On February 22, Jim Moore, a supporter of two-time City Council candidate Kenneth Jackson, sent out a Facebook message to a long list of recipients titled “Help Ken,” seeking payment from supporters for an overdue $2,000 loan to avoid taking Jackson to court on March 20 (after C-VILLE went to press).
“In desperation to purchase TV time, Ken asked me to lend him $2,000 against the $2,545 balance in the account,” Moore wrote. Jackson and his partner signed a personal note, but, so far, says Moore, he hasn’t received any payment.
Moore set up a GoFundMe to collect on the debt, but after complaints from other supporters, he disabled the account.
A campaign finance report indicated that as of the end of the reporting period on November 30, 2017, a $2,000 loan made by Moore to the campaign on October 31 had a zero balance, according to Rosanna Bencoach, Charlottesville’s general registrar. She says there is no entry for loans repaid on that report, “so this may be in error.”
Bencoach also told C-VILLE that Jackson’s campaign finance filing for December reports that the loan from Moore was repaid on December 12.
Moore says the loan has not been repaid.
Other odd information appears in Jackson’s campaign finance reports. One donor, allegedly named “Mary Mary,” donated $700 and lists her occupation as “horse.”
When political donations are collected in Virginia for a non-federal campaign, campaigns are required to collect the name, home address and occupation of the donor. Fundraising campaigns on Gofundme.com do not typically collect home addresses or occupations.
At least two GoFundMe accounts were created in connection with the campaign: one that raised money directly for Jackson’s campaign last fall, and Moore’s short-lived effort to collect on his loan.
According to Rick Sincere, a former long-time member of the Charlottesville Board of Elections as well as the one-time chairman of the Virginia Republican Party, this form of fundraising may potentially be a violation of campaign finance laws.
“Using GoFundMe to raise campaign money is probably illegal, just as ‘passing the hat’ at an event would be, since you can’t properly trace the source of the donation for attribution to a particular donor or determine whether the source of funds is a foreign national, for instance,” Sincere says.
Moore says it was never his intention to run afoul of campaign law.
On the Facebook group page, he wrote, “OK. I’m sorry for this. I apologize and will remove this campaign. I let my frustration turn into vengeance. Please be aware that I did this with much advance notice and full knowledge by Ken.”
Says Moore, “I made a personal loan and I am disappointed it wasn’t repaid.”
Jackson, who says he had nothing to do with Moore’s loan collection efforts, first ran for City Council as the Republican nominee in 2003 and lost in the general election. He ran again as an independent last year and lost amid questions about other campaign finance irregularities.
The Charlottesville native says he’s through with the city.
“I should also inform you that I have no intention of moving back to Charlottesville nor seeking public office there,” says Jackson, who now lives near Farmville. “It has no longer become the home I knew and loved. Now it is just a hate-filled city focusing on things and not people who are the citizens.”
The city used to be a community not divided by race, color, religion or gender, he says. “That city no longer exists for me.”
Clarifications March 26: Jackson was identified as a conservative in the original story, but says he’s a fiscal conservative, and is not conservative on social issues.
Jackson says the campaign report he filed that listed contributor “Mary, Mary” with occupation “horse” was corrected within 24 hours. However, “Mary, Mary” still appears on a state campaign finance report.
Brasserie Saison is celebrating the season with German beers that eschew the traditional less-than-desirable Oktoberfest offerings from Munich, instead pouring dark, heavy American lagers that taste “far better than the real thing.” Photo by Natalie Jacobsen
What makes for a good fall beer? Extra body? Darker malt? Pumpkin spice? Every brewer and brewery in Charlottesville has their own ideas about this. So I grabbed a friend and visited five local breweries to see what their takes on fall beers are—and whether they shied away from the polarizing pumpkin beer.
At Reason Brewery up Route 29, I ordered a pumpkin beer. “We don’t have one,” responded Mark Fulton, one of Reason’s founders.
Good. I think pumpkin beer is usually terrible. And what Reason is offering for fall is a black lager, with a heft perfect for cooler weather. It’s on tap at the brewery and they intend to begin distributing it by the end of October. Hopped like a pale ale, the malt is dark but the ABV is still only around 5 percent.
“I personally am a dark beer fan,” Fulton said. “I think a lot of people sort of relate a darker beer with the cooler weather.”
Reason Brewery co-founder Mark Fulton says most people relate darker beer with cooler weather. The brewery currently has a black lager on tap that is hopped like a pale ale but has a rich flavor thanks to dark malt. Photo by Natalie Jacobsen
Our next stop was Champion to taste its annual pumpkin beer called Kicking and Screaming—so named because the brewers had to be dragged kicking and screaming into making a pumpkin beer. But this year, they apparently kicked their way out of it, because the pumpkin beer has now been deep-sixed.
Good.
Sean Chandler, our bartender, presented us with three samples of proposed fall beers from Champion.Biere de Garde, Fruit Casket (a double IPA) and Pacecar Porter.
The Biere de Garde was an instant winner: dark, spicy, richly blanketing the entire palate.
“My war is on pumpkin spice, not on spice or pumpkins,” says Jeff Diehm, whom I once again dragooned (he also helped determine the best grocery store bar in “Store credit: What’s the best grocery store bar in town?, August 2-8, 2017) into tasting beer with me. “I’d call it a very good after-dinner beer. It’s pretty spicy, and I think I would slip into something darker to close my evening.”
Champion’s Fruit Casket was a surprise. A double IPA brewed with agave that comes across neither as an IPA nor as gimmicky as it sounds. Big, full, less hoppy than you’d expect. This is what you want to sit around a bonfire with.
The Pacecar Porter is simultaneously dark and bright tasting. An unusual sharpness to the hops on top of a classic moderate porter.
Moving along to Three Notch’d Brewing’s new location at the IX Art Park, the first thing we noticed was that this place is pretty different from Three Notch’d’s first tasting location on Grady Avenue. The new place has a full-service kitchen, and executive chef Patrick Carroll focuses on local, sustainable ingredients and uses Three Notch’d’s craft beers and sodas in the food whenever possible.
The brewery’s Apple Crumb Amber Ale will be released soon, but it wasn’t available yet for us to taste. One of our bartenders made a face at the mention of pumpkin beer and didn’t even want to discuss it. What was available in an autumn mode was a Blue Toad Harvest Cider. It screamed cinnamon, but in a good way. You could put it on the table for Thanksgiving dinner and pair it with turkey and stuffing. We drank it alongside a shared platter of poutine, which featured fork-tender beef and fried cheese curds with onions and gravy covering a plate of fries. The perfect food to turn to halfway through a five-stop brewery crawl.
At Brasserie Saison, the Belgian restaurant and brewery on the Downtown Mall, a curious map of Europe was suggested by Munich-themed Oktoberfest banners and seasonal German beers offered alongside the classic Belgian offerings of steamed mussels and saison.
Manager Wil Smith served us tastes of the Oktoberfest beer and wouldn’t be baited into talking trash about pumpkin beers (which, fortunately, they aren’t making).
Traditional Oktoberfest beers in Munich are kind of crappy. In fact, that’s the whole point of them. Oktoberfest is a sloppy, drunken, week-long booze fest where a celebration of the palate isn’t exactly the point. American Oktoberfest beers, including Brasserie Saison’s, are often dark, heavy lagers that taste far better than the real thing.
Hardywood Pilot Brewery & Taproom’s Farmhouse Pumpkin Ale is a delightful departure from the pumpkin spice-laden beers typical of the genre. Photo by Natalie Jacobsen
Taking the free trolley up West Main Street, we visited Hardywood’s new-ish outpost near the Corner.
Lora Gess, our bartender, poured us tastes of Hardywood’s Farmhouse Pumpkin Ale. Diehm and I gleefully prepared to hate it as much as we each hate all things pumpkin spice.
“A lot of people have really misconstrued pumpkin-flavored everything because of what it is,” explains Gess in defense of her employer’s pumpkin ale. “It’s a pumpkin-spice-latte-kind-of-society these days. But [this beer is] fresh, it’s mild. You get a pumpkin flavor but not a fake pumpkin flavor.”
And she was right. Somehow, Hardywood made a pumpkin beer that wasn’t awful. In fact, it was great.
It starts life as a traditional farmhouse saison to which Hardywood adds fresh pumpkin—not canned, not frozen—fresh. Instead of an insipid blend of pie-inspired spices, the notes of spice come from the flavor profile of the malts and esters produced by the yeast. Hardywood has brewed a masterful pumpkin beer that took us by surprise and almost made us stop talking trash about pumpkin beer.
Almost.
As the sun went down, we wound up back downtown at South Street Brewery. Finally, we found the holy grail we’d been looking for all day: Twisted Gourd, described by our bartender as a pumpkin chai beer.
“This is a pumpkin spice beer,” Diehm observes with his first sip. “I think if someone was looking for a pumpkin beer, this is where to go get it. It’s South Street, so it’s always a good solid beer. And it’s got pumpkin, so I hate it. But if this is what you are looking for, it’s a solid pumpkin beer. It’s the most honest pumpkin beer I’ve had.”
“This is cloying,” I respond as I taste it. “It’s terrible. But it’s so true to what it is.”
If you like pumpkin spice lattes, you’re gonna love this beer. But if you don’t, South Street has you covered with several other fine autumn beers, including Soft-Serv (tastes like chocolate soft-serve ice cream) and a barrel-aged version of their classic Satan’s Pony.
William Taylor, president of the board at Piedmont Council for the Arts, says the organization, which took over management of the ArtInPlace program two years ago, outlived its purpose as a communications center for the arts community. Photo by Amy Jackson
One week after issuing a report on the economic contribution of the arts in August, the Piedmont Council for the Arts, which commissioned the study, closed its doors after 38 years. Only months earlier it had renovated space in York Place and hired a new executive director, the latest in a string of leaders over the past two years.
What went wrong?
According to the chairman of its board, William Taylor, the organization had outlived its purpose as a communications center for the arts community. Others suggest the problem might have been with the board. And the city, in denying funding for PCA earlier this year, questioned its fiscal viability and “operational stability” because it had not had an executive director for a year.
When the organization was founded there was no World Wide Web. Live Arts didn’t exist yet and the McGuffey Art Center was only seven years old. A lot has changed since then.
“PCA’s primary role 38 years ago was providing information about the arts and about art events to the public, and that was before modern technology and the internet,” Taylor says. “People don’t need PCA to distribute information that way anymore because it’s available. C-VILLE Weekly has a pretty comprehensive list. I think PCA was absolutely a critical piece of the puzzle in building today’s arts and cultural scene.”
In recent years, PCA appeared to struggle to find a mission since the disintegration of a major effort to lead the implementation of a cultural plan for Charlottesville that was intended to boost arts-related tourism, create new opportunities for children and provide affordable housing and studio space to local artists. Initial money was raised, a study was conducted, and an all-star committee put their names behind it.
But nothing ever happened.
Amid a broad turnover of leadership within local arts organizations, including PCA, Live Arts, The Bridge PAI and others, PCA’s big plan fizzled, and city government never got behind it. Aside from the popular ArtInPlace program, PCA became functionally invisible to most local artists and art-lovers.
“The cultural plan identified many opportunities for leveraging [PCA’s] work, but deepened investment from public and private sources, as well as continued active engagement from individuals and organizations were required for PCA to succeed,” says Maggie Guggenheimer, a former consultant to PCA who now works for the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. “In lieu of those, I think folding the organization was a judicious and responsible decision.”
Danielle Bricker worked at PCA from 2014 through 2016, and handled everything from accounting to event planning. She recalls working for an organization that always seemed to be in turmoil with a difficult board of directors and no clear direction.
PCA went through three executive directors during Bricker’s tenure. At times, Bricker was the organization’s only employee.
“I think the world of every executive director I worked under,” Bricker says. “The failure of the organization is not on them. It’s on the board of directors.”
Once the cultural plan came out, “Nobody really talked about how this would be funded,” Bricker says. “Nobody really talked about how we would develop the organizational capacity to really make this happen. At the same time we realized that that document was set up to fail, and we as an organization did not know what we needed to do next.”
According to Taylor, the decision to pull the plug was not made hastily.
“The entire time I’ve been chair of the board, I, along with the board, had been evaluating all aspects of the organization,” says Taylor, “and stability from an operational and financial standpoint was one of them. We spent a few months carefully evaluating the finances and decided it wasn’t a sustainable position and voted unanimously to wind down the organization.”
Taylor still believes that public arts coordination is essential and hopes that a successor organization will emerge to give the arts community a seat at the table in dealing with government.
“We certainly want to hand over any proceeds from the wind-down to the organization that would handle that,” Taylor says.
PCA’s executive director, Deborah McLeod, who owns Chroma Projects art laboratory, declined to be interviewed.
“She came to the organization at a very rocky time; she came with a lot of great ideas,” says Taylor. “I’m sad for this entire turn of events, but I’m particularly sad because I think that if Deborah had had just a little bit more runway she would have been able to do a lot of really great things at PCA.”
Bricker hopes to see a successor organization emerge, but ideally with a different group of people serving on its board.
“There are definitely people on the board who, I think, want to care about art and want to be that kind of person but it’s not their background,” Bricker says. “It’s not where they come from. It’s kind of this forced passion almost. Trying to tick off the boxes of what a good citizen looks like…definitely a kind of Rotary Club type is on the board.”
L.L. Bean, the newest addition to the Shops at Stonefield, is geared toward college students who want to give off an outdoorsy vibe, and day hikers in search of rations and non-breakable plastic wine glasses. Photo by Natalie Jacobsen.
L.L. Bean opened in Charlottesville a few weeks ago, which may be as much of a cultural milestone as the arrival of a Trader Joe’s.
The new store at the Shops at Stonefield arrives at a time when the outdoor business is in a state of upheaval on the north end of Charlottesville. Woodbrook Sports & Pro Shop, a family-owned gun and hunting store, recently closed due to rising rent and what seemed like increasing competition from Dick’s Sporting Goods and Gander Mountain. Then Dick’s Sporting Goods announced its intention to close its 29 North location (a Dick’s remains at 5th Street Station on the south end of town). And Gander Mountain declared bankruptcy only a few years after opening its massive outdoor equipment and apparel store. Thus, a vacuum on the north end was created, with Great Outdoor Provision Co. (known for high-quality hiking, camping and climbing gear) holding court a little further south in Barracks Road Shopping Center.
While L.L. Bean still has a whiff of the original hunting and fishing supplier that began in 1912 in Freeport, Maine, it isn’t going to scratch the outdoor itch for everyone. Its hunting and fishing supplies are only available online and are not offered in the new Charlottesville store. But it is still a place where you can pick up a decent sleeping bag or day pack if you don’t need a wide selection, or a pair of boots.
“One thing that we will never lose sight of, and is part of our DNA, is the outdoors,” says Mac McKeever, spokesman for L.L. Bean. “We started as an outdoor company. We started as a hunting and fishing company with the iconic Maine hunting boot. …That is our soul and we will never lose sight of that.”
While L.L. Bean still has a whiff of the hunting and fishing supplier that began in 1912 in Freeport, Maine, it isn’t quite going to scratch the outdoor itch for everyone.
At the store’s grand opening, McKeever’s point was illustrated by an enormous motorized L.L. Bean boot that was parked out front for the occasion. Imagine the Oscar Mayer Weinermobile, only less roomy inside and with nothing to eat. Also, it’s a boot.
The massively popular boots are available in the store, as is a lot of other apparel. But rather than outfitting serious wilderness expeditions, this store primarily sells clothing and accessories for people who may want to give off an outdoorsy vibe on their way to class. You can’t find a fishing rod or an ice axe, but there are non-breakable plastic wine glasses, exactly four propane canisters and a few stand-up paddle boards. There’s even trail rations, including Backpacker’s Pantry dehydrated pad Thai.
For those who would like to move beyond outdoor style and toward adventure, the new Bean store still has something to offer.
“We have expanded our outdoor programming through outdoor discovery schools,” McKeever says. “One thing that differentiates this store from other stores is that we sell the outdoor apparel but we also do demonstrations and clinics, some paid and some for free to teach people how to do it.”
Photo by Natalie Jacobsen.
Planned classes include fly-tying, paddleboarding 101 and setting up hiking boots for maximum comfort.
“So on Meetup, we’ll say, ‘Meet us at this trailhead at this time and this date and we’ll take you on a hike,’” says McKeever. “One of the reasons we chose this area is that people here not only have a great affinity for the outdoors, but there’s lots and lots of stuff to do in the outdoors. Tons of hiking, tons of biking trails.”
He is right about that. In and within an hour of Charlottesville, locals can fish for catfish, bass or eels, go flatwater and whitewater canoeing and kayaking, hunt everything from squirrels to black bear, go hang gliding, rock climbing, hiking or camping, or just sit in a park wearing fancy boots and taking selfies.
L.L. Bean’s history began with mail-order sales of the nearly indestructible boots, which are still handmade in Maine.
“We don’t chase trends,” says McKeever. “They have this interesting way of finding us. With the Bean boots they are now really popular with college students. They’ve always been popular with hunters and loggers and people who work outside because they keep your feet warm and dry and they’re tougher than a tire. But they’ve realized this huge crossover appeal lately with college students and people in the fashion world.”
The Barracks Road Harris Teeter’s bar was the hands-down winner of the night, with cheap prices and excellent service. Photo courtesy of Eze Amos.
As competition has grown among Charlottesville’s high-end grocery stores, a trend has emerged of adding bars. I’ve walked past these odd grocery store bars countless times but it has never occurred to me to pull up a stool and order a glass of beer before picking up milk and vegetables. Which invites the questions: Who in the heck goes to a grocery store bar—and why do they do it?
An investigation was needed. A Saturday night pub crawl, in which I was determined to drink beer at three area grocery store bars, ensued. I enlisted the help of a few friends: Jeff Diehm, Jeff’s girlfriend, Sierra Hammons, and Colleen Buchanan, our designated driver.
The bar at the Barracks Road Harris Teeter is tucked in along the wall behind the wine section, at the front end of the store. It’s easy to miss. Three patrons were perched atop bar stools as we approached. A baseball game was playing on a large TV and six taps stood near a wide selection of bottled beer. If you look straight ahead, it kind of feels like a normal bar. Turn around and you’ll see, well, a grocery store.
When we saw the prices, it started to feel less like a normal bar—in a good way. All six draft beers are $4 a pint, all the time. Bottles are $3—and that isn’t just Bud Light. Three bucks will get you a bottle of nearly any of the hundreds of 12-ounce bottled beers that Harris Teeter carries.
“We have really good prices and really good food here,” said Charles, our bartender.
Charles was right. It turns out that you can buy any prepared food from the deli section and bring it over to the bar to eat. Not only can you do this, but they encourage it: You get $1 off your beer with the purchase of a prepared food item.
There is no other bar in Charlottesville where you can eat and drink at these prices. The taps from Three Notch’d and Starr Hill cost less for a pint than at those breweries.
A woman walked over with, inexplicably, a basket of laundry and a dog. She ordered a beer and began chatting with another patron. Even at the grocery store, bars have colorful regulars.
Jeff got up, grabbed a bag of pretzels from the snack aisle and opened them on the bar. Charles scanned them and added them to our tab. In fact, your whole cart of groceries can be rung up while you sip a pint of beer or a glass of wine (the bar does not offer liquor).
“I just switched grocery stores,” Jeff declared.
Reluctantly, we pushed off to Whole Foods.
The bar at Whole Foods was built with better materials and décor than the one at Harris Teeter. And our bartender, Brenden, was knowledgeable and helpful. But it wasn’t the same kind of place.
“On Friday nights, you get a lot of single people with pizza for one who stop here for a drink before going home,” a woman seated at the bar told me. “It’s like their moment of feeling like they’ve interacted with the world.”
An eight-ounce pour of a beer called Dragon’s Milk cost $8. That set the tone for the rest of the tap list, which isn’t cheap. But Whole Foods does have a barroom edge most customers probably don’t know about: They’ll honor a growler from anyone.
We felt a sense of being physically in the way at the Whole Foods bar. Repeatedly, shoppers with carts and baskets mumbled a “pardon me” as they pushed past us. The traffic flow discouraged us from lingering, but Whole Foods does have its own set of regulars, some who stop by every day.
Duly restrained, we moved on to our final stop of the night: Wegmans.
The Charlottesville Wegmans dropped in last year like a fortress of food. You measure that place in acres, not square feet. And it set aside a corner of that acreage for a bar and restaurant called The Pub. The space feels luxurious compared with other grocery store bars.
“This is basically an airport bar with different things rolling by on wheels,” Jeff observed.
Wegmans went to lengths far beyond Harris Teeter or Whole Foods with a full-service restaurant and bar, including mixed drinks. Sometimes it even has live music.
Wegmans has nine taps, mostly between five and six bucks per pint. It has a happy hour from 4-6 pm, Monday through Friday, and $5 appetizers, including mussels and a barbecue-bacon burger. We snacked on perfect fresh, raw, salty Chesapeake Bay oysters.
Jeff was right. Wegmans bar does feel like an airport bar, but it doesn’t drain your wallet the way a typical airport bar does. I can see how someone who lives nearby might pick this as his neighborhood hangout, and stop by often for a few pints and a burger, or a dozen oysters.
“I enjoyed Harris Teeter the most,” Sierra says. “I felt like I was less in the way than at Whole Foods. …I would definitely go there again to pregame before going downtown where the more expensive beers are.”
The unanimous winner of the night was Harris Teeter, for selection, value, food and atmosphere. Charles’ service as bartender sealed the deal. But at any of Charlottesville’s grocery store bars, there is a deal waiting for the adventurous, the weird and the cheap.
Jason Kessler's insurance policy for his August 12 rally in Emancipation Park has been canceled. Photo by Eze Amos
White nationalist-event organizer Jason Kessler obtained a special event insurance policy for his Unite the Right rally planned for August 12 in Emancipation Park, although the city does not require one for demonstrations. Good thing for Kessler, because newly uncovered problems with the insurance policy and with the certificate issued as proof of it have apparently led to cancellation of the policy.
Kessler obtained a one-day liability policy online from East Main Street Insurance Services in Grass Valley, California. Kessler’s event, which will include white nationalists such as Richard Spencer, anti-Semitic speakers like the Traditionalist Worker Party’s Matt Heimbach and attendees including the National Socialist Movement, was described as an “outdoor meeting” for underwriting purposes.
C-VILLE Weekly obtained a copy of Kessler’s certificate of insurance on file in City Hall and spoke with an insurance professional who has reviewed it and discussed it with the insurer. The expert spoke with us on the condition of not being publicly named.
The certificate identifies the insurance provider as Evanston Insurance, “which is part of the Markel group,” says the insurance professional, “and I know people at that insurance company and it didn’t seem very likely to me that they would knowingly insure an event like the one that was supposed to happen on August 12th. …I provided [Markel] with a copy of the certificate. I provided them with details about what the actual event was and suggested that they might want to look into it.”
In an email provided to C-VILLE, a representative of the company indicated that an increase in risk will now lead to cancellation of the policy.
Factors that increased the liability risk of Kessler’s rally since the policy was issued include plans for thousands of people to attend rather than the 400 that Kessler indicated in his permit application, according to C-VILLE’s source. He held a press conference surrounded by the Warlocks, a “1%” motorcycle gang, and Kessler now says people misunderstood their role and believed the Warlocks would be providing security for the rally rather than just for the press conference. Chapters of the Warlocks have been investigated by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies and charged with multiple counts of murder, drug and weapons charges, and possession of stolen property.
The increased number of attendees is likely to exceed the park’s capacity to hold them, and city police closed surrounding streets for the smaller KKK rally July 8. A state law requires event organizers to provide proof of liability coverage (with the locality named as an additional insured) if a public street is blocked off.
Additionally, the certificate of insurance provided to the city was altered and some standard language was stricken.
Markel’s agents who sell this type of policy are prohibited from rewriting the policy, and Virginia law says a certificate of insurance can’t be altered unless the policy has also been changed to match that wording, says the local expert.
Under the section marked “Certificate Holder,” rather than listing the City of Charlottesville and the address of City Hall, Kessler made Lee Park the certificate holder and gives the physical address of the park as the address to which any notice of cancellation should be mailed. No mailbox or office exists in Lee Park, which has since been renamed Emancipation Park.
Kessler would not confirm or deny the cancellation of his insurance policy, but maintains no coverage is required.
“I was never legally required to obtain insurance for the event,” Kessler says by email. “Demonstrations are not required to have insurance because it would be an undue burden on First Amendment expression. I got it anyway to help lower the risk for the city.”
Update August 2: Kessler says the Warlocks will not be providing security August 12 and they were only present to protect him during his July 11 press conference.
A glimpse of the insurance policy for which Lee Park is the certificate holder.
Protesters showed up at the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail on Mother’s Day. Photo by Eze Amos
This past Mother’s Day, a new political organization found an unusual way of observing the holiday: By standing in front of the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail holding signs in support of certain classes of incarcerated women.
The group, Southerners On New Ground, is a national group working to establish a local chapter. SONG wrote in a press release, “In Charlottesville, too many black women are being denied bond. Even though we have raised the money to bail out local black mamas, they are being forced to stay in jail while they await their trial due to overly harsh prosecutors and Virginia’s unfair presumptions against bond.”
It turns out that isn’t quite true at the local jail.
According to Superintendent Martin Kumer, there were a total of 30 women being held in the jail at the time of the demonstration.
“At that time we didn’t have anyone who could be released [if a bond was paid],” Kumer says. “That’s not surprising. Any time we do those reports like that we might have five to 10 people in the whole jail—men and women out of 453 as of right now—who if they posted bond could be released.”
When a suspect is arrested and charged with a crime, there are three types of decisions a judge can make: Release the suspect on her own recognizance without paying any money; set bail and require her to come up with cash for freedom until her trial date; or decide the suspect is either a flight risk or a danger to others and keep her in jail.
According to local SONG organizer Lyndsey Beutin, the group doesn’t have any evidence for the claim that a high number of black and/or LGBT women are being held without bond in the local jail.
Roberta Williamson, a long-time local activist for poor people charged with crimes (she’s not formally affiliated with SONG), believes the bail system has turned into a modern form of debtors’ prison and should be reformed.
“For some people, putting up bail means not paying rent, not buying food, not buying an inhaler for a kid. It puts people in a horrible position,” Williamson says. “Now, if someone has murdered someone that’s one thing. If someone has been picked up because they are driving when they are sober after they’ve lost their license for driving while intoxicated, they’re going to go to jail. …One person that I know was picked up on her way to pick up her sick son. …On the other hand, wealthy people I know who have lost their license can use Uber.”
Nationwide, a movement is growing to eliminate bail money entirely. Even Kumer spoke in support of that idea.
“Studies have shown that people who get released on cash bonds or released on no cash bond, there’s no difference in terms of who shows up for court,” Kumer says. “It really doesn’t matter.”
The 30 women who were being held on Mother’s Day had been denied bail due to the particulars of their cases, he says. Not because they didn’t have enough money.
There are those who pose a danger who should not be out on bond, Kumer explains, sitting in his office in the same building on Avon Street where now-convicted serial killer Jesse Matthew was held pending trial.
“I mean let’s face it, we have had some pretty heinous crimes come through Charlottesville,” he says. “Serial rapists, serial murderers. [Jesse Matthew], people wouldn’t have thought that he was a danger to society until he was caught. But when we look back on things he had done and things we think he has done, would you want him back out on the street?”
Kumer also thinks that Charlottesville and Albemarle County’s judges and prosecutors are already working to prevent the jail from being used as a debtors’ prison.
Charlottesville allows most of those arrested to be released on a signature bond without putting up any money, says Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Joe Platania. “We do not use secured bonds in this community as a general rule,” he says. “Poor people in jail because they can’t post bond—it is rare.”
“That we don’t have a lot of people sitting here who can’t afford to pay bonds shows that our local judges and commonwealth’s attorneys, what discretion they do have, they are using it to ensure that people who don’t need to be in jail aren’t in jail,” Kumer says.
“If more speeders, businessmen, got held in jail for two weeks, you’d have a [state level] policy change,” Williamson says. “But because it is people who have very little voice and who are very worried about risking everything they have if they raise their voice, it’s up to people like me to do a little noise-making.”
Although Reason head brewer Mark Fulton loves making and drinking IPAs, he wanted to tap into an underserved segment of the local beer market by offering beers with an ABV lower than 5 percent. Photo by Tom McGovern.
Charlottesville’s newest brewery will open without an IPA. That is not a typo. Mark Fulton, head brewer at Reason Brewery, has four beers planned for the July opening, and none of them will be a standard-issue bitter palate bomb or even have an ABV of more than 5 percent.
Reason’s reason for avoiding IPAs is to stake out an identity sharply different from the other local breweries in a field that is starting to feel a bit crowded.
“These other breweries are already doing an excellent job of making IPAs and double IPAs,” Fulton says. “I like making them, I like drinking them, but it felt like an opportunity to identify an under-served segment of the craft beer market.”
Reason’s reason for avoiding IPAs is to stake out an identity sharply different from the other local breweries in a field that is starting to feel a bit crowded.
Fulton grew up in Charlottesville but moved to establish himself as a successful brewer at other people’s breweries. He left the top job at Maine Brewing Company in Portland, Maine, to come home and partner with high school friends J. Patrick Adair and Jeff Raileanu, and open a brewery and taproom.
His flagship beer will be a blonde ale that clocks in at only 4 percent ABV. It is mild with a hint of floral aroma from a touch of cascades hops, and it has a smooth finish from the restrained use of oats and wheat with Hallertauer hops. It is clean and sparse with no room for error on the brewer’s part. The slightest problem with temperature or contamination would wreck this thing, which speaks to Fulton’s skill.
Can a super-calm beer with an ABV lower than Keith Richards’ sweat succeed as a flagship beer? Charlottesville drinks Champion Brewery’s Shower Beer (4.5 percent ABV) at a rate only slightly slower than water, so Fulton might be on to something. All of Reason’s beer, at least initially, will fit into this mold: low ABV, little bitterness, totally chill.
Fulton poured me a small glass of his new pale ale. The amazing thing about it is that it is an actual pale ale. Following the IPA arms race of the past decade, a standard IPA now tastes like a double IPA did in 2000, and a pale ale tastes like an IPA of yore. Double IPAs of today were previously known as Pine-Sol. Almost nothing tastes like a pale ale anymore, except for Reason’s mild, pleasantly cloudy (I like cloudy beer because the vitamin B in that yeast means that it’s practically medicinal) beer that seems to have time-traveled from the 1990s.
Reason’s other beers have not been made yet, so they were not available for me to taste, but a planned saison will also be a retro brew.
That Belgian and French farmhouse style has been boosted and redefined by major producers such as Brasserie Dupont, which has popularized it in the U.S. as a high ABV ale of around 7-9 percent. They put it in wine bottles and make it feel like the real Champagne of beers. But historically, saison was brewed for field hands to drink during the harvest. It used to be fairly low in alcohol content and was often made using whatever fermentables were around, including oats, wheat and barley.
And that’s Fulton’s intended approach to a saison. It will be under 5 percent and likely a stark contrast to the polished saisons coming out of Brasserie Saison on the Downtown Mall right now. Reason also plans to offer cold-brew coffee served on nitro, like Guinness stout.
One potential roadblock to trying these new beers: finding the place. Reason is located in a large industrial building hidden behind the Guadalajara restaurant on 29 North (official address is 1180 Seminole Trl., Suite 290).
There isn’t another brewery close to Reason’s out-of-the-way location. Even so, is there really enough business left to support yet another local Charlottesville brewery?
“I look at it and say absolutely,” Fulton says. “I was brewing in Portland, Maine, which is a bit bigger than Charlottesville but not by much, and we had 20 breweries. A good test is go into any restaurant in Charlottesville that focuses on local food and craft beer…look down the line of taps. How many are not Charlottesville breweries; how many of those could be?”
Lee Graves started writing about Virginia’s craft-beer scene in 1996 for the Richmond Times-Dispatch. His latest book, Charlottesville Beer, traces the area’s beer history from Thomas Jefferson’s father’s homebrewing to our plethora of craft beer options. Photo courtesy of subject
Fans of locally made craft beer have long felt that we had something special happening here. Now there is a book to reinforce that. Author and journalist Lee Graves has written Charlottesville Beer, documenting the history of area brewing and outlining the current state of the industry.
While working as a journalist in Richmond, Graves witnessed the birth of Legend Brewery in 1994. It was Richmond’s first microbrewery, and because Graves was a well-traveled beer-lover who had been to Germany and England, the Richmond Times-Dispatch put him on the regional beer beat a few years later.
That was a time when most people still thought that green bottles meant fancy beer.
“My best friend was a beer geek,” Graves says. “We used to be very adventurous. We came to Charlottesville to try Blue Ridge [Brewing Company], which was the first brewpub in the state. …I was looking around the state and Charlottesville was happening.”
Graves watched as Blue Ridge was bought and transformed into Starr Hill, and South Street and other small breweries began to pop up all over town.
Local beer hounds probably already know some of that history. But what comes as a surprise in Graves’ book is that the story of beer in Albemarle County likely starts with the estate of Peter Jefferson, father of Thomas Jefferson. His wife, Jane Jefferson, would have been in charge of brewing the household’s staple beer. In the households of both Peter and Thomas Jefferson, slaves were involved in brewing beer and growing the raw ingredients.
“In doing the research for the book I stumbled across something that I want to raise awareness of,” says Graves, “and that is the role of slaves in growing and selling hops. There’s instances of slaves growing and selling hops back to the plantation owner: Bagwell Grainger selling 60 pounds of hops to Thomas Jefferson for 20 bucks in 1816 is an eye-popper. Plus, Peter Hemings, I would love to have some recognition of him.”
Hemings was the brother of Sally Hemings, a slave who was widely believed to have had a sexual relationship with Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson arranged for Peter Hemings to be trained by a former professional brewer from London. This likely raised the quality of Monticello’s beer above the hearthside kitchen beers that had previously been made in Albemarle County.
Charlottesville went dry well before Prohibition became federal law. Graves says that in June 1907, 430 votes were cast for banning alcohol while 390 voted against the ban.
But local brewing continued behind closed doors even during Prohibition. According to Graves, William “Reddy” Echols, professor of mathematics and the namesake of UVA’s Echols Scholars Program, made his first illicit batch in 1919. The results were poor, but in 1920 he managed “an excellent stout—with good flavor and alcoholic strength.”
After Prohibition, the area was as much of a beer wasteland as most of the U.S.: Lagers like Budweiser and Schlitz were all that was available. But that lack of decent beer in Charlottesville turned out to be an important part of starting the craft beer revolution that eventually changed the entire American beer landscape. It was right here at the University of Virginia where Charlie Papazian, father of the craft beer movement, studied nuclear engineering and first encountered homemade beer in the early 1970s.
He met a neighbor off of Montebello Circle who was making his own beer. Invited to taste it, Papazian was impressed and realized what he had been missing by only drinking commercially produced beer.
According to Graves, Papazian’s first recipe called for a can of Blue Ribbon malt extract, sugar, water and yeast. Laughably primitive by today’s homebrewing standards, it was still far better than what was commercially available at the time. Papazian began brewing his own beer and teaching friends in his apartment on Jefferson Park Avenue.
Papazian went on to write The Complete Joy of Homebrewing, which soon became the default text for anyone interested in making his own beer. He also founded the American Homebrewers Association and the Brewers Association, which is now the major trade group representing American craft brewers.
Small breweries are everywhere in Virginia today, but Graves thinks the Charlottesville and Albemarle beer scene is unique within the Commonwealth, largely because it emerged first.
“If you look at the history in Charlottesville, all of these breweries started before the current boom,” Graves says. “The first beer tourism trail [The Brew Ridge Trail], that’s been a model for the rest of the state.”
Charlottesville had a built-in advantage as a beer region because of the open-mindedness of its residents, and access to ingredients.
“I think the community of Charlottesville is very smart, very hip, very open to new ideas,” Graves says. “Plus there is a really strong agricultural community surrounding Charlottesville. These days the use of local ingredients has propelled a lot of the current boom. Charlottesville has always been percolating with new ideas, and I think beer just happened to fall in there.”
J. Brian McCrory has been an Uber driver and runs a personal taxi service, but he says driving the Bella’s Ice Cream truck is more fun because of the kids’ excitement when they spot him. Photo by Amy Jackson
Ethan Lipscomb tore the shirt from his thin frame and tossed it through the artificial fog and colored lights off the stage in the basement of the Jefferson Theater. The crowd erupted and the drummer punctuated the landing of the shirt with the hit of a cymbal. Lipscomb launched into the next song with his band, Just Sex.
The next morning, with ID-check bracelets still fastened around the wrists of many sleeping concert-goers, Lipscomb reported to work as a barista at Shenandoah Joe Coffee Roasters. Next week he could be doing construction again. Welcome to Charlottesville’s gig economy, where unsalaried millennials and Gen-Xers patch together a living from whatever work they can find, often while making art or music.
“My job is I work at a coffee shop and I pick up side jobs,” says Lipscomb, who has also acted at Live Arts. “Whether that be construction or music or event planning. …I’ve been a pool and spa technician. That paid a ton of money, actually. Roofing.”
Ethan Lipscomb works as a barista at Shenandoah Joe during the day, and fronts the synthesizer-led band Just Sex at gigs around town. Photo by Jackson Smith
Coffee shops in Charlottesville have changed in tone and layout during the last 20 years. In 1997, Mudhouse on the Downtown Mall featured a living room-like layout with black leather couches. Large scrapbooks sat on the coffee tables and regulars would fill them with doodles, poems and stories. Evenings featured poetry readings and acoustic music performances. It was a place where people came to talk to strangers.
Today, the couches and scrapbooks are gone. In their place are rows of open laptops and coffee-sipping freelancers with earbuds guarding them against the overtures of their fellow workers.
A generation ago, cobbling together a living was almost unthinkable. Since the end of World War II, the trend had veered toward higher standards of living and more stable lives for most Americans. But for many people born during the 1970s onward, the white-picket-fence lifestyle has only been something they’ve seen on television. They pass from college through their 20s and 30s and beyond, waiting to start families and buy houses. Waiting for salaried jobs with benefits that are harder to come by.
The music business—both locally and nationally—is particularly tough. Music sales have dropped to almost nothing as services like Spotify and YouTube distribute artists’ intellectual property while paying them literally pennies for tens of thousands of streams. And local owners of live venues have different ways of paying bands.
“Some venues will say to you, ‘We’re going to take [all of the money] up until 100 people,’” Lipscomb says. “After you have 100 people who came in the door and paid $10 a ticket, then you can start making money. And then you have some venues that will say, ‘We’ll just cut you a percentage at the door.’”
Even if the bands get to keep all of the cover charge, the math still doesn’t work out very well. Lipscomb says that a common scenario might be that three bands play a show together, with 70 people paying the $10 cover charge; $150 would pay for promotion, fliers and the sound guy. That leaves $550 to split between the three bands. The two opening acts each get 30 percent and the headliner keeps 40 percent. If that headlining band has three members, they are only paid about $73 each. And managers of music venues often require that a band not play anywhere else in Charlottesville up to a month ahead of the booked date.
This is why so many musical acts in Charlottesville are now one- or two-piece bands, according to Lipscomb. Adequately paying two guitarists, a bassist, drummer and singer has become close to impossible. Just Sex includes Lipscomb singing and playing a synthesizer, plus a live drummer. Occasionally they are joined by a bass player.
“If I could have a full band, I definitely would,” Lipscomb says. “I would have a four- or five-piece. I’m in two bands…it comes down to a financial thing. We would love to scrape by and make money to survive—none of us are trying to get rich. We’re trying to do what we love. We’re gonna do that, but that requires us to eat and have a room to practice in.”
The drive to succeed
J. Brian McCrory also dabbles in art and music. He is one of many locals who have driven for Uber but is now skeptical about the company.
McCrory started driving for Uber about a year ago. “That was my first foray into gigging,” he says. “First it made a lot of sense to make cash quickly. But as I went on it was clear that Uber drivers really don’t make very much at all. Keeping the costs of the car and keeping it drivable and on the road, the AC working, it’s a tough gig for sure. The whole dichotomy of Uber probably needs a second look from its higher-ups.
“When I started out I could make between $80 and a $100 in a regular 10-hour day or $150 if I worked on weekends, but I’d be working till 3 in the morning,” McCrory says.
Because of changes in Uber’s rates, that income dropped to about $50 a day. The drop in income came on top of McCrory’s realization that neither Uber nor his personal auto insurance policy covers the liability of driving his car for hire. He has scaled back his time driving for Uber, doing so only when other gigs have fallen through or failed to pay.
“I do everything,” McCrory says. “People are always asking, ‘What are you doing now?’ At the moment I am driving an ice cream truck. I [also] drive a personal taxi service, I am helping to record an album for a budding artist, and I teach classes in batik and drawing. There’s plenty of other little things thrown in from time to time as well.”
The ice cream truck gig is fun, at least. McCrory drives for Bella’s Ice Cream, a local company with two trucks. He says he likes it better than Uber, although there still isn’t a lot of money in it.
“What makes [driving the ice cream truck] a good day is that you’re out making people feel nostalgic—the kids love it and do dances to the songs,” McCrory says. “The kids all help each other out. They’re always pooling their money to help a kid who doesn’t have anything. It gives you faith in humanity.”
Working as a personal taxi service (he’ll take people to Washington, D.C., or Baltimore, for instance) outside of Uber, McCrory finds customers occasionally by word of mouth. It pays better without Uber taking a cut.
Like many people in the gig economy, McCrory does not have health insurance.
“I haven’t had [health insurance] for a really long time,” McCrory says. “Even with a decent job it was a difficult thing to secure. It’s been rough, I have a lot of back problems…my partner does have insurance, very good insurance, but spousal benefits are almost impossible. They’re like half of his paycheck every pay period.”
McCrory has a bachelor’s of fine arts in illustration and design from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. He says that if he could find a full-time, salaried job as an art teacher then he would like to make the transition, but he hasn’t had any luck. Meanwhile, he says there’s an upside to staying in the gig economy.
“I have done a lot of soul searching and figured out that I am more of an ambivert than an introvert or an extrovert so I love mixing up my job from day to day so that I don’t have to talk to people some days and get to talk to people other days,” McCrory says. “It keeps it fresh. It keeps it flowing and happy for me. I definitely have less money but it’s better for my soul, I think.”
McCrory and his partner would like to adopt children, but the lack of financial stability has been a factor in holding off.
“We talked about kids. I absolutely love kids,” McCrory says. “I think it’s completely impractical [to have kids in the gig economy]. I think you have to be in a pretty good situation to consider having children in this day and age. There are so many issues with just keeping a regular 9-5 job. …I definitely don’t think I would consider it unless I had something that I knew was going to support me for a long time.”
Settling in
Jay Taylor’s elderly mother and a son in high school keep him tied to Charlottesville in spite of a résumé that would land him a good job in many other places.
“I had a full-time gig here where I managed the [Martin Luther King Jr.] Performing Arts Center,” Taylor says while sitting on a bench in McGuffey Park on a Saturday afternoon. “It was more than 40 hours a week. It was like 60, sometimes 80 hours a week. I lived, ate, drank, breathed, slept that job and I had no time left for myself or my family and I kind of regret that actually.”
When Taylor’s mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, he needed to spend more time with her than his job allowed. So he quit the Performing Arts Center and moved into the gig economy. Now he makes stuff, fixes stuff and moves stuff.
“I own a box truck so I move things and I make things,” Taylor says. “But I mostly fix things. I also work in the film and theater world and do lighting and sound and sets.”
Jay Taylor quit his 60-hour-a-week job to spend more time with his family, and has since become a member of the gig economy by working as a carpenter, handyman, set designer and mover. Photo by Ron Paris
Skilled in carpentry, wiring, mechanics, plumbing and decorative arts, Taylor’s jobs come via word of mouth, and he can do anything from trimming out a bathroom to building a film set. Taylor, who’s married and is decades older than the average gig economy worker, would like to focus on work in the film industry but film jobs are sparse in Charlottesville.
“I work for a local promoter doing music videos from time to time,” Taylor says. “I do props and sets and design, making their vision of what the thing should be come to life. Art meaning set, background, the visualization of whatever the mood is that they are trying to go for.”
Hiring a mover with experience in the arts and set design appeals to some of Charlottesville’s affluent residents, which is what keeps Taylor in business, he says. Most professional moving companies won’t show up to move just one or two pieces of furniture.
“I guarantee you that you’ll be able to get it cheaper,” says Taylor. “But that’s not why you’re hiring me. It’s more than just moving the sofa. I’m gonna do it with a smile, I’m gonna do it carefully, I’m going to do it intelligently.”
Taylor had health insurance but recently lost it due to a sudden premium increase.
Taylor and Thomas both grew up in Charlottesville. Thomas attended Tandem Friends School and went on to study film at the New York Film Academy.
“I’m trying to put back into production my documentary on local jazz music,” Thomas says. “It’s about when it is appropriate to clap at a jazz performance. And I do all the things I have to do to keep the rent money moving.”
Thomas has also done construction work and general handyman duties. “I’ve done mechanical work, car repair for friends, I can do brake jobs and whatnot,” he says. “My other main gig is I do draft system installations. Install beer systems. We redid the taps here at Miller’s, I did the taps at Smoked [Kitchen and Tap] in Crozet. We’re getting ready to do a full brewery install…so that should be fun, installing all the big tanks and pipes.”
But Thomas has had just about enough of the rising rent and lack of opportunity in Charlottesville. Also, he has not had health insurance since 1998 and has not visited a doctor in six years.
“I am trying to go somewhere else,” he says. “Just trying to figure out the right place. I have to move out of my current abode in the fall. I don’t want to get stuck into a lease here in Charlottesville again. The rent is so high and the pay is so marginal that it makes it difficult. I’d like to be somewhere bigger with better public transportation. Thinking of like Seattle, Portland, maybe Charleston if I want to stay closer. They have more opportunity, bigger markets. I’m much more likely to find better pay.”
Sean Thomas has done restaurant work, in addition to construction work and general handyman duties. “I’ve done mechanical work, car repair for friends, I can do brake jobs and whatnot,” he says. Photo by Ron Paris
Meanwhile, Thomas isn’t bitter about being in the gig economy. Several weeks after being interviewed in person, he reached out by email to clarify that he’s okay with his career choice.
“I have come to enjoy gig work,” Thomas says. “It allows me to take on as much work as I want, or to take off time for family or travel. It does mean I have to pack in more work when the season is good then schedule other activities in the down times. I would like to make an official career out of gigging.”
The right balance
Jessica Glendinning seems to have found a smoother spot in the gig economy than anyone else interviewed for this article. She is a yoga teacher and a freelance editor and writer specializing in corporate communications. Sitting around her dining table beside a wall of books, with the sound of unseen dogs behind a closed bedroom door, she seems content and comfortable.
“Anyone who is a full-time yoga teacher in Charlottesville can tell you that it is almost impossible to make a living teaching yoga,” Glendinning says. “If you were to teach for three or four different studios and teach five classes a day, you could possibly make it happen. Right now it’s a form of supplemental income.”
Yoga studios have popped up around town even faster than breweries. Competition for students is fierce. And alternatives like Pure Barre, Zumba and Pilates add to the squeeze on local yoga teachers.
“I’ve had this conversation with folks in Charlottesville that we’re at a point of maximum saturation with yoga,” Glendinning says.
Jessica Glendinning works as a part-time yoga teacher while most of her income comes from freelance writing and editing. She says she’s seen a shift in the economy since she started gigging, in that new companies are bringing in more people on a contract basis. Photo by Amy Jackson
Writing and editing is Glendinning’s main gig, while the yoga classes wax and wane as freelance writing contracts come and go.
“I’ve been writing since I was old enough to hold a pencil. It was always just fun. Back in 2007 I started doing the National Novel Writing Month…that was the first time I started taking it seriously,” Glendinning says.
She started writing professionally when a company that she was working for full-time needed an employee to ghost write for its CEO. Later she moved on to writing corporate blogs and newsletters as an independent contractor.
“As of two weeks ago I had an ongoing contract that was supposed to be 15 to 20 hours a week that turned into two to five hours a month. So it’s a period of transition now.”
Glendinning’s niche in corporate communications gives her periods of greater stability than most freelance writers enjoy [full disclosure: The writer of this article is a freelance journalist living in the gig economy]. Instead of trying to sell one article at a time, she secures contracts that include a planned schedule of blog entries, newsletters and other materials.
In spite of the yo-yoing income, Glendinning is happy with her situation.
“I’m not built for a cubicle,” she says. “For a long time when I first started freelancing I was also supporting myself with part-time work. I look at it now and think about it…oh man, having a paying job with a steady paycheck and health insurance. And then you’re like, ‘I realize how much that sucks.’ I almost feel like I’m unemployable. As a freelancer, what does your résumé look like? I’ve gone back and forth. Do I want to give this up? No…I am so much more productive here with dogs on my feet.”
Glendinning has health insurance through her partner. “It would be really difficult” to make this work if she were single, Glendinning says. “I squeezed by for a few years, but it’s a lot nicer now knowing that if a contract dried up that feast or famine is balanced out by having someone else in the household with an income.
“Since I started doing this, the general economy has changed,” she says. “Not as many people were doing this. But it has shifted and now a lot of newer companies are just bringing people in on a contract basis and not having to pay for things like health insurance.”
A 2016 survey commissioned by Freelancers Union indicated that 35 percent of the total American workforce are freelancers. That’s 55 million freelancers, up from 53 million in 2014.
“If you interact with someone within the gig economy, even if it’s just an Uber driver, I know that Uber doesn’t require people to tip, but Uber drivers make less than any other ride service by far. They definitely would appreciate a tip,” says McCrory, the former Uber driver. “Also know that if someone’s working a job that you think is a little job a lot of time it’s to support a dream of theirs. So just being extra nice and kicking in a little extra if you think they did a good job is really helpful.”
*This article was updated at 12:07pm May 12 to reflect the correct spelling of J. Brian McCrory’s name.
