Audrey Nguyen and Ben Rosenblum were married on the courthouse steps on May 4. Photo: Meredith Sledge Photography
It’s to be expected that one’s wedding day will include a few stressors—the guest shuttle didn’t arrive on time, there’s a stain on the bride’s veil, the band left a crucial instrument behind. What’s less predictable: A global pandemic shuts down the wedding altogether. Here are three local couples embracing the change.
May the 4th be with you
Audrey Nguyen and Ben Rosenblum
Original wedding date: May 2, 2020
New ceremony date: May 4, 2020
New wedding date: April 24, 2021
There’s something to be said for looking for a silver lining. For Audrey Nguyen and Ben Rosenblum, who had planned a May 2 wedding at Mount Ida Farm & Vineyard, it was the ability to make their new wedding anniversary—the one they’d wanted initially—a reality.
“We’re both really big Star Wars fans,” says Nguyen. “When we decided to get married, we were like, ‘Oh my gosh, we should try to get married on May the 4th.’” The date, a Monday, wouldn’t work with their schedules, so they settled on May 2. But when things started shutting down due to coronavirus restrictions, they realized they could make it work with a simple courthouse wedding.
“As far as bad scenarios go, we were still actually able to get married on what would have been our ideal wedding day anyway.”
Photo: Meredith Sledge Photography
After saying “I do,” the couple headed to Mount Ida to pick up some beer and wine, then swung by The Catering Outfit, where their catering team had prepared a wedding-night meal kit. Their planner, Karen McGrath of Anne Arden Events, brought flowers to the ceremony, and their photographer, Meredith Sledge, caught the whole thing on film.
“It was really nice to still have all of our vendors involved,” Nguyen says.
That’s not to say the couple, who met six years ago while attending UVA, didn’t hit some snags when it came to re-planning their wedding. While they’d settled on a May 4 ceremony, they decided to move the real wedding celebration—with friends and family—to next April. One problem: Next spring, Ben’s groomsman’s wedding is the first week of April, Audrey’s maid of honor’s is April 17, and one of the bridesmen is getting married two weeks after April 24.
It was a complicated shuffle, but it all worked out in the end—with another silver lining: Because her wedding ring got caught in New York City, Nguyen now has two: the last-minute replacement she wore May 4, and one she’ll save for next year’s much-awaited big day.
Patt Eagan and Anika Kempe. Photo: John Robinson
See you next year
Anika Kempe and Patt Eagan
Original wedding date: May 23, 2020
New wedding date: May 29, 2021
Sixteen hours after Anika Kempe and Patt Eagan made the call to postpone their wedding, all the details were in place. With a few immediate family members in the high-risk category for COVID, and others having to travel internationally and from the West Coast, says Kempe, they felt confident in making the tough call.
“Neither of us could imagine getting married without any of these people present,” Kempe says. “We let our guests know on March 23, so relatively early into the current pandemic reality.”
Once they decided on postponement, with the help of their wedding planner, Bryce Carson of Richmond-based Roberts & Co., the couple began checking with vendors about availability. Their venue, The Clifton, offered Memorial Day in 2021 at no additional charge, which was a bit of foreshadowing for how well the process would go with the other companies they were working with. One by one, each of them—Amy Smith Photography, Ana Cavalheiro Fine Jewelry, Bryce Carson, Gregory Britt Design, MS Events, Nicole Laughlin MUA & Co., and Sam Hill Entertainment—was able to postpone to May 29, 2021, with little trouble.
“We’ll never appropriately be able to express our gratitude to them for their support, generosity, and understanding,” Kempe says.
As the bride notes, she and her husband-to-be may have had to postpone the wedding, but “everything besides the date remains the same—venue, vendors, and anticipation.”
Lena Turkheimer and Mark Owen shared their backyard wedding with guests through Zoom. Photo courtesy subject.
Screen time
Lena Turkheimer and Mark Owen
Original/new wedding date: April 11, 2020
Much like the virus’ early news coverage, Lena Turkheimer and Mark Owen felt like their wedding plans were changing day-to-day. After Early Mountain Vineyards—the venue where they’d planned to have their spring celebration—announced it wouldn’t hold any weddings while Virginia’s stay-at-home order was in effect, the couple started dreaming up Plan Bs.
“We pretty immediately knew that we wanted to have it in my parents’ backyard, weather permitting,” Turkheimer says. They hoped to include their immediate family and wedding party, then pared down to only their parents and siblings, but even that was an unrealistic expectation, given that their siblings were spread out across the country.
Finally, they decided to include just their parents and broadcast the “I dos” via Zoom for everyone else. Once the decision was made, everything came together—the morning of the ceremony.
Turkheimer’s parents assembled the arbor frame the couple initially planned to use at EMV, and the bride and her mom decorated it with flowers while Owen and Turkheimer’s dad set about figuring out the video feed, Macgyvering a rubber band to an iPad on a standing desk.
“It was not the prettiest,” Turkheimer says, “but it was great because none of the guests could see behind the scenes.”
As for the wedding “guests,” those near and far really got into it, with the bridal party donning their suits and dresses for the occasion.
“The tuxes were often paired with shorts, though, and we had a few people in bathrobes,” Turkheimer says. “One of my friends is staying at her parents’ house, so she decided to attend in the only formal dress she had there—her high school prom dress.”
When it came down to it, having the smaller-scale day allowed the couple to focus on what matters most, Turkheimer says: “Getting to marry each other… [and] the support of our closest friends and family.”
Mel Walker has always offered takeout at his eponymous soul food diner, but most of his business comes from eat-in and catering orders. “It’s not the same money right now. But we’re hanging in there,” he says, thanks in part to support from his loyal customers.
Standing in the Chimm dining room, Jay Pun felt a sense of unease. It was the weekend of March 7, and the tables were full of diners noshing on Thai and southeast Asian street food dishes.
“This is really starting to freak me out,” said one of Pun’s employees, who was also surveying the scene. Pun had to agree. COVID-19 was becoming an increasing threat, and it was nearly impossible to look around the dining room without cringing at the sound of a sneeze or a cough, or wondering who among them might be an asymptomatic carrier.
“It’s every restaurateur’s dream to have a packed house, to always have a business going,” says Pun, but that night, the dream started to feel more like a nightmare.
Pun, who co-owns both Chimm and Thai Cuisine & Noodle House, had good reason to worry: Just a few days later, on March 11, the World Health Organization would classify COVID-19 a global pandemic, and a few days after that, on March 16, the City of Charlottesville announced its first confirmed case.
On March 17, Governor Ralph Northam issued a public health emergency order for restaurants to enforce a 10-patron limit, and by March 23, he ordered them closed for service other than takeout and delivery.
Once that mandate came down, eateries had to decide what to do next: Close indefinitely? Expand an existing takeout business? Build a takeout program from the ground up? Lay off employees so they could start collecting unemployment benefits, or try to keep some on in a modified way?
These are not easy decisions to make. The Charlottesville area has a high number of restaurants per capita (not to mention significant wedding and tourism industries), and the restaurant and hospitality industry employs a significant percentage of the local population. Reductions in hours and service options affect thousands of workers and their families.
And while those decisions have varied greatly from restaurant to restaurant, and continue to shift each week, the desired outcome—survival—is the same across the board.
“There are a lot of formats that make sense” in how to maintain a business right now, says Ben Clore, co-owner of Oakhart Social and Little Star, both located on West Main Street. “Every restaurant should do what’s best for them.”
At first, Clore says, they reduced staff and tried takeout (using a combined menu for both places) to clear out the pantry and see how it went. But after weighing potential health and financial risks against benefits and rewards, Clore and his business partners decided that moving to a takeout model just wasn’t worth it. Both spots are closed for now.
Just down the street at Mel’s Café, Mel Walker continues to prepare his full soul food menu. Mel’s has always offered takeout, but the catering and dine-in side of the business “was a lot more money,” says Walker. “It’s not the same money right now. But we’re hanging in there.”
Walker’s had to buy more containers and utensils than he usually does, and says packing to-go orders requires more work than prepping eat-in plates. And as restaurant suppliers start to run out of certain things, most notably fresh meat (a number of America’s largest meat processing plants have had to shut down due to COVID-19 outbreaks among workers), he’s a little worried about being able to get all the ingredients he needs.
Jay Pun’s restaurants, Thai Cuisine & Noodle House and Chimm, already had takeout systems in place, which has helped during the shutdown. Photo: John Robinson
Before the pandemic, Pun estimates between one-quarter and one-third of his restaurants’ business came from takeout orders. “Looking back, I’m glad we had that in place,” says Pun.
Business is doing well enough that he hasn’t had to lay off any employees. And for those who don’t feel comfortable working in the restaurant space, despite everyone wearing masks and gloves and taking extra cleaning precautions (like trading natural products from Method and Seventh Generation for CDC-recommended Lysol and Clorox-type cleaners), Pun’s tried to give them back-end work if they want it.
“So far so good, knock on wood,” says Pun. “I don’t know if it’s a trend, if it will continue, or if it’ll get even busier.”
Other spots, like Moose’s By the Creek in Hogwaller and Ivy Inn on Old Ivy Road, are doing takeout for the first time.
“It’s going as good as it can go,” says Moose’s co-owner Amy Benson. Moose’s now offers its full menu of diner staples, including breakfast, at expanded hours (9am to 5pm Wednesday through Saturday), plus special family-style meals on Sundays. “You just have to find the thing that keeps people coming back,” she says. Demand has been high enough that Benson says she’s been able to keep on all five of Moose’s full-time employees.
After Moose’s closed its dining room following the weekend of March 15, some regulars pressed to come in in groups of nine or less, but Benson wouldn’t allow it. She adores both her regular customers and her employees, and it wasn’t worth the risk.
“Hopefully we’ll get through this and get going again,” she says.
After initially closing his restaurant, the Ivy Inn’s Angelo Vangelopoulos is now serving takeout Wednesday through Saturday. Photo: John Robinson
Angelo Vangelopoulos closed the Ivy Inn’s dining room after that second weekend in March, too. Like Pun, the chef-owner had a growing sense of unease at seeing his restaurant full of people, and kept thinking, “We’re doing the wrong thing to make this better.”
Vangelopoulos, who’s been with the restaurant since 1995, made the decision to close temporarily. Takeout didn’t seem like an option for the Ivy Inn’s upscale seasonal American cuisine. “We’re not a carry-out restaurant; we’re not equipped for it,” says Vangelopoulos. And he wanted his employees to be able to apply for unemployment as soon as possible. “I knew the line would only get longer,” he says.
“It was one of the toughest days I’ve lived through. We’ve got almost 30 people that rely on us for their well-being and income. And there’s a pretty tight social structure inside a restaurant, too—we consider each other family, we take care of each other. That was really hard, getting the message out to my people.”
But the restaurant was losing $800 every day it remained fully closed, so, as it became clear that stay-at-home directives wouldn’t be ending anytime soon, takeout seemed worth a try. After taking a week to figure out menus and ordering systems, and purchase takeout containers, the Ivy Inn now does carryout four days a week, with a different daily menu, Wednesday through Saturday (Thursday is “Mr. V’s Greek Night,” an homage to Vangelopoulos’ father, who’s now helping out in the kitchen and who owned and ran a restaurant in Springfield for many years).
To keep costs as low as possible, Vangelopoulos and his family are handling everything themselves, and like many restaurant owners, he notes that takeout is even more work than eat-in. There are lots of moving parts, from taking orders to prepping food to texting with customers waiting in the parking lot. “I am not joking you when I say we are working more now than before we closed, and we were open seven days a week,” says Vangelopoulos.
“I’m fully happy running with a lower profit margin at this time to really survive, to keep a little bit of cash flow coming into the checking account,” says Vangelopoulos. It also helps that his landlord has told him not to worry about rent right now.
For PK Ross, owner and flavor virtuoso of Splendora’s Gelato on the Downtown Mall, the COVID-19 pandemic has made her think differently about her business. Immediately after the governor issued the stay-at-home order, she moved to carry-out only and added delivery. She has kept only one employee, her general manager, on the books. “Customers are ordering, but it’s nowhere near our walk-in business,” she says, in part because nobody’s out on the Downtown Mall.
Normally at this time of year, Ross would be making between 18 and 24kg of chocolate gelato per week, one of the shop’s biggest sellers. Last week, she made eight.
“Customers are ordering, but it’s nowhere near our walk-in business,” says PK Ross of Splendora’s. Photo: John Robinson
Even before the pandemic began, Ross had planned to close her Downtown Mall storefront in August. “Holding on until this mess lifts was my initial hope…so that I could have a farewell summer with my customers,” she says. But now she’s thinking of keeping Splendora’s going beyond the summer, in a different spot, and with something close to the model she’s currently operating—a scaled-down shop with more emphasis on delivery.
Even the most seasoned restaurateurs aren’t sure what’s next, and as the pandemic continues, the situation only grows more complicated. Already, one local restaurant—the Downtown Grille—has closed its doors for good. To receive the federal Paycheck Protection Program loans many small businesses are applying for right now, restaurants would have to keep their entire staff on the payroll. But between state unemployment benefits and the additional $600 per week federal benefit, many workers who have been able to qualify are making more direct income on unemployment than they would in a restaurant. And even if restaurants are allowed to open in the next few months, customers, servers, and cooks still might not feel safe congregating in dining rooms and kitchens.
At this point, it’s impossible to know what the industry will look like in even a few months. But for now, many are grateful for the community support they’ve received, both from the funds set up to help their employees, and from takeout orders. Pun notes that “people are so much kinder than they ever were, which has been awesome.” Even in the best of times, customers typically don’t tip enough or at all on takeout, but Pun’s noticed that lately, folks are tipping the standard 15 to 20 percent, if not more.
And Walker’s glad he can maintain relationships with his loyal customers, relationships he’s established through reliably serving hamburgers, fried chicken, cornbread, and collards for years. “I want the whole community to know how much I appreciate the support. I want everyone to stay safe and try to do the best they can to get through this,” he says. “I’ve been in the restaurant business a long time, and ain’t nobody seen anything like this before.”
Walter Slawski (of Shebeen Pub & Braai and The Catering Outfit) has worked with Sysco Food Service of Virginia to establish a twice-weekly food pantry for laid-off restaurant and hospitality workers. Photo: John Robinson
Feeding the cooks
South African eatery Shebeen Pub & Braai and its sister restaurant/catering biz The Catering Outfit are among the local spots that have stayed open, serving takeout and chef-prepared meal kit offerings. And in a partnership with Sysco Food Service of Virginia, they’ve also opened a food pantry to help unemployed restaurant workers (including some of their own) stock their home kitchens.
“I know what my employees are going through,” says Shebeen and Catering Outfit owner Walter Slawski. “Not only are we trying to create revenue streams” to pay them if they want to work right now, “we’re trying to help people.”
Sysco’s provided more than $25,000 worth of groceries, says Slawski, and they’re relying on private donations from the community, too. So far they’ve given out more than $32,000 worth of food to over 1,000 food service and event workers.
The pantry is open Mondays and Thursdays from 11am to 2pm in the Shebeen parking lot, and what’s in each pre-packed bag varies from pickup to pickup. Sometimes it’s a lot of dry goods and refrigerator items like cold cuts, bacon, and juice, or fruit like bananas and oranges. One week, LittleJohns donated bags of potato chips and bread. Sysco’s donations are a little more on the wild side—five-pound bags of macaroni, for instance—but Slawski says there’s been nothing but gratitude.
Any restaurant and hospitality industry worker can visit the pantry, which Slawski says operates on an honor system: People will be asked where they work, or used to work, prior to the pandemic, but that’s it. “We don’t turn anybody away.”
Allison Kirkner, nurse practitioner at UVA. Photo: John Robinson
While most of us are staying home, some locals are still heading to work, to keep essential services running. Here are nine of their stories, in their own words.
Allison Kirkner
Lead nurse practitioner and manager, cardiothoracic ICU at UVA Hospital
As told to Erin O’Hare
Every single day is a different day. It would be totally fascinating were it not terrifying.
We work 12-hour shifts in our ICU, cover 24/7, and typically take care of patients who’ve had heart and lung surgeries.
Surgeons like to operate, but, three, four weeks ago, my surgeons made the decision to stop what we’re calling “electives.”
Because the volume is down, I’m asking for volunteers from my team to send to the COVID unit. Six or seven advanced providers, including myself, volunteered to either go on our regularly scheduled shifts or pick up extra ones. We’ve been doing that for about three weeks now. It’s been nice to shift our resources to help our colleagues.
There are a lot of conversations at UVA and elsewhere about who should be taking care of these patients and who shouldn’t be. I have pretty severe asthma, but I feel like everybody has something going on. I have been so impressed by my colleagues who have stepped up and said “I’ll do this part,” or “I’ll do that part.” This is a team sport.
I’m from southwestern Virginia and this is the hospital my parents would come to if they were very, very sick. You do it to take care of your patients and your community and lend whatever expertise you have toward patient care. I’m not a corny person—I’m actually a very sarcastic person—but, one thing I always talk about is that I’m solely motivated by patient care, and that’s really, really hard and frustrating in this. We’ve definitely been hamstrung by the federal government and by slower responses. I’m pretty impressed with UVA’s response overall. There are areas where we wish we could go back in time [and make adjustments] that would help us now. We’ve also been blessed with time, because our wave hasn’t hit yet, unlike New Orleans or New York. We have a little more time to prepare.
Something I’ve learned dealing with critically ill patients who have bad outcomes and do die sometimes, is to let myself wallow when I need to. I have days where I know I’m not going to get anything done, and I let myself be sad. We need to take the time to know what our bodies are saying to us, and to grieve not just specific patients but normal life. I’m also trying to stay working out on my water rower, and spending time with my husband, who’s a school teacher. And also wine.
Photo: Zack Wajsgras
Laura DeLapp
Shift supervisor at The Haven;
intake coordinator at PACEM
As told to Laura Longhine
The Haven is a day shelter. Before, we were open to anyone in need, including those who were housed. They would sign their names on the sign-in sheet and then go about their day. Now, we are no longer able to serve the housed community. We are now greeting people outside of the door, we are temperature checking, we are asking specific questions about health. We did have two that we had to turn away—one had left New York just last week, and another who had just left Maryland.
Once they are inside those doors they have to sanitize their hands, and we’re sanitizing the building, all surfaces, every hour.
There’s very few of us working inside the building, because most of the guests we have are extremely vulnerable. We’re communicating with the other staff either on Zoom or phone calls or emails.
We’re still interacting with the guests, but now it’s a lot different because you know we have to maintain that space. We actually put a piece of tape down by the front counter, and everybody’s covered in masks anytime they’re in the shelter.
The atmosphere is a lot quieter. I think a lot of [our guests] are concerned. I put one of the computers on the news every morning so they can keep up with everything that’s going on. It’s almost a totally different place right now.
For overnight shelter, PACEM is housing the women in The Haven, and we are housing the men at Key Rec Center. All the beds were spaced six feet apart.
As far as getting infected, I don’t have any concerns. Because a lot of the guests we have currently, I’ve been dealing with over a year now. I’m familiar with most of them, their health concerns. I sort of worry more going to the grocery store than I do at The Haven.
I’m always in a mask. I keep hand sanitizer in my vehicle, in my jacket pocket, anywhere that I can fit hand sanitizer I typically have it. And I’m making sure that myself and the guests are continually washing our hands, not touching faces, that sort of thing.
Exercise is a big stress release for me, because I have kids, I have five at home. My fiancé kind of maintains the household when I’m here.
I’ve got a good support system: I’m from a large family, and the majority of us are essential workers. So we talk a lot.
Staff photo
Jane Colony Mills
Executive director of Loaves & Fishes
Food Pantry
As told to Brielle Entzminger
In our normal operations, people come into the pantry and sit at a registration desk, they sign on a signature pad that’s been touched by multiple hands, and they grab a grocery cart and pick out their food. We also use 160 volunteers a week.
So when the epidemic began, we realized pretty quickly that we were going to have to completely redo how we do things. We had to ask our volunteers to stay home, to reduce the chance for exposure.
Now, instead of letting people shop, our staff organizes and bags the food, and puts it into grocery carts, wearing masks and gloves, so it’s ready to go when people pull into the parking lot. We’re still doing a face-to-face registration, but it’s with a clipboard—I’m the one doing that, with a mask and gloves on, and we’ve seen at least a 20 percent increase in people coming in.
Our staff push a grocery cart to a car, and the people receiving the food put it into the car themselves. Staff then sanitize the cart with Lysol before loading it up with bags again.
Trying to keep a distance between myself and the people who come in is pretty hard, because a lot of engines are running. You’re trying to get information from six feet away, and I can’t necessarily hear what people are saying. We’ve also seen a huge uptick in Spanish-speaking households coming for help, so I’ve recruited my daughter, who speaks Spanish, to help with that, along with one of our volunteers.
I think our greatest fear as a staff is that one of us is going to infect one of our clients. We’ve had some of our older clients and ill clients come to get food, and it’s so worrying. But they have no other way of getting food. The whole thing about infecting our families scares us too. I take off everything I’ve worn to work and put it immediately in the laundry. The gloves are thrown away, and the mask also goes into the laundry.
We’re all just trying to get back to our normal, as normal as we can be. I love to cook, so with my daughter and husband home, I’m making dinner all the time, and they are too. While I’m jealous that I’m not actually getting to stay home, the concept is great, because it’s making us appreciate each other more.
Staff photo
Modou Secka
Cashier at Oak Hill Market & Deli
As told to Carol Diggs
I have been working here for five years, and I have never seen anything like this. We want to stay open for our customers, so I am very careful to wipe everything down and to keep things clean. And we have the rules about distance, the tape on the floor. For us working here, they’ve given us masks, hand sanitizer, gloves, and wipes. I use the spray sanitizer on the glass doors too, that’s why they don’t look so clean as they do with Windex. And the plastic screen for the checkout counter will be coming in later this week.
We’re not open as much—only from 10am to 9pm now, it used to be 7am to 11pm. But we have nice customers, they understand. When they come, and they see cars parked outside, they look in first and make sure there won’t be more than 10 people inside. If a family comes, some of them may stay outside.
Many customers do come in for groceries, because they can get in and get out quick, and they don’t want to go to the big stores. And we have a great deal right now on soda.
I have to make sure I’m careful when I go home, too. When I get home, I change all my clothes and wash them, wash my hands too.
Photo: John Robertson
John Anderson
Driver for JAUNT
As told to Brielle Entzminger
Before the epidemic, it was just the everyday hustle and bustle. People felt free to use JAUNT, and ridership was pretty steady. Now, there’s a lot less riders. I drive on the same route, but it’s been cut short. I work less hours, since there’s not as much of a demand for drivers. We aren’t charging fares at this time. Every driver has to wear masks and gloves, and sanitize their bus several times a day—the seats, walls, rails, essentially everything that people touch.
Because I’m not going into the JAUNT office and socializing with my co-workers like usual, it can also be a bit isolating. When I go to work, I see the other drivers in the parking lot and make small talk for a little while, but we have to keep our distance from each other.
As for the passengers, I’ve haven’t seen that many people wearing masks and gloves, but they’ve been practicing social distancing and sitting far away from each other. We’ve also been picking up a lot of health care providers from the main facilities and transporting them. However, I feel pretty safe and at ease, because they can’t enter their facilities without being screened for virus [symptoms].
I try to stay safe and distant from everyone. But still having to go places, both for work and outside of work, it can be scary.
I’ve been sleeping a lot more than usual, because my hours are a little bit different. I don’t have to go into work as early as I normally do. I try not to look at the news as much, and really try to stay away from it, because most of it is bad news. And outside of work, I’ve been staying home and trying to stay safe. It seems like it’s going to be a long time before it gets better, but I’m just hanging in there, and trying not to let it get to me. That’s all you can do.
Photo courtesy subject
Erik Bailey
Paramedic for Charlottesville Fire Department
As told to Erin O’Hare
Before, you’d wear a mask if someone had the flu, or another confirmed illness. Now we wear one always. I’m a lot more vigilant than I used to be, because of how insidious the virus is and how it’s spread: You have to assume everyone has the virus and be good about your PPE usage.
I work on the ambulance, in addition to the fire engine, directly involved in patient care and transport, so, if I’m within six feet of a patient, I’m wearing eye protection, a surgical mask, gloves, and a gown. And the patient wears a surgical mask, too.
The N-95 mask shortage has been all over the news. We’re wearing N-95s when we’re doing an aerosolizing procedure, which can produce airborne [virus] particles, such as intubation, doing CPAP, CPR, things like that, we’re wearing N-95s and the plastic visors, as well as gowns.
You talk to any health care provider, what they’re concerned about is, are you staying safe and healthy? Is your family staying safe and healthy? Are your co-workers staying safe and healthy? Because this is a quietly spreading virus, you’re worried you’re taking it home to your kids, your wife, your husband, anyone else. You see across the country all these fire departments with large portions of their staff being quarantined due to exposure. That’s my biggest concern: I’d feel bad spreading it to other people. My parents are both in their 60s, living in northern Virginia, which is a hot spot right now, so I’m concerned about them, definitely talking on the phone with them more than I used to. And the PPE shortages. Any provider is concerned about having the PPE that they need. We’ve been fortunate to have it so far.
I cope by trying to learn as much as I can about what other departments, providers, and health systems are doing. But I have to pull back when I can, and focus on other stuff. My wife and I just bought a house, so we’ve been doing a lot of DIY projects. I’ll take my bike out on remote roads. A lot of streaming. Trying to read, eat well, rest, stay active. Oh, and I’ve recently joined the legions of people baking bread.
[Medics] are kinda going through what everyone else is going through, making adjustments, trying to be more careful. I’d just say, take care of each other the best you can.
Staff photo
Terrell Mellen
Pharmacist at Top Notch Pharmacy
As told to Ben Hitchcock
It’s really important for people to realize that, even though there’s a pandemic, they should still be prioritizing their health—which means getting their regular medications on time, and efficiently.
It’s been easy for us to come to work. I know a lot of essential workers are kind of nervous about that, but we know our patients by name, know them really well. It makes us want to come to work, to still provide their medications for them. Just letting them know to remember to take care of themselves at a time like this.
We’re still open normal hours, offering all the services we normally do to our patients. We’re not letting people in the store, we’re doing curbside pickup and home delivery only. We can also mail prescriptions. The only thing we’re not currently doing is immunizations, to protect the patients.
We haven’t had a huge problem getting in any medications at this time. The only one that we’re having to limit some supply of is the hydroxychloroquine. [Demand for hydroxychloroquine skyrocketed after President Trump tweeted that the drug was a “game changer” in the fight against the virus; he was referring to a French study that has since been discredited.]
We got in as much as we could. It’s normally used for patients with chronic conditions like lupus. It also can be used as an anti-malarial drug. We’re prioritizing dispensing it to patients who have been on it long-term, and need it for their chronic conditions.
We’re trying to keep business here as normal as possible—still taking days off to decompress from it, though. [My go-to] is gardening and house projects, these days. And mountain biking, too.
Everybody has been, honestly, so kind and generous these past couple weeks. A patient today dropped off Bodo’s, just because. I think everybody’s trying to take care of each other.
Photo: Zack Wajsgras
Lester Jackson
Elevator assistant mechanic at UVA
As told to Erin O’Hare
All of the elevators I work on are hospital, medical research, or medical related. Doing my job, you could lose your life, but it’s more likely from accidents like a long fall or getting caught up in machinery. But now there’s a heightened sense of, you could lose your life and possibly usher in the death of family members, too. If I get this thing, I could bring it home. The threat is there. Not every moment of my time, or even the majority of it, is spent working around hospital elevators associated with the pandemic, but when something needs to be done [there], we play a major part in it.
There are a few elevators at the hospital side that have to work at all times: the helicopter elevator, elevators that are dealing with this pandemic. There’s no getting around it.
We have to wear face masks at UVA, period. But when going specifically to the hospital elevators used for patients who have the virus, I have to wear a Tyvek full bodysuit with a hood. It covers my boots and everything. I wear a surgical mask, an N-95 mask, a splash shield, latex gloves.
It’s hard to feel completely safe. Whenever you have to put on that amount of gear, you may feel physically safe, but mentally, it wears on you. The more stuff you put on, the worse you tend to feel emotionally. Every day when I get home, I take all of my clothes off and put them in a bag outside of my house—my shoes, my socks, my shirt, my pants, everything. My neighbors are getting a free show! It is what it is. I have a bucket of water and soap outside, and I wash my hands and my beard. As soon as I get into the house, I get right into the first shower downstairs before I do anything else.
I’m trying to do what I can to keep my family safe. Trying to keep any exposure that I could possibly have to a minimum.
I’m making a lot of music, though, trying to stay creative. Working on a lot of projects, a Nathaniel Star love album, Eros, up next. I’m spending time with my children, my family. I take my mom groceries. She has everything she needs, but I can’t hug her. She can’t hug her grandchildren. That’s been hard.
You just find yourself saying, every day: “This is crazy. This is crazy.” I don’t even know what else to say. That’s on repeat.
Cooper Halley
Lyft driver
As told to Carol Diggs
I wasn’t too concerned about this virus at first; it seemed like it was mostly overseas, not here. But when the president started closing down travel… I talked to my dad, he’s a pretty smart guy, and he gave me some specific tips that he knew from working for Uber. He was already taking these precautions, because he’s an older man, you know, but for me—I’m 26— it’s hard for me, like most young people, to be afraid of something I can’t see the effect of.
In a car, it’s hard to keep six feet apart. So I keep the windows cracked—unless the customer objects—to circulate air from outside. I cover every inch of my skin, and I wear gloves. I have several different bandannas. Of course I can’t find a medical mask anymore. Usually when I get home, I spray any part of the car that won’t get ruined by it. It’s funny, most of my customers aren’t taking precautions, but they expect the driver to; I think it makes them feel better. I think everyone is trying to be a little nicer to each other, perhaps because you can’t be close together, you know?
Most of my customers don’t have a car of their own. The rides I get are people going to the store for something they need, or to or from the airport. No one’s going out for entertainment.
For now, I’m feeling it out day by day. My dad has stopped driving. I’m keeping an eye on my sick-o-meter. If it gets so a majority of my rides are worrying me, I’ll stop.
Ever since its emergence in the United States, the coronavirus has impacted people’s lives in distinct ways, and laid waste to societal norms as we know them. For high school seniors, this includes social and academic expectations for their final semester.
Senior year has always been notable for prom, graduation, lasting memories with friends, acute senioritis, and the final blossoming into adulthood that precedes leaving the nest. As a senior at Charlottesville High School, I’ve found myself mourning what would’ve been, and jealous of classes of the past and future that will get to participate in things many of us have long taken for granted. Scrolling through Instagram, my memories are bittersweet as I look at pictures of my junior prom, CHS soccer’s state championship, last year’s graduation ceremony, and more. There’s one common sentiment I keep hearing over and over from my closest friends: “It wasn’t supposed to end this way.”
For some seniors at CHS, however, there are more pressing concerns than losing a graduation ceremony or missing out on prom. Before the pandemic, Lucy Butler worked at Little Star, the Spanish-influenced restaurant located in a converted garage on West Main Street. As a food runner and host, she’d carved out a stress-relieving routine and a steady source of income, until she was recently laid off when Little Star was forced to close its doors and exclusively serve takeout. “It’s been hard not having that outlet, and stressful not being able to make money to provide for myself,” says Butler.
Compounding her financial stress, Butler’s father was laid off from his job in the restaurant industry too. And this pandemic couldn’t come at a worse time for her education. “Since I will be paying all of my college [tuition] myself, I’ve been frantic about how I’ll be able to afford my down payment for the fall semester,” she says. “I’m hoping that my previous job or other facilities will reopen in time for me to start working again and saving money.”
For spring-season athletes, these abrupt closures also carry the sting of disappointment. Earning accolades and championships for both his club and high school teams, Said Osman had every intention of leading Charlottesville High’s varsity soccer team to a second consecutive state championship after last year’s thrilling overtime win. It’s difficult to accept that those dreams have been dashed. “I still can’t wrap my head around it,” says Osman. “I’ve built multiple friendships [through] CHS soccer, and the fact that we don’t get to win games and [another] championship with each other really sucks. We don’t get to enjoy big moments like walking across the field with family on senior night and signing to play on the collegiate level in front of [our] school.” Despite this blow, Osman’s athletic career won’t be over anytime soon. He is committed to attend and play soccer at the University of Lynchburg.
For me (and many others), this crisis affects college decisions: The volatile stock market and very real possibility of a virtual first semester are considerable factors to weigh when considering where to attend school in the fall. As someone offered admission to UVA Wise with the intent to transfer to UVA, a virtual first semester could be beneficial in reducing my time away from home. If I decide to go to another university, missing that on-campus semester could be a drawback. I have friends who are considering a gap year, because they don’t want to pay full tuition for half a year’s worth of the onsite college experience. With so much uncertainty in the air, the only thing to be sure of is that this outbreak will distinctly affect the lives of high school seniors for months, and possibly years, to come.
Chanell Jackson is one of 61 people recently transferred from the ACRJ to home electronic incarceration. Photo: Zack Wajsgras
Chanell Jackson is home early.
The local resident and mother of three had about seven weeks left on her six-month sentence in Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail when she was transferred to house arrest in late March. She’s one of the 61 non-violent offenders who have so far been released with ankle monitors, as the ACRJ braces itself for the worst-case scenario playing out in prisons across the country: a coronavirus outbreak within the jail.
“It feels good to be home and with my family, especially with everything that’s going on,” Jackson says. “In the jail it’s scarier if you get sick. I don’t feel like I would be able to quarantine properly.”
Jackson’s concerns are legitimate: more than 5 percent of inmates in New York’s huge Rikers Island complex have already tested positive for COVID-19, meaning the jail has a higher infection rate than any country in the world. In Virginia, as of April 8, 11 inmates and 12 staff at the Virginia Correctional Center for Women have confirmed cases of the virus. Some Virginia prisons have had serious health care problems even in the best of times—in 2019, a judge determined the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women had failed to provide sufficient care after four women died while incarcerated there.
Also nearby, local advocacy groups report that 100 immigrants held in a Farmville ICE detention center have gone on hunger strike to protest their continued incarceration despite confirmed cases of the virus in the jail. The facility, run by the for-profit company Immigration Centers of America, experienced a mumps outbreak last year. ICE denies that the current strike is occurring.
“The jails and prisons already don’t have adequate health care for people who are inmates,” says Harold Folley, a community organizer at the Legal Aid Justice Center. Given the virus, “if you lock somebody up, I feel like it’s a death sentence to them.”
Under normal circumstances, ACRJ has six “hospital cells” for more than 400 inmates.
ACRJ Superintendent Martin Kumer understands the concern. “I want to be clear, jails and prisons are not set up for social distancing,” he says. “They’re designed to house as many people as efficiently and effectively as possible.”
Emptying out
Across the country, advocates have demanded that local justice systems reduce the risk for incarcerated populations by letting as many people as possible out of jails. Some such programs are underway—in March, California announced it would release 3,500 people over the next two months.
Locally, some prosecutors have enacted progressive emergency measures designed to reduce jail populations. Others haven’t deviated from their usual practices.
Charlottesville Commonwealth’s Attorney Joe Platania and his Albemarle counterpart Jim Hingeley have worked with the jail to identify nonviolent prisoners with short amounts of time left on their sentences, and transfer those people to house arrest or release them on time served. The commonwealth’s attorneys have also recommended releasing nonviolent prisoners being held pre-trial. That’s resulted in 122 of the jail’s 430 inmates leaving the premises so far.
Nelson County prisoners also go to ACRJ, but Nelson County Commonwealth’s Attorney Daniel Rutherford, a Republican who campaigned on aggressively prosecuting drug crimes, has not participated in the efforts to decrease the jail population, says Hingeley. Rutherford did not respond to a request for comment.
“People don’t understand, the commonwealth’s attorneys have so much damn power,” Folley says. “Joe and Jim have the ability to release people to home monitoring free of charge.” Normally, offenders must pay their own home monitoring costs, up to $13 per day.
“Home electronic incarceration is not release,” says Hingeley, a point Platania also emphasizes. People on HEI are still incarcerated, and can be returned to the jail without any court getting involved if they violate the terms of their house arrest by doing things like traveling without permission or failing a drug screening.
A history of violent convictions will ensure an inmate stays in jail, Kumer says, but there are other considerations, too, like if the inmate is medically vulnerable or where they might go upon release. “We have a large number of individuals who are otherwise nonviolent but they have no place to live,” Kumer says, so they have to stay in jail.
Police Chief Rashall Brackney supports the shift to home monitoring. “I am very confident in the commonwealth’s attorneys, as well as the superintendent, that they are reviewing those cases and taking a very careful look at each of those individuals who would qualify,” she says. That’s a more tempered tone than some other police chiefs in Virginia: “The COVID-19 pandemic is NOT a get-of-out-jail-free card in Chesterfield County,” the county’s police chief wrote in a Facebook post. Last week, two employees at the Bon Air Juvenile Correctional Center in Chesterfield County tested positive for COVID-19.
The jail is emotionally isolating in the best of circumstances, Jackson says, and coronavirus precautions won’t help—all visitation has been halted, except attorneys. The jail is offering two free emails and two free phone calls per week to try to ameliorate the situation. (Normally, an email costs 50 cents—“a stamp will cost you more than that,” Kumer notes—and a phone call costs 12 cents per minute.)
Fewer people behind bars means prisoners can be more spread out and the facility requires fewer staff to operate. Kumer says the plan is to segregate—the jail has emptied out and rearranged one wing to house all inmates who start exhibiting symptoms.
For now, inmates and officials wait with bated breath to hear the virus’ dry cough rattle through the cell blocks. So far, “no one has been symptomatic enough to test,” says Kumer.
Despite these precautions, Kumer isn’t rosy-eyed about the situation. “There’s not a lot we can do if an outbreak does occur,” he says.
Looking ahead
The 308 inmates currently inside the jail is the smallest number in at least 20 years, says Hingeley.
The emergency measures represent baby steps towards a more equitable justice system. The city-commissioned Disproportionate Minority Contact report earlier this year concluded that black people were disproportionately punished at every level of the local justice system. As it turns out, releasing non-violent offenders and people serving short sentences disproportionately helps black people: A little less than half the jail’s total population is black, but two-thirds of the people transferred to HEI due to coronavirus are black.
“There’s a lot of folks who are not paying attention to people who are incarcerated,” says Folley. “When you think of people incarcerated you think, automatically, they are criminals, right. But what people should know is they are human, too.”
“I think they definitely should offer [HEI] more,” Jackson says. “There’s still rules and regulations that you follow, but some people have minor violations and they’re being incarcerated and taken away from their family. At least on home monitoring you can stay home and take care of your family. Because every day is precious.”
Jackson says she loves cooking, and she’s been doing plenty of it since she got home. Her favorite thing to make is lasagna; she just pulled one out of the oven. “I’m very family oriented. I’m very happy to be home with them,” she says. “I have a younger daughter, she’s 1, so I’ve been catching up with her, spending time with her…Everything is mama, mama where’s my mama,” she says, laughing.
Will the change last? That depends who you ask.
“We’re taking some calculated risks with some of these decisions,” Platania says—he doesn’t want to “overreact one way or another.”
He says it’s “absolutely” possible that the local justice system takes a more progressive view of sentencing and bail decisions after coronavirus. “But you know to turn that on its head,” he adds, “if we make a decision to release someone on a nonviolent larceny offense, and they break in to someone’s house and steal something or hurt someone, do we then say well, everything we did was unsafe and foolhardy?”
Hingeley, who ran his 2019 campaign as a candidate for prosecutorial reform and alternatives to incarceration, is more direct. “Absolutely it is my goal to have these practices last,” he says. “From my perspective these are things that we should be doing.”
The emergency measures offer an unusual opportunity to see progressive policies in practice. “We are going to be accumulating information about the effects of liberalized policies with respect to sentences and bail decisions,” Hingeley says. “I am optimistic that that experience—as hard as it comes to us, in this emergency—that experience nevertheless is going to teach us valuable lessons. And we’ll see big changes going forward.”
“I can take the initiative, but other people have to agree,” Hingeley says. Platania also emphasizes that judges are a coequal branch of government to prosecutors, and though there’s been great “judicial buy-in” during this emergency, that won’t necessarily be true in the future.
“I do hope that this will change the system,” Folley says, “but it takes a number of people with courage.”
Updated 4/8 to reflect the number of confirmed cases in the Virginia Correctional Center for Women.
Keevil & Keevil is offering free lunches for neighbors who need it, Monday-Friday at 12:30. Zack Wajsgras
On Monday, Governor Ralph Northam ordered all Virginians to stay at home, turning the “suggestion” that we all keep our distance into an official command. While the announcement likely won’t change much in Charlottesville, where schools, universities, and most businesses are already operating remotely, the order’s timeline—it’s in effect until June 10—was a forceful reminder that this crisis isn’t going away anytime soon.
Social distancing is vital–Virginia has over a thousand cases of COVID-19, and climbing. Staying at home is an act of responsibility for those in our community who are most at risk. But it’s worth noting that the burden doesn’t fall equally on all of us.
Here in Charlottesville, our wealthiest (and whitest) neighborhoods tend to be the ones with the most trees. A friend in Ivy has a lawn the size of a soccer field (complete with nets); in my own neighborhood, kids can wander down to the creek and ride bikes on the Rivanna Trail. Meanwhile, the city has closed the parking lots to most of its parks and even removed the rims from the basketball hoops.
It’s always been true that some people have more private resources than others. But now, our great levelers—public schools, public parks, public libraries—are out of reach. It’s more important than ever that we figure out how to take care of each other.
They say you can judge a society by how it treats its most vulnerable members—children, the elderly, the sick, and the poor. You can also judge a society, or a person, by how they act under times of stress and difficulty.
In the past few weeks, many in our community have responded to this crisis with resourcefulness and compassion: from fundraising to sewing masks to staffing food banks.
Now, we’re in it for the long haul. We’ll need to learn new ways of maintaining community, while staying apart.
Colleges around the nation have switched to online instruction, with some hiccups along the way. Illustration: Jason Crosby
“I’m going to kill a fifth during this lecture,” announced one student, holding a bottle of whiskey aloft as his classmates tuned in for a Zoom meeting of a UVA data science class.
“I can hear you,” the professor said back.
As coronavirus has swept the nation, universities across the country have had to go digital, ditching in-person class meetings in favor of video conferencing. The transition has come with plenty of thrills and spills: Clips have circulated of college students confidently striding naked through the frame, getting their hair braided, or taking bong rips while the professor rambles on. As the above anecdote from recent grad Alex Hendel suggests, UVA students and faculty have taken their fair share of digital pratfalls in the two weeks since online classes have begun.
Politics professor Allen Lynch sent an email to his class on Thursday afternoon, admitting that he had delivered his entire 75 minute lecture without pressing record. Only the first six seconds made it online. When a student pointed out the error, “my heart sank,” Lynch says.
He forged ahead and delivered the lecture again the next day—but once again, after concluding, noticed he had failed to hit record. “One more time tomorrow!” said the respected Russian politics scholar, before finally managing to upload the lecture on his third try.
Second-year engineering student Nora Dale says the distance makes her advanced math classes harder. “I can’t show someone my screen easily, to show them my code or a math problem, in an online format,” Dale says. “A lot of the time I would swing by office hours to ask one question, but now office hours—you have to meet over video, you have to join the queue, it just takes so much longer.”
“The golden lining is that sometimes people show their pets on camera, which is always cute,” she says.
Participants might be scattered thousands of miles apart, but in a sense, online learning provides an unparalleled intimacy. Sometimes these glimpses into the lives of colleagues are lovely. “I learned my English professor color codes her bookshelf!” says fourth-year Gracie Kreth.
Other times, such peeks are unsettling. Third-year Emmy Monaghan says that in her anthropology class, a student was disassembling and cleaning a gun on screen during the lecture. “It was so wild…it seemed very intentional.” Monaghan says. “My professor sent out an email yesterday telling us that we need to have our cameras off from now on.”
Some students have taken it upon themselves to provide a bit of levity in these difficult circumstances, with pets or otherwise. First year Aidan Reed noticed a Zoom feature that allows users to project a digital background on their calls, and attended his English seminar from a pineapple under the sea—projecting the inside of SpongeBob’s house behind him as he sat in class.
“One of my favorite shows of all time is “SpongeBob,” and I thought it would be funny because everyone’s in their house right now,” Reed says.
With the world in disarray, and everyone forced to learn a new system on the fly, it’s as good a time as any to relax the rules a bit. “I wanted to make people laugh,” Reed says, “because I’m sure everyone’s pretty miserable going through all of this.”
Governor Northam's stay-home order will be active until June 10.
Settle in
“Our message today is very clear: That is to stay home,” said Governor Ralph Northam at the beginning of a March 30 press conference.
On March 27, the governor issued Executive Order 53, which shut down schools for the rest of the year, closed all “non-essential” businesses, and asked everyone to social distance, in hopes of slowing the spread of COVID-19. But over the weekend, photos of crowded beaches in places like Norfolk showed that many Virginians weren’t taking Northam’s suggestions seriously. Late last week, Charlottesville’s City Council wrote an open letter to the governor, urging him to “implement stricter measures.”
Monday’s Executive Order 55 is more direct, and requires everyone to stay home unless they are seeking medical attention, buying food or other essential supplies, caring for a family member, or “engaging in outdoor activity, including exercise.” Public beaches and campgrounds are closed.
In-person gatherings of 10 or more people are now punishable by a Class 1 misdemeanor. Northam said last week that the state is “certainly not looking to put people in jails,” but that law enforcement will be taking steps when necessary to break up groups.
Not much should change here in Charlottesville, where the city had already shut down most public spaces. Essential businesses like grocery stores will stay open, and restaurants and retail stores will still be allowed to offer online ordering (or in-person shopping with no more than 10 customers at a time) and curbside pickup or delivery.
The executive order will be in effect until at least June 10. “To date, this has been a suggestion,” Northam said on Monday. “Today, it’s an order.”
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Quote of the Week
“This is a little bit of medical trivia for you. Certainly nothing against our retail stores that sell clothing, and especially neckties, but neckties actually harbor contagious pathogens.”
—Governor Ralph Northam, on his new look. He hasn’t worn a tie in two weeks, reports the Virginian-Pilot.
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In Brief
Senior scare
Despite limiting visitors and other safety measures, The Colonnades, a nursing home in Albemarle County, confirmed March 27 that there is a case of COVID-19 within its community. The facility has since ramped up its prevention efforts, including ending communal dining and screening all residents and staff for symptoms daily. A resident at The Lodge at Old Trail in Crozet also tested positive for the virus last week.
Farm fresh
As restaurants close or pivot to take-out, some have dropped their weekly orders from local farms. But Brian Helleberg, owner of downtown French spots Fleurie and Petit Pois, has taken a more creative tack. After donating food to his staff, he’s now repurposing his deliveries into a CSA. For $109, customers can purchase a weekly basket of kitchen staples, from veggies to meats, and can add other foods, including ready-to-go meals. A portion of the proceeds will benefit the restaurants’ longtime partner, City Schoolyard Garden.
A hoopless backboard at Washington Park. Staff photo
Hoop dreams
Neighborhood Development Services closed all of the city’s basketball courts last week due to the coronavirus, but that order was seemingly not enough to keep locals from shooting hoops. So NDS removed the rims from the backboards at multiple courts, including Washington Park. Die-hard ballers will have to get creative.
Keep up the pace
Those who signed up for the Charlottesville Ten Miler don’t have to let months of training go down the drain. From now until April 4, all are welcome to participate in a virtual race by running 10 miles by themselves on the official course, or a different route, and recording their times on the Ten Miler website. Don’t want to leave the house? No worries—you can run it out on the treadmill.
Entrepreneur Oliver Kuttner says he has the infrastructure to quarantine COVID-19 infected people in an RV village, but needs help to make that happen. Photo: Elli Williams
Entrepreneur and inventor Oliver Kuttner has been known to step up in a crisis. In 2005, he loaded the Starlight Express, a Charlottesville-New York luxury bus service he co-founded, and headed south with supplies to aid victims of Hurricane Katrina in Mississippi.
Now Kuttner has a plan to house those who are infected with COVID-19 and need a place to quarantine: a 157-acre industrial site he owns near Lynchburg and the James River. Initially he wanted to build small bungalows, but then he decided RVs with their own ventilation systems could house 7,000 people more safely than hotels or dormitories.
“I have the infrastructure ready,” he says. “I’m halfway there.” But it’s the second half of his $80-million vision that’s more challenging.
“It’s bigger than what I can do,” Kuttner says. “I’m not a health care provider.”
He wants a larger organization like FEMA, the Red Cross, or state government to partner with him for what he says is a very cost-effective way to isolate infected people. “I need someone to put their arms around me,” he says. “I have a plan to flatten the curve in central Virginia.”
And Kuttner, who lives part time in Germany, believes the U.S. is where Germany was seven weeks ago. He’s convinced that if he can’t get the RV park off the ground by April 10, it will be too late to make it happen before health care capacity in the Thomas Jefferson Health District is overwhelmed.
One person interested in a similar plan and who has met with Kuttner is Lockn organizer Dave Frey, who envisions putting campers at NASCAR racetracks. “I know where to get RVs,” says Frey.
“David has experience setting up a facility for thousands of people,” says Kuttner.
But so far, Kuttner says he’s gotten no response from FEMA or elected officials. FEMA referred C-VILLE to its how to help webpage, but did not answer whether the agency would get involved in a project like Kuttner’s.
And as the pandemic continues its exponential growth, Kuttner says, “I would not be surprised if [this plan] never flies.”
The RV retreat isn’t Kuttner’s only COVID-19 effort. On Friday, he said he’d just procured 49 ventilators from his connections in China and plans to offer them to New York, where Governor Andrew Cuomo has put out a plea for the respiratory equipment.
Kuttner, who won the $5-million 2010 International X Prize for his design of a 102-miles-per-gallon car, also has finished a prototype for a patient transport vehicle that has separate ventilation for the driver. “I may build 10 next week,” he says. “I’m not sitting at home playing Netflix,” he says of his 18-hour days.
“I think we have a huge disaster coming,” says Kuttner. “I hope I have egg on my face in the end, but from what I’ve read, I think we’re underestimating it.”
Due to the coronavirus, Trader Joe’s is limiting customers to 30 at a time inside the store. PC: Eze Amos
Suddenly, a new normal
Just two weeks ago—two weeks ago!—our schools were open, our basketball team was eyeing a tournament run, and our restaurants were dusting off the patio furniture for long evenings of springtime outdoor dining.
But thanks to the spread of the infectious and dangerous novel coronavirus, Charlottesville has had to quickly adjust to a new normal.
Parents are scrambling to keep their kids entertained for hours on end, and they can’t just throw them outside, because even the playgrounds are closed. Grocery stores have been cleaned out, as people stock up for a long period of social distancing (Trader Joe’s is limiting customers to 30 at a time inside the store). And on Monday, Governor Ralph Northam announced the closure of non-essential businesses—including gyms, barber shops, and salons—and banned gatherings of more than 10 people.
PC: Staff, Zack Waksgras, Eze Amos
The town’s health care infrastructure has braced itself for what appears to be an imminent rush of new patients. UVA hospital, which made drastic changes to its visitor policy March 22, has set up a screening station at its entrance, and health care providers are short on personal protective gear, including masks, gloves, and goggles.
Restaurants have shifted to take-out only, including Bodo’s, which for so long resisted the tantalizing potential of the Emmet Street and Preston Avenue stores’ already installed drive-through windows. In times like these, it’s good to accentuate the positive: Yes, we’re in the thick of a global pandemic and a total economic collapse, but at least we’ve got drive-through bagels.
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Quote of the Week
“The sooner we can get this health crisis under control, the sooner our economy will recover… We must put aside what we want and replace it with what we need.”
—Virginia Governor Ralph Northam on his directive, issued March 23, to close non-essential businesses for 30 days
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More masks, please!
Local health care workers are soliciting donations of masks, gloves, goggles, and other household goods in the face of a national shortage of protective gear. Paige Perriello, an area pediatrician, tweeted a picture of herself wearing a mask made of styrofoam and a piece of clear plastic with the caption “Charlottesville’s innovators are coming to our aid!” The initiative is called Equip Cville, and donations can be left at Champion brewery from 11am-1pm every day—see supportcville.com for details.
Pediatrician Paige Perriello PC: Twitter
Budget burdens
This year’s city budget discussions were contentious even before the added stress of a worldwide public health crisis. Now, with COVID-19 shutting down the restaurant and tourism industries, and meals and lodging tax revenues falling accordingly, the city has announced it will need to cut an additional $5 million from the final budget. The budget was supposed to be finalized in April, but for obvious reasons it will not be finished on schedule.
Community cares
The Charlottesville Area Community Foundation has raised more than $2 million for its emergency response fund, thanks to Dave Matthews Band’s Bama Works Fund, the Batten Family Fund, the City of Charlottesville, Albemarle County, and more than 150 other donors. In partnership with Cville Community Cares and United Way, as well the city and county, CACF will distribute the money to area households impacted by COVID-19 and community-based organizations that provide food, housing, and other forms of basic assistance.
Taking a stand
A group of UVA student activists has created a petition demanding greater resources and support from the university, particularly for students who are low-income, first-generation, and immunocompromised. The petition asks UVA to provide non-student workers (such as Aramark employees) and non-federal work study student workers with paid sick leave; refund housing, meals plans, and tuition/fees (or provide a prorated credit for next semester); offer housing to housing-insecure students and community members; and establish a mutual aid fund for students and low-wage workers with unexpected expenses, among other demands. It has been signed by more than 750 other students, alumni, faculty, staff, and community members.
