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Moving forward: Two years after A12, how do we tell a new story?

The "Inside Out: Charlottesville" mural features photos of 120 local activists, along the wall of the Violet Crown on Second St. Photo: Eze Amos

It’s been two years since the “Summer of Hate,” and Charlottesville, to the larger world, is still shorthand for white supremacist violence. As we approach the second anniversary of August 11 and 12, 2017, we reached out to a wide range of community leaders and residents to talk about what, if anything, has changed since that fateful weekend, and how we can move forward.

Responses have been edited for length and clarity. 

 

What do you think of how Charlottesville, as a city, has responded in the aftermath of A12? What’s changed? What hasn’t?

It’s hard to say what’s changed in Charlottesville. Once heralded as America’s most ideal city, we’ve been outed as a place that is just as flawed as any other town. Having been forced to enter a conversation that has no easy solution, it feels like a collective healing from August 11 and 12 and its aftermath is going to take much longer than any of us want to believe. It’s a humbling and sober thought. That’s not to say there isn’t reason to hope—there certainly is—but I think that the pace of change—real, lasting change—is glacial. I think there’s a way to press on for a better future while extending grace to ourselves and each other.

—Sam Bush, music minister at Christ Episcopal Church and co-founder of The Garage art space

 

Charlene Green. Photo: Devon Ericksen

I think the way we tried to respond last year, from a law enforcement perspective, I think it was one of safety, we were definitely trying to assure the residents that no one was going to get hurt in the same way.

I think this year, the planning of Unity Days has definitely given community members a whole new opportunity to figure out how to be engaged about this, how to acknowledge the anniversary, and I think so far it has been a pretty successful effort.

It’s about constantly educating folks about what Charlottesville is all about, because we’re not a one-story town.

–Charlene Green, manager of the Charlottesville Office of Human Rights

 

I still think it’s a plantation, not a city. I feel that we should be going further with having transparency in the community to be able to work together.

The city hasn’t done anything besides make themselves look good, writing books, getting all these different recognitions for themselves, but nothing for the community.

[A lot of] the activists that were hurt…and that have been the true fighters for Charlottesville, are gone. And then you have some of us who are still left here, but I’m willing to leave, because I’m tired. Because this hasn’t just been going on for me since 2017, this has been going on for me for 13 years now. So I’m tired, because it’s like the more you’re fighting, it’s like it’s not changing.

–Rosia Parker, community activist and Police Civilian Review Board member

Rev. Seth Wispelwey and other clergy marched to oppose the KKK in July 2017. Photo: Eze Amos

It’s difficult to answer, because what people make of that weekend, whether they experienced it directly or not, is up to them, and relies so much on the stories we told about ourselves beforehand.

As a co-creator of Congregate, in our weeks of training, we always emphasized that it was about using the weekend of August 11th and 12th as a pivot point to the long, deep, hard, life-giving work we all can be a part of in dismantling white supremacy. So some people took up that call, and have continued to run with it, learning and growing along the way, and others covered their ears, and wanted to believe that this had nothing to do with Charlottesville or our collective responsibility to one another. And then still others were somewhere in the middle, believing that their ongoing efforts were sufficient, that the status quo was naturally going to lead to some sort of evolutionary progress. We’re a very self-satisfied progressive city.

I think it’s no secret that governing authorities, from City Council to the police force, in the summer of 2017 made choices that left our community vulnerable and exposed and suffering from violence. What hasn’t changed is there still has been little to no accountability for that, and so while people have undertaken their own healing processes, I still believe, even two years on, there’s a tremendous trust deficit between members of the community who saw the violent threat for what it was, and our ostensible leadership, who by and large prescribed ignoring it and left people to be beaten, and then prosecuted some people who defended themselves.

And again we saw that on the first-year anniversary, the over-militarized response. Treating the community and activists as the enemy has been the wrong direction so far. And I don’t think it would take much to repair that trust deficit. “I’m sorry” is free. But that’s going to take some work, and I haven’t seen changes there from city leadership.”

–Reverend Seth Wispelwey, former minister at Restoration Village Arts and co-founder of Congregate Charlottesville

 

I think in the aftermath of A12, we’ve seen a tremendous increase in civic engagement. More and more people are paying close attention to City Council and getting involved with local community groups. People are trying to understand where we’re at as a community, and how we can create real, lasting change.

The conversation around race and equity has completely changed and there’s an unprecedented level of awareness about local economic and racial inequalities. But we haven’t yet created the level of institutional change needed to fundamentally shift the balance of political and economic power within Charlottesville. We’ve planted the seeds of change, but we have a lot of work left to do when it comes to changing outcomes.

–Michael Payne, housing activist and City Council candidate

 

Everything and nothing. We’re still very much a city divided. There have been some efforts made…but I don’t think there’s been any real substantive change. We elected Nikuyah, but I’d like to think that that would have happened whether August the 12th ever did or not.

The city’s done a great job with the Unity Days events and that’s a huge start. But we’ve still got such a long way to go.

–Don Gathers, community activist and former Chair of The Blue Ribbon Commission on Race, Memorials, and Public Spaces

 

 

Photo: Amy and Jackson Smith

“I was still new to Charlottesville when A11/12 happened; I had only been here about eight months, so I don’t have a great deal of perspective on Charlottesville before that time. The changes that I have seen, though, I would characterize as a greater urgency around the conversations that Charlottesville and the country as a whole must engage in—conversations around systemic and institutionalized racism, equity, and the historical inequalities that continue to resonate locally and nationally.

One of the things that worries me in the community is that I continue to hear people say things along the lines of, “they (meaning the white nationalists) weren’t from here…” True, some did come from other places, but I think it is dangerous not to acknowledge fully that this is our problem, too.”

—Matthew McLendon, Ph.D., director of The Fralin Museum of Art at UVA

 

In terms of where we are this year—with no active threat of more violence and a plan for less police presence, I do want to emphasize that there is increased possibility for the beginning of a healing journey, both at the individual and the community level. It was very hard to begin that process that year, as so many people felt unsafe around the anniversary, so that feels to me very different this year.

Mental health-wise, reflecting on the changes over the past few years, there are many more therapists and other people in our community who are prepared to respond to traumatic experiences and to facilitate healing—in particular the establishment of the Central Virginia Clinicians of Color Network.

Obviously, trauma is historical and something we’re still grappling with. On the positive side, our community is looking very explicitly at health disparity and in particular racial inequity around health outcomes for the first time. Everyone’s coming together in our community health needs assessment to say our number one priority is to address inequity in health outcomes. So I think that is a positive change. Has that disparity changed yet? No. So we have a lot of work to do, but awareness is the first step.”

—Elizabeth Irvin, executive director of The Women’s Initiative

 

Susan Bro. Photo: Eze Amos

I think Charlottesville is working to bring awareness to the citizens and change its image. There have been intensified efforts to shed light on the truth of the past. That’s a good beginning. But the racial divides in housing and education seem to still be just as bad as before. None of us at the Heather Heyer Foundation actually live in town or even Albemarle County. So we are on the outside, looking in.

—Susan Bro, mother of Heather Heyer and president of the Heather Heyer Foundation

 

It is always a challenge in the aftermath of a traumatic event, like A12, to move from the initial reactive state to a long-term adaptive state. The city, local businesses, organizations, and citizens responded to the events with a great deal of energy and attention. When we realized that many of us had turned a blind eye to the racism in our community, our leaders took on new initiatives and made demands for change with gusto. But the real trick is what happens in the next 5-10 years.

—Bree Luck, producing artistic director, Live Arts

 

What do you think the city needs to do to move forward?

One huge step would be to visibly and viably take ownership for that weekend and what happened, and the role that they actually played in it. It’s still very much a point of contention that the folks who directly lost their jobs were two men of color.

The council, whatever it may look like on the first of the year, they’ve got a huge task on their hands. The new buzzword of course is civility, and I think that we’ve got to become comfortable in the incivility for a while, because this was so very painful and hurtful for so many people. Now I’m not saying that 10 years down the road folks still should be shutting down meetings because of it. I don’t see the necessity of that. But if something triggers a person…I think we have to allow space for that, and understand it.

They’ve got to figure out how to bring about some level of trust between the city and the community and the police department. Because that’s what’s sorely lacking right now. And figuring out how to do that, that’s the E=MC squared equation.  What it looks like and then how to make it happen. That’s something that’s vital to the renaissance, if you will, of Charlottesville, and getting us to a point where we’re not recognized as just a hashtag.

—Don Gathers

 

We certainly have issues in this community that we’re working on, but there’s also a lot of great things that are happening. The Chamber of Commerce is in a great position to help with that.

It’s not surprising that the business community [and tourism have] taken some hits from the events that happened in the last couple years. Nobody wants to minimize some of the tough conversations and hard work that’s going on here to build equity, but you can work on those things and also highlight the things that are going really well-—companies that are launching and doing world-class work here, opportunities that are opening up for new careers, that’s the piece that the business community thinks needs to be out there more.

It would be helpful if there was cooperation between elected officials and the business community and others, trying to get toward some shared goals.

—Elizabeth Cromwell, President & CEO, Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce

 

We have to commit ourselves to the work of making Charlottesville a more equitable city, not just in word but in deed. And we have to hold space to celebrate and document who we are as community and what we’ve accomplished. Fundamentally, we care about this community because we love the people in it. We can’t be afraid of acknowledging that.

—Michael Payne

 

I was fortunate to hear Bryan Stevenson, the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, speak earlier this year, and I was moved by his insistence on the need for “proximity.” He stressed that we must be close to, and by extension listen to, those who are not like us.

The Fralin Museum of Art joined the larger national conversation on social justice by participating in the “For Freedoms” project with “Signs of Change: Charlottesville.” Working with our community partners, most importantly Charlene Green from the Office of Human Rights, we convened a series of workshops to bring people together to first learn about the histories of marginalized people in Charlottesville and then talk about ways we could help to stop history from repeating itself. There must be continued opportunities for proximity, education, and dialogue.

—Matthew McLendon

 

What the City of Charlottesville I believe needs to do in its various official capacities is apologize and take ownership for the exposure and violence that came. At its root, it was a failure to take the inherent violence of white supremacy seriously: these were terrorist groups who threatened violence, the city was adequately warned, and we know for a fact that the police were more interested in what “antifa” was going to do, or [suggested] that we should just ignore them. No one can tell me that if this had been an ISIS free speech rally that it wouldn’t have been shut down immediately. So it starts with that.

Honest and sincere apologies are not weakness, they’re a sign of strength, and I think what Charlottesville is fighting to do and what the city could help do is stop continuing to gaslight people and say yeah, we were wrong, we will take the threat of white supremacy seriously, and I think the temperature would cool across the board.

—Rev. Seth Wispelwey

Rosia Parker outside the courtroom after the James Fields verdict, in December. Photo: Eze Amos

One, you gotta listen to the community. Don’t just listen at the community, listen to the community. [Be] willing to be transparent, willing to create ideas together, that will make a thriving community.

—Rosia Parker

 

As a city, I think we have an obligation to help provide opportunities for folks to be engaged and for people to see that we’re trying very hard to walk the talk. At the Office of Human Rights, if we say that equity and social justice are important for residents, then we need to show it.

—Charlene Green

Photo: UVA

 

Moments of adversity and heartbreak sometimes give us an opportunity for collaboration and progress. Since August 2017, UVA and the local community have been working together in unprecedented ways. The UVA-Community Working Group that came together last fall identified the most pressing issues that we can begin to work on together—jobs and wages, affordable housing, public health care, and youth education—and efforts are under way now to address those issues through UVA-community partnerships grounded in equity and mutual respect.

So many of us love Charlottesville. I think the best way we can express that love, and the best way we can move forward after August 2017, is by working together to make our community stronger, more united, and more resilient than it’s ever been before

—Jim Ryan, president of the University of Virginia

 

We need to continue our efforts to rebuild the bonds that unite all of us, with the understanding that a community dedicated to issues of social justice and racial equality is a place that we can be proud to call home, and a place that more people will want to come visit.

—Adam Healey, former interim director of the Charlottesville-Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau

 

Addressing racism at the structural and institutional level remains the highest priority. In particular being able to give the mike to people of color, black people in particular, who have historically not had a voice, would be at the top of that list. From a mental health perspective that’s important because healing can’t occur without first acknowledging the trauma of people who’ve experienced this, and I think we still have a lot of work to do. Some of these events of Unity Days are beginning to give voice to that, and I think there’s a lot more room to do more.

—Elizabeth Irvin

 

My heart goes out to the city officials since they’re the ones who are publicly shouldering what is actually each of ours to carry. I hope that they will continue to serve humbly, to keeping listening and asking questions. I’ve found that bringing small groups of people from different backgrounds together can be an effective way to get people to speak honestly and calmly in a way that inspires others to listen.

—Sam Bush

 

Someone besides me to say what we need to do to move forward. People like me who have been in leadership positions for many years ought to create the space for other people living and leading quietly in our community to say what needs to happen.

—Erika Viccellio, executive director of The Fountain Fund

Don Gathers and others at the official unveiling of the Inside Out: Charlottesville mural. Photo: Eze Amos

What do individual people need to do to move the community forward?

If you see a need, don’t wring your hands and hope someone does something about it. Step up to see what you can do to move things forward. And then actually do it. Don’t play armchair quarterback. Put feet to your intentions and get involved. If you don’t step up and out, who will?  #StepUpStepOut.

—Susan Bro

 

I’m not sure the public speaking platforms of our age are as effective as we think they are. Many of us are speaking to people who already agree with us which, in turn, merely helps us feel better about ourselves while vilifying those who disagree with us. As a result, we seem quick to anger and slow to listen. The alternative, I think, is much more difficult but more effective. I think we’d each be better off by getting to know someone who couldn’t be more different from us and then befriending them. Easier said than done, of course.

—Sam Bush

 

There’s no magic pill here that’ll fix this. We’ve got to begin to have those tough and difficult and hard conversations. And we’ve got to stop talking about race and start talking about racism. We can’t just talk about white supremacy, we’ve got to actually have the difficult conversations about white privilege and white advantage. And once we embrace those conversations…then we can move forward and start talking about unification.

I’m not sure there’s a mediator or moderator in the world that could handle that, because in so many instances we’re still talking at each other instead of to each other. We’re still talking about each other instead of trying to handle and solve the problem as it presents itself. How it’s handled, what it looks like, I’m still trying to envision it, but I know that it’s got to happen in order for us to move that needle.

—Don Gathers

 

 

Lisa Woolfork and members of the Hate-Free Schools Coalition of Albemarle County, who fought for a ban on Confederate imagery in county schools. Photo: Eze Amos

People can support community members who are already doing the work to build a better Charlottesville. City councilors need to respect and support Mayor Walker’s leadership. Voters need to vote for strong racial justice supporters. School administrators need to respond with deep policy changes to address concerns about racial equity raised by students and families. We need to stop protecting Confederates and their white supremacist legacy. We can create a brighter future if we do the difficult, sometimes uncomfortable, yet necessary work of liberation, learning and unlearning.

—Lisa Woolfork, UVA professor and community activist

 

Listen! We are each, as individuals, responsible for change. I am clear that as a white male, I need to listen to people of color and other marginalized communities with lived experiences different from mine. By listening we can understand what we need to do to be active allies. My fear for our whole society is that far too many people want to speak and too few have the self-discipline or awareness to listen.

—Matthew McLendon

 

Choose to live in community. In an age of climate change, neoliberalism, and tech-mediated communication, we are encouraged to remain fearful and isolated. To paraphrase bell hooks’ essay “Love as the Practice of Freedom”, the road to healing our wounded body politic is through a commitment to collective liberation that moves beyond resistance to transformation. We all have a positive role to play in healing and transforming our community. Yes, that means you too!

–Michael Payne

As individuals we just need to get involved, and stay aware. Because we can’t depend on one agency or one entity to handle it all; we need to all step up as a community, and in whatever way you feel the most comfortable. Hopefully you’re able to push yourself out of your comfort zone. It’s when we stay in our little circles of comfort that we tend to perpetuate stereotypes and assumptions about people in different groups. So to push ourselves to get involved and be challenged, and to challenge each other, I think are some of the things we can do.

–Charlene Green

 

Photo: Nick Strocchia

First and foremost is that self-reflection and working around issues of race and privilege. And within that, being willing to take care of ourselves and recognize what we need to do around our stress and anxiety so we can continue to have uncomfortable conversations and meaningful dialogue, but also continue to challenge ourselves moving forward.

Relative to the traumatic aspect of the anniversary itself, people who were more directly impacted still may be experiencing a lot of traumatic stress, so I just encourage those people in particular to reach out for support.

—Elizabeth Irvin

 

My own perspective shift came from new and growing relationships in Charlottesville, thanks to a lot of grace and space afforded to me by people who have been working on anti-racist advocacy for a long time here.

The truth is we all have space and grace to grow forward, and so what individuals can continue to do, and I’m talking about cis-hetero white individuals particularly, is not just listen to voices and perspectives that are threatened and crushed by white supremacy, but start to foreground their asks and desires. It will be costly for a lot of the privilege we carry, but it’s a cost that liberates, and is really life-giving in the end.

We can’t all be responsible for all the things all the time, or we’ll burn out, so get plugged in and focus where you feel most called and led. There’s a multitude of opportunities, but life’s too short and racism is too strong in this country to not try a bit harder to show up in embodied solidarity, somewhere.

—Seth Wispelwey

 

For those of us who weren’t born and raised here I think we need to be committed to better understanding the community we live in. It is only recently that I started regularly attending events and tours at the African American Heritage Center. I have a new, and essential, emerging understanding of the community I’ve been “serving” all these years.

—Erika Viccellio

 

One thing that we can do as individuals is to extirpate the systemic racism that plagues our culture. At Live Arts…we have begun to explore the systemic barriers to [theater] participation, including obvious issues like cost and content representation—and not-so-apparent barriers like architecture, language, food, and transportation. With the help of community partners this year, Live Arts offered more “pay what you can” tickets and scholarships than ever before. Also, we are diversifying representation on our stages by making more stories written and directed by and about persons of color and women.

Education is the key to effecting change. At Live Arts, we discussed micro-aggressions, unconscious bias, and workplace discrimination each month in board and staff meetings. This summer, we invited volunteer directors to join a diversity, equity, and inclusion workshop so that our creative teams have the tools to create a safe space to work and play.

We are far from perfect. But the aim is not to create a utopian society where we all say and do the right thing. Instead, the goal is to have an equitable culture of belonging, prosperity, community, and creative exploration.

—Bree Luck

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Come together: Revised UVA speech policy earns high marks

UVA alum Bruce Kothmann, who was removed from the steps of the Rotunda in May for reading a Bible without permission, tested restrictions again in July by waiving a gay pride flag. Bruce Kothmann

By Jonathan Haynes

Despite the controversy over the University of Virginia’s revisions to its right-to-assemble policies, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education has awarded the university its highest free speech rating.

FIRE, a group that defends the constitutional rights of students and faculty in higher ed, ranked UVA as a “green-light” university, along with with 42 other universities out of the 466 it monitors around the country, ahead of “yellow light” James Madison University and “red light” Virginia State University.

“We classify schools as red, yellow, green light based on how well the First Amendment is upheld at public schools and how well any school follows its own policies,” says Robert Shibley, the executive director of FIRE. “UVA has generally done a pretty good job.”

UVA alum Bruce Kothmann stirred debate over UVA’s campus speech policies last May, after an officer removed him from grounds for reading a Bible on the steps of the Rotunda without the university’s permission.

A viral video of the stunt shows an officer calmly listing newly prohibited activities to Kothmann, who asks if “reading the Bible aloud” is included. After pausing and flailing his left arm, the officer says, “Apparently.”

The revised “time, place, and manner” policy was written by the Dean’s Working Group, a steering committee established by UVA’s then-president Teresa Sullivan after a crowd of torch-bearing neo-Nazis set upon a small group of protestors surrounding the Jefferson statue on August 11, 2017.

The policy restricts people who wish to exercise their First Amendment rights and are not UVA students, staff, or faculty to one of nine designated areas, among them Nameless Field and the McIntire Amphitheater, where they may assemble with a maximum of 25 to 50 people for no more than two hours. Non-affiliated persons must request permission between one and four weeks in advance. Violators may be banned, but are typically just removed.

Shibley doesn’t foresee any legal challenges because the policy is content-neutral and justified by a safety interest. The policy “passes constitutional muster,” he says. “But I think it’s very disappointing that the university adopted it.” Nonetheless, that didn’t prevent FIRE from giving UVA the green light because its policies don’t interfere with student expression.

UVA modeled its revisions after the University of Maryland’s time, place, and manner restrictions, which were upheld by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Kothmann, a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Pennsylvania was visiting his alma mater last May to see his daughter, who had just completed her second year at UVA. He had read about the policy in the UVA alumni newsletter and, unable to shake it from his mind, decided to test campus enforcement.

The revisions proved controversial before their release, drawing criticism from members of the Faculty Senate Policy Committee Council. And some activists, students, and faculty had been pressuring UVA to ban specific organizations, since alt-right marchers were the perpetrators of on-campus violence August 11.

UVA banned 10 individuals involved in the torch march, but maintained that it is constitutionally forbidden from banning people or groups for ideological reasons.

“Times are changing, context is changing,” says Curry School professor Walt Heinecke. “Maybe it’s time for UVA to start legally pushing to see how far it can move that discussion.”

Critics lament the policy’s chilling effects on protest. Both Heinecke and William Keene, a professor of environmental science at UVA, point out that past on-campus protests against racial injustice, the invasion of Cambodia, and the ouster of Teresa Sullivan would not be permissible under the revised policy.

Shibley agrees that the policy could have negative consequences: “During the civil rights movement, non-students were coming on campus to engage in discussion and protests,” he says, adding that fewer interactions with the community will limit students’ exposure to different perspectives.

The policy has stirred little reaction from students, however, who are still free to protest. Student groups that are officially registered with student council may also invite an unlimited number of non-affiliated persons to grounds, but groups that are not registered, such as UVA Students United and the Living Wage Campaign, could be affected.

When the on-campus protests for the anniversary of August 11 and 12 presented an opportunity to test the policy’s enforceability, UVA ended up enacting security measures that far superseded the policy’s parameters, such as requiring clear bags, installing metal detectors and fencing around campus, and vastly restricting the plaza around the Jefferson statue, where UVA Students United and other activists had planned a protest.

But besides Kothmann, there are few known instances of people being removed for violating the policy.

And Kothmann has violated the policy several times without incident since his removal. In July, he waved a gay pride flag on the Rotunda steps and reported himself to the university counsel. After an hour without a response, he reported himself to a receptionist inside the Rotunda. “I saw you,” she said. “Do you need a drink of water?”

Outside of UVA President Jim Ryan’s inauguration on October 19, Kothmann and his daughter handed out flyers about the restrictions to several administrative officials. Many of them took one, including Ryan. On November 2, Kothmann reported himself for juggling pomegranates in the McIntire Amphitheater. Nobody responded. 

Correction January 3: Robert Shibley’s name was misspelled in the original story.

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In brief: Constitutional choices, banned from Grounds, $4-million manse and more

The Rivanna River flooded in May and edged near homes in Woolen Mills. Skyclad ap

But wait, there’s more on the ballot

While congressional candidates are getting all the attention, they’re not the only choices that need to be made at the polls November 6. Virginia likes to ask voters to weigh in on additions to its constitution, such as the now-unconstitutional marriage-is-between-a-man-and-a-woman amendment. A repeal of that will not appear on the ballot, but there are two other constitutional amendments for voters to consider on Tuesday.

One expands a property-tax exemption to spouses of service members who were killed or totally disabled in action to allow the spouse—as long as he or she does not remarry—to relocate and still claim the exemption. A “yes” on this amendment means approving the exemption.

The second, more controversial amendment, allows localities to offer property tax breaks to owners who make improvements to flood-prone properties. That means people who put money into protecting their property against rising waters can get a real estate tax break.

Critics say such breaks mean people who don’t live on the water are subsidizing the cost of waterfront living for others, and that they encourage building on flood-prone land. Supporters say the tax relief provides an incentive for owners to make expensive fixes to protect their properties.

A “yes” vote on this amendment means you support allowing localities to offer the property tax break.

Earlier this year, Delegate Steve Landes, who represents western Albemarle, voted against the flood amendment in the House because of concerns about the increasing number of constitutional amendments providing “more and more exemptions from property taxes.” But he says he supports both amendments now, and notes that while the flood amendment allows localities to provide this exemption, “it does not require them to do so.”

Quote of the week

“I don’t need thoughts and prayers—I need change.”—Jordan Bridges, a UVA third-year and president of Jewish Voice for Peace, at an October 27 candlelight vigil for the 11 people shot to death in a Pittsburgh synagogue earlier that day, according to the Cavalier Daily.

In brief

Unite the Right organizer Richard Spencer will not be welcome at his alma mater the next four years. Eze Amos

Banned from UVA

Ten people associated with last year’s August 11 march through Grounds are banned from university property for four years. The list includes alum Richard Spencer, whose wife filed for divorce last week, alleging assault; Elliott Kline, aka Eli Mosley, former Identity Evropa leader in charge of Unite the Right security; former Marine Vasillios Pistolis; the Daily Stormer’s Robert “Azzmador” Ray, and four members of California-based Rise Above Movement arrested in early October.

Fields files charge

James Fields, the man charged with driving his car into a crowd on August 12, 2017, killing one person and injuring many others, was allegedly attacked by another inmate at the local jail earlier this month. Fields filed an assault charge against Timothy Ray Brown Jr, but he showed no physical signs of being beaten up at his October 29 motions hearing,

Too young to drink—and buy handguns

Two UVA students filed a lawsuit challenging a federal ban on the sale of handguns to those under 21 (18-year-olds can legally buy rifles and shotguns, but not handguns). Tanner Hirschfeld, 20, and Natalia Marshall, 18, are suing the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, its acting director, Thomas Brandon, and U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, claiming the age limit is unconstitutional.

George Allen’s old house on the block

staff photo

Social Hall, the circa 1814 house once owned by the former Virginia governor and U.S. senator on East Jefferson Street, is for sale for nearly $4 million. Janice Aron bought it in 2006 for $1.1 million, and extensively renovated the 6,500-square-foot manse, which features five bedrooms, a lap pool, and an unparalleled view of Market Street Park and the statue of General Robert E. Lee.

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In brief: Shifting precincts, hefty raise, murky water and more

Know your polling place

It’s been an eventful couple years, and if you want to speak up when it matters (by voting in the midterms on November 6) your deadline to register is October 15. With that in mind, we also want to remind 15,000 voters in Albemarle County that their polling places have changed.

The county has added three new precincts and folded the Belfield precinct into Jack Jouett, says Albemarle registrar Jake Washburne.

Split are Cale, which begat the new Biscuit Run precinct; Crozet and Brownsville, which gave birth to Mechums River; and Free Bridge, which adds Pantops precinct.

And voters in the University precinct who had cast ballots at the soon-to-be demolished U Hall will now do so at Slaughter Rec Center.

The splits will make Election Day lines more manageable, says Washburne, and there’s another deadline he’s considering: “After February 1, 2019, we can’t change any precincts until after the 2020 presidential election.”

Some are predicting massive turnout in November. Compared to last September, Albemarle has added 2,000 voters. And Washburne mailed over 700 ballots on the first day of absentee voting, compared to 94 on the first day of the last midterm election in 2014. 

In the city, registrar Rosanna Bencoach says there’s always a surge of registrations in September and October from the student population. But according to the state elections website, Charlottesville has 922 more active voters as of October 1 than it did a year ago.

Bencoach issues a caveat to would-be voters: Don’t wait until the last minute to register or to request an absentee ballot, which must be applied for by 5pm the Tuesday before the election.

“With the current postal delivery practices, that’s way too late,” she says.

Quote of the week

“The Court is not typically in the muck and the mire of partisan politics. But this throws it right into the swamp.”—Barbara Perry, Miller Center director of presidential studies, on the Kavanaugh hearing

Lucrative gig

staff photo

City Council appointed Brian Wheeler interim clerk of council at its October 1 meeting. The current city spokesperson and former editor of Charlottesville Tomorrow temporarily replaces Paige Rice, who resigned last month. Since starting with the city in February at $98,000, raises have upped Wheeler’s pay to $116,438, an 8 percent increase in less than a year.

A12 anniversary costs add up

Charlottesville spent $921,334 over the August 12 anniversary weekend putting downtown on lockdown, and the University of Virginia reports its costs were $422,981. Adding the Virginia State Police’s expenses of $3.1 million, that puts the police-heavy weekend at around $4.4 million—and that’s not including Albemarle County’s costs.

Mayor tops duchess

Mayor Nikuyah Walker is No. 51 on the Root’s list of 100 most influential African Americans ages 25 to 45, coming in ahead of No. 52, Meghan Markle.

Chris Greene closed again

After a dog swam in the lake over the weekend and then died suddenly, Albemarle County officials have closed it for water recreation until results from new water quality tests are available.

Pot arrests surge

Despite decriminalization and legalization around the country, Virginia’s marijuana arrests hit their highest levels in a decade last year. Arrests statewide spiked 20 percent and convictions still carry the possibility of a six-month driver’s license suspension and up to $800 in fines, according to the Virginia Mercury.

Indigenous Peoples Day

Karenne Wood. Publicity photo

“We have been categorized as people of the past,” Karenne Wood, an enrolled member of the Monacan Indian Nation, told C-VILLE in March. She pointed out that in school textbooks, American Indians are often written about in the past tense: They lived in this type of house; they ate squash and corn; they wore feathers.

But she also hopes those textbooks will tell the story of Virginia Indians present and future. For Wood, director of Virginia Indian Programs at Virginia Humanities, that means working with textbook writers to tell a fuller—not just colonist—history of Native Americans. “We have adapted to live in this century along with everybody else,” she says.

To acknowledge their history on Indigenous Peoples Day, and to give a native perspective on how the story of Virginia’s first people can be expanded, Wood will give a talk called “Stone, Bone, and Clay: Virginia Indians’ History of 18,000 Years” on Monday, October 8, from 6:30-8pm at Lane Auditorium in the Albemarle County Office Building.

Monacan tribal dancers will perform immediately following her presentation.

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Too broad: Judge dismisses August 11 charge against CVS shopper

John Miska was arrested for possessing the razor blades he'd just purchased at CVS. Photo Janis Jaquith

A judge today said the city’s lengthy list of prohibited items on the Downtown Mall over the August 12 anniversary weekend swept “far too broadly,” and he dismissed a charge against a disabled veterans activist for possession of razor blades that were purchased August 11 at CVS.

John Miska, 64, bought two cases of Arizona iced tea, a can of bug spray, lightbulbs, and a pack of razor blades, and was arrested outside CVS for possessing prohibited items in the downtown area, where access was limited to two entry points on Water Street. Citizens attempting to enter the mall had to have bags and wallets searched before they were allowed to enter—although Miska was able to open carry a firearm. Metal beverage cans, aerosols and razor blades were prohibited, although Miska was only charged for the blades.

Miska entered a not guilty plea and was represented by the Rutherford Institute, a local civil rights organization.

Virginia State Police Sergeant S.W. Johnson, one of the 700 state police in town for the weekend, testified that he’d been alerted to Miska’s plans to purchase the forbidden items because the vet “made certain statements about his intentions to go to CVS” to the checkpoint staff. Johnson stopped Miska when he came out of the store with his walker, which carried the cases of iced tea, and he said he could see the other alleged contraband in the plastic CVS bag.

“He said he had common items for household use,” said Johnson. “He said he likes tea.” Miska declined Johnson’s offer to help him take the items to his car, and the officer took him into custody, Johnson testified.

Other people on the mall were drinking out of cans in restaurant patio areas, but Johnson did not arrest them because they appeared to be “part of private establishments,” he said.

Judge Bob Downer ruled in favor of Miska’s motion to dismiss and seemed to take a dim view of the city’s ban of certain items while allowing businesses on the mall to sell those items, commenting, “If the city really wanted to prohibit these items, they should have shut down all the stores that sold them.” He also said the restrictions were “too much” and that the ban was too broad.

“This case—in which a dozen police swarmed a disabled veteran with a walker buying cans of iced tea and bug spray from a CVS—is far from the only example of a dysfunctional, excessive government that overreaches, overspends, and is completely out of sync with the spirit of the Constitution,” said constitutional attorney and Rutherford president John W. Whitehead.

Also heard in Charlottesville General District Court were five other cases of those arrested over the anniversary weekend.

Former C-VILLE Weekly contributor Toby Beard, who was charged with “obstruction of free passage” August 12 during a march from Washington Park to downtown, pleaded guilty to a lesser infraction of walking in the street when a sidewalk was available. He was given a $15 fine, which was suspended.

His attorney, Janice Redinger, said after the hearing that the commonwealth dropping the charge from a Class 1 misdemeanor to a traffic infraction “was an acknowledgement that no crime took place.”

Chloe Lubin was charged with assault and disorderly conduct, and was ordered to do 50 hours of community service by January 31 for each charge. An obstruction of justice charge was dropped, with the condition it could not be expunged, and a misdemeanor charge of carrying a concealed weapon also was dismissed.

North Carolina resident Algenon Cain, who was charged with two counts of trespassing, did not appear in court. He was found guilty and fined $250 on the first count, with $200 suspended, and $250 on the second charge.

Veronica Fitzhugh was charged with misdemeanor assault and entered an Alford plea, which is a guilty plea that acknowledges the prosecution has enough evidence to convict but the defendant maintains her innocence. She was sentenced to complete 20 hours of community service by January 31.

Spotsylvania resident Martin Clevenger was charged with disorderly conduct following an encounter with Fitzhugh at Market Street Park. According to state trooper J.M. Hylton, who was standing behind a barricade in front of the Lee statue, Clevenger walked up to the statue and saluted.

“A female approached him and begin to scream and curse,” said Hylton. Clevenger “snapped and leaned over and shouted” at Fitzhugh.

Video showed Fitzhugh screaming “go home” and  “get the fuck out of my town” at Clevenger.

He replied multiple times, “If history is forgotten, you are bound to repeat it.” He also said that Fitzhugh was touching him and asked officers to arrest her. In the video, he stands saluting the statue while Fitzhugh continues to shout at him, until he suddenly turns to confront her, which, he testified, was because she insulted his father’s military service.

“I was there peacefully protesting,” said Clevenger. “You can see her spitting at me. That’s assault.” He said he acted in self-defense when she disparaged the “honor of my father.”

Downer said the case is one of the most difficult to decide because of the latitude required by the First Amendment. But he said  “the conduct of Ms. Fitzhugh certainly provoked” Clevenger’s reaction, and found Clevenger not guilty.

Outside the courthouse, anti-racist activists followed Clevenger into the Market Street Parking Garage and shouted at him and the police officers there. Clevenger sped out of the garage on a motorcycle.

Miska was screamed at with shouts of “fuck you racist” as he left the courthouse with his attorney, Elliot Harding.

Said Miska, “Perhaps we’ve shown the screaming meemies there is a way to protest government overreach within the system.”

Veteran John Miska was called a Nazi as he left the courthouse. Staff photo

Updated October 1 with comments from Whitehead, Redinger and Miska.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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In brief: America’s Dad, Virginia’s tampons, A12’s price tag and more

U.S. Senator Tim Kaine stopped by York Place for a pizza party with UVA students. Eze Amos

New contender for America’s Dad?

Senator Tim Kaine stopped by his campaign office in York Place September 21 for a pizza party with nearly three dozen University of Virginia Democrats.

Supporters passed around campaign signs that said “America’s Dad,” although Kaine may have some competition for the title—a spokesman for Bill Cosby told reporters recently that Cosby is still America’s Dad, despite his conviction for sexual assault.

In an exclusive interview on the vital topic of “dad jokes,” Kaine confessed that he groaned when his staff introduced the signs during his 2016 vice presidential campaign. “I kind of found myself in the center of all these dad jokes. And I mean, this is a very dad thing to say, but until I was in the center of them, I didn’t know there was such a thing as a dad joke.”

Urban Dictionary defines a dad joke as an “indescribably cheesy” or dumb joke made by a father to his kids. “We’re in a business where people get called a lot of names, and being made fun of because of my dad quality? I’ll take that,” says Kaine.

Smells of pepperoni and cheese wafted through the air as Hillary Clinton’s former running mate also fielded questions about his favorite type of ’za.

“I will always have Canadian bacon, mushroom, and black olive if I can,” he said. “Not everybody has Canadian bacon. It was more popular back in the day, and with Trump in a trade war against Canada, I’m sure there’s no more Canadian bacon.”

Believe it or not, he was also there to talk politics. As was 5th District congressional candidate Leslie Cockburn, who was preaching to the choir when she said one of her top priorities is debt relief for folks with student loans.

Like his young constituents, Kaine said he believes in climate science, marriage equality, and reasonable rules to “stop the carnage of gun violence.”

“I feel like politics is a lot like a train that’s run away and we need to pull the emergency brake,” Kaine told the crowd of students. And when recruiting young supporters, he said he no longer just talks about the differences between Republicans and Democrats.

“It’s not just that there’s a difference between the two sides,” he says. “It’s that you make a difference.”

As for defeating opponent Corey Stewart? “I feel good about what I see, but we take nothing for granted.”

Quote of the week

“If someone chooses to visit a Virginia Department of Corrections inmate, he or she cannot have anything hidden inside a body cavity.”—Spokeswoman Lisa Kinney tells the AP why women can’t wear tampons or menstrual cups when visiting state prisons.

In brief

Tourism bureau slam

Adam Healey, interim executive director for the Charlottesville-Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau, called the agency a “weak marketer,” its messaging “confusing,” and its positioning “dusty” rather than modern, according to Allison Wrabel’s story in the Daily Progress. And he wants to bump the bureau’s advertising budget from around $400,000 to $6 million.

Weekend traffic fatalities

UVA engineering grad student Rouzbeh Rastgarkafshgarkolaei, 27, died on U.S. 29 in Culpeper around 4:50am September 23, when his 2006 Audi sideswiped a Dodge Caravan, ran off the road, and caught fire. Virginia State Police said speed was a factor. That same day, Mary Elizabeth Carter, 19, died when her Mazda crossed the center line in Louisa and struck a Ford F150. Police said she wasn’t wearing a seatbelt.

Jowell Travis Legendre faces multiple charges. Charlottesville Police

Student assaulted, robbed

A UVA student was robbed and sexually assaulted around 9:30pm September 19 on the 500 block of 14th Street NW, city police said. Louisa resident Jowell Travis Legendre, 29, was arrested the next day and charged with object sexual penetration, forcible sodomy, robbery, grand larceny, and credit card larceny.

Well endowed

UVA’s endowment jumped almost $1 billion in the last fiscal year, from $8.6 billion to $9.5 billion. Even more impressive, the endowment has seen a 10.9 percent annual return over the past 20 years, according to COO Kristina Alimard.

Nuts wanted

The Virginia Department of Forestry is seeking acorns and nuts from 12 different species, mostly oaks, from state landowners. The department wants to plant them at its Augusta Forestry Center for tree seedlings.

 

 

Pricey preparations

While Jason Kessler was in D.C., Virginia State Police sent 700 officers to Charlottesville during the
August 12 anniversary weekend that brought out hundreds of anti-racist activists, students, and
mourners, but little to no opposition. The cost?

$3.1 million, according to VSP spokesperson Corinne Geller, who says the department has submitted the bill to the Virginia Department of Emergency Management for reimbursement. That number includes: $953,000 for equipment and vehicles,
and $885,000 in salaries (for officers who would have been working anyway). It does not include costs for Charlottesville, Albemarle, and UVA.

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Students rally: A diss to police and a march through the streets

Hundreds of students, faculty, and other supporters gathered at the University of Virginia on August 11, the one-year anniversary of the white supremacist-led tiki-torch rally on Grounds, to support those who were beaten by men in white polos and khakis a year earlier. They also protested the police, and the security parameters they allege that UVA forced on their rally. Photo by Eze Amos

Minutes before their rally was scheduled to begin August 11 in front of the Rotunda, UVA student activists dropped a banner that said, “Last year they came with torches, this year they come with badges,” and instructed hundreds of attendees to move their demonstration a few hundred feet to the left, where cops weren’t already waiting for them and they wouldn’t have to pass through metal detectors.

“They are here to control us,” said Erik Patton-Sharpe into a megaphone, and the crowd of students, community members, and out-of-town activists who came to support them echoed it. “They are here to control us,” the student said again, stomping a black combat boot on the pavement with every word.

It was the anniversary of the night that hundreds of white supremacists marched across Grounds, carrying lit tiki torches and chanting “Jews will not replace us.” When they reached the Thomas Jefferson statue at the base of the Rotunda, they encircled it and a group of counterprotesters—mainly students and faculty—and then pepper sprayed them and beat them with their torches.

The victims have often said that night in 2017 set the tone for the rest of the August weekend, when countless brawls between neo-Nazis and anti-fascists broke out in the streets, and law enforcement stood by idly.

At an event titled The Hope That Summons Us earlier that morning, President Jim Ryan said on his 11th day in office that UVA must admit to the mistakes it made last summer, pledge to learn from those mistakes, and not be afraid to apologize.

He earned himself a standing ovation with his message for the victims: “I am sorry. We are sorry.”

At their rally for justice that evening, a student said she didn’t believe him.

Others said cops don’t exist to protect them, and that law enforcement has a history of violence against anti-racist protesters.

Students C-VILLE interviewed at the rally declined to give their names, but allies passed around a flier with their unified message.

By Eze Amos

“What you see around you is not what we asked for,” it said, alleging that UVA administration forced them to plan the rally within the security parameters, required them to choose a select group of community members to join them, suggested they only allow those with student IDs inside the barricades the university erected, and designated a space for white supremacist counterprotesters. Said the flier, “It is a betrayal of our ideals and our community. …The city and the university’s desire to control images and protect their brands has created a dangerous police state.”

“This was a wonderful opportunity to look at the physical structures that they were being framed in as an analogy for the institutional structures that they are trying to resist,” said Lisa Woolfork, a Black Lives Matter organizer who teaches at the university.

She was wearing a T-shirt that said “professors act against white supremacy” when one of the student organizers at the rally asked her to help pass out their fliers.

Many professors wore the same shirt, and another student said she could feel the support from UVA faculty that night.

“I do have a certain degree of power and authority, and I think it’s useful for those in positions of power to support those who have less power,” said Woolfork.

The flier also listed the students’ demands to the university: To pay all outstanding medical bills for victims of last August 11 and 12, to denounce white supremacy by issuing lifelong no trespass orders to the men identified on Grounds last August 11, and to disclose any profits raised at last summer’s Concert for Charlottesville.

By 7:20pm, riot cops had lined up on the outskirts of the new rally location on the triangle of grass in front of Brooks Hall, and the activists began hurling a new chant at them: “Why are you in riot gear? We don’t see no riot here.”

Photo by Eze Amos

Some went face to face with law enforcement, while others advised them not to escalate the situation. The rally resumed peacefully and its attendees were again on the move.

They marched to The Colonnades amphitheatre at Lambeth Field, with a dozen first stopping to confront a person they called “Nazi” wearing a Longwood University T-shirt and cowboy boots. By about 8:05pm, they had regrouped and some decided on a march through the streets of Charlottesville.

Students, faculty, and allies then marched through town, chanting and cheering as people came out of their homes and businesses to clap along or record the chaos on their cellphones. A few miles later and after many had tapered off, a group of about 100 local and out-of-town activists arrived downtown.

A police helicopter trailed the march, and officers were lined up along the way. On Water Street outside of Mono Loco, a Virginia State Police officer darted into the crowd and tackled one woman, for reasons VSP spokesperson Corinne Geller was unsure.

Immediately, the woman’s anti-fascist comrades swarmed her, and yanked her out of the officer’s grip. The brawl had separated into two smaller ones, and the activists joined back with the march without any arrests.

Video of the mini melee shows two VSP officers holding a third one back, as he struggled to break free in an apparent attempt to reach the protesters involved in the fight.

Another similar scuffle broke out on the Downtown Mall, where police say an officer saw a man masking his face and he and the suspect were knocked to the ground as the officer moved toward him. Charges are pending in this incident, but, again, the activist and his friends rejoined the demonstration and were lost in the crowd. They made their way to Market Street, where they decided to call it a night.

And to make sure everyone in the group was on the same page, they shouted their plan: “Come back tomorrow morning.”

 

Additional photos by Eze Amos:

 

 

 

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‘Martial law’: Officials say 1,000 cops necessary, searches ‘consensual’

To enter the Downtown Mall, citizens had to submit to a search of purses and wallets. Police say that was “consensual.” Photo Eze Amos

The August 12 weekend passed with no loss of life or serious injury, but many Charlottesville residents were not reassured by the show of police force and the restrictions on pedestrian access to the Downtown Mall that were announced a couple of days before they went into effect.

The Virginia State Police provided 700 officers, and the total number of cops on hand was around 1,000, according to officials.

“Last year, I was afraid of the Nazis,” says Black Lives Matter organizer and UVA professor Lisa Woolfork. “This year, I’m afraid of the police.”

Civil rights attorneys blasted the decision to limit pedestrian access to the mall to two entry points on Water Street—and that was before everyone entering had to submit to a search of bags and wallets.

“You wonder why some people in our community distrust you,” writes Jeff Fogel in an email to city officials. The decision to withhold notice of the mall lockdown “smacks of deception, manipulation, and lies,” he says.

Rutherford Institute founder John Whitehead criticizes the lack of transparency and disclosure of a specific threat before restricting citizens’ ability to move freely. “To me it looks like martial law,” says Whitehead. “It creates a police state.”

At an August 13 press conference, public safety officials continued to refuse to answer whether there had been credible threats that warranted having 1,000 cops on hand.

“We had very large crowds here,” says Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney. “We had to plan for the variable of the unknown”—even if it was pretty clear the alt-right wasn’t coming.

Virginia State Police Superintendent Gary Settle says, “Some intelligence that I can’t reveal in a public forum caused us to make certain decisions and err on the side of caution.”

Brackney says the last-minute announcement of restricted mall access was to keep those points “close to the chest” and not reveal vulnerabilities to people who were surveilling social media for entry points into the controlled area.

On August 8, she said that citizens would not be subjected to searches unless there was reason to believe they had something that was on the lengthy list of prohibited items, including sticks, aerosol sprays, and knives. But on August 11, everyone who wanted to go to the mall had to submit to a search of bags and wallets.

Says Brackney, “Everyone actually was given the option. There was no one that was searched that was not consensual. Everyone was allowed in. It was their items that were not allowed in.”

City councilors C-VILLE talked to were vague about what they knew about the mall lockdown. “I don’t think we’re allowed to talk about that,” says Wes Bellamy. Vice-Mayor Heather Hill says she knew there would be restrictions, but didn’t know exactly what they were.

Even after mourners had paid their respects on Heather Heyer Way, state police continued to block Water Street and tensions remained high. Staff photo

Some saw the measures as an insult and over-compensation for last year’s deadly rally.

“I feel violated,” says activist Rosia Parker. “I feel completely violated. The presence we have here now should have been here last year.

She adds, “They’re protecting property, not people.”

Parker also objects to being searched to walk on the Downtown Mall, and seeing police officers in riot gear protecting the Lee statue.

“I think it made things more tense,” says UVA prof and activist Jalane Schmidt. “The solution to last summer is not over policing.”

She notes that initially officials said they were not going to check bags, and then ended up searching even wallets. “We’re under martial law in all but name,” she says.

Some made a point of braving the downtown hassles and came to support businesses there, like Kat Imhoff, Montpelier president and CEO. “I thought the police did a pretty good job,” she says. “A couple of times we left the barricaded area and had to go all the way around to get back in.”

Her friend, Dorothy Carney, compares the security measures to the Transportation Security Administration after 9-11. “It felt like an overreaction because nothing was shared about threats.”

The appearance of riot police did not did not put protesters at ease at the UVA student rally Saturday night. Eze Amos

Carney attended the student rally Saturday night and said it was really peaceful around Brooks Hall until about 100 cops in riot gear came marching in. That’s about the point Imhoff arrived, and she says, “You can see how quickly things can fall apart.”

Both Carney and Imhoff say cops were a lot friendlier this year than last, when they would not make eye contact.

“I had a lot of police smiling at me with my Black Lives Matter T-shirt on,” says Carney.

One other thing struck her: “You have a security checkpoint but you’re still allowing guns in. We need to change those laws.”

City Council is holding a community listening session from 6 to 8pm Tuesday at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center.

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A diss to the police and a miles-long march through the streets

Students planned a new rally location when their original spot in front of the Rotunda had too many security measures for their liking. Photo by Eze Amos

And updated version of this story with additional photos can be found here.

Minutes before their rally was scheduled to begin in front of the Rotunda, UVA student activists dropped a banner that said, “Last year they came with torches, this year they come with badges,” and instructed hundreds of attendees to move their demonstration a few hundred feet over, where cops weren’t already waiting for them and where they wouldn’t have to pass through metal detectors.

“They are here to control us,” said Erik Patton-Sharpe into a megaphone, and the crowd repeated it back to him. “They are here to control us,” he said again, stomping his black combat boot on the pavement with every word.

It was the anniversary of the night that hundreds of white supremacists marched across Grounds, carrying lit tiki torches and chanting, “Jews will not replace us.” When they reached the Thomas Jefferson statue at the base of the Rotunda, they encircled it and a group of counterprotesters—mainly students and faculty—whom they then attacked with pepper spray and torches.

The victims have often said that night set the tone for the rest of the August weekend, when countless brawls between neo-Nazis and antifascists broke out in the streets and law enforcement stood by idly.

At their rally for justice tonight, students said some may think cops exist to protect, but they disagree. (All students C-VILLE interviewed declined to give their names, but organizers passed around a flier with their message.)

“What you see around you is not what we asked for,” it said, alleging that UVA administration forced them to plan the rally within the security parameters. “It is a betrayal of our ideals and our community.”

It also said, “The city and the university’s desire to control images and protect their brands has created a dangerous police state.”

By 7:20pm, riot cops lined up at the new rally location at Brooks Hall, and the activists began hurling a new chant at them: “Why are you in riot gear? We don’t see no riot here.”

Some went face to face with the law enforcement, while others advised them not to escalate the situation. As they settled down and the rally resumed peacefully, its attendees were again on the move.

They marched from outside the Rotunda to Lambeth Field, with a dozen first stopping to confront a “Nazi” in a Longwood University t-shirt and cowboy boots. By about 8:05pm, they had regrouped and decided on a march through the streets of Charlottesville.

They then paraded through town, chanting and cheering as people came out of their homes and businesses to clap along or record the chaos on their cellphones. A few miles later (they took the long way), they had arrived on the Downtown Mall, and as cops in reflective vests began to line up on Market Street, the activists decided to call it a night.

And to make sure everyone in the group was on the same page, they shouted their plan: “Come back tomorrow morning.”

This is a night-of dispatch, and it will be updated with photos, details and more context.

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Gun-carrying vet arrested for scraper blades

John Miska was arrested for possessing the razor blades he'd just purchased at CVS. Photo Janis Jaquith

John Miska frequently shops on the Downtown Mall, especially when CVS has two-for-one sales on cases of Arizona iced tea. Today, he ran afoul of the city’s list of prohibited items after he made his purchases, and was arrested for possessing the single edge blades he bought for his ice scraper.

Miska, 64, says he was both open- and concealed-carrying handguns, which are not prohibited during the Downtown Mall lockdown that limits pedestrian access and requires a search of purses, bags and backpacks belonging to those who wish to enter the mall.

“I clear the checkpoint, I’m Second Amendment friendly, I go into the store and make legal purchases,” says Miska. A police officer picked up his bag and asked to search it, he says. “I didn’t give him permission to search. He did it anyway.”

The list of prohibited items in the city during the August 10-12 weekend includes metal beverage cans, aerosol cans and razors, but Miska says he was not charged for possessing the two cases of canned green tea and mango iced tea, nor was he charged for possessing the bug spray he purchased.

He questions why businesses were allowed to sell the banned items and says while he was getting arrested, he saw a woman at a cafe drinking a beer out of a glass bottle, which is also a prohibited item. “They didn’t arrest her,” he says.

Miska, who is a disabled veteran, says he cut his knees and arms while police “were trying to stuff me into a paddy wagon too small for a disabled person.”

More injurious, he says, are the “hypocrisy and sheer stupidity of what they’re doing downtown.”

Says Miska, “I was challenging the authority of the director of public safety, the governor and the new city manager that they could abrogate my civil rights when there was no known threat. There was no Nazi demonstration, yet they turned downtown into a no-go zone. The Supreme Court says in public, a citizen has a right of free passage.”

City spokesman Brian Wheeler says, “People entering a store within the security area would have already been through an access point and been informed about the prohibited item restrictions.”

After three hours, Miska was released with a notice that he would be considered a trespasser if he appeared in the restricted downtown area before 6am Monday and with a class 4 misdemeanor arrest for failure to comply.

Miska, who on August 23 of last year attempted to remove a shroud that was placed over the Robert E. Lee statue in Market Street Park, knows it could have been worse. “They could have charged me with 48 counts of having soda cans,” he says.

Also arrested was Algenon Franklin Cain, 28, of Red Springs, North Carolina, for trespassing on two separate occasions. He’s being held without bond. And William Erbie Hawkins Jr., 53, of Amelia, was arrested for being drunk in public after a Virginia State Police officer noticed him walking unsteadily and gave him a field sobriety test, according to a press release issued by the City of Charlottesville.