Bacon's Rebellion

  • The “Targeted Relief” That Missed the Target

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by Jon Baliles

    For years we have heard the city needs more affordable housing. For years we have heard that cutting the real estate tax rate only helps the rich. And for years, anytime someone brings up the discussion about offering relief to everyone, the conversation turns to the need for “targeted relief.”

    When the tax rate was being discussed in the Fall of 2024, the Stoney administration promised such relief when they announced the “Gap Grant” program, which ostensibly was going to offer up to $200 per month for six months to those who qualified and spent more than 30% of their income on housing. This was less about providing assistance and more of a diversion away from the discussion about reducing the tax rate. It succeeded in convincing Council not to lower the rate and for over a year now, no one seemed to want to try and make the new program work.

    And guess what? It didn’t.

    Even for a gimmicky program, Gap Grant was allocated $3.9 million that would have offered some (temporary) relief to those who met the criteria; but the city didn’t even try to seem to make the program want to work. The Avula administration could have picked it up and run with it, but instead, let it founder. In October, Graham Moomaw at The Richmonder reported that only $20,400 had been disbursed and the city had processed just 22 applications out of more than 2,300 received (around 1,100 were denied for various reasons).

    The city’s new Finance Director said there had only been one staffer handling the paper applications but three people had been hired part-time to get through the backlog. At that time, the city said they would continue the program until the money was gone and then decide whether or not to fund it again. The Avula administration also said they would provide an update on the program within 60 days.

    But they didn’t.

    (more…)

  • Youngkin (Tries to) Take the Money and Run

    Posted on

    by

    Todd Truitt

    An array of one dollar bills scattered on a surface.

    The federal tax-credit scholarship program isn’t open yet, but Virginia’s already in line.

    by Chad Aldeman

    Republican Glenn Youngkin will leave office as governor of Virginia later this month. To his credit, he spent a lot of his tenure pushing for higher standards for public education. He revised the state’s accountability system to bring more transparency and urgency to school ratings. And he raised the state’s cut scores in the name of closing the “Honesty Gap” between state tests and true content proficiency.

    But on January 1st, Youngkin did one more thing: He attempted to make Virginia the first state to opt in to the new federal tax-credit scholarship program created in last year’s tax bill. I use the word “attempted” here though, because his letter to the U.S. Treasury Department is not binding. In fact, the Treasury is currently in the midst of a regulatory process to define the parameters of the new program.

    Why did Youngkin’s team decide to do this on their way out the door? My hunch is it was a political move to try to trap incoming Democrat Abigail Spanberger into eventually joining the program. But I don’t think it will work, and it could even backfire. (more…)

  • 2026’s Power Word: Affordable

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    by Derrick A. Max

    Derrick A. Max

    “Affordability” has become the most powerful word in modern politics – and nowhere more than here in Virginia. Candidates promised “affordable housing,” “affordable health care,” “affordable energy,” and “affordable childcare,” often without defining what affordability means or acknowledging the tradeoffs required to achieve it. Now in office, the progressives in the General Assembly have even crafted a slick video to show their commitment to the “affordability agenda.” No doubt, Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger will repeat the call for affordability frequently in her inaugural address tomorrow.   

    What is lost in this discussion is that from an economic perspective, affordability is not a universal outcome that can be mandated by law. It is a relative condition that always raises a critical question: affordable for whom, at what cost, and paid for by whom? 

    Consider the minimum wage. Raising it may increase take-home pay for some workers who keep their jobs, potentially making life more affordable for them. But economic reality does not allow higher wages to appear without consequence. Employers respond by cutting hours, reducing hiring, replacing workers with automation, or raising prices. For the worker who loses a job, affordability collapses entirely. For workers who get their hours cut back, affordability is cut.  For low-income families facing higher prices at the grocery store, restaurant, or Walmart, affordability is reduced, not improved. The policy creates winners and losers, despite politicians speaking as if everyone wins. They don’t. 

    (more…)

  • The Fine Art of Gerrymandering

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    What might a 10-to-1 Virginia congressional map look like? Chaz Nuttycomb, president of State Navigate, gives it a shot:

    Political map of Virginia showing various electoral districts in different colors.
    Source: (21) Home / X

    So much for congressional districts representing natural communities of interest.

  • Money Down a Rathole

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    A man in a suit is pouring a burlap sack filled with money into a hole in the ground.
    Image credit: Chat GPT

    VRE and Norfolk ‘Tide’ are big wastes of tax dollars.

    by Ken Reid

    “The Tide,” the cute name given to the 7.4 mile-Norfolk light rail now entering its 15th year of service, was dubbed in an August expose the “Worst LRT in America.” 

    According to Hampton Roads Transit’s 2026 budget, the annual cost of operating the Tide is $14 million and “local funding” (which means funds from HRT and City of Norfolk taxpayers) totals is $8.2 million while $4.847 million comes from federal and state sources. Only $944,567 are from fares.

    This means the “farebox recovery” (to use transit parlance) is only 7 percent!!! Many of the Hampton Roads Transit buses have but 3 to 12 percent farebox recovery, according to reports, but operating costs for buses are about 50 percent less than the rail.

    Monthly Tide ridership is high in the summer – about 3,000 a day — likely because Norfolk Tides minor league games get a number of passengers, but it was only about 2,200 a day in November 2025.

    Assuming 2,200 riders per day, Norfolk and state taxpayers are paying $6,363 a year per passenger ($10.6 million divided by 2,000, 365 days a year) — meaning, it would be cheaper to buy each passenger a used car – or put the money into police, schools or other needy services.

    (more…)

  • Schools Push the Religion of Secularism and Assume the Role of Parent

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Logo of Virginia Beach City Public Schools featuring a compass design with the text 'CHARTING THE COURSE'.

    by Victoria Manning

    A Virginia school district has spent precious educational funding on a controversial outside mental health counseling program for students—without parental knowledge or consent. One of the largest districts in the Commonwealth recently announced a $255,000 contract with Uwill Mental Health to provide online counseling to 35,000 students in grades 6-12. Uwill’s ideology is in clear opposition to the tenets of many faith groups, likely unknown by parents.

    Telehealth provider “UWill”

    Virginia Beach City Public Schools (VBCPS) spends over a half million dollars on outside mental health counseling for students — over and above more than 100 full-time school counselors employed by the division.

    Uwill, the contractor used by VBCPS, brags that 25 percent of their counselors identify as LGBTQIA+ and some of their top therapists specialize in sexual identity counseling. Yet they don’t offer support based on a student’s religious beliefs, a central tenet of mental health treatment for many Christians and other faith traditions.

    (more…)

  • Youngkin’s Term Made Virginia Stronger, More Prosperous

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    by Derrick A. Max

    Gov. Glenn Youngkin

    Governor Glenn Youngkin’s final State of the Commonwealth address last night offered more than a farewell. It served as an empirical rebuttal to the claim that conservative, pro-growth governance, like those supported by the Thomas Jefferson Institute, cannot deliver tangible results. By every meaningful metric — jobs, investment, education outcomes, revenue growth, and regulatory efficiency – we agree with Governor Youngkin that Virginia today stands much stronger than it did four years ago. 

    Business Development and Job Creation 

    Youngkin’s speech underscored what is probably his administration’s defining achievement: restoring Virginia’s reputation as a place where businesses can invest, expand, and hire. Since declaring Virginia “Open for Business” on Day One, the Commonwealth has: 

    • Secured more than $157 billion in business investment (more than the previous six administrations combined);  
    • Increased employment by nearly 270,000; 
    • Created 255,000 new job openings, with 80,000 new jobs expected from existing commitments, including 40,000 construction jobs. 

    These are real, high paying positions in manufacturing, life sciences, and advanced technology — all across the Commonwealth. 

    Governor Youngkin warned the incoming administration and the new General Assembly that this growth requires policy certainty, right-to-work protections, lower taxes and a government that competes rather than obstructs. His passionate warning against altering Virginia’s right-to-work law was not ideological, it was empirical, rooted in observed capital flight from high-tax, high-regulation states. 

    (more…)

  • Batteries in VA Equal to PJM Demand? That’s Truly Nuts.

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    by Steve Haner

    Battery firm Fluence is working on this bill. This is one of its projects.

    Proposed legislation to require Virginia’s two main electric utilities to load up on battery storage in the next 20 years has now been introduced, and the target battery amounts for Dominion Energy Virginia grew even larger than in the version of the bill previewed by a study commission in December. It is way larger and more expensive than the bill vetoed by Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) last year. 

    For Dominion and Appalachian Power Company combined, doing a bit of simple math, the bill is calling for more than 135 gigawatt hours of battery storage. That is probably enough stored electricity to meet their current customer demand three or four times over (five times on a slow day). At the estimated price per gigawatt hour used in this previous post, the capital cost (less profit and operating expenses) would surpass $90 billion.

    If they existed today, they would hold enough electricity to cover the entire 13-state PJM regional transmission organization on all but a few days. These folks want to back up the entire PJM system with batteries paid for by Virginia ratepayers. (It is a bit more complicated than that, but this does indicate the scale of power involved. Their first hour of combined discharge would be 21 GW, still a stunning amount of electricity.)

    Incoming Governor Abigail Spanberger (D) has since listed this $90 billion battery legislation as one part of her “energy affordability” agenda, so a veto this time seems unlikely. It is also fair to assume Spanberger or at least some of her advisors saw this new draft before it appeared as a bill in the past 24 hours. This new version is House Bill 895, from Delegate Richard Sullivan, D-Fairfax, and a Senate companion bill is expected.

    Most of the capital cost and years of profit for the utilities would show up on people’s bills long after Spanberger leaves office in four years.    

    (more…)

  • Parole Bill Would Usurp Governor’s Appointment Powers, Release Dangerous Inmates

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Group of prisoners in striped uniforms climbing through a large hole in a wall.
    Image by Grok

    by Hans Bader

    A progressive Virginia legislator apparently thinks the parole board isn’t releasing enough inmates. So he has introduced a bill, HB318, that would let progressive legislators, rather than the governor, pick many of the parole board’s members. His bill would also make it much easier to parole inmates serving life sentences — which could result in the release of many killers — and make it hard not to parole inmates who committed crimes as juveniles, if their continuing dangerousness is due to “the nature of the offense” they committed or other factors beyond their “demonstrated ability to control.”

    Right now, the Virginia Parole Board has five members, all picked by the governor and confirmed by the General Assembly. HB318, sponsored by Delegate Patrick Hope, D-Arlington, would expand the parole board to 10 members, and let individual legislators pick five of them. “Three of” those five would “be appointed by the Speaker of the House of Delegates,” and “two of” them would “be appointed by the Chair of the Senate Committee on Rules.” (The Speaker of the House is Don Scott, who in 2020 proposed a failed bill that would have required the release of many inmates based on their age, leaving the parole board with no discretion to block their release even if they were still dangerous).

    (more…)

  • Buckle Up. The General Assembly Is on Its Way

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    A person stacking coins into piles on a table.

    by Kerry Dougherty

    Virginia’s General Assembly convenes tomorrow in Richmond. But a handful of pre-filed bills give us a taste of what’s to come when Democrats come roaring back into power.

    Remember when Virginia Democrats promised to make Virginia more “affordable?”

    Yeah, about that.

    Not sure how authorizing localities to impose an additional sales tax will make life more affordable.

    Ask a Democrat. Continue reading.

  • Virginia’s New K-12 School Report Cards

    Posted on

    by

    Todd Truitt

    A group of high school students wearing casual attire, including white shirts and backpacks, walking and chatting in front of a school building on a sunny day.

    by Todd Truitt

    In December 2025, the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) issued new school report cards for the 2024-25 school year under the new school accountability system.

    The school report cards provide an overview of schools’ performance under the new system, as well as summarize such results into 1 of 4 summative ratings: Distinguished; On Track; Off Track; or Needs Intensive Support.

    The new system looks at various factors largely prescribed by federal law, such as: academic proficiency and growth for elementary and middle schools; academic proficiency for high schools; chronic absenteeism for all schools; career and college readiness for high schools; and graduation rates for high schools. More information on the scoring system for such ratings are available on the VDOE’s website here.

    As stated in the December 2025 (generally positive) report of Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission (JLARC) on the new school accountability system: “the [new system] is an improvement over the prior system…and has design elements that more precisely and comprehensively measure performance than the prior system.” JLARC said no major revisions to the new system are needed, while suggesting various “refinements”. (Matt Hurt of the Comprehensive Instructional Program wrote about some tweaks he would like to see.)

    (more…)

  • Mr. Beardsley Goes to Richmond

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    A man in a suit speaking at a podium during a meeting, with empty chairs in the background.
    Scott Beardsley giving testimony

    Newly appointed UVA President Scott Beardsley (appearing at the 1:06 point in the video) looks old, tired, and drained in his testimony before the General Assembly. Based on this performance, the odds of him standing up to lawmakers’ demands appear to be roughly zero. Interesting question: Will legislators decide to keep him, thinking that he can be badgered and bullied into compliance, or will they agree only to a board that will select someone more to their ideological liking? — JAB

  • Is West Virginia Unconstitutional?

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Amusing tongue-in-cheek conversation between John Reid and former Governor/Senator George Allen.

  • New School Accountability System Could Use Some Tweaking

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by Matt Hurt

    A distressed businessman surrounded by flying documents and multiple computer monitors displaying data and graphs.

    In December JLARC released a report on the School Performance and Support Framework (SPSF), Virginia’s new accountability system. The report states that the new system is better than the old Accreditation system, but improvements are needed. From the perspective of an educator who has spent the last twenty years focusing on student outcomes and accountability, I largely agree with the report. The following are some facets of the system that should be reviewed and hopefully improved.

    Complexity

    I used to believe that the old Accreditation system (our previous accountability system) was extremely convoluted. However, compared to the SPSF, I would now consider the old Accreditation system the model of simplicity.

    Under the old Accreditation system, there were only a few things that were calculated differently among schools by level (elementary, middle, or high school), namely graduation rates, college and career readiness, and growth.  Given that there was no summative score for each school, there was more inherent simplicity. There were thresholds for each of those categories to identify schools for overall support, and there were predetermined thresholds for subgroup performance for federal accountability purposes that everyone knew prior to beginning the school year.

    (more…)

  • Welcome Todd Truitt

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Man smiling at the camera, wearing a light plaid shirt against a soft background.
    Todd Truitt

    I’m pleased to announce that Todd Truitt will join the Bacon’s Rebellion team as a regular contributor. His editorial concentration will be K-12 education policy in the commonwealth.

    Todd is a parent of two Arlington Public Schools (APS) students in Arlington County and an education advocate during his free time. He has been active on K-12 education policy issues as a volunteer at the local level for 5 years and at the state level for two years. His main areas of focus in education policy are on accountability, assessment, instruction (especially math) and school finance.

    (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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