Author: Scott Weaver

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Would you give this man a job?


Former Democratic governor Mark Warner rolled into town May 6 as he kicked off his campaign for U.S. Senate. After being introduced by a triumvirate of local Dems named Dave—Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris, Councilor David Brown and state Delegate David Toscano—Warner took the stage. He wasted no time in trumpeting his record as governor: turning around an inherited $6 billion budget deficit and making Virginia more attractive to businesses. He called for bringing troops home from Iraq, as well as better health care for veterans. Warner also cited the need to reinvest in the nation’s infrastructure and voiced his support for a 21st century rail system. “I’m asking you,” he told the midday crowd on the Downtown Mall, “will you hire me?”

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.

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Council decides not to decide on big house

When Charlottesville City Council declined to step into the middle of a dispute over the construction of an ambitious, environmentally friendly house that north Downtown neighbors argue is too large, it may have just delayed the inevitable. On May 5, councilors voted 4-1 to (ready for this?) not vote on an appeal brought by residents around 509 Second St. SE, where Mark and Barbara Fried plan to build a house that tops out at over 5,000 square feet.

Previous coverage:

Proposed house straddles past, future
Can carbon neutral meet north Downtown?

The house was approved by the city Board of Architectural Review (BAR) on March 18 by a 6-1 vote. Neighbors, though, are concerned that the size of the house will negatively affect the characteristic of the neighborhood, as well as set a bad precedent for infill projects. They had appealed the BAR’s decision to Council.

After more than two hours of presentations from the neighbors, the project’s architect, Allison Ewing, and the Frieds’ attorney, state Delegate David Toscano, councilors seemed less than eager to make a ruling on the appeal. Councilor Satyendra Huja motioned to defer a vote, hoping the appeal could be resolved back at the BAR level.

“I thought it needs a little more work, especially as it related to the street and the neighborhood,” says Huja. “I think they’re moving in the right direction.”

But Council didn’t specify that the BAR address the one subject that caused neighbors to file an appeal—the building’s size. Without addressing that, neighbors are unlikely to drop the appeal.

“It’s sort of unclear what the scope of the BAR discussion is going to be,” says Fred Scheider, who is a preservation architect and who addressed Council on May 5. “Our feeling is that if it involves basically tinkering around with details, that’s not going to be sufficient. We really are looking to address the issue of size in a substantive way.”

Councilor David Brown, who voted against the deferral, argued that the BAR had already approved the project—including its size. By sending it back, and with the appeal still pending, it is likely that the BAR will check its work, and send it right back to Council.

Toscano, no stranger to the workings of city government as a former Charlottesville mayor, says he doesn’t think the possibility of City Council ducking a vote on the second appeal will happen.

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.

An interesting question too few are asking

Want to know what Mayor Dave Norris really thinks about the Meadowcreek Parkway? Check out Jim Duncan’s blog, where he asks a question that more people should be asking: What if the MCP didn’t exist?

Of course, it doesn’t, not yet anyhow. But it exists as an idea on to which different people can project their agendas, values and fears. Sure, it’s two miles of road, but it also serves as a bellwether for issues like transportation and conservation.

Norris makes a good point in the comments:

"Many people say that we’ve been talking about this road for 40 years and it’s time to just get it built. I would say that we’ve been talking about it for 40 years and it’s time to change the terms of the conversation. A whole lot has changed in 40 years about the way we understand urban design and vitality. Let’s not assume that just because something sounded appealing 40 years ago, it still is the best answer for our community."

Obviously, a lot has changed in the last 40 years, but one of most radical potential shifts in our culture is arguably taking place right now, the death of the automobile culture. NRP recently had a story about the stability of home prices in urban areas in the face of declining prices of suburbs and exurbs. Why? Gas prices, for one reason.

And then there’s this piece in the Atlantic, which basically argues that American cities will soon follow the European model of housing its poorest—putting them out in the slums of the suburbs.

"For 60 years, Americans have pushed steadily into the suburbs, transforming the landscape and (until recently) leaving cities behind. But today the pendulum is swinging back toward urban living, and there are many reasons to believe this swing will continue. As it does, many low-density suburbs and McMansion subdivisions, including some that are lovely and affluent today, may become what inner cities became in the 1960s and ’70s—slums characterized by poverty, crime, and decay."

It is exactly the opposite of Yeats: The center is the only thing that will hold.

And just to pile on a little more dooms-day goodness to the subject, the Sierra Club is going to screen "End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of The American Dream" this Thursday at 6:30pm at the McIntire Room of the Central Library. It’s free, and the documentary looks at the idea of peak oil at its possible effect on the American suburban lifestyle. I haven’t seen it, but I think I’ll try to check it out.

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Red dirt alert!


Amid the great swatch of red dirt, five houses are springing up in Belvedere. The 675-unit development, which has billed itself as a green project, is beginning a five- to six-year build-out. Cass Kawecki of Stonehaus, Belvedere’s developer, says the initial five houses will be move-in ready by June. The village green will be opening in mid-summer, and a community owner’s association is germinating. “We’re at that point where it’s transitioning from an idea and concept to a real, active, lively place,” says Kawecki. Plans for the SOCA soccer complex will be in front of the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors on Wednesday. There is still work to be done, though. Stonehaus has sold 55 lots to two builders. Kawecki says over 20 percent of those lots are under contract or reserved.

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.

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Final exam

1. How many books does the UVA Library contain? [answer]

a. A little over 5 million
b. 2.5 million
c. Counting would spoil the Library’s magnificence
d. The only book necessary, partner, the Bible


2. Who was the last UVA basketball player drafted into the NBA? [answer]

a. Roger Mason Jr.
b. R.J. Reynolds
c. Ralph Sampson
d. George “Peach Bucket” Jeffers

3. How much is UVA trying to raise with its Capital Campaign? [answer]

a. $75 million-ish
b. Not gonna lie. Couple bucks for a cold beer.
c. $3 billion
d. How much you got?

4. How many points a game did UVA basketball coach Dave Leitao average as a player at Northeastern University? [answer]

a. 14.3
b. 6.0
c. 2.3
d. Too busy yelling to score


Dave Leitao


5. Writing home, why did Edgar Allen Poe say that his friend Wickliffe was expelled from UVA? [answer]

a. Poems didn’t rhyme
b. Caught with corncob pipe
c. Bit a student in a fight
d. Wasn’t Hoo material

6. How many acres of land does UVA own, making it rather hard to ignore and easy to revile? [answer]

a. 220
b. 438
c. 1,883
d. 3,392

Andrew Alston

7. What UVA class did student Andrew Alston credit with learning how to “defend himself” by stabbing Walker Sisk 20 times? [answer]

a. Macro economics
b. Eight-week Aikido class
c. Modern American Poetry
d. Intro to Poli Sci

8. How did William Faulkner, then a UVA professor, fracture his collarbone in Charlottesville? [answer]

a. Escaping a burning bar…er…barn
b. Furiously typing a single sentence spanning 17 pages
c. Falling off a horse
d. Falling off the wagon

9. Which of these was not a final project for a master’s candidate in the American Studies program? [answer]

a. BBQ
b. The American Hobo
c. Halls of Fame
d. Cheddar cheese

10. When did the first documented act of streaking the Lawn occur? [answer]

a. The Summer of Love
b. Right around the time Jefferson’s first large shipment of wine from France arrived
c. Tradition has never been documented
d. October 1937

11. Which school had the highest undergraduate enrollment in the fall of 2007? [answer]

a. McIntire School of Commerce
b. College of Arts & Sciences
c. School of Engineering and Applied Science
d. School of Easy Knocks

12. What happened when the first black student attempted to enter UVA in 1935? [answer]

a. The school of Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence, admitted her
b. State paid for her tuition—to an out-of-state school that actually accepted black students
c. Admissions wait-listed her
d. Board of Visitors harumphed repeatedly

13. Light on firewood money, what did Edgar Allen Poe burn to keep warm one frosty night while living on the Lawn? [answer]

a. Piles of poems
b. All his clothes
c. Too drunk to notice he was cold
d. His furniture

14. Besides a painting of TJ himself, whose portraits hang in Jefferson Hall, where the Jefferson Literary and Debating Society meet? [answer]

a. Members Edgar Allen Poe and Woodrow Wilson
b. Tina Fey and Tracy Morgan
c. Confederate Generals Robert E. Lee and JEB Stuart
d. Norman Mailer and sundry critics

15. What crazy thing are fourth-year students supposed to do on the day of the last football home game? [answer]

a. Not wear a tie to the game
b. Drink a fifth of liquor
c. Make out with Cav Man
d. Piss off Al Groh

16. What is the largest donation in history to UVA? [answer]

a. $12 million
b. Howie Long’s son
c. $100 million
d. $454 million

17. According to College Wikis, what do you have to do to correctly streak the Lawn? [answer]

a. Kiss the ass end of the Homer statue
b. Leave your clothes at the top of the Rotunda stairs
c. Look through Rotunda keyhole and say, “Good evening, Mr. Jefferson”
d. All of the above, while naked (and drunk)

18. When a member of the Seven Society dies, what happens? [answer]

a. The chapel bell tolls every seven seconds, for seven minutes
b. His or her name is revealed
c. A wreath of black magnolias, in the shape of a seven, appears at the funeral
d. All of the above

19. What does UVA’s endowment shake out to, per student? [answer]

a. Enough to buy and sell you
b. 200,019—in dollars, unfortunately
c. The cost of a Charlottesville condo (2004 prices)
d. Amount too obscene for family newspaper

20. After jacking up out-of-state tuition by 6.7 percent, how much does UVA cost for nonresident UVA undergrads? [answer]

a. $37,420
b. $29,600
c. $18,875
d. $9,666

21. When did the first Board of Visitors meeting occur? [answer]

a. 1776
b. 1812
c. 1819
d. 1856

22. Who was John Paul Jones Arena named for? [answer]

a. Davy Jones’ lockermate
b. Led Zeppelin bassist
c. Revolutionary War–era point guard
d. A very rich man

John Paul Jones Arena

23. Why did student Joseph G. Semmes shoot and kill John A.G. Davis, a  professor, in 1840? [answer]

a. Unhappy with first-year experience
b. Davis tried to unmask him
c. Davis failed his senior thesis “Bearded White Men and their effect on American History”
d. Argument over the 2nd Amendment

24. President John Casteen won the Mishima Award in 1987 for what? [answer] a. Pole-vaulting
b. Fundraising
c. Smiling
d. Collection of short stories

25. After being sentenced to two life terms for killing his girlfriend’s parents, what did former UVA student Jens Soering do while in prison? [answer]

a. Push-ups. Lots of push-ups.
b. Begin to establish an inmate honor code
c. Confess
d. Write the book Way of the Prisoner


Tom Santi

26. UVA tight end Tom Santi will be catching passes from whom next year? [answer]

a. Al Groh
b. Peyton Manning
c. Sean Singletary
d. Tom Brady

27. What’s the name of UVA’s oldest improv group? [answer]

a. Assaulted Nuts
b. Hoos On First
c. Amuse-Bouche
d. Mr. Jefferson’s Improvisational Players, Inc.


Chris Long

28. Did you know Chris Long, the No. 2 pick in the 2008 NFL draft, has a dad? [answer]

a. Really? I hadn’t heard.
b. No, I wasn’t aware.
c. Dad? The one with glasses?
d. Yes, I’m sick of hearing about Howie too.

29. Which state has the lowest number of UVA alumni? [answer]

a. Alaska
b. Louisiana
c. Montana
d. Utah


30. Who is UVA’s top rated professor on RateMyProfessor.com? [answer]

a. Political know-it-all Larry Sabato (see sidebar)
b. Poet Charles Wright
c. Grad student Amy Wentworth
d. Adolescent crush expert Peter Sheras

Extra Credit: How well do you know Larry Sabato?


Larry Sabato


1. What is name of the website run by Larry Sabato, UVA’s (and the nation’s) political guru? [answer]

a. Larry J. Sabato’s Mustache
b. Larry J. Sabato’s Crystal Ball
c. Larry J. Sabato’s Witch’s Cauldron
d. HandicappingHorse Races.com

2. What is Sabato’s tagline? [answer]

a. “Cross me and I’ll slaughter you in print!”
b. “Call me!”
c. “Politics is a good thing!”
d. “I epitomize what’s wrong with our political process!”

3. Sabato was dubbed the “Mark McGwire of political analysts.” What does that mean? [answer]

a. He has massive forearms
b. He’s not good on the defensive
c. He’s done drugs with Jose Canseco
d. Given a chance, will stonewall Congress
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Who lives on the Lawn, anyway?

Despite the big hoo-ha from students when President John Casteen gave fundraiser extraordinaire Bob Sweeney a spot on the Lawn, the pavilions still serve as an all-star gallery for UVA professors.

But just who are these powerful few? The list includes a well-known talking head, an endowment head and a handful of deans. All pavilion occupants have one thing in common: free landscaping services.

Pavilion I

David Breneman: This former dean of the Curry School of Education now oversees the planning and implementation of the new Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy. He specializes in areas of finance and economics of higher education. So the man knows his way around an endowment portfolio.

Pavilion II

Jeanette Lancaster: Lancaster runs the School of Nursing—at least for a little while longer—and she’s also president of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing. It might be assumed she is the Lawns’s go-to person in case someone needs CPR.

Pavilion III

Robert Pianta: He’s the dean of the Curry School, as well as the director of the Center of Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning. So surely the students living on the Lawn don’t have a problem with Pianta. Plus, in 2006, he bagged a $10 million grant for the Curry School to study preschool education.

Pavilion IV

Larry Sabato: If CNN is dialing a pavilion number, chances are it’s Sabato’s phone that’s ringing. A former Rhodes Scholar and ubiquitous political commentator, Sabato is also the founder and director of the Center for Politics. No word, though, on whether he handicaps the Student Senate races.

Pavilion V

Patricia Lampkin: What doesn’t Lampkin do? She oversees the Office of African-American Affairs, the Office of the Dean of Students, the Department of Student Health and on and on. She also boasts a doctorate from UVA.

Pavilion VI

Robert Sweeney: Mr. Big Money scored himself a spot on the Lawn in 2007. In protest of giving a fundraiser that spot, students tacked up “For Sale” signs on their Lawn doors. Apparently, $3 billion is considered a good offer.

Pavilion VII Upper Apartment

Sarah E. Turner: A professor of education and economics, she also co-edited the forthcoming book, Earnings From Learning: The Rise of For-Profit Universities, with Breneman and Brian Pusser. Maybe they talked to Sweeney while researching?

Pavilion VII Terrace Apartment

Gladys Saunders: Students interested in Gallo-Italian dialectology, French phonetics, phonological variation, historical linguistics and French sociolinguistics drop by this Francophone professor’s abode all the time, we imagine.

Pavilion IX

Karen Van Lengen: Few can appreciate the pavilions’ beauty more than Van Lengen, the dean of the Architecture School. Though it would be interesting to pop in and ask her where TJ went wrong.

Pavilion X

Carl Zeithaml: If anyone is likely to open up a pavilion bodega, selling all the items students may need (and sandwiches!), it would be Zeithaml, the dean of the McIntire School of Commerce. Maybe he could even put a Corner CVS out of business.

Montebello

James Aylor: Mr. UVA triple-threat himself, Aylor earned his bachelor’s, masters’s and doctoral degrees from UVA. The School of Engineering and Applied Science dean probably knows all the secret passageways on campus, too.

Additional reporting by Serene Aandahl

Today in Pro-Life News

Let us go then, you and I, to certain half-deserted websites filled with tedious arguments–Pro-Life News.

Up pops everyone’s favorite 5-Percent Maverick, John McCain. Pro-Life News assures its readers that McCain won’t follow through on his past desire to change the GOP abortion platform so that it might (gasp) include exceptions for rape and incest. In his 2000 presidential campaign, McCain thought that might be reasonable. Not now, apparently. C-VILLE had a sidebar in its sex ed cover story that broke down the three remaining presidential candidates in terms of their stances on sex ed/reproductive rights/gyno-facsism.

But the money quote from Pro-Life News? Well that would be from Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council: "If he were to change the party platform, I think that would be political suicide. I think he would be aborting his own campaign because that is such a critical issue to so many Republican voters and the Republican brand is already in trouble."

And we all know, campaigns begin at conception.

The last item tackles the recent controversy at Charlottesville and Albemarle high schools regarding students wearing "Virginity Rocks" t-shirts. Both schools allegedly told students to ditch the t’s, and that is a sure-fire way to raise the ire of the Rutherford Institute. It sounds like the situation has settled into your basic "Did not/Did too" legal standoff. You know, technically speaking.

A Great Wailing and Gnashing of Teeth

Breaking News: Either someone is repeatedly stabbing News Editor Will Goldsmith—who is sitting behind me—or he is listening to Rob Schilling’s radio show about the water supply plan.

Follow up: Turns out Will is listening to the radio. And moaning and cursing.

Look for his story on the suddenly-controversial water supply plan this coming Tuesday.

Virginia could be roadmap out of primary mess

Back in 1994, Virgil Goode was a Democrat, Mark Warner was Virginia’s Democratic party chairman and former governor Doug Wilder was in the same unenviable position where Hillary Clinton now finds herself. As the Democratic primary for a Virginia U.S. Senate seat wound down, Wilder was staring at a coming defeat to incumbent Senator Chuck Robb.

Wilder’s former press secretary Dan Conley has a must-read piece in Salon today about the back-room negotiations that led Wilder to drop out of the race and ultimately back his opponent—and what it took to get him to do these things.

"I had a front-row seat to this greatest of all Democratic crack-ups as Wilder’s press secretary. The candidate trailing badly in the polls on Labor Day weekend, our campaign decided that we had only two options left: keep running the same campaign, or sink Sen. Robb."

The piece offers a way out of a messy, protracted Democratic struggle between Clinton and Barack Obama that is threatening to run all the way to the August convention. But it’s also a fascinating look at a back-room deal that has shaped Virginia politics.

Some of those national Dems might want to take a hard look at Conley’s advice. According to Politico, Obama is planning to declare victory very, very soon.

Warner’s aw-shucks, self-deprecating digs speak to a dominant lead

Good politicians are good story tellers, and Mark Warner can tell a story. Warner kicked off his bid for John Warner’s (requisite parenthetical: no relation to Mark) U.S. Senate seat this week and rolled through Charlottesville yesterday.

In front of a midday crowd on the Downtown Mall, Warner, a former governor, told the story of how, a couple of days ago in Southwest Virginia, a person introduced him as the best governor Virginia’s had since Thomas Jefferson. Warner’s two middle-school-aged daughters were with him, and afterwards one said to the Senate hopeful, "Dad, don’t believe everything they tell you."

Mark Warner in Charlottesville
Hire me! Warner stumps on the Downtown Mall. (photo by Josh Rhett)

The story drew laughs from the crowd, but it also says something about just how comfortably out front Warner is of his Republican opponents, former Governor Jim Gilmore and state Delegate Bob Marshall. Besides being the widely recognized favorite in the race, Warner is crushing his competition in the fundraising department. As of March 31, Warner is sitting on $4.4 million, while Gilmore has a scant $208,000, Marshall just $20,000.

That Warner is able to knock himself down a peg or two says something about how much of a threat either Republican poses right now. In fact, before launching into his stump speech, Warner made it a point to list his past business failures and political defeats (after which, of course, he makes millions and wins the Governor’s seat as a Democrat in an overwhelmingly Republican state).

The Washington Post’s Anita Kumar has an excellent piece on Warner’s kickoff, and the big-ass lead he’s currently enjoying:

"Six months before the November election, the popular former governor is widely considered the front-runner to replace retiring Sen. John W. Warner in a race that could help further solidify Virginia’s gradual shift toward becoming a more Democratic state. The Republican incumbent is of no relation to the Democrat."

Warner’s speech in Charlottesville was preceded by a Who’s Who of local Dems. City Councilor David Brown emceed, Julian Taliaferro and Satyendra Huja were busy glad-handing the crowd, state Delegate David Toscano spoke and Mayor Dave Norris had his introduction interrupted by Warner and his procession making their way to the stage.

But by far the most conspicuous speaker before Warner was Bill Crutchfield, a lifelong Republican. Warner bagged Crutchfield’s endorsement because he is what Crutchfield called "a bridge builder," ("We don’t need more jihad politicians in Washington," said Crutchfield), a highly successful person and good on economic issues.

Warner made it a point to tout his Pro-Business bona fides and  the creation of clean-energy jobs. Regularly the domain of the Republicans, Warner has made business one of his strengths. In 2006, Forbes Magazine ranked Virginia as the No. 1  state for business. Warner will lean heavily on the fact that he turned around what he called a $6 billion* budget deficit that he inherited from the previous governor, who is none other than his potential challenger Gilmore.

He talked the talk of a tough fiscal conservative, saying that Washington needs the smart government that he became known for in Virginia.

And in the end, Warner distilled his campaign down to a job interview, saying to the Charlottesville crowd, "I’m asking you, will you hire me?"

*Correction: The post originally stated that the deficit was $6 million. In fact, it was $6 billion, much more than a "pizza and a beer." The reporter vows to work on the legibility of his note-taking in the future.