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Protesters seek year-round city-run homeless shelter
About 30 members of the city’s homeless community, advocates for homeless people and other concerned residents gathered behind the city’s old Public Safety Building early last Friday evening for a rally and sleep-in protest at the entrance of the emergency overflow shelter.
Richmond Public Schools losing budget director during critical season
Richmond Public Schools is losing one of its chief budget architects as the School Board and Superintendent Dana T. Bedden prepare to kick off their budget negotiations for fiscal year 2017 with Mayor Dwight C. Jones and Richmond City Council. Betsy Drewry, RPS director of budget and planning, will leave her position Friday, Feb. 5, to become director of budget and finance for Prince George County, she told the Free Press at Monday’s School Board meeting at City Hall. Ms. Drewry is exiting after 18 months in the position. She was the Prince George school system’s budget chief for 14 years prior to coming to Richmond.
‘We need to rebuild, renew and refocus,’ Emancipation Day speakers say
One after another, speakers at the 75th Annual Emancipation Proclamation Day Worship Celebration at Fifth Baptist Church in the West End passionately implored listeners to get involved in community betterment. Lynetta Thompson, president of the Richmond Branch NAACP, drew shouts of “Amen” and “Hallelujah” when she said, “Black churches, we need your help. We need for you to be a voice for the voiceless,” she stressed. She urged audience members to step outside the walls of the church to perform community service and become active in groups such as the NAACP that work for social change. The Bible, she said, has more than 300 verses speaking to seeking social justice and helping the poor.
Planned school cuts causing pain
North Side resident Sherri Davis said she is concerned about planned budget cuts that may close schools, crowd classrooms and have parents scrambling to arrange transportation for their children. “It becomes a safety issue when you propose to put more kids in classes,” the mother of two Richmond Public Schools students told the Free Press on Wednesday. “It’s already hard enough for teachers to teach the large numbers of students they have in their classrooms.”
Student apologizes for playing racist song
The neatly attired African-American teenager somberly stepped to the podium at the Henrico County School Board meeting last week at New Bridge School in East Henrico.
Attention deficit?
Busy school superintendent wants to teach college course
Busy school superintendent wants to teach college course
School bus plan raises safety concerns
Tara Spencer stands on her porch in the Creighton Court public housing community each school day and watches as her 12-year-old daughter, Japria, waits about 20 yards down the street to catch the bus to Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School where she is a sixth-grader.
Confederates to hold service at Downtown church
The executive director of the Historic Richmond Foundation is defending the organization’s decision to rent the historic church it owns and maintains in Downtown to a Richmond-based national group that glorifies the Confederacy.
Dr. Bedden gets 2-year extension
The Richmond School Board presented Superintendent Dana T. Bedden with an early Christmas gift Monday when six of its nine members voted to extend his contract by two years — through June 30, 2019. The extension comes midway through Dr. Bedden’s initial 3½-year contract that began Jan. 13, 2014, and was scheduled to expire on June 30, 2017.
Sharpton on GOP: ‘They entertain you with foolishness’
“And let us not be weary in well doing!” the Rev. Al Sharpton said. “For in due season, we shall reap, if we faint not!” Moved by those stirring words, more than 1,000 worshippers rose to their feet, cheering and applauding Rev. Sharpton on Sunday during his sermon at the Men’s Day service at historic Gillfield Baptist Church in Petersburg. “If you give up, think of those ahead of you. If they had given up, where would we be?”
Frustration growing
City Council offers amendments to add millions of dollars to RPS while School Board approves cost-cutting measures
Community members are becoming increasingly angry and concerned about the future of Richmond Public Schools, especially after the Richmond School Board voted Monday to cut costs by shutting down two North Side buildings and implementing a new bus transportation system in the fall of 2016 that will make it more difficult for some students to get to their schools.
Police brutality : ‘I will not tolerate it’
Chief talks tough on expectations of officer conduct
Richmond Police Chief Alfred Durham minced no words about how he won’t tolerate brutality and excessive use of force by officers under his command. “I’m going to tell it like it is. If there is riffraff in my department and you’re wearing a gun and a badge, you’re gone,” he told an audience of about 50 people at a public forum Tuesday night at Richmond’s Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School. “I will not tolerate it.” At this second “Peeps and Police Community Conversations” attended by mostly elderly and middle-aged adults, Chief Durham said that “several officers were disciplined” recently after they mishandled a situation inside a resident’s home. He did not elaborate.
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.
School Board votes 4-2 to back Bedden’s ‘leveling’ plan
Are arts and music programs and foreign language classes now an endangered species in some Richmond Public Schools? That’s what some School Board members, students, parents and supporters fear in the wake of Monday night’s 4-2 vote by the board to back Superintendent Dana T. Bedden’s “leveling” plan.
Former presidential candidate Wilder offers advice to Clinton campaign
Former Virginia Gov. L. Douglas Wilder — the nation’s first elected African-American governor and one-time Democratic presidential candidate — issued a cautionary warning to Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton’s campaign prior to a talk and book-signing event Tuesday at his alma mater, Virginia Union University.
Nation’s first elected black governor feted at gala
L. Douglas Wilder wore his million dollar smile as he entered the ballroom at the Downtown hotel where nearly 500 people had gathered to honor him.
Fourth Baptist’s pastor leads by faith activism
Dr. Emory Berry Jr. calls himself a “walking miracle.” The 38-year-old is celebrating his fifth anniversary as pastor at Fourth Baptist Church in Richmond. When his mother was pregnant with him, doctors at a Miami hospital urged her to terminate her pregnancy because of health complications, he said. Instead, he said, his mother had faith that God would allow her to deliver the child safely and that he would make a difference in the world.
Call to action issued at Community Leaders Breakfast
“It’s not time for us to be silent!” Gov. Terry McAuliffe thundered. “It’s time to fire it up!” With smiling Baptist minister and Mayor Dwight C. Jones seated nearby at the 37th Annual Community Leaders Breakfast to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Gov. McAuliffe sounded every bit the mission-driven evangelist as he called for the com- munity to rally around his agenda for more jobs, a commitment to early childhood education and full restoration of rights for nonviolent ex-offenders.
More than 12,000 flood Brown’s Island for race opening
Richmond native and American Idol finalist Rayvon Owen and the Richmond Symphony wowed more than 12,000 people Friday night on Brown’s Island as they opened the UCI Road World Championships with a dazzling show ushering in a resplendent riverside sunset. The Richmond Cycling Corps, a group of East End youngsters ages 12 to 17, then led a colorful procession of the 16 cyclists from Team USA, followed by 74 youngsters carrying the flags of the nations participating in this international bicycling race.
NFL quarterback Russell Wilson gets hometown welcome
Seattle Seahawks All-Pro quarterback Russell Wilson scored a touchdown with a hometown crowd of 4,500 people at the Richmond Forum, where he was the special guest and speaker Saturday night at the Altria Theatre.
