Bacon's Rebellion

  • Flag Vandalism at UVa a False Alarm, Ryan Says

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    A few days ago I reported an alleged act of vandalism against 2,977 tiny American flags planted in the ground as part of a 9/11 commemoration at the University of Virginia. The evening after the service, which was sponsored by the conservative Young Americans for Freedom and attended by President Jim Ryan, it was discovered that hundreds of the flags had been knocked over. A preliminary review of surveillance tapes suggested that unidentified individuals had flipped over a table with a banner.

    A more in-depth review by UVA police now says that wind might have blown over the flags and that the person in the video might have been trying to set the table right.

    The incident had drawn considerable attention at UVa. Two days ago Ryan updated the Board of Visitors about the incident. I republish it here; (more…)

  • Henrico, Chesterfield Users of Richmond Gas Unprotected by SCC, State Law

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    Steve Haner

    Pending Termination

    by Steve Haner

    Sec. 13.10. No sale or lease of utilities except when approved by referendum. There shall be no sale or lease of the water, wastewater, gas or electric utilities unless the proposal for such sale or lease shall first be submitted to the qualified voters of the city at a general election and be approved by a majority of all votes cast at such election.

    That provision is in the charter for the City of Richmond, part of the Code of Virginia. Note it does not require the city’s leaders to consult with the people before closing a city-owned utility, just before the sale or lease.  (more…)

  • VEC Made $930 Million in “Incorrect” Payments Last Year

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Inundated by unemployment claims during the COVID-19-induced recession last year, the Virginia Employment Commission made an estimated $930 million in “incorrect” payments last year, according to an update by the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission.

    The magnitude of wasted dollars has gone largely unnoticed as the media and the Northam administration have focused on VEC’s failure to deliver unemployment benefits to out-of-work Virginians, many of who have fallen behind on their rent payments now face eviction.

    Between March 2020 and July 2021, the VEC paid out $13.9 billion in state and federal unemployment benefits, states JLARC. The number of claims jumped tenfold, and guidance for administering the gush in federal relief dollars was unclear and evolved over time. The VEC’s obsolete claims-processing software was overwhelmed. Further, the VEC compounded its problems by making forms and instructions overly “complex and confusing.” (more…)

  • Wait, What? Renter Credit Scores Are Improving?

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    James A. Bacon

    Average credit scores. Graph credit: Consumer Protection Finance Bureau

    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 payments, stepped up unemployment insurance benefits, and the suspension of college loan repayments for the change.

    Virginia advocates of tenant rights used the eviction crisis as justification for the partial moratorium on evictions through June 2022. (Before evicting tenants for unpaid rent, landlords need to give tenants 45 days to get rental assistance approved.) At one level, the crisis appeared to be very real. The Virginia Unemployment Commission fell far behind in processing unemployment benefits to workers who lost their jobs, which seemed a plausible explanation for why so many were falling behind on their rent payments.

    Administrative failures may be responsible for Virginia’s eviction crisis, but the CFPB report suggests that the story is more complicated than commonly portrayed. (more…)

  • Follow the Science. Whose Science?

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    djrippert

    Image by Katja Fuhlert from Pixabay

    James Earl Biden. Yesterday was supposed to be the day when almost all American adults could start getting the first booster shot for the Pfizer vaccination. On August 18 the Biden Administration announced that a Pfizer booster shot would be available to Americans who received their second Pfizer dose at least eight months prior. At the time of the announcement, Biden said, “This will boost your immune response. It will increase your protection from COVID-19.  That’s the best way to protect ourselves from new variants that could arise.”

    While the Biden announcement contained the usual boilerplate notation that approvals had to be secured from the FDA and CDC before the booster program could begin, it seemed obvious that the administration expected approval.

    The scheduled date for broad based Pfizer booster shots came and went yesterday without a broad based booster program. (more…)

  • Redistricting: the First Stab at Statewide Maps

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    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    by Dick Hall-Sizemore

    The Virginia Redistricting Commission started out by dividing the state into eight regions. Its original plan was to proceed with drawing House and Senate districts, region by region, starting with Northern Virginia. That quickly proved to be inefficient, slow, and impractical.  Last week the map drawers  were instructed to produce statewide House and Senate maps. As part of their guidance, they were told to “respect” political subdivisions as much as possible, while adhering to the compactness and equal population requirements.

    Today, they produced those maps for the Commission members, and the public, to view and comment on. I will use one county with which I am familiar, Halifax, to illustrate two aspects of the redistricting process: how different, legitimate approaches can produce different results and the partisanship dilemmas. (more…)

  • Dominion Dips Toe into Battery Storage

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Last week Dominion Energy announced a slew of new solar and energy-storage projects, which it describes as a “significant step” toward achieving the net-zero carbon goals for Virginia’s electric grid under the Virginia Clean Energy Act.

    The proposed investments include 11 utility-scale projects, two small-scale distributed solar projects, one combined solar and energy-storage project, and one stand-alone energy storage project. Aside from receiving State Corporation Commission approval, the projects will require state environmental permits and local zoning approval.

    Once in operation, the projects will be able to provide 1,000 megawatts of electricity, or roughly enough to power 250,000 homes at peak output. Dominion said the package of projects would add $1.13 to the typical residential customer’s monthly bill.

    Dominion’s announcement raises questions. If utility-scale solar is the most economical form of electricity generation, how come rates will be going up? (more…)

  • The Real Election Integrity Issue in VA this Year

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    James A. Bacon

    by Paul Goldman

    Virginia is on track to hold an unconstitutional, illegal election this November 2. The Governor knows it. The Lieutenant Governor knows it. The Attorney General knows it; indeed, he is in court fighting my effort as the lawyer for the defendants in Goldman v Northam, et al, which is a federal action against the Governor and the Virginia Board of Elections. (The case is number 3:21 – cv – 00420 and all the documents can be found in the federal court PACER system, free to all Virginians).

    The upcoming November elections for the House of Delegates are flat-out unconstitutional. The constitutionality was decided in a previous federal case in Virginia (Cosner v. Dalton, et al, 52 F. Supp. 350 (E.D. Va. 1981). The defendants were John Dalton, then Governor of Virginia, and the top officers of the of Elections. In Cosner, the federal court merely applied the law as first articulated in the seminal case of Reynolds v Simms (377 U.S. 533). In 1964, the United States Supreme Court had declared the equal protection clause of the 14th applicable to the apportionment of the districts in state legislatures.

    “Simply stated, an individual’s right to vote for state legislators is unconstitutionally impaired when its weight is in a substantial fashion diluted when compared with voters of citizens living in other parts of the state.” Reynolds at 568.

    In the ensuing decades, Attorneys General of Virginia and their counterparts in other states have been in federal courts around the country trying to define the term “in a substantial fashion” as a statistical marker for legal purposes. Legendary Virginian Henry Howell, the leading anti-Byrd Democrat at the statewide election level, became the first in Virginia to put the Reynold’s decision to a constitutional test in the case of Mahan v Howell, 410 U.S. 315 (1973). (more…)

  • Convicted, But Innocent–Emerson Stevens

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    by

    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    Emerson Stevens with his attorneys, Jennifer Givens and Deidre Enright.   Photo credit: Alec Sieber/ UVa School of Law

    by Dick Hall-Sizemore

    In August, Governor Northam granted a full pardon to Emerson Stevens. Stevens had been convicted of killing a young mother of two in 1985 in a small fishing village on the Northern Neck. The pardon was based on evidence that “reflects Mr. Stevens’ innocence.”

    Stevens maintained from the beginning that he was innocent. His first trial ended in a hung jury. The second jury found him guilty and sentenced him to 164 years in prison.

    He was paroled in 2017 after being held in jail and prison for more than 30 years for a crime he did not commit. Although free on parole, he continued to fight to clear his name. (more…)

  • The Reconstruction Story Rarely Told

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    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    America’s culture wars are national in scope, but they hit especially close to home in Virginia, which was, before the current cultural cleansing, home to many monuments to Confederate soldiers and generals. Central to the struggle over history is a desire by many to replace narratives that whitewashed the evils of slavery and segregation with “true” narratives that highlight White guilt. The danger is that the narratives now in vogue will be no more reflective of reality than the happy-darky renderings of 50-year-old Virginia history textbooks.

    We can all agree today that slavery and segregation were moral abominations. But the history as morality tale — of unremitting evil perpetrated by Whites against Blacks — leaves out a lot. History is complicated. The history of Reconstruction and its aftermath is extremely complicated.

    As a starting point for studying Southern history, you would do well by reading Philip Leigh’s book, “Southern Reconstruction. I thought I was fairly well versed in American history. It turns out that there was much I did not know. (more…)

  • Jeanine’s Memes

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    James A. Bacon


    From the Bull Elephant

  • SCC Staff: Dominion Should Refund $312M, Cut Rates, Due to $1.14B Excess Profits

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    SCC Staff summary showing how $1.14 billion in Dominion Energy Virginia excess profits get whittled down to only a possible $312 million refund.  Step one, not shown, is the law allows the company to keep the first 70 basis points of excess profit no questions asked.  Click for larger view.

    by Steve Haner

    Customers of Dominion Energy Virginia are due a refund of $312 million and the company’s future base rates should be reduced by another $50 million annually, the utility accounting staff at the State Corporation Commission concluded in testimony filed September 17.

    Patrick W. Carr, deputy director of the division of utility accounting and finance, was joined in filing testimony by ten other members of that staff, but he provided the baseline result in his opening summary.

    In the staff’s opinion, Dominion earned $1.143 billion of profit in excess of its allowed 9.2% return on equity during the four year period it reviewed, 2017 through 2020. The company will vigorously dispute those claims in rebuttal testimony, it is safe to predict.

    The State Corporation Commission is entering the key phase of its so-called “triennial review,” which in Dominion’s case covers an extra year because that is what it asked of the Virginia General Assembly, and the Assembly seldom declines DEV’s requests. This is the first full audit of the company’s finances since 2015, which covered the two prior years of 2013 and 2014. (more…)

  • A Small Victory for Pluralism at UVa

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    by

    James A. Bacon

    UVA President Jim Ryan (left) poses with members of the Young Americans for Freedom at the 9/11 commemoration ceremony.

    by James A. Bacon

    I’m beginning to have a smidgeon of sympathy for University of Virginia President Jim Ryan.

    On the 20th anniversary of 9/11, Ryan attended an event sponsored by the Virginia branch of the Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) to commemorate the lives lost in the terrorist attacks. YAF is an avowedly conservative group, and the keynote speaker, retired Col. Dan Moy, is a UVa lecturer but also chairman of the Republican Party of Charlottesville. Nevertheless, the ceremony, which featured 2,977 miniature flags in the grounds, one for each American live lost — was not overtly partisan. Unless you happen to think that remembering lives lost to terrorism is itself partisan.

    Ryan tweeted his appreciation to YAF. “Many thanks to YAF @ UVA for organizing this morning’s moving event commemorating the lives lost on September 11th,” he wrote.

    The tweet immediately generated blowback. As the Cavalier Daily student newspaper reports, “students and other social media users” critiqued Ryan’s choice to thank YAF. On Instagram, his post generated 52 comments, most condemning the recognition of YAF. On Twitter, Ryan’s post received mostly negative 27 replies. (more…)

  • Virginians Seek Help for Problem Gambling as Industry Expands

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    by

    James A. Bacon

    by Carolyn Hawley

    In the first six months of 2021, individuals requesting help for gambling-related problems made 394 phone calls to the Virginia Problem Gambling Helpline. That compares to 335 intakes in all of 2020, and 311 intakes in 2019 — meaning the Commonwealth is seeing a significant increase in call volume made by individuals with gambling problems or family members who are concerned for them.

    The increase in help-seeking phone calls corresponds with the expansion of gambling availability within the Commonwealth. Data from other states suggests that when gambling expands, rates of problem gambling tend to rise, although these often level off. Most importantly, it signifies an urgency need to grow a network of professionals to treat this rising need. (more…)

  • VDH Still Can’t Count

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    James A. Bacon

    by Carol J. Bova

    In a blog post published yesterday, I noted that the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) COVID-19 dashboard breaks down vaccination status by racial/ethnic group and by age, but not by racial/ethnic groups and age.

    Thinking that VDH might possess the data, even if it had chosen not to publish it, I submitted a Freedom of Information Act request. The answer can be seen in the screen grab above: “The record does not exist.” (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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