Dan Easley

A diner in Staunton is for sale, construction begins on a new road in Waynesboro, and Charlottesville City Schools tells students to turn off their cell phones. That, and a recap of the week in Virginia governance and politics.

The Commonwealth’s budget impasse continues, not without repercussions; a Harrisonburg Councilman has his Driving While Intoxicated charge amended to improper driving; the Town of Strasburg declares a drought emergency; and the Inflation Reduction Act provides new tax incentives for renewable energy.

Billboard Governor Youngkin visits the Rockingham County Fair and talks about supporting education, 1,000 students in Albemarle County won’t have a bus ride to school, chronic wasting disease spreads across the deer population, and a charitable bingo hall in Richmond argues a referendum should be removed from the city ballot.

Two legal challenges against the Mountain Valley pipeline dismissed last week. Charlottesville and Albemarle county join a national program to address violent crime, while, in Staunton, a man dressed as Spider-Man patrols the streets. Secretly recorded audio plays a role in election campaigns, and the 87th Annual Old Fiddler’s Convention happened in Galax last week.

Virginia Medicaid is reviewing whether the two million people covered by the program are still eligible for its free health care. Virginia's governor is working to remove the Commonwealth from multistate organizations. And the National Park Service has awarded more than $9 million in grants to twelve states, including Virginia.

A roundup of the weeks news in the Commonowealth; Senator Kaine announced federal funding for mental health care in Harrisonburg, we learn about libraries, lunches, and weapons scanners in the schools, the Richmond Jazz Festival returns, and we look at a book remembering the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, now six years past.

The Perseid meteor showers are underway, and so are election campaigns for the General Assembly. And a new poll finds Virginians would rather spend the Commonwealth’s budget surplus on funding schools than on tax cuts for the wealthy.

The Richmond Electoral Board reverses their decision to reduce early voting opportunities, a financial dispute between a health insurance company and peoples’ doctors threatens the health of those people, and a new museum is coming to Waynesboro.

Three men from Central America won their immigration cases, but Immigrations and Customs Enforcement are detaining them anyway; Senator Tim Kaine meets with black business leaders in Richmond; for over thirty years, children from across the mid-Atlantic who survive burns have attended a summer camp just for them in the Shenandoah Valley.

2023 is shaping up to be the most expensive legislative election cycle in the history of the commonwealth. UVa could become the first major institution of higher education in America to publish the political donations of its faculty and staff. And the sharp spike in mortgage rates is keeping many homeowners from considering whether to put their homes on the market.