Bacon's Rebellion

  • APCo Rate Case is a Battle of Accountants Over Details, Profit Margin

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    Steve Haner

    By Steve Haner

    The latest review of base rates for the Appalachian Power Company’s 540,000 Virginia customer accounts may end with yet another price increase, the second in two years, but a fierce and detailed battle of accountants will determine the size.

    The State Corporation Commission held a public comment session Monday and a full evidentiary hearing Tuesday on the request from the company, known usually by its acronym APCo. It is part of the larger American Electric Power system, with the bulk of its actual power generation assets not located in this state.

    The application for the rate increase is based on the company’s financial performance in 2023, when it claims it earned a profit (measured as return on equity) of only around 3%. The SCC in its previous rate review had authorized 9.5%, but what that actually means is the company has an opportunity to earn and keep that much. It might not and in this case did not get there. The SCC’s own staff accounting analysis came up with a similar anemic profit estimate. (more…)

  • Atlantic Park Part 2: City Council, Campaign Contributions and City Money

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    sherlockj

    Atlantic Park Part 2: City Council, Campaign Contributions and City Money

    By James C. Sherlock

    Elections in republics are transactional everywhere. We vote for and contribute to those who we think will vote as we would.

    This series is about Virginia Beach. We do not vary from that script.

    Council members run as independents. An in-depth review of seven years of Council meeting minutes has revealed that on most matters members have seemed relatively apolitical. After months of research for this series, the author cannot identify with assurance whether many of the members are conservative or liberal in their personal politics.

    City Council appoints the members of the city’s development authority that holds title to the city’s land and has tourism development and business recruitment budgets. Many appointees historically have been developers or their representatives. They played a significant role in Atlantic Park. But development authority bond issues and budgets must be approved by Council, which thus maintains control.

    City money. Virginia Beach is the largest city in the Commonwealth and has a budget to match. In 2025 the city had a $2.5 billion operating budget and a $385 million capital budget.

    Influence over the capital budget is concentrated in the hands of the real estate development interests who dominate campaign donations.

    Election costs. The costs of City Council election campaigns vary between ward and at-large seats, but have grown to cost more than the four years of pay for the work, which until this year was capped by law statewide at $28,000. For cities of over 260,000, the caps are now mayor $56,000 and other Council members $52,000. So most Council members have day jobs.

    Update 1:30 PM Sept. 10. For civilians, the General Assembly bill that raised the limit singled out Virginia Beach for the highest Council compensation without admitting it. The populations of Virginia cities:

    1. Virginia Beach: 453,649
    2. Chesapeake: 253,886
    3. Arlington: 235,845
    4. Norfolk: 230,930
    5. Richmond: 229,247
    6. Hampton: 137,061
    7. Alexandria: 165,317
    8. Newport News: 187,906

    Stop update.

    Underfunded candidates occasionally win here but that is not usually the way to bet.

    (more…)

  • Atlantic Park Part 1: Prologue

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    sherlockj

    Atlantic Park Part 1: Prologue

    Updated September 18 at 10 AM and 3:16 PM

    By James C. Sherlock

    Atlantic Park is under construction as a massive new entertainment district near the oceanfront in Virginia Beach’s resort area. The centerpiece, a surf park, will be surrounded a 3,500-seat concert hall, shops, restaurants, offices, and apartments.

    If it succeeds, Atlantic Park will transform the resort district of Virginia Beach and generate additional tax revenues for the city.

    But the City Council early on rejected a plea from the city manager to be able to “tell them it will pay for itself” and never looked back. Council never asked for a city business plan, perhaps because it would have served as a rebuke as spending on the project spiraled out of control. 

    In 2023 city officials were forced by SEC requirements for a city bond issue to publicly acknowledge the manifest economic risks to Atlantic Park, but did so only buried in a 900+ page bond prospectus. Those risks, which led a report in Bloomberg in review of that bond issue to call Atlantic Park a “speculative bet,” would have ruined the story.

    Here are two views of city spending. First, a slide presented to city council on May 28 of this year.

    But the city borrowed the money.

    A second slide below is compiled by the author from the documentation of three series of bonds issued in 2023 and 2024 which city bond authorities must repay through providing money from revenues for city appropriations:

    That view shows the city at over $300 million in equity and debt for what the council slide called $153 million in city contributions.  

    Expensively improved city land worth $40 million is leased to the developer at a dollar a year for up to 100 years.  Four hundred parking spaces that cost $30,000 each to build are also leased to the developer for a dollar a year plus contributions to a maintenance fund.

    This series will tell the story of how we did it, but not why.

    (more…)

  • Argh! Tech Tops UVA in WSJ Ranking

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    There are many ways to tally the “top” universities. One is to measure an institution’s prestige or reputation. Another is to capture the educational value added based on metrics of cost, salary after graduation, and return on investment. Yet another is to rank universities by their success in promoting upward social mobility.

    The U.S. News & World-Report, which basically measures reputation, is the best known. The Wall Street Journal tracks return on investment.

    As much as it pains me to draw peoples’ attention to the fact, Virginia Tech outranks the University of Virginia in the latest WSJ ranking.

    The outcomes of rankings like this hinge on the factors considered and the relative weight apportioned to those factors. Methodology is everything. The WSJ does not track students’ intellectual growth, development as informed citizens, or transformation into social-justice crusaders. It’s all about the Benjamins.

    (more…)

  • An Antisemitic Act Denounced at UVA!

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    James A. Bacon

    Finally, an antisemitic act that University of Virginia authorities could forcefully condemn!

    The McIntire School of Commerce’s Rouss Hall showcases flags representing the home countries of students past and present. One of them is an Israeli flag. On Friday someone vandalized the flag with the statement, “Where is Palestine.”

    McIntire Dean Nicole Thorne Jenkins said the incident is being treated as an instance of antisemitism. “Questions about the showcase of flags are welcome; however, this was an act of vandalism. Vandalism is not protected speech: it is criminal conduct.”

    “This act of antisemitism is antithetical to the values and norms of the McIntire School and the University as a whole,” said Provost Ian Baucom and President Jim Ryan in a joint statement. “As we all begin another year together on Grounds, we want to make it as clear as possible that while we are committed to free expression, vandalism is not protected speech. Like bigotry and harassment of any kind, it has no place at the University.”

    Not a hint of moral ambiguity. Good.

    I can’t help but wonder, though, what the reaction would have been if someone had defaced the American flag.

    — JAB

  • Jeanine’s Memes

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    James A. Bacon

    From The Bull Elephant

  • A Polite Golf Clap, Please, for Virginia Free Speech Rankings

    Posted on

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Virginia colleges and universities fare well in the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) survey of free speech on college campuses this year. The University of Virginia moved to the No. 1 spot, making it the university most hospitable to free speech among the 257 U.S. institutions polled.

    Among other Virginia universities included in the ranking, the College of William & Mary and George Mason University ranked “above average”: 12th and 16th place respectively.

    Virginia Commonwealth University, Washington & Lee University, and James Madison University were classified as “slightly above average,” in 32nd, 33rd and 37th places respectively.

    Virginia Tech was a Virginia laggard in 116th place, but even that qualified as “average.”

    (Liberty University was excluded from the survey because its policies “clearly and consistently state” that it prioritizes values other than free speech.)

    As in past years, elite private universities in the Northeast were among the most hostile to free speech. FIRE ranked Harvard and Columbia as the two very worst — “abysmal” — in the entire country.

    The high scores for Virginia institutions are no great honors. The bar is set exceedingly low. Snagging the No. 1 spot is like being awarded “cutest pooch” in an ugly dog contest.

    But I suppose it’s of source of solace to observe that UVA, William & Mary, GMU and its Virginia brethren are less oppressive places to learn, teach and conduct research than their peers nationally.

    (more…)

  • Bacon Meme of the Week

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    James A. Bacon

  • RGGI Tax Spikes Again. Democrats Will Bring it Back, Virginia.

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    By Steve Haner

    The dollar cost for permission to burn hydrocarbon fuels in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative region spiked another 22 percent in just three months. 

    This is one more sign electric power producers in those states know they will need to keep using hydrocarbons despite the political policy push to eliminate them.

    The RGGI auction earlier this week set a clearing price of $25.75 per ton, up more than 22% from the $21.03 in the June auction, which itself had been a 31% increase over March’s $16. When Virginia first forced its power companies to pay the carbon tax to fuel their plants, the price for an allowance was $7.60. So, the price has risen 240 percent in less than four years.

    Virginia is no longer a member of the multi-state RGGI compact, and Virginia’s power producers have not needed to own and “retire” carbon “allowances” to run their coal, natural gas or oil generators since last year. But the legal effort to return to RGGI is still churning in litigation, and every Virginia politician with a D after their name – every single one – praises RGGI like manna from Heaven. (more…)

  • Police Can and Should Cooperate with ICE, Miyares Says

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    State law enforcement officials have the authority to cooperate with federal Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials in detaining illegal immigrants, said Attorney General Jason Miyares in an AG opinion released yesterday. Moreover, he added, they have a moral obligation to do so.

    But Virginia law enforcement is not required to work with ICE, and so-called sanctuary cities are permitted to look the other way while the feds go about their business.

    “To our sheriffs who already cooperate with ICE on immigration matters: Thank you,” said Miyares. “To those who refuse to cooperate with ICE: Shame on you.”

    Miyares issued the advisory to clarify the interpretation of his predecessor, Democrat Mark Herring, which left local law enforcement with questions about their obligations to collaborate with ICE.

    (more…)

  • The Case Against Assault Rifles

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    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    by Dick Hall-Sizemore

    Pop quiz. Who said the following about assault weapons? “They are military-style weapons designed for sustained combat operations that are ill-suited and disproportionate to the need for self-defense…[and] which have become primary instruments of mass killing and terrorist attacks in the United States?”

    1.  Vice-President Kamala Harris
    2. Sen. Mark Kelly
    3. President Joe Biden
    4. Chris Rock

    OK. So, it is a trick question. The correct answer is “none of the above.” The answer is Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson, III, of the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Wilkinson, from Richmond, is the longest-serving member of the court, having been appointed in 1984. He is well-respected and considered one of the most conservative members of the court. His name was often included in lists of possible appointments to the Supreme Court, and he was interviewed by President George W. Bush for a vacancy.

    Wilkinson’s characterization of assault weapons is included in his majority opinion in a recent case, Bianchi v Brown, issued in a 9-6 ruling by the full court upholding Maryland’s law prohibiting assault weapons. Specifically, the Maryland statute prohibits the selling, purchasing, receiving, transporting, transferring, or possessing an assault weapon and authorizes law-enforcement officers to seize and dispose of such weapons sold, purchased, received, transported, transferred, or possessed. (Md. Code Criminal Law  Sec. 4-303, et seq.) The Maryland statute goes into some detail defining “assault weapon.” That description is set out in the Bianchi opinion.

    (more…)

  • “Bert, You Useless, Racist, Fat [Bleep]!”

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    So much for civil discourse at the University of Virginia. So much for empathetic listening. Soothing aspirations emanate from the President’s Office, but it appears that many members of the University community haven’t gotten the message — or just plain reject it.

    A week ago, The Cavalier Daily student newspaper published an article reporting that the UVA administration had suspended the Student Guides from giving historical and student-orientation tours. By way of context, the article noted that Bert Ellis, a Board of Visitors member and former president of The Jefferson Council, had been a vocal critic of the Guides, some of whom gave what amounted to half-hour walking tours of the history of racial oppression at UVA.

    The article then quoted Ellis as follows:

    “​​The University Guides now seem intent on ‘contextualizing’ Mr. Jefferson as a slave holder and rapist, and to completely undermine his part of the Founding of America and our University,” Ellis said in a 2021 article published to The Jefferson Council’s website.

    Ellis has been labeled as a racist and a homophobe by people who disagree with his political views, and he has shrugged off the slurs. But even he was unprepared for this response.

    (more…)

  • Jamming Statistical Square Pegs into Round Holes

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Another day, another study highlighting a racial “disparity.” In this case the study, published by Julian, a civil-rights and international and international human-rights organization, focuses on racial disparities in traffic-stop outcomes in Virginia.

    The findings have been uncritically reported by Radio IQ — headline: “Race is a factor when police stop drivers in more than 90 Virginia communities” — as well as the VA Scope newsletter, WVEC in Norfolk, and what surely must be an AI-generated recapitulation by MSN for national distribution.

    The authors, Charles Meire and Saman De Silva with Julian, dig into data on 3.2 million traffic stops compiled since the Virginia Community Policing Act mandated its collection in 2020. The underlying supposition of the enabling legislation was that racial disparities were evidence of “bias-based profiling,” and such is the underlying premise of this report as well.

    The only thing that can safely said about the conclusions in the study, “Disparate Impact: A Statistical Analysis of Virginia Police Stop Outcomes,” is that racial disparities in the incidence of traffic stops and outcomes from those stops do exist. But the interpretation of those disparities is very open to debate.

    (more…)

  • Why Is Fairfax Unhappy With the New K-12 Accountability System?

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Fairfax County educators are dissatisfied with the Youngkin administration’s new accountability system for Virginia’s public schools. They are arguing that the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) plan, which goes into effect next year, will paint an inaccurate picture of how schools and students are performing, reports WTOP News.

    During a school board work session last week, Michael Molloy, director of the school district’s government relations office, said the system is “extremely heavily weighted toward mastery, toward passing a test.” While there is a growth component included in the evaluation, he said, it’s “a relatively limited component, less so than I think the current system accounts for growth.”

    Under the new regimen just approved by the Virginia Board of Education, public schools will be classified in 2025 as Distinguished, On Track, Off Track, or Needs Intensive Support. More than half of Virginia’s public schools would be labeled “off track” under the new system. Using a provisional model based on partial data, Virginia Board of Education staff estimated that 58 would be labeled as needing “intensive support.”

    Source: FINALIZING VIRGINIA’S SCHOOL PERFORMANCE AND SUPPORT FRAMEWORK Virginia Board of Education August 2024

    (more…)

  • New Battle of the James Centers on Dominion Gas Plant

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    Steve Haner

    By Steve Haner

    Lee pulled his army out of the trenches along the James River south of Richmond and retreated to Appomattox just under 160 years ago (I’m rereading some Civil War history this month). Now the peace of the region is about to be shattered by the next battle in America’s great energy civil war, because Dominion Energy Virginia wants to build a new natural gas powerplant in the area. 

    Dominion has been making an outreach effort to the people of that part of Chesterfield County and has mounted a public relations campaign in support of the proposed 1,000 megawatt plant. The activist opponents, who would fight any gas-fired facility no matter what the circumstances, have now announced they plan to bring their challenge to Dominion’s neighborhood open house tomorrow, Sept 5.   

    The 6 p.m. Dominion presentation at a local hotel (details here) will be preceded by the opponent’s program at a restaurant next door. The message, of course, is that if the plant is built, its emissions will worsen health and even kill people. One flaw in the message is that the small gas plant will be built on the site of a former much more massive, and much more polluting, coal generation station. If that didn’t devastate and depopulate Enon, it is doubtful this will. (more…)

Now Available

Book cover of 'Dust Mites: A Second American Revolution' by James A. Bacon, featuring astronauts planting a flag with a blue and white emblem on a lunar landscape, with Earth visible in the background.
For sale on Amazon.com

The year: 2075. The American colonies on the Moon are getting restless under Washington’s tyrannical rule….

This second edition of “Dust Mites” has a snazzy new cover, includes helpful lunar maps, and is 5,000 words tighter than the original. The sequel, “Trogs,” is scheduled for publication this summer.

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Bacon’s Rebellion is Virginia’s leading politically non-aligned portal for news, opinions and analysis about state, regional and local public policy. Read more about us here.

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