News links for January 28 and January 29

And now time for another news and info thread, this time not entirely focused on Albemarle and Charlottesville. The formatting for

• First, the United Kingdom has held its first Climate Assembly. Note in the image how participants were chosen. Story in the @guardian (bit.ly/2GtVky5)

• Wolves were returned to Yellowstone National Park 25 years ago, which has lead to a restoration of many species. This @guardian article explains how that happened and what is at stake. Note the annual figure generated by wolf tourism! (bit.ly/2vn1bmq)
• Rewilding the warming Arctic could help with carbon sequestration, but some are suggesting the scale could be at the level of "megafaunal ecosystem engineering." Here's a story from @physorg_com I got from a Sierra Club list I am on (bit.ly/2t3NUOU)
• As an aside, rewilding on a global scale is a major plot point of the novel 2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson, one of my favorite authors. I want to start a KSR book club. (bit.ly/36ERFZ7) Back to the thread.
• Tropical forests are not storing as much CO2 as before, but boreal forests are. More in this @CarbonBrief article. (bit.ly/30YSvyw)
• Many point to overpopulation as a reason for the world's climate issues, but @AlberroHeather warns against that approach in this piece on The Conservation (bit.ly/2RAeB7k)The Census is underway this year, but the Weldon Cooper estimates for July 2019 are out. @Knott_Katherine has this story in today's @DailyProgress (bit.ly/2RVyVPE)
• Our data-driven lives in the 21st century require data centers, and centers require a lot of power. The @ChesBayJournal has this story, which includes comments from my @piedmontenviron colleagues (bit.ly/2GsnVnx)
• James Monroe owned hundreds of people as slaves, like many other early presidents. Now, Highland is involving their descendants as a way to rewrite the history. @wusa9 has this story (bit.ly/37BD1D9)
• Childcare will be provided to any parent who wants to attend the Albemarle County school board's meeting on Thursday night. Details in the @DailyProgress (bit.ly/36B25ZF)
• Virginia Tech is going to open an indoor farming facility at the Institute for Advanced Learning and Research in Danville. Story on @GoDanRiver (bit.ly/2t7K7Aa)
• A 2019 survey of U.S. Mayors found has found that many believe their communities are too auto-centered. @routefifty has this story (bit.ly/37CSxyl)
• The Charlottesville School Board's budget request for FY21 is $2 million higher than officials in Charlottesville City Hall were expecting. Story from @Knott_Katherine in the @DailyProgress (bit.ly/2GApDmQ)
• Passenger flights through the Charlottesville Albemarle Airport doubled in the last decade, and the airport is looking at ways to improve the terminal as a result. @NBC29 has this story from a public meeting last week (bit.ly/2GB6hxL)
• There's a mysterious artists putting up pictures of a Hot Dog over Charlottesville @erinaroo caught up with this person for this article in @cville_weekly (bit.ly/2RT88mM)
• How easy it to remove trees in urban Atlanta for development projects? @mariasaporta has this article, which includes a mention of John Dewberry (bit.ly/2RGDgY5)
• Wild Wolf has closed its location in Charlottesville. I never got around to going there.How many places have come and gone from that space? (bit.ly/2uLisFy)
  
• New Kent County has begun a strategic planning process and many are lamenting the potential loss of rural character. Here's a Daily Press story on the process (bit.ly/313PT2c)
• Commercial poultry operations in eastern Virginia can lead to excessive nitrogen getting into the Chesapeake Bay and other waterways. Here's another @Daily_Press story (bit.ly/2RET3q0)

January 26 and January 27 news links

• Time for another post of recent news stories from the past week that I saw in the Daily Progress and created a big tweet thread for, for the sake of posterity.
• First, @TylerHammelVA wrote about two local businesses cutting back retail hours to focus on wholesale efforts. They are Snowing in Space and Red Rocker Candy. (bit.ly/38HWn9L)
• During their discussion of the year-end surplus, Charlottesville City Council discussed a compensation study for city employees. @nstoutDP captures the nuance well in this article from the 1/22/20 @DailyProgress (bit.ly/37xX1X2)
• Last week, @rideJAUNT unveiled their first all-electric vehicle, a ten passenger van. @craftypanda has this preview from the kickoff event (bit.ly/37Aw9Gc)
• Charlottesville has five new areas for parkland and on March 12 the parks and rec advisory board will consider potential new names. Story in the 1/23 @DailyProgress (bit.ly/2RreiM6)
• Charlottesville Area Transit will be able to purchase an "automated passenger county system" now that a local transportation planning board has signed off on the idea. I'm quoted in this @DailyProgress story from (bit.ly/2TQEiSx)
• The Albemarle school system's funding request for FY2021 is 7 percent higher than the current year, an increase intended to hire more people to contend with a growing population. @Knott_Katherine has this story (bit.ly/2RSf1Vx)
• Charlottesville City Council got a preview of the FY21 budget and thankfully there were reporters there to give the public information. @nstoutDP has this account (bit.ly/2TVq7Md)
  
  One thing to editorialize on this one tweet.
  
  This meeting was not recorded or televised, and I think that was a mistake. None of the materials for that meeting available online yet.
  
  Exhibit A - (bit.ly/2Gi9faA)
  Exhibit B - (bit.ly/2tVt1Wu)
• Both @PiedmontHousing and @cvillehabitat received Virginia loans for affordable housing projects. I learned new things from this @DailyProgress article (bit.ly/2Gnh9zi)
• I read the paper to make sure I know things that have happened. I don't read it every day but just learned three American firefighters were killed in a plane crash in Australia. From Thursday's paper: (bit.ly/37wNnEb)
• Roanoke's bus system is operated by an Ohio company. According to this @roanoketimes article, there's a bit of a troubled history. (bit.ly/2GsVLJ2)
• The woman at the center of a landmark student free speech case spoke at @UVALaw last week (bit.ly/38JkGUQ)
• The Charlottesville School Board met on Saturday to discuss the upcoming year's budget. @Knott_Katherine has the story in yesterday's @DailyProgress (bit.ly/2uEY2OM)
• The Rector of the University of Virginia, Jim Murray, describes in this commentary how putting Morven under conservation easement helps achieve environmental goals. (bit.ly/2O2zZ2K)
• UVA astronomer and librarian Ricky Patterson told a crowd at a Sierra Club meeting yesterday how changes in lighting technology have made light pollution worse. @craftypanda has the story in today's @DailyProgress I am quoted in this one town. (bit.ly/3aKLpSE)

January 5, 2020 News and Information Round-Up

Sunday news and information research time. As always, this information is repurposed from a Twitter thread.

CHARLOTTESVILLE and VIRGINIA 

• First, Charlottesville has released "stop and frisk" data which appears to show a decline in "investigative detentions" but the tables may not show whole picture. @nstoutDP writes in Saturday's @DailyProgress (bit.ly/2FloDm3)
  
• The Charlottesville public housing agency (CRHA) can't document that procurement policy was followed in the purchase of $728K of goods and services. That's the result of a @HUDgov audit released this past August. @nstoutDP has this @DailyProgress report (bit.ly/2ZS5hOJ)
  
  The audit was triggered by a "hotline complaint" that CRHA had awarded a contract for internet services without seeking bids. That claim wasn't true, but @HUDgov concluded the audit had merit. Read the report here: (bit.ly/2QqREDe)

A clip from the HUD report

• The flu has been strong this season, but the strain going on is less common than usual. @Suarez_CM reports for the @RTDNEWS and the story is on A2 of yesterday's @DailyProgress - Have you had it? (bit.ly/2QnPiF0)
  
• Luray-based @MyBlueRidgeBank has joined the New York Stock Exchange, capping off a year of expansion. The story is on A3 of yesterday's @DailyProgress (bit.ly/2FlGysz)
  
• Loudoun Supervisors will meet on January 7 and will provide final budget direction to the county's administrator. The budget office is advising against a proposed tax cut. More from @LoudounNow (bit.ly/37EmWMC)
  
• Thirty-three middle and high school teams competed at @UVA yesterday to qualify for the FIRST Tech Challenge, a robotics competition. @Knott_Katherine has this story in the @DailyProgress (bit.ly/36mfw09)
  
• Albemarle will seek new ways to find people to join boards and commissions. One county resident and former EDA member studied the issue while at the Frank Batten School. @craftypanda has this story for the @DailyProgress (bit.ly/2SV0drf)
  
  One thing Albemarle could do, and you could do, is help publicize this list of vacancies and ask people to apply for them. Share this with people you know. Each is important in its own way. (bit.ly/2SUbpo9)

• 

  A clip from the Albemarle boards and commission vacancy page
• Speaking of volunteering, would you like to do so in 2020? There's a whole list of opportunities on C2 of the @DailyProgress ranging from being a tax counselor for AARP to volunteering at the UVA Medical Center gift shop. Get the paper to see the list!
  

ENVIRONMENTAL 

• The largest mining boom in the world's history could soon begin as an international framework to govern ocean floor dredging nears completion. The impact to deep sea ecosystems will be enormous. This @TheAtlantic piece is very important. (bit.ly/37yEERm)
  
• State and local governments stepped up efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in 2019. @insideclimate has a summary of action and progress across the United States. (bit.ly/2STLRrl)
  
• The fires in Australia continue to intensify as temperatures remain high and as the death toll mounts. An @AP story on A4 of the @DailyProgress today (bit.ly/2QReYJj)
  
  Australian Prime Minister defends his government's response and told reporters now is not the time to assign blame. This @AP update is on the @DailyProgress website (bit.ly/2tAbdj6)
  
• The director of @BlueRidgePoison Center explains why lead is so toxic to the human body and how its presence in the built environment affects so many. This is on C4 of today's @DailyProgress (bit.ly/36uQfRm)
  
• The field of architecture is coming to terms to the role construction plays in factoring carbon footprints. There's a lot of information in this @ArchDaily piece that's worth reviewing (bit.ly/2Qr9LbY)
  
• The Hampton Roads Sanitation District is experimenting with treating water and returning it to an aquifer in order to replenish groundwater. This account is from the firm that sold the doors to the SWIFT project. (bit.ly/39GCYra)