Category Archives: Public corruption

Virtual Education in K-12 Public Schools – A False and Corrupt Narrative in Virginia

Posted on July 3, 2022 by | 43 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Public employee interests with personal stakes in the outcome are lying by omission in public discussions of virtual schooling in Virginia.

Their message was published in Suzanne Munson’s column in the Richmond Times Dispatch on Jun 25th.

The VDOE has made a commendable start with online learning through its Virtual Virginia classes. But these are available in only a handful of school districts, serving less than 2% of the commonwealth’s students. This system could become a major player, with serious funding from the General Assembly. (emphasis added)

A free, accredited online curriculum, featuring the finest instructors in every subject, would level the playing field for students from diverse backgrounds. Rich and poor students alike across the commonwealth could receive the same good instruction, addressing uneven education in affluent, low-income and rural areas. Students confined at home due to illnesses or physical disabilities would be able to keep up with their studies and not fall behind.

Additionally, for those choosing remote learning individually or in small-group settings, this need not be an isolated experience. There could be opportunities for discussion, exercise, social interaction and creative expression, with adult supervision.

Ms. Munson failed to mention that exactly the public school educations she describes have been offered successfully for more than a decade free to parents by VDOE-certified private providers offering SOL-compliant instruction here in the Commonwealth.  Ms. Munson may even be ignorant of the existence of the privately run program.  

Somehow they have been doing it for those years to the great satisfaction of parents without “serious funding from the General Assembly.” They exist on the state share of school funding for each pupil that attends. The state money follows the child. No special state appropriations. Parents pay nothing. The local school districts pay nothing.

The problem the state employees have with that program is that the participating organizations are privately run. VDOE under the previous administration made a coordinated attempt to drive the MOP (Multi-division Online Provider) program out of business.

Now the state employees, using communications like Ms. Munson’s column, are lobbying for vast increases in dedicated state appropriations for their own virtual program. Promotions undoubtedly to follow for everyone currently in the program.

That constitutes public corruption. Continue reading →

43 Comments

Posted in Education (K-12), Efficiency in government, General Assembly, Political Influence, Public corruption

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Virginia’s Self-Inflicted Nursing Home Crisis – Part 3 – McAuliffe & Herring

Posted on October 2, 2021 by | 4 comments

by James C. Sherlock

In the first two parts of this series, I wrote about the shortage of state inspectors for nursing homes in the Virginia Department of Health Office of Licensure and Certification (OLC)  and the continuing danger it poses to Virginia patients.

The problem, unfortunately, is much wider than just nursing homes.  So is the scandal.

That same office inspects every type of medical facility including home care agencies as well as managed care plans. Except it cannot meet the statutory requirements because it does not have sufficient personnel or money. And it have been telling the world about it for years.

Terence Richard McAuliffe was the 72nd governor of Virginia from 2014 to 2018. Mark Herring has been Attorney General since 2014.

We will trace below that they can reasonably be called the founding fathers of overdue inspections of medical facilities in Virginia.

VDH has been short of health inspectors since McAuliffe and Herring took office and still is .

Both of them know it. And they know that lack of inspections demonstrably causes unnecessary suffering and death.

Continue reading →

4 Comments

Posted in Consumer protection, Ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes, Money in politics, Political Influence, Public corruption, Regulation, Scandals

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Former Norfolk Sheriff Convicted of Fraud and Bribery

Posted on September 8, 2021 by | 23 comments

Former Norfolk Sheriff Bob McCabe

by Dick Hall-Sizemore

Here is another name to add to the list of corrupt public officials — former Norfolk Sheriff Bob McCabe.

Earlier this week, a federal jury convicted him of all 11 counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering. The charges covered actions committed over a 22-year period. They included accepting gift cards to expensive restaurants, Redskins tickets, free catering for his annual golf tournament, an all-expenses paid trip to Nashville, “loans” that were never repaid, and thousands of dollars in cash to spend during casino trips. He was also charged with providing inside information to select companies seeking contracts with the sheriff’s office.

Testifying in his defense at his trial, McCabe admitted to violating campaign finance laws, but claimed it was not intentional. “I just didn’t pay attention to them like I should have.” He also admitted getting loans and gifts from businessmen who had multi-million dollar contracts with the city’s jail, but insisted, “I’ve never taken a bribe in my life.” The “loans” and gifts were because they were friends, he insisted. Continue reading →

23 Comments

Posted in Courts and law, Crime , corrections and law enforcement, Ethics, Public corruption

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Campaign Finance Reform in Virginia – the New Governor Must Lead

Posted on September 4, 2021 by | 21 comments

by James C. Sherlock

I consider campaign finance reform the foremost issue facing representative government in Virginia.

We are one of only a few states with no campaign donations limits at all. We pay for that in legislation enacted and not enacted because of the preferences of huge donors. And in the stink of legal public corruption.

It also drives way up the cost of running and keeps good people from participating.

The new governor will have to lead. Continue reading →

21 Comments

Posted in Elections, Electoral process, Ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Money in politics, Political Influence, Politics, Public corruption, Scandals

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COPN Monopolies Depress Income for Virginia Healthcare Professionals Without Lowering Costs

Posted on April 5, 2021 by | 26 comments

The Business of Healthcare

by James C. Sherlock

Virginia is among the richest states in the country.  

We are ranked ninth among states with the highest median household income in the 2019 (latest) Census Bureau American Community Survey. Virginia median household income was $74,222 and the U.S. as a whole was $62,843.

But Virginia has a Certificate of Public Need (COPN) law among the most stifling of competition in the nation. The law itself and the regional monopolies created combine to suppress both opportunity and income for healthcare professionals.  

The monopolies don’t just control the healthcare delivery market, they also control the labor market.  

This essay will illustrate the effects of COPN and COPN-generated monopolies in depressing wages, and thus on the willingness of medical professionals to practice here. And then show you those lower wages don’t save consumers a dime. Continue reading →

26 Comments

Posted in Consumer protection, General Assembly, Governance, Health Care, Labor & workforce, Money in politics, Public corruption

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Sentara and the Judge

Posted on February 22, 2021 by | 24 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Updated Feb. 23 at 2:15 pm

In an ongoing series of reports, Ray Locker, enterprise and investigative editor of the Checks and Balances Project, has exposed a story with far-reaching implications.

Norfolk Circuit Court Chief Judge Mary Jane Hall sat in judgment on a case, Chesapeake Hosp. Auth. v. State Health Comm’r,  in which Sentara was an included defendant.  

It appears from that reporting that she could have recused herself for two reasons:

  • prior to her appointment to the bench Judge Hall not only had represented Sentara for years in another COPN case; but also
  • the judge’s co-attorney on that previous COPN case, Jamie B. Martin of Williams Mullin, was Sentara’s attorney in Chesapeake Hosp. Auth. v. State Health Comm’r.

From Mr. Locker’s first article:

The Virginia Canons of Judicial Conduct says this about judicial impartiality:

“(1) A judge shall disqualify himself or herself in a proceeding in which the judge’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned”

Further under Canon 2,

“The test for appearance of impropriety is whether the conduct would create in reasonable minds a perception that the judge’s ability to carry out judicial responsibilities with integrity and impartiality is impaired.”

My own additional research into published Norfolk Circuit Court opinions shows that Judge Hall sat in judgment on cases in that court involving Sentara as well as on Chesapeake Hosp. Auth. v. State Health Comm’r.  This case was filed in Chesapeake Circuit Court.

The Chief Justice of the Virginia Supreme Court, who is charged with overseeing judicial conduct, assigned the case to Judge Hall

Chief Justice Lemons of the Virginia Supreme Court asked Judge Hall to sit by designation in Chesapeake in place of the judges of the First Judicial Circuit (Chesapeake) and hear the case. She accepted. He made the appointment on July 31, 2018.

There would be three possible reasons to import a judge:

  1. Chief Justice Lemons assessed that there were no judges on the Chesapeake Circuit with the experience to hear a COPN case; or
  2. he assessed that the Chesapeake Circuit judges were conflicted or could have been considered so; or
  3. The Chesapeake Circuit had more cases than judges at that point.

There is no indication in the record of why Judge Hall was imported in this case.

Continue reading →

24 Comments

Posted in Courts and law, Ethics, Health Care, Public corruption, Scandals

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What Texas’s Crisis Means for Virginia

Posted on February 21, 2021 by | 208 comments

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.  Continue reading →

208 Comments

Posted in Blogs and blog administration, Budgets, Business and Economy, Consumer protection, Culture wars, Disasters and disaster preparedness, Economic development, Energy, Environment, Insurance, Labor & workforce, Land use & development, Money in politics, Political Influence, Politics, Property rights, Public corruption, Public safety & health, Regulation, Science & Technology

Business as Usual in the Virginia Senate – “Dominion Dick” Saslaw Delivers

Posted on February 16, 2021 by | 46 comments

Sen. Dick Saslaw (D)

by James C. Sherlock

Associate Press headline Feb. 15: “Virginia Senate Democrats kill electric rate reform bills.”

Fish gotta swim, Senator Richard L. “Dominion Dick” Saslaw gotta be Senate Majority Leader and Chairman of the Virginia Senate Commerce and Labor Committee.

Saslaw has received nearly a half million dollars in campaign donations from Dominion Energy and its previous CEO, Thomas Farrell. The Chairman literally would be cheap at ten times the price.

From the AP:

“The Senate Commerce and Labor Committee on Monday swiftly killed the last of more than half a dozen bills this session that aimed to reform Virginia’s system of electric utility rate review, which is seen by Wall Street investors as favorable to the utilities and by critics as an example of legislative capture by companies with an outsize influence over the General Assembly.”

Dominion sweeping all before it actually gives some sense of stability to the General Assembly.

Below is a list of campaign donations by Dominion Energy and Tom Farrell to the Senators who voted with Dominion on the closest vote, 8-7 to table Virginia HB1132 Electric utility regulation; initial triennial review, requirements, sponsored by Del. Jay Jones (D). Continue reading →

46 Comments

Posted in Consumer protection, Energy, ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Money in politics, Political Influence, Public corruption, Scandals

Basic Child Literacy Cannot Be too Much to Ask of Richmond City Public Schools

Posted on February 9, 2021 by | 26 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Half of Black 4th graders in Richmond public schools couldn’t read in 2019. That is not OK.

It is way past time to demand both better performance and accountability. Clearly neither the city of Richmond nor the Commonwealth has done that effectively.

So I have filed formal complaints with the federal government to see if the Departments that provide federal money to the Richmond City Public School District can establish accountability for how all of that money has been spent.

Jason Kamras currently serves as the Superintendent of Richmond Public Schools (RPS). He has first-rate credentials — National Teacher of the Year in 2005, undergraduate Princeton, masters in education from Harvard. Worked in leadership positions in D.C. Public Schools before coming to Richmond.

He is the highest-paid superintendent in Richmond history at $250,000 annually. His initial three-year contract was slated to expire this summer.  He just received a 4-year extension on a split 6-3 vote by the Richmond School Board.

The performance of Mr. Kamras’ Richmond School District is cataclysmically bad.   Continue reading →

26 Comments

Posted in Civil Rights, Consumer protection, Education (K-12), Federal, Governance, Government Oversight, Public corruption, Scandals

Virginia’s Legendary Corruption Blocks Antitrust Enforcement

Posted on February 5, 2021 by | 12 comments

Great Seal of Virginia

by James C. Sherlock

Readers of this blog have indicated an unquenchable appetite for information about and discussion of Virginia’s Certificate of Public Need (COPN) law and its administration.

This essay informs on the negative impacts of the COPN law and the Virginia Antitrust Act (the Act) itself on the enforcement of antitrust laws against Virginia’s regional hospital monopolies.

First, know that the business activities that some of Virginia’s hospital monopolies exhibit can already be deemed illegal under both federal and state antitrust laws. But the Act gives them a special dispensation, complicates both state and federal antitrust enforcement and results directly in the in-your-face anticompetitive activities we see every day.

The federal government (and once even Bob McDonnell as Virginia Attorney General) occasionally have intervened to block interstate mergers or in-state acquisitions before they occur, but always within the federal administrative and court systems, and they have never challenged COPN decisions.

But no government agency has ever sued over the business activities of Virginia’s COPN-constructed monopolies. Continue reading →

12 Comments

Posted in Antitrust, Business and Economy, Consumer protection, Courts and law, Crime , corrections and law enforcement, General Assembly, Governance, Health Care, Public corruption, Scandals

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COPN Scores a Kill

Posted on January 31, 2021 by | 44 comments

by James C. Sherlock

More than eleven months ago I wrote an essay titled, “The Legal Corruption of (Virginia’s Certificate of Public Need) COPN.” That system needs overhaul, not adjustment, and the people of Hampton Roads need help.  The Governor needs to lead in both efforts.

Today I offer the third in a series (first two here and here ) of essays providing background and potential future solutions to the closure of Bon Secours DePaul Hospital in Norfolk.

This is the story of the public, state-sponsored execution of DePaul and a simultaneous attempt to create a bleak future for Bon Secours in Hampton Roads.

COPN mortally wounded that hospital in 2008. It lasted until now as Sentara gnawed away at it  Its death was announced this past week. Pending is how Bon Secours will look at its future in Hampton Roads.

Continue reading →

44 Comments

Posted in Antitrust, Charity and philanthropy, Ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care, Money in politics, Public corruption, Regulation, Scandals

Mark Herring’s Worst Thanksgiving –  Conspiracy Against EVMS may lead to Federal Involvement

Posted on November 20, 2020 by | 52 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Sentara CEO Howard Kern

Scandals are sometimes overrated. Not this one.

I have reported here before on the strange case of the EVMS-ODU merger. I posted here on Nov 1, Nov 2  and Nov 3 with my own concerns on the subject. Many of my assessments came to fruition.

On November 13 and 20, the Checks and Balances Project picked up the story and took it to the next level. The quotations below are from the November 20 story.

I am not an attorney, but I will project today the significant legal jeopardy into which the process may have put the group that got together to coordinate and plan that merger without EVMS participation. 

Not to mention the legal and personnel mess that it puts on the desk of Virginia’s Attorney General and the Governor. 

Continue reading →

52 Comments

Posted in Courts and law, Crime , corrections and law enforcement, Education (higher ed), Ethics, Federal, Governance, Government Oversight, Public corruption, Scandals

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Statue Contract Investigation: the Ball’s in Herring’s Court

Posted on November 13, 2020 by | 20 comments

by James A. Bacon

A special prosecutor charged with investigating a $1.8 million contract to take down Confederate statues in the City of Richmond, is asking Attorney General mark Herring to authorize the Virginia State Police to help him.

“I hereby request that you authorize the Bureau of Criminal Investigation within the Virginia State Police to conduct an investigation into this matter,” wrote Timothy Martin, commonwealth’s attorney for August County, to handle the matter.

According to the Associated Press, Martin told Jeffrey Breit, an attorney for Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney, he needs additional investigators to conduct interviews. Continue reading →

20 Comments

Posted in Public corruption, Scandals, Uncategorized

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Maybe We Can Sue

Posted on August 29, 2020 by | 26 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Updated August 30, 3:30 pm

I wrote yesterday about a House of Delegates bill that ultimately was passed by the House Committee for Courts of Justice as House Bill No. 5074 Amendment In the Nature of A Substitute (the bill).  

I wrote of its effects on public officials and owners and managers of private companies for violations of COVID-19 regulations. The bill makes them not just accountable to state and federal regulators, but also personally civilly liable for the slightest violation of any part of the virtually unclimbable wall of applicable regulations. And Virginia has the strictest COVID-19 occupational safety regulations in the nation.

This essay will discuss the ethics of two different original bills and reveal the secretive process by which the final substitute was developed in committee. It will ask the General Assembly to clean up a scandal of its own making.

Some may say this “goes on all the time.” It may, but that does not mean it should.

Continue reading →

26 Comments

Posted in Business and Economy, Courts and law, Ethics, General Assembly, Open Government, Public corruption, Scandals

Elmer Gantry In Lynchburg

Posted on August 26, 2020 by | 36 comments

Jerry Falwell, Jr., and wife Becki

By Peter Galuszka

The resignation of Jerry Falwell Jr. amid a series of scandals may have a strong impact in Virginia where his late father built an extraordinary, ultra-conservative evangelical university in Lynchburg that later became highly politicized lightning rod supporting President Donald Trump.

Falwell has been caught up in a number of controversies including limiting speech on campus, going after The New York Times for trespassing when it reported he insisted that student ignore wearing anti-viral pandemic masks and so on.

What happened with Falwell Jr is as  an American story as apple pie topped with a Cross. It might have some straight out of the pages of Elmer Gantry.

After touting strict school policies that forbid students from drinking alcohol, watching “R”-rated movies or engaging in pre-marital sex, Falwell was pictured aboard a NASCAR mogul’s yacht half dressed with a semi-clad, pregnant woman who was said to be his wife Becki’s assistant. Falwell was holding a wine glass with a liquid in it but Falwell said it wasn’t wine.

Shortly afterwards, he gave an interview to the right-leaning Washington Examiner stating that his wife had been involved with a multi-year sexual affair with Giancarlo Granda, a former Miami Beach pool boy whom Falwell funded to set up a hostel business. Continue reading →

36 Comments

Posted in Children and families, Consumer protection, Culture wars, Economic development, Education (higher ed), Governance, Individual liberties, Media, Money in politics, Property rights, Public corruption, Scandals