Unshoveled sidewalks like this one on Water Street were common this winter.
PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE

Even though snow blocked sidewalks all over town for weeks following major snowstorms in what was a record-breaking winter, no one has been convicted under Charlottesville’s ordinance requiring snow removal from public sidewalks.

Police declined to issue citations following the December 18-19 Snowpocalypse because the city had done such a poor job clearing its own sidewalks.

The snow removal ordinance hit another hurdle this week when judges dismissed charges against five people and businesses, including McDonald’s, Wendy’s and Yellow Cab, who were cited in February for not shoveling.

Defense attorney Andre Hakes argued in Charlottesville General District Court March 12 that Virginia’s Dillon’s Rule, which says a locality can only adopt laws that are allowed by state law, does not give the city authority to make (more)

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Front yard clutter? City zoning inspectors ordered this Cherry Avenue resident to relocate the satellite dish.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

Satellite dish in my yard
Tell me more, tell me more
Who’s the king of your satellite castle?

We may not know exactly what Dave Matthews meant in his song “Satellite,” but last month Cherry Avenue resident Susan Blake had no doubts about what a letter she received from the city had to say about the dish in her yard: relocate it within a month— or face legal action with fines up to $5,000.

After losing her job with a construction company, Blake was looking for ways to save money, and switching from cable to satellite television was one of them.

“I was paying $62 per month for Comcast, but now I’m paying $27 per month for DirecTV,” says Blake. “That savings practically pays my electric bill.” Of course, those $27 offers are only good for the first year, but with things so tight for folks like Blake, many people are switching over.

However, that small piece of mind was shaken by the letter she received from (more)

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The RSWA had “no success” fixing billing problems at the BFI/Republic transfer station—- but Van der Linde got sued.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

For over two years, the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority publicly branded Peter Van der Linde a cheat and attacked the recycler with an anti-mafia statute as part of a $20 million lawsuit, based largely on the unsubstantiated testimony of a disgruntled former Van der Linde employee, now serving jail time for attempted extortion.

But a curious thing happened when the Authority dropped its lawsuit on January 20. As Van der Linde agreed to pay $600,000 to settle it, the Authority’s corporate partner in trash, BFI/Republic, also agreed to pay a six-figure sum.

“The big question,” says vocal lawsuit critic Betty Mooney, “was why BFI agreed to pay when RSWA had never named them in their lawsuit. Is this now an admission that BFI owed funds to the community?”

The Hook asked BFI, RSWA board members, and City Councilors why BFI agreed (more)

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After years of boom times, Albemarle County Executive Bob Tucker presents a diminished budget for the second year in a row, this one 12 percent less than two years ago.
PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE

With the University of Virginia as the big employer in town, Albemarle County has often been thought to be sheltered from the financial pain other parts of the country are suffering. The fiscal year 2010-11 budget County Exec Bob Tucker unveiled February 25 dispels that notion.

Tucker’s $293,850,901 budget is $10.3 million trimmer than last year and nearly $40 million less than fiscal year 2008-09.

The good news for homeowners is that the property tax rate holds steady at 74.2 cents per $100, so while homes lost value in the county on average 3.96 percent, at least those tax bills will be a few bucks less.

The bad news: All those best-place-to-live attributes (more)

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Delegate Rob Bell, right, votes against marijuana reform bills in committee and becomes the subject of a YouTube video.
PHOTO FROM YOUTUBE

Supporters of two bills on marijuana— one to decriminalize possession of small quantities and one amending Virginia’s on-the-books medical marijuana law— accuse Delegate Rob Bell in a YouTube video of leading the charge to derail legislation that might have provided relief to cancer victims.

Michael Krawitz, with Virginians Against Drug Violence and Patients Out of Time, complains that Bell ignored human suffering and used “straw man” arguments during a January 27 subcommittee hearing by alleging that the measures would lower the penalties for an adult selling pot to a third grader— an “inflammatory” allegation bearing little connection to the real world, says Krawitz.

Bell, however, says he remembers a respectful hearing, and that he questioned a witness who claimed decriminalization would save $75 million a year by keeping Virginia’s 20,000 pot arrestees out of jail for 30 days.

“That was inaccurate,” says Bell. “I can’t recall a case where anyone spent 30 days in jail for pot.”

House bills 1134 and 1136 were carried by Republican Delegate Harvey Morgan from Gloucester, and have been tabled for a year.

The makers of the video “had an agenda,” says Bell. “I am not as important as they think.”

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Where the sidewalk ends: Water Street on February 17, just past the federal courthouse.
PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE

Charlottesville Police have gotten tough on businesses and individuals who have not removed snow from public sidewalks, and issued five summons for noncompliance with the city’s snow removal ordinance.

McDonald’s, Wendy’s, and Yellow Cab got tickets February 11, and individuals in the 1700 block of JPA and in the 700 block of Monticello were written up this week.

“We’ve received over 150 complaints,” says Lieutenant Gary Pleasants. “The majority were warned, and most complied.”

Since the December snowpocalypse, police have come under fire for not enforcing the sidewalk ordinance, which requires that residents clear walkways within 12 hours after snowfall ceases.

At the end of January, Chief Tim Longo admitted that (more)

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If Delegate Bell’s bill passes, police may be able to remove their address from government websites.
PHOTO BY WILL WALKER

The woman jailed for publishing the address of an undercover drug enforcer has apparently inspired a new measure in the General Assembly that might let police officers pull their addresses offline— even though civil libertarians say that the underlying law that criminalized the I HeArTE JADE blog and put its creator behind bars for a month is unconstitutional.

“This bill was inspired by a local website that seeks to identify undercover policemen,” says bill patron Rob Bell (R-Charlottesville). “The site includes photos of their homes that come from government sites. For the safety of the officers, I want to help them get that stuff off the government sites.”

Bell’s bill, HB1382 (one of 41 he’s introduced this session) was originally written so that any person or business— such as a blog or newspaper— publishing an officer’s address was required to remove it after receiving a written demand.

“It doesn’t look much like the original,” says Bell. “This (more)

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Crozet-based eBay merchant Fred Carwile was surprised by eBay’s action.
PHOTO BY LISA PROVENCE

Super Bowl Sunday left Crozet resident Fred Carwile “frustrated and angry,” he says. And not because the Saints won.

That was the day he discovered that his sales listings for back-issues of High Times magazine, which he’s sold for years on eBay, had been yanked without warning.

Further infuriating Carwile: He claims that two different eBay customer service reps told him the marijuana-oriented mags were pulled at the request of the federal government.

“The federal government (more)

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Roy’s Place gets a Valentine– its first plowing of the season on February 13.
PHOTO COURTESY CHRISTINE CORNWELL

The cul-de-sac that Charlottesville city crews won’t plow because of a dispute with the developer got mechanically scraped for the first time this season, but negotiations to get the neighborhood off the city’s  no-plow list remain at a stalemate.

“I’m going to move the snow tomorrow,” says developer Bobby Banks on February 12. “Not to say I’m responsible. The people there deserve better.”

The residents discovered their legal limbo during the December 18-19 Snowpocalypse when the city said its crews wouldn’t plow Roy’s Place because the developer had not properly (more)

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An ambulance made it onto unplowed Roy’s Place during a recent light snow, but residents are fearful.
PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

What if you lived in Charlottesville, paid your taxes, but still found yourself living where public snowplows won’t go? Residents of one city neighborhood say that’s the situation they’re facing because of a dispute between the developer and the city.

After two feet of snow fell in December, residents of the 16-house subdivision known as Roy’s Place eagerly awaited snowplows. They heard one scraping on nearby Hartman’s Mill Road and Rougemont Avenue. And then it moved on.

And that’s when they learned of their legal limbo. According to residents, Roy’s Place has never (more)

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Paul W. Cherington Professor of Business Administration at Harvard. Bruce R. Scott, explores how public policy has effected the business environment in the last several years…and how a misunderstanding of capitalism may have lead to the recent economic instability. February 12, 11am, at the Miller Center. Scott’s newest book is The Concept of Capitalism (Springer, 2009).

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