
Ebenezer Baptist showing movie for Alzheimer’s awareness
Historic Ebenezer Baptist Church in Jackson Ward is hosting an event to draw awareness to Alzheimer’s disease.

Erica Campbell, Richard Smallwood in concert at Saint Paul’s Baptist
Saint Paul’s Baptist Church will be filled with the music of Grammy Award-winning gospel artists next weekend. Singer Erica Campbell is headlining a gospel concert 7 p.m. Saturday, June 27, at the church, 4247 Creighton Road.

RRHA youth feeding locations announced
Children in the city’s public housing communities will have access to a free and nutritious breakfast and lunch this summer.

Federal appeals court orders Va. congressional district lines redrawn
For the second time, a three-judge panel has found the General Assembly illegally packed black voters into a single congressional district — diminishing their influence and ability to elect a candidate of their choice in adjacent districts. And for the second time, that ruling is expected to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court as the Republican-dominated legislature seeks to maintain GOP control of the state’s congressional delegation.

VSU placed on warning by accrediting agency
Virginia State University, which has been tussling with the state auditor over its financial reporting, now has taken a slap from the regional group that accredits the historic Petersburg area school. The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools announced last week that VSU has been placed on warning, a sanction imposed for failing to provide evidence it was in compliance with all of the group’s standards.

Special election July 21 for 74th House District
Voters in the 74th House of Delegates District will be going to the polls twice. First, there will be a special election to fill the district’s vacant House of Delegates seat Tuesday, July 21.

Protests erupt over teacher cuts, reassignments
Teachers, students, parents and supporters mobilized via social media when they learned Richmond Public Schools officials began instituting cost-cutting changes affecting the jobs of some of their most beloved teachers. “Please help!” read one urgent Facebook post.

Richmond Jazz Festival returns to Maymont Aug. 8-9
Richmond once again is hosting some of the top jazz, neo-soul and rhythm and blues artists at the 6th Annual Richmond Jazz Festival at Maymont.

Personality: Miasia Keana Scruggs
Spotlight on Metro Boys & Girls Clubs 2015 Youth of the Year
When Miasia K. Scruggs joined the Fairfield Court Club of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro Richmond as an elementary school student, she had no idea it would be a life-changing move.

Woman power
Female candidates claim victory in Tuesday’s primary elections
Female political power was on display in Tuesday’s primary elections in the Richmond area. In separate Democratic and Republican party contests, women repeatedly emerged as the candidates of choice among the voters who went to the polls, leaving male rivals in the dust.

VUU announces 2015 Athletic Hall of Fame inductees
Five former athletes, a coach and the longtime “Voice of the Panthers” are headed for the Virginia Union University Athletic Hall of Fame.

Rayvon to sing in city this weekend
Spread the word: American Idol heartthrob Rayvon Owen is coming to Richmond this weekend.

Trial starts June 15 for former ROC pastor
Google the name Geronimo Aguilar and you’ll find articles that chronicle the rise and fall of the former Richmond Outreach Center pastor once affectionately known as “Pastor G.” An article in late 2001 asked if he was the “next great hope for Richmond’s inner city.” By May 2013, the picture turned bleak with his arrest in Texas on charges that he sexually abused an 11-year-old girl and her 13-year-old sister in the mid-1990s in Tarrant County.

Charity no substitute for justice
In his speech the night before his murder, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. repeated the Biblical parable of the Good Samaritan who stopped and helped the desperate traveler who had been beaten, robbed and left half dead as he journeyed along the road from Jerusalem to Jericho. The Good Samaritan is traditionally considered a model of charity for his willingness to treat a stranger as a neighbor and friend. Dr. King agreed that we all are called to follow his example and serve those around us who need help. But he reminded us that true compassion — true justice — requires attacking the forces that leave others in need in the first place.

The black-on-black murder myth
Conservative blogs, websites, newspapers and pundits are at it again, screaming that young black males are killing each other with abandon in city after city. They repeatedly toss out the supposedly raging murder violence in Baltimore, Chicago and New York City as proof that black- on-black carnage has mounted to national epidemic levels. It makes no difference that murder rates have drastically plunged in most big cities during the past two decades, and that Chicago and Baltimore are glaring aberrations to the consistent steady national decline in murders.
Primary lesson
Primary lesson With Tuesday’s primary elections now in the rear view mirror, we reflect on the lesson we can take into the Nov. 3 general election.
Bad cop registry
Out of control.That’s how the police chief of McKinney, Texas, described the abhorrent actions of former police Cpl. Eric Casebolt in responding to a call at an end-of-school pool party in a suburban Dallas neighborhood.

Stephanie T. Rochon, 50, local TV news anchor
Stephanie Therese Rochon knew no strangers, whether she was anchoring the evening news at WTVR CBS6, worshipping at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church in Henrico County or out in the community. “She was just a very happy person,” her husband, Jeffery D. Moten, said.