Bacon's Rebellion

  • Demanding Openness about UVa’s Cost Structure

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Last week the University of Virginia Board of Visitors held a workshop to discuss next year’s increase in tuition, fees, and other charges and to hear input from the public — mostly students begging the board for relief from the ever-escalating cost of attendance.

    A PowerPoint presentation released at the meeting essentially made the case for hiking tuition again, although the exact percentage will depend upon the level of financial support provided by the Commonwealth. The estimated increase for undergraduate, in-state tuition will range between 0% and 3.1%. Additional fees are set at $114.

    The presentation reflects the Ryan administration’s spin on the numbers. It’s the job of the Board of Visitors to probe deeper. In this post, I will first summarize the administration’s stats, and then I will provide some numbers that the board should consider as it ponders the tuition increases.

    “Tuition is last resort,” states a slide expressing UVa’s tuition philosophy. “[We first] look to other revenues and savings.”

    We’ll see about that. (more…)

  • More Money, Same Level of Service

    Posted on

    by

    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    Photo Credit: Richmond Times Dispatch

    By Dick Hall-Sizemore

    There are often cries of anguish or outrage on this blog and elsewhere over the increases in spending proposed in budget proposals and then authorized by the General Assembly. Some of this criticism of increased spending is justified, but, sometimes, the increase is the result of circumstances beyond an agency’s control. Sometimes, stuff just costs more.

    Replacing State Police cruisers is a good example of this quandary. For many years, the State Police used the Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor. When Ford stopped production of that model in 2011, the State Police began using the Ford Taurus Police Interceptor.  (It took me a little while to get used to seeing the State Police in those smaller cars.) Next, Ford discontinued production of the Taurus in 2019. After testing Dodge and Chevrolet vehicles as potential replacements, the State Police selected the Ford Police Interceptor Utility. (This is a modified SUV and it explains why I have been seeing local police driving SUVs, which was a little disconcerting.) (more…)

  • COPN – Don’t Leave Home Without It

    Posted on

    by

    sherlockj

    by James C. Sherlock

    Sometimes I think we don’t personalize the effects of Virginia’s Certificate of Public Need (COPN) program on individual Virginians in ways that are relatable. Nor do many understand the power of the hospital monopolies.

    Many readers here have followed the progress of our reporting of the increasing and relentless suppression of competition in healthcare by COPN. I will offer in this essay a single example that may personalize it.

    In 2009, the regulation, not the law, that defined the radius from your home of facilities that would be considered when seeing whether you are adequately served by existing open heart surgery facilities was changed as follows:

    Title 12. Health » Agency 5. Department Of Health » Chapter 230. State Medical Facilities Plan » Part IV. Cardiac Services

    Article 2
    Criteria and Standards for Open Heart Surgery

    12VAC5-230-440. Accessibility Travel time.

    A. Open heart surgery services should be within 30 60 minutes driving time one way, under normal conditions, of 95% of the population of a the [ health ] planning district [ using mapping software as determined by the commissioner ].

    Simple change. Thirty minutes was changed to 60 minutes. You surely did not notice. You were meant not to notice. And your elected representatives were not asked to vote on it. (more…)

  • Buy Bacon’s Book

    Posted on

    by

    Peter Galuszka

    By Peter Galuszka

    This is a shameless advertisement. Jim has written an excellent book and you should buy it and review it.

    While some of Jim’s focus is at odds with a similar book I wrote eight years ago, “Maverick Miner” is a really well put together effort at research and writing.

    In my reporting, I asked many people, mostly miners, what they thought about E. Morgan Massey. The response: tough on unions but good guy. I heard this over and over. I was told that if rank and file miners had a serious problem, they could call Morgan and he’d come to the mountains to work things out. I heard this a lot and it gives credence to Jim’s book.

    You should buy the book, read it, and like it or not, post something on Amazon. Here’s something I did:

    “In this book, Jim Bacon, a Richmond journalist, tells a fascinating story about 94-year-old E. Morgan Massey, the former head of coal company that would become highly controversial. Massey paid Bacon to write a private narrative about the Massey family and agreed to let Bacon write his own unabridged account. Taken as a biography and while understanding that this is from Massey’s viewpoint, the result works very well. Massey explains why he hired Donald L. Blankenship, who achieved remarkable notoriety as the boss of Massey Energy, a company spinoff. He ended up in federal prison. The book underestimates the human and environmental cost of coal mining in the Central Appalachians. It also takes Massey’s side in dissecting what caused the April 5, 2010 explosion that killed 29 miners – the worst such U.S. coal disaster in 40 years. Even so, Bacon’s access to internal sources and records is a welcome contribution to understanding a great story.

    Peter Galuszka is author of “Thunder on the Mountain: Death At Massey and the Dirty Secrets Behind Big Coal.” (St. Martin’s Press, 2012)

  • What Texas’s Crisis Means for Virginia

    Posted on

    by

    Peter Galuszka

    by Peter Galuszka

    The Texas freeze and ensuing energy disaster has clear lessons for Virginia as it sorts out its energy future.

    Yet much of the media coverage in Virginia and certainly on Bacon’s Rebellion conveniently leaves out pertinent observations.

    The statewide freeze in Texas completely fouled up the entire energy infrastructure as natural gas pipelines and oil wells stopped working, coal at generating plants iced over and wind turbines stopped working.

    Making matters much worse, Texas opted not to have power links with other states. Its “free market” system of purchasing power meant utilities skimped on maintenance and adding weather-relative preventive measures such as making sure key generation components were weatherproof.

    The result? Scores dead and millions without electricity. Here are more points worth considering in Virginia:

    Climate Change is For Real

    It is a shame that so much comment in Bacon’s Rebellion is propaganda from people who are or were paid, either directly or indirectly, by the fossil fuel industry. Thus, the blog diminishes the importance of dealing with climate change in a progressive way.  (more…)

  • Updates: PPP, PIPP, Dominion’s School Buses

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    by Steve Haner

    Tax on Paycheck Protection Program Grants

    The General Assembly session deadlines require final decisions on various revenue bills before the final budget bill is adopted, in theory keeping the two issues separate. What is good tax policy should not be driven by the need or greed of the appropriators.  (more…)

  • The VMI Contract: Why the Rush?

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Last November 5, the Commonwealth of Virginia issued an RFP for a contract to investigate racism at the Virginia Military Institute. The document set an ambitious deadline. Responses were due November 17 — giving vendors less than two weeks to prepare submissions. Moreover, the document wanted the successful bidder to provide preliminary findings and recommendations by Dec. 31 and final recommendations by June 2021.

    That made no sense to Carter Melton, VMI class of ’67, two-term VMI board member, and retired president of Rockingham Memorial Hospital. During his 30 years with the hospital, he had developed dozens of RFPs. He had never seen such ambitious deadlines for such a complex project. When he read the document, he was astonished — so astonished that he took out a full-page ad in the Sunday Richmond Times-Dispatch to get his views in front of Governor Ralph Northam.

    First, he wrote, the scope of this project was vast and boundless. The RFP called for extensive document review, focus groups, anonymous questionnaires, a cross mapping of relevant VMI policies with those of every other college and university in the Commonwealth, and numerous legal opinions. “This is a huge piece of work; it asks for everything but the kitchen sink.” (more…)

  • Bacon Meme of the Week

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

  • Jeanine’s Memes

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Jeanine’s Funday Memes, Bull Elephant

  • Certificate of Public Need – This Seems Promising

    Posted on

    by

    sherlockj

    by James C. Sherlock

    Democrats, the primary bulwarks for the Certificate of Public Need (COPN) law in Virginia, took the opportunity last year to create as part of a major revision to COPN law a new 19-member State Health Services Plan Task Force.  

    That group is to advise the Board of Health on the content of the newly renamed State Health Services Plan (ex-State Medical Facilities Plan (SMFP).

    I wish the task force luck.  They will need it.

    The new task force is apparently a temporary casualty of COVID-19, but it shows how desperate the Democrats (read hospitals) are to revitalize COPN after a 2019 Chesapeake Circuit Court decision and supporting appeals court decision in Chesapeake Hospital Authority d/b/a, etc. v. State Health Commissioner and Sentara Hospitals.  

    Both decisions exposed it for what it is — a regional monopoly protection racket that is subjectively applied — and found the administration of the COPN system in Virginia to be incompetent at the same time. (more…)

  • VMI Update: The WaPo Makes Another Sleazy Insinuation

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    In the early stages of the Barnes & Thornburg investigation into racism at the Virginia Military Institute, there was some contention over how the inquiry should be handled. Initially, VMI administrators asked for its lawyers to observe investigators’ interviews of faculty, staff and students. Barnes & Thornburg pushed back, saying the lawyers’ presence would be intimidating. The disagreement erupted into public view when the investigative team published its interim findings earlier this month.

    VMI has since backed off, and in its latest article on the racism controversy the Washington Post quotes anonymous faculty sources as saying that they have spoken to Barnes & Thornburg and felt no pressure from school officials.

    So, the question arises: Why did VMI officials back off? Did they do so voluntarily, or did they feel coerced? Here’s what the Washington Post had to say:

    After one state lawmaker suggested that VMI could lose some of its $19.3 million of state funding if it did not cooperate, the college’s interim superintendent, retired Army Maj. Gen. Cedric T. Wins, released a statement encouraging students and teachers to come forward. He shared a designated email and phone number for the firm’s investigators. Pledging the college’s commitment to confidentiality, he promised that all members of the VMI community “will be treated equitably and without fear of retaliation at every stage of this vital process.” (more…)

  • Dude, What Happened?

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Check out this graph from the Virginia Department of Health COVID-19 dashboard. Look how dramatically the seven-day moving average of COVID-related deaths in Virginia plunged in early January. Peaking at 51 on Dec. 31, the average daily deaths dropped to 18 by Jan. 7.

    In Central Virginia, one of five regions, the rolling average dropped to 1.14 deaths. Very similar pattern in Northern Virginia. The numbers haven’t been that low since March 2020 in either region!

    The decline in deaths is considerably sharper than the drop for confirmed cases and hospitalizations, so the epidemic is far from vanquished. And the drop seems to have plateaued. Still, unless the numbers are a statistical artifact that does not reflect real-world trends, this looks like good news.

    — JAB

  • Five Dem Senators Defy Party Orthodoxy on Governors Schools

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Sen. Chap Petersen speaking on senate floor last year. Credit: Virginia Mercury

    by James A. Bacon

    A Senate committee voted Thursday to spike a bill aimed at “expanding diversity” in Virginia’s governor’s schools, reports The Virginia Mercury. While it is encouraging to know that admittance into the governor’s schools will continue to be based on merit-based tests, the vote has a broader significance, which is even more heartening. It hints that a significant number of Democratic Party legislators are not entirely on board with Governor Ralph Northam’s policy of implementing policies informed by critical race theory throughout Virginia schools.

    The stumbling point for several Democratic legislators is that they have many Asian-American constituents. Asian-Americans are disproportionately admitted into Virginia’s elite public high schools, most notably into Northern Virginia’s nationally recognized Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology where they comprise 73% of the incoming freshmen. Asian-Americans have the most to lose from Northam’s definition of “diversity,” which requires admitting more African-Americans and Hispanics and fewer Asians. Whites would be far less affected by the changes. (more…)

  • Bacon Bits: Fear and Loathing at Every Turn

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    Minutes away from monthslong blackouts. Partisans and their friends in the media will debate forever how to apportion the blame between renewables, natural gas and other factors in the rolling blackouts in Texas. What the situation in the Lone Star State indisputably does do, however, is drive home the absolute necessity of maintaining an electric grid that can withstand rare but extreme weather events. As terrible as conditions are now, with people now going without water and power, it could have been worse. According to officials with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas or ERCOT, the power grid was “seconds and minutes” away from catastrophic failure that could have left Texans in the dark for months, reports The Texas Tribune. Anyone who does not think the same thing could happen in Virginia as we hurtle toward a zero-carbon (and potentially zer0-nuclear) energy grid is homicidally naive.

    More news you’ll never read in a Virginia news outlet. We have to rely upon New York-based National Review magazine for this revelation: “While Virginia’s teachers unions have been vocal regarding their worries about returning to school, and their disapproval of the school reopening bill (SB 1303), new documents obtained by National Review show the unions also have engaged in an intense behind-the-scenes pressure campaign to influence Democratic state lawmakers over the reopening issue. Over just the past few months, the unions have combined to send thousands of emails to Democratic House delegates about school-reopening plans. And so far, the lawmakers have refused to release the vast majority of the emails, citing a state law that allows them to shield their correspondence from the public.” (Hat tip: TooManyTaxes)

    Healthcare consolidation continues apace. Bacon’s Rebellion is the only publication in Virginia that is worried about the ongoing consolidation of the healthcare industry. The public doesn’t seem to care either, but we’re going to document the trend anyway. The latest news is that the University of Virginia Health System has signed a letter of intent to buy out Novant Health U.Va. Health System, a Northern Virginia regional health system owned and operated by the two companies since 2016. Winston-Salem, N.C.,-based Novant owns 60% of the health system. Under the deal, UVa Health, which owns 40%, will own the whole kit and caboodle. (more…)

  • Hey, ACLU: Forget the Fence, Go After Curfews and Booze Restrictions

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by Kerry Dougherty

    Some of us have been waiting 11 months for Virginia’s legal eagles – especially the ACLU – to bombard the courts with a blizzard of challenges to Gov. Ralph Northam’s excessive executive orders that have stomped on the constitutional rights of millions of Virginians.

    Instead we mostly got crickets.

    For a time, churches were closed.

    Where were the lawyers?

    In most places public schools are closed, despite laws that require school districts to meet the educational needs of students with disabilities, many of whom can’t learn without face-to-face instruction.

    Where are the lawyers? (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.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement

About

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.

Fund the Rebellion

Shake up the status quo! Your contributions will be used to pay for faster download speeds and grow readership. Make a one-time donation by credit card or contribute a small sum monthly.

Can’t wait until tomorrow

For your Bacon’s Rebellion fix?

Enter your email address to receive immediate notifications of new posts by email.

SUBSCRIBE

Search Bacon’s Rebellion

Categories

Archives

The Jefferson Council

Protecting Thomas Jefferson’s Legacy at the University of Virginia

Forgot Your Password?

Shoot me an email and I’ll generate a new password for you.

Latest