Happy February! (and don’t believe Punxsutawney Phil -- there’s no way we are getting six more weeks of winter…)  This month, we begin with an interview with Rappahannock’s very own Moe Moe (aka William Shanks), the entertainment king of our county’s refuse and recycling program.  And who, along the way, makes us all better waste managers.  Enjoy!

This month is special in another way: It’s our Rural Virginia Education focus issue.  Education is getting an enormous amount of Virginians’ attention this year.  As well it should, especially in rural communities.  We believe building a prosperous, 21st-century economy starts in rural communities - and that in turn will require real investments in education at all levels.  The question is whether our new governor and our legislators are willing to back up all the talk about improving educational access with real money. We offer here our take on three critical priorities our politicians should address.  Last, our education post-script takes look at how Dark Money groups hope to manipulate for political ends parents’ understandable concern about our children’s education.  As always, we will provide you with links to some of the best writing we have seen on these priorities.  Enjoy. 

This month we also look at “what’s happening around the Commonwealth”, including links and quick takes on some of the goings-on and ideas circulating in Richmond.   

Finally, our Just for Laughs article is about a woman who asks: what do you do when your not-so-significant other really isn’t worth a Valentine?  Put him up for auction, of course!  So it’s a full issue! Happy reading.

And, if you have not already, please  subscribe!

Over the Fence Interview

Moe Moe (aka William Shanks) doesn’t just run the Rappahannock refuse and recycling center.  A born entertainer, he has figured out how to use social media to cajole the rest of us into being better stewards of the enormous amounts of refuse we manage to create.  Read the interview here: Read More

The Rural Virginia Education issue

 The good news is that Virginia’s public education system ranks as one of the very best in the nation.  The bad news: there is a large and growing divide between the quality of education available in urban and rural communities.  What needs to be done?  We focus here on three priorities:

Fixing crumbling rural schools:   Virginia has one of the greatest disparities in the entire country in our public school infrastructure.  If you live in a wealthy county, your kids’ school is state of the art; if you are in a poor county, they may not even dare drink the water.  How can that be?  Because, unlike school operation costs which get state funding, each county is on its own to finance school construction.  The result: Virginia’s rural counties have a monumental $25 billion backlog in urgently needed school construction!  Fortunately, after years of procrastination, there appears to be an emerging, bi-partisan consensus to at least begin to act. But is our anti-tax governor going to support it?  Suggested readings: Cardinal News (February 7, 2022) and in the Roanoke Times (February 14, 2022)

Making college affordable for rural youth:  Virginia has one of best state systems of higher education in the country – but also one of the most expensive.  Barely 6% of students at our state-supported colleges are from low-income families – while 45% are from high-income families!  That is one of the worst records in the country.  Of course, not all rural students are low income – but it is also true that rural communities have a much greater percentage of students who cannot afford to pay sky-high tuition than urban areas do.  What gives?  Two reports that we link to here – one from Old Dominion University, the other the non-profit State Higher Education Finance (SHEF) -- explain how the three decades the Virginia legislature spent cutting their funding has hurt both universities and community colleges.  The result is a system that skews toward the wealthy – an especially devastating outcome for rural communities looking to use education to transform their economies. Suggested reading: Cardinal News article (January 25, 2022) on the Old Dominion University report; the actual ODU report (January 16, 2021); and the State Higher Education Finance (SHEF) profile of Virginia. And yes, the last two links have a lot of information to read through, but it is worth it!

Retaining our teachers:  Teachers are the “front-line workers” ensuring our kids education. Burned out, however, by the pressures of educating through Covid and worn out by the politicization of their work, they are leaving the profession in droves.  That is the troubling conclusion of the NBC news report below.  What can be done?  For starters, says long-time teacher Patricia Smith in the second article, communities and politicians need to end the blame game.  Teachers deserve support; if not we may end up teaching our kids ourselves…   Suggested reading: NBC News, February 1, 2022; and Richmond Times-Dispatch, February 2, 2022 commentary by Patricia Smith

 The House of Delegates GOP blocked a bill that would ban police using fake documents to intimidate suspects.  Of course, some will argue that there should be no rules in rooting out criminals – but what about those who are actually innocent who are intimidated into “confessing” to crimes they didn’t commit?  And should we be ok with any public official purposely falsifying information?  

Virginia Mercury’s Bob Lewis’ commentary:  not paying our young workers a living wage is eating our seed corn.  Lewis writes persuasively that failure to pay our young workers a living wage is “eating our seed corn” by devastating the work force that will be the future backbone of our economy.  This should be required reading for Delegate Nick Freitas (R-30), who last week tried to kill a one dollar increase in the minimum wage.  Really?

State funding makes local slaughterhouse possible. On a happier note, here is a great story about new state funding to support the creation of a local slaughterhouse, thanks to a bill sponsored by Democratic legislator Sam Rasoul. The availability of a local slaughterhouse will be a huge boon to small cattle farms.

Irish woman puts husband up for sale on auction site, says ‘no return or exchange’. What happens when you forget Valentine’s Day? Maybe your spouse will put you up for auction. In this case, the woman seems less angry than just worn out. “Still needs some house training, “ she writes, but “right now I have neither the time nor the patience”. On the positive side, he “Should remain loyal if kept fed and hydrated regularly.” At least they don’t live in Virginia…