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Music week features folk, hip-hop, jazz, metal, pop, rock, R&B and more
Entertainment will be in the spotlight during the first ever Richmond Music Week.
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Goldman prepares to sue over casino
In mid-June, Richmond City Council voted 8-1 to select RVA Entertainment Holdings LLC as its preferred choice to operate a resort casino in the city — setting the stage for a second attempt to win city voter support for a gambling operation that was defeated two years ago. However, political strategist Paul Goldman believes the no-bid award to the company could violate a provision of the state constitution as well as the Virginia Public Procurement Act. He said he is preparing a lawsuit to test whether the city was required to go through a bidding process before making what amounts to a perpetual right for that company to operate the casino.
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Free community testing for COVID-19 continues
The Richmond and Henrico County health districts are offering testing at the following locations:
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Feeling the heat
Local libraries, other facilities offer relief for some
It’s been a record-breaking hot summer and, according to the World Meteorological Organization and the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, July was the world’s warmest month ever recorded.
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Richmond Electoral Board to reverse course
The Richmond Electoral Board is preparing to retreat from its controversial and evidently illegal plan to eliminate two early voting sites for the upcoming Tuesday, Nov. 7, general election, one at Hickory Hill Community Center in South Side and the other at City Hall. Hit by strong backlash after the vote last month to shutter those sites as well as a stern, official legal opinion stating the action violated state law, the Republican-led board already has scheduled a special meeting for Friday, Aug. 4, to reverse course.
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VCU Medical Center leads again in annual ranking
For the 13th consecutive year, Virginia Commonwealth Uni- versity Medical Center has been recognized as the No. 1 hospital in the Metro Richmond area by U.S. News & World Report in its Best Hospitals rankings for 2023 and 2024.
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A ‘woke’ military? Don’t forget the messy race relations that got us here, by Clarence Page
Recent Republican moves to limit diversity training and transgender rights and other hot button controversies stemming from the annual defense authorization bill remind me of my own days in uniform back when some of those diversity policies were being created.
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Historically Black fraternity drops Florida for convention because of DeSantis policies
The oldest historically Black collegiate fraternity in the U.S. said it is relocating a planned convention in two years from Florida because of what it described as Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration’s “harmful, racist and insensitive” policies toward African-Americans.
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Bold beginnings
RPS pilots new program at 2 schools
It was bright and sunny Monday morning when Angela Swafford brought her sons, Zarkarin and Zionyah, back to school. While other Richmond students and parents are still in the middle of the summer break, Ms. Swafford was one of the first of many parents escorting their children to Fairfield Court Elementary School this week as part of a pilot program extending the school’s semester from 180 to 200 days.
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For Emmett Till’s family, national monument proclamation cements his inclusion in the American story
When President Biden signed a proclamation Tuesday establishing a national monument honoring Emmett Till and his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, it marked the fulfillment of a promise Till’s relatives made after his death 68 years ago. The Black teenager from Chicago, whose abduction, torture and killing in Mississippi in 1955 helped propel the Civil Rights Movement, is now an American story, not just a civil rights story, said Mr. Till’s cousin the Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr. “It has been quite a journey for me from the darkness to the light,” Mr. Parker said during a proclamation signing ceremony at the White House attended by dozens, including other
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Personality: Tiya Williams
Spotlight on Richmond Metropolitan Habitat for Humanity board chairman
Tiya Williams, a board member of Richmond Metropolitan Habitat for Humanity since 2015 and the outgoing board chair, knows from personal experience the life-changing effect the nonprofit can have on people’s lives.
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Council approves Highland Park housing units, ban on wild animals, and more honorary street signs
Rushing to get to their August recess, City Council spent less than 90 minutes passing more than 40 pieces of mostly routine legislation that largely involved approvals of special use permits for development and authorizations for future transportation projects.
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RRHA prepares to launch home-buying initiative
Richmond is preparing to become the first place in the country to test a revamped federal regulation aimed toward making it easier for people who hold housing vouchers or live in public housing to buy homes. Describing it as a “groundbreaking and historic ini- tiative” that would build wealth for those who qualify, Steven B. Nesmith, the chief executive officer for the Richmond Redevelopment and Housing Authority,
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Free community testing for COVID-19 continues
The Richmond and Henrico County health districts are offering testing at the following locations:
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Slavery was good?
Africans were so lucky to be captured, shipped in torturous conditions away from their homeland, stripped of their languages, kinship, religion and culture and bound into perpetual servitude in America so that they could learn “useful skills.” Pretty preposterous, right? Not for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
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All is forgiven? by Charlene Crowell
When the Biden Administration announced its latest initiative to reduce the nation’s unsustainable trillion dollar student debt, both borrowers and advocates rejoiced. In the coming weeks an estimated 804,000 student loan borrowers will together receive $39 billion in federal loan debt cancellations.
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Biden names longtime Hill aide as his legislative affairs director
President Biden is tapping Shuwanza Goff — a veteran congressional aide who also served as his main point of contact to the House at the start of the administration — as his new director of legislative affairs, making her the first Black woman to be the White House’s chief emissary to Capitol Hill.
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Bobby Dandridge recognized in Bullets’ D.C. Sports Hall of Fame induction
Native Richmonder Bobby Dandridge, along with the entire 1977-1978 Washington Bullets, have been inducted into the Washington, D.C. Sports Hall of Fame.
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Jacoby Brissett’s experience is a win for Commanders
For every Plan A, there needs to be a Plan B. For right now, that’s quarterback Jacoby Brissett with the Washington Commanders.