his new album, Townes, a collection of 15 songs by Townes Van Zandt. There’s plenty of press on Earle’s relationship with Van Zandt, but Earle’s feelings towards his friend are summed up best by a single, oft-used soundbite: ”Townes Van Zandt is the best songwriter in the whole world and I’ll stand on Bob Dylan’s coffee table in my cowboy boots and say that."

Feedback is a Townes Van Zandt fan as well. (In fact, local Thomas Gunn is known to do a great cover of "Rake," one of our favorite TVZ tunes.) So he was thrilled when Snag Films, which hosts a handful of quality rock docs, sent us a copy of the Townes Van Zandt documentary, Be Here to Love Me. Watch the movie—yup, the whole darned thing—below. And get psyched; Earle’s set is going to be a good’n:

Be Here to Love Me

And, as a bonus, here’s a great version of "Rake" from the man himself:

Carol Whitehead, editor, secretary and wife of Founder and President of the Rutherford Institute John Whitehead suddenly died this afternoon. She was the mother of five, including former C-VILLE staff writer and current contributor Jayson Whitehead.

She collapsed in her office during the first presentation of the Institute’s 2009 Summer Speaker Series, a talk by Operation Rescue founder and anti-abortion activist Randall Terry this morning.

Click here to read about Terry’s presentation.