Category: Poverty & income gap
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School Discipline, Part III: Reframing Discipline in Virginia and Considerations for Making New Policy
by Matthew Hurt and Kathleen Smith Reframing School Discipline The Student Behavior and Administrative Response (SBAR) data collection was implemented in response to reframing school discipline from that of criminal, punishment, and exclusionary practices from 1991-2020 to that of restorative, intervention, and inclusionary practices in 2021 and beyond. The SBAR reports on behaviors that impede…
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School Discipline, Part I: Framing School Discipline and National Data
by Matthew Hurt and Kathleen Smith This is the first of a three-part series on school discipline. The authors present the information and then provide discussion questions. We hope the discussion will further an understanding of the complexity of school discipline and safe and orderly schools. Part I of this series frames school discipline and…
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RVA 5×5 – Holiday Briefing
by Jon Baliles It’s Friday! Which means this newsletter would normally be filled with stories and analysis about what is happening in the RVA region (not all of it good), with an honest and insightful take (so far as that is possible). For instance, this week we could have stories about: A non-profit that presented…
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Suggestions to Ease Virginia’s Housing Crisis without Additional State Money
by James C. Sherlock The Richmond Times-Dispatch, on cue, wrote in an editorial the other day that more state money was needed to fund local housing. Maybe. But that is not the first place to look. The governor wants to condition development aid to local communities on their reforming land-use policies to permit more construction.…
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Do Slumlords Contribute to Violent Crime?
by James A. Bacon In the previous post, I argued that the underlying cause of violence in the City of Richmond is social breakdown stemming from erosion of the family structure and the resultant failure to teach children the skills they need to avoid and resolve conflicts. In the great philosophical debate over the extent…
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Culture Wars + Unearned Income Equality = Political Realignment
by James A. Bacon If you want to understand the political realignment taking place in the United States — and Virginia, of course — you need to read this column in The Wall Street Journal: “Income Equality, Not Inequality, Is the Problem.” Most commentary on income inequality in the U.S. focuses on income reported to…
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Interview with Virginia’s Secretary of Health and Human Resources on Petersburg Health – Part 1
by James C. Sherlock I have written about the initiatives of the Youngkin Administration to help Petersburg improve the economic situation and quality of life in that city. Petersburg is last in education of children, last in health outcomes and factors, last in public safety. It is an economic basket case. The Youngkin administration and…
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The Public Housing and Education Debate – Who, Exactly, are the Racists?
by James C. Sherlock There is agreement on both sides of the political divide in Virginia and the rest of the country that public housing projects were and are hellholes. I have written that the bipartisan response, vouchers, run into lack of supply virtually everywhere. Cue the debate about causes and solutions. Let’s take a…
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Capitalism is the Solution To, Not the Cause Of, the Affordable Housing Crisis
by James C. Sherlock My colleague Dick Hall-Sizemore posted a column here on housing for the poor. He titled it “Little Guys Lose Again.” His opening: A recent article on this blog about the high cost of housing generated a considerable amount of discussion. Much of the discussion centered around the role of government in…
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What the Wind Project Costs You and Who Pays
by Steve Haner If the project goes as planned, the consumer cost for Dominion Energy Virginia’s offshore wind installation will rapidly rise to a peak in 2027 and then descend annually over the following 20 years. If it produces power for 30 years, in the final phase the revenue related to the project will exceed…
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The Affordable Housing Crisis Intensifies
The Washington Post has published an interactive graphic showing how much rents have increased across the United States over the past year. Average rents in Virginia increased most rapidly in Hampton Roads, the Richmond metro, and the Fredericksburg area — up 20.4% in Spotsylvania County and 20.2% in Bedford County outside Lynchburg. Among localities that…
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More Ignored News: Bag Tax Coming to Richmond
by Steve Haner The plastic bag tax recently approved in Roanoke and several Northern Virginia localities, created by the General Assembly in 2020 as a local option, is also coming to the City of Richmond. It was promised in the same September 13 Richmond City Council “climate crisis” resolution that implied a future closure of…
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Wait, What? Renter Credit Scores Are Improving?
by James A. Bacon Who would have guessed? For all the angst over the “eviction crisis” precipitated by COVID-19-related job losses, it turns out that the financial condition of low-income renters improved overall as the epidemic wore on, according to a new report by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The federal bureau credits stimulus…
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SCC Hikes Electricity Bills For New PIPP Subsidy
By Steve Haner All customers of Dominion Energy Virginia and Appalachian Power in Virginia will begin soon to pay an extra monthly charge related to the coming Percentage of Income Payment Program, the General Assembly’s new electricity cost subsidy for low-income residential customers. The PIPP was initially created in the 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act…
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Wake Up, People! This Is Me Telling You That the Old Answers Are Not Working!
by James A. Bacon How many children have to be killed, wounded and traumatized before people wake up? Headline from today’s Virginian-Pilot: “Nearly a dozen children have been shot this month in Norfolk. Communities are hurting…” And then it adds this kicker: “and activists want change.” The Virginian-Pilot spoke with elected officials, community organizers, the…