“This case is about right and wrong,” says RSWA director Tom Frederick in a recent memo, accusing recycler Peter Van der Linde of “defrauding” the RSWA out of more than “a million dollars in tipping fees.”
FILE PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

After nearly two years of silence, the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority has finally responded in detail to public comments and media coverage of its $20 million RICO lawsuit against trash recycler Peter Van der Linde. Authority director Tom Frederick released a memo ahead of the RSWA Board’s October 27 meeting that includes some of the “substantial evidence” that Van der Linde “defrauded the RSWA in excess of a million dollars in tipping fees.”

According to Frederick, after the RSWA’s  “service contribution fee” was implemented in 2005, Authority officials began noticing sharp drops in the amount of area trash that Van der Linde was hauling, as reported to them by BFI, a development that Frederick characterizes as a smoking gun.

“During one twelve-month period from September 2006 through August 2007, Mr. Van der Linde’s companies declared zero tons from Albemarle/Charlottesville,” says Frederick, “a period within which there are multiple photographic records” of Van der Linde’s orange dumpsters in the area.

At the time, Frederick had his recycling manager, Bruce Edmonds, tracking and photographing Van der Linde’s containers. In the county, development director Mark Graham had instructed his building inspectors to keep track of the distinctive orange containers.

“They might think I’m a criminal, but do they think I’m stupid?” responds Van der Linde, who plans to issue his own memo to refute Frederick’s comments, point by point, at the Authority’s Tuesday meeting. “Do they really think (more)

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“This is a monumental waste of time and money,” says Bob Fenwick of the Waste Authority’s lawsuit against Peter Van der Linde, seen here on the trolley Van der Linde uses to give school tours of his recycling facility.
PHOTO BY DAVE MCNAIR

Independent City Council candidate Bob Fenwick held a press conference today at Peter Van der Linde’s $11 million Zion Crossroads recycling facility, at which he dropped off some trash of his own (concrete scraps, yard waste, and a broken weed trimmer) and called on Charlottesville City Council to rescind the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority’s $20 million RICO lawsuit against the recycler.

“We have two governments going after Peter Van der Linde using my tax money and my water fees,” said Fenwick. “Their staff attorney has been reported to be charging $515 an hour. This is a monumental waste of time and money.”

As an area businessman for 30 years, Fenwick said that Van der Linde’s struggle with the RSWA “struck a chord,” and like the YMCA plans for McIntire Park, seemed like another case of “government not following the will of the people.” Fenwick said he’s tried to find out the RSWA’s side of the story, but to no avail.

“Why doesn’t someone from the County Board of Supervisors or City Council stand before us and tell us why this lawsuit is a good idea?” Fenwick asked. “They have publicly accused this man of being a criminal, and now they hide from public comment.”

Fenwick also criticized the RSWA’s (more)

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“It is absolutely false that I supported flow control,” says BoS member Ken Boyd, calling it “more than a stretch” to suggest he ever did.

FILE PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

Two weeks after the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority Board discussed its interest in getting a flow control ordinance to bolster a revamped Ivy transfer station, Authority director Tom Frederick now appears to be backing away from such a move, which would have given the Authority monopoly control over trash collection and might have driven the Authority’s nemesis out of business.

On October 7, after news of the flow control discussion broke and Coy Barefoot and Rob Schilling took up the issue on their radio programs, Frederick appeared before the County Board of Supervisors to say that his staff was not presently pursing flow control.

“I have not been directed by the Board to work on a flow control ordinance,” said Frederick, summarizing what he told the Supes, “and am not working on one.”

Earlier in the week, Supervisor Ken Boyd, who also sits on the RSWA Board, called in to Schilling’s show to distance himself from flow control, a term he said he “was not familiar with” when (more)

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Independent City Council candidate Bob Fenwick called on Mayor Dave Norris to “publicly repudiate” the RSWA’s $20 million lawsuit against Peter Van der Linde.
FILE PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

While our elected officials continue to support the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority’s $20 million RICO lawsuit against recycling entrepreneur Peter Van der Linde, two candidates seeking office are now speaking out against it.

Wednesday night, at the Free Enterprise Forum’s candidate forum at Burley Middle School, Independent City Council candidate Bob Fenwick, who says he is “appalled” by the lawsuit, called out Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris on the issue. While the Hook was not present at the forum, Fenwick summarized his statements after the meeting.

“As a citizen of the City of Charlottesville and not as a candidate I’m calling on Mayor Dave Norris tonight to strongly and publicly repudiate this lawsuit,” Fenwick said. “ And I don’t want to hear any baloney about the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (more)

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Hydraulic Wash’s struggle to install a rainwater collection system has made its way to Gov. Tim Kaine’s desk.
FILE PHOTO BY WILL WALKER

As the Hook recently reported, a county laundromat owner stepped into a bureaucratic quagmire when he tried to install a rainwater harvesting system last year. Now a slew of environmental groups, political leaders, and business owners have stepped into the fray, firing off a letter to Gov. Tim Kaine this week asking that guidelines for the practice be “expeditiously developed.”

Hydraulic Wash owner Charlie Smith says he was “run through the wringer” by the county plumbing inspection process, which thwarted his plans with outdated codes and regulations. Indeed, county building officials have admitted that one inspector was “uncomfortable with the concept” of rainwater harvesting.

Smith was eventually forced to seek approval for his plan from the local health department, but local health officials say it’s the first time they have had to review such a request, and that they (more)

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The Embarq brand lasted approximately three years.

As Embarq readies to merge with CenturyTel to become a new landline-based company, it won’t be taking some of its customers with it. Embarq wireless subscribers recently received letters and text messages that as of October 1, the company will no longer provide cell phone service.

The trend seems to be more and more phone users ditch landlines to (more)

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Blogger and digital plagiarism watchdog Waldo Jaquith.
FILE PHOTO BY HOOK STAFF

Put a blog in Waldo Jaquith’s hands, even a literary magazine’s blog, and there’s no telling what can happen. Last week, the Virginia Quarterly Review employee called out Wired editor and best-selling author Chris Anderson on VQR’s blog for lifting whole passages from Wikipedia and other sources for Anderson’s new book “Free: The Future of a Radical Price,” something many other reviewers, including New Yorker writer Malcolm Gladwell, appeared not to have noticed.

The post came with a mea culpa from Anderson— he was told before-hand that his book was going to be challenged— who claimed that it was a mistake and that he  and his publisher had “forgotten” to cite the passages.

Jaquith’s post made an immediate impact, having generated 177 comments to date from people— including Anderson— arguing (more)

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Capturing the market: Peter Van der Linde’s recycling facility, which opened last December, is already handling over 250 tons of trash a day.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

Recycling entrepreneur Peter Van der Linde, who opened an $11 million state-of-the-art recycling facility in Zion Crossroads last December, recently did a round of local radio interviews, drawing attention once again to his ongoing legal battle with the Rivanna Solid Waste Authority, which has filed a $3.5 million lawsuit against him.

“If this doesn’t bother you, nothing will,” declared former Republican City Councilor Rob Schilling on his WINA radio program, saying he was “disgusted” by the Authority’s action against Van der Linde. “It’s wrong in every single way.”

After having toured Van der Linde’s facility, Schilling told listeners (more)

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Happy times at Stanford University by UVA’s former “Green Dean.”
PHOTO BY ANDREAS Brændhaugen

In a recent article in Fast Company magazine, “Green Guru Gone Wrong: William McDonough,” staff writer Danielle Sacks goes to great length— over 6,500 words, actually— to dismantle locally-based architect William McDonough’s nearly mythic status as a visionary green architect. As Sacks points out, UVA’s former “Green Dean” was Esquire’s 2005 “Big Thinker of the Year” and one of Time’s “Heroes for the Planet,” but then she proceeds to do a “demolition job” on McDonough, as Treehugger.com characterized it.

At the start of the piece, McDonough is seen palling around with the likes of Cindy Crawford, Goldie Hawn, Universal Studios president Ron Meyer, fashion designer Tom Ford, and billionaire Richard Branson, while he makes everyone swoon with his theories of a waste-free world. By the end of the piece, however, Sacks has McDonough struggling like a dolt to put up a patio umbrella at a mansion in Maine that one of his famous friends has let him use.

“Sweaty and breathless, McDonough finally flips the umbrella upside down onto the deck. “Snap this until it snaps into that,” he instructs me, pointing to a wooden lever. He is crouching over as if he were inspecting some kind of beached specimen, his hair like a tuft of grass atop a windswept rock. It’s hard not to wonder, even with Al Gore’s Hollywood engine behind him, whether this is really the man to lead the next industrial revolution. Or whether, as McDonough says, rising with a gasp, “there’s an easier way to do this.” (more)

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Smoke detectors are not all created equal. A detector test conducted by the Hook with assistance from local fire officials revealed in June that ionization models may not activate until it’s too late to escape.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

A creative smoke detector promotion by Albemarle County Fire Department yielded free pizza for lucky— and safety conscious— Domino’s Pizza customers last week. The October 7 promotion promised customers of the Seminole Trail store a free pizza if a county firefighter riding along with the delivery driver determined that all of the home’s smoke detectors were functioning.

Barber says three firefighters teamed up with three delivery drivers from 4-7pm and served up about a dozen free pies.

“I would have liked to have gotten more houses, but overall I’m pleased,” says County Fire Marshal James Barber, who adds that the department deliberately limited the scope of the promotion because it was their first attempt and they didn’t know how strong response would be. Barber expects the department to repeat the promo in about six months, and says that “hopefully, it’ll be expanded.”

Despite the relatively low number of pizza calls, to the firefighters’ delight, the detectors were working at almost every home they visited. “We replaced two batteries,” says Barber, “but every home we went to, the detector basically was functional.”

Barber says the firefighters answered residents’ questions about detectors (more)

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The wife of Augusta County Sheriff Randy Fisher smelled smoke before the smoke detector sounded during a September 22 fire at the couple’s residence, according to Mike Fisher, Chief of the Dooms Volunteer Fire Company in Augusta.

At around 12:30am, Mrs. Fisher was awakened by the smell of smoke. She “went down the hallway to the kitchen thinking neighbors were burning something,” says Chief Fisher (no relation to the Sheriff). “When she came back up the hall to the bedroom, the smoke detector sounded. Her husband was working downstairs, and she yelled for him to come back upstairs.”

The Fishers escaped from the house with their two dogs, but by the time firefighters responded, the flames had spread from the attic– where an electrical fire likely started, according to Chief Fisher– into the main living area.

In most Augusta County fire investigations, fire officials determine the type of detector present, says Chief Fisher. The detector at Sheriff Fisher’s home was completely destroyed, says Chief Fisher, so identifying whether it was photoelectric or ionization was impossible. Chief Fisher says he didn’t see any other smoke detectors present in the house.

Sheriff Fisher has not returned the Hook’s repeated calls.

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Smoke detectors are not all created equal. A detector test conducted by the Hook with assistance from local fire officials revealed in June that ionization models may not activate until it’s too late to escape.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

Last week, the Albemarle County Fire Department announced a smoke detector promotion in which anyone ordering pizza from Domino’s Pizza on Seminole Trail on Tuesday, October 7 between 4 and 7pm will receive a free pizza if a firefighter riding along with the delivery driver determines all smoke detectors in a customer’s residence are functioning. If any of the detectors aren’t working, the customer pays for the pie but gets a free detector.

There was just one problem with the creative promotion: the department made no mention of the type of detector that should to be present in order to receive the free pie.

Not anymore!

At the Hook’s request, says Albemarle Fire Inspector Joseph Gould, the department will now not only check if the detectors are functioning but will also identify the type of detector. Homes equipped with battery operated ionization detectors, even if they function, will be offered the combination detectors that are supplied through the county’s free detector program. Residents of homes with hardwired ionization models will be educated on the need to replace their detectors.

As the Hook has reported on extensively, ionization detectors– the type found in at least 90 percent (more)

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Dan Doernberg’s new program aims to help voters cut through political spin.
FILE PHOTO BY JEN FARIELLO

Cutting through the spin of political campaigns can make one’s head spin, but thanks to Albemarle resident Dan Doernberg, founder of Fairness.com, voters across the country will have a new tool just in time for the final head-spinning stretch of the presidential race.

Dubbed “CriTweak”— a combination of critique and tweak— the tool is a computer program that Doernberg hopes will revolutionize the way people read and comment on online articles and documents. Instead of the typical commenting format, in which readers post comments at the bottom of the page, CriTweak allows users to comment on specific passages simply by mousing over them, and to see what other commenters have posted on those same passages without leaving the page.

“If someone lays out an idea or something in a speech, a reader might think, ‘That’s a really good idea, and I’d add this implication,’ or say, ‘don’t forget about this aspect,” says Doernberg. “It’s meant to both be critiquing things you don’t agree with and amplifying and expanding ideas that you do like.”

The program is already up and running at electiondocs.com and features 400 searchable documents– speech transcripts and news articles relating to the election. Doernberg says the full transcript of the first presidential debate will be online at the site in the near future and ready for commenters. (more)

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Honor Award winner Cougar Upper Elementary and Pre-K School by VMDO Architects, Bowman Consultants, Siteworks, 2RW, and Fox & Associates.
PHOTO BY BOB

During September, the Charlottesville Community Design Center displays the winners of the 2008 Virginia Go Green Competition, a contest sponsored by the James River Green Building Council to highlight design that supports the principles of sustainability in central Virginia. First Friday opening reception, September 5, 6-9pm. 100 5th St. NE. 984-2232.

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In his own words, for nearly 15 years Boston Deputy Fire Chief Jay Fleming has been on a “one man mission” to change the type of smoke detectors used in American homes.

Not anymore. Last week, nearly 300,000 troops joined Fleming’s battle when the International Association of Fire Fighters became the first major American fire organization to formally endorse photoelectric smoke detectors and, in the process, to formally condemn ionization detectors, which Fleming argues are responsible for at least 10,000 fire-related deaths since 1990.

“We’re making progress!” Fleming says of the resolution– co-sponsored by Fleming’s Boston department, Local 718, and the Professional Fire Fighters of Vermont– that passed unanimously by voice vote last week at the IAFF’s annual convention in Las Vegas.

Professional Fire Fighters of Vermont president Matt Vinci is also thrilled that the resolution passed. “It’s an issue that firefighters (more)

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Daniel Widdowfield will appear in court Monday, August 4 for a bond hearing.
COURTESY OF UVA POLICE

Today UVA police announced the arrest of 24-year-old Daniel Wayne Widdowfield, a shop worker for the UVA athletics department, on three felony charges of contacting someone he thought to be a female minor for sexual purposes. Apparently, had Widdowfield been successful in his alleged solicitation, the girl would not have been the first to become acquainted with him.

A look at Widdowfield’s profile (log-in required) on social-networking website Facebook.com reveals that, while Widdowfield has yet to be convicted of anything, he counts at least 100 local underage girls among his 219 “friends,” including students from Albemarle, Monticello, Western Albemarle, and Charlottesville High School. In fact, according to Widdowfield’s profile, a rising sophomore girl from Spotswood High School in Rockingham County became friends with Widdowfield just before noon today, and on Tuesday he “sent a (more)

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In the Hook’s quest to learn more about the ubiquitous but overhyped type of smoke detector now getting worldwide scrutiny, we decided to conduct another test. Although this type— ionization— has been widely faulted for its failure (which the Hook witnessed first-hand) to promptly detect smoldering fires, we’ve been told it actually catches a common kitchen combustion rather quickly. Thus the toast test.

As the video shows, the detector in question, a 7-year-old, hard-wired ionization unit erupted into noisy sirens before we could even spot a wisp of smoke or turn on our video camera. We turned the toaster off a full 28 seconds of cooking time later, and still the toast, as seen in the photo, is barely singed. (We subsequently burned the toast, and the competing technology detector, the photo-electric, soon sounded.)

Prompt detection of kitchen combustion might seem to be a good thing. Nope. According to Adrian Butler, co-founder (more)

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A bill which would have eased environmental restrictions for a controversial wind farm slated for construction in Highland County has stalled in committee. As previously reported in the Hook, Senate Bill 324, introduced by State Senator Frank Wagner (R-Virginia Beach), would have exempted all electric facilities that generate and distribute renewable energy with a capacity of no more than 50 megawatts.

The bill would have affected the proposed wind farm planned for the mountainous rural area 70 miles northwest of Charlottesville in Highland County. If completed, the project would be the state’s first utility-scale wind generation facility. Highland New Wind LLC, the company planning the development, has faced harsh criticism from (more)

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