Good morning, RVA: 922↘️ • 13↘️; a George Floyd hologram, and a stunning map

Good morning, RVA! It’s 75 °F, and you can expect “cooler” temperatures today. We’ll still see the hot and humid 90s, just the low 90s instead of the high 90s.

Water cooler

As of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 922↘️ new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealthand 13↘️ new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 127↘️ new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 30, Henrico: 65, and Richmond: 32). Since this pandemic began, 281 people have died in the Richmond region. A couple things to note this morning! First, the outage or backlog or whatever at VDH did seem to cause a one-time increase in new coronavirus case counts, and today’s new COVID-19 case numbers are back under 1,000. Second, faced with a worsening situation in the 757, the Governor tweaked Phase Three (as predicted) for just a handful of localities in the Eastern Region of the state: Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Norfolk, Suffolk, Portsmouth, Hampton, Williamsburg, Newport News, Poquoson, James City County, and York County. In those localities, on-site alcohol sales will end at 10:00 PM, all dining establishments must close by 12:00 AM, indoor dining will be limited to 50% of capacity, and gatherings over 50 people will be prohibited. The new restrictions will remain in place for at least a couple of weeks, an entire COVID-19 incubation period. Third, a GMRVA Patron reminded me of this VDH form to report violations of the Governor’s executive order requiring folks to wear masks inside of buildings. Wearing a mask is not a joke, and, in fact, it is required by the dang Governor while inside.

RPS Superintendent Jason Kamras says teachers will not be virtually teaching from their classrooms this coming school year. While this is exactly what Chesterfield Public Schools have required—that teachers show up for work each and every day with students staying home—I didn’t know that it was something teachers in Richmond wanted. Kamras says opening the buildings to teachers would open the buildings to additional staff, additional cleaning costs, and, most importantly, the coronavirus itself—which is exactly the point of keeping all learning virtual for the foreseeable future.

City Council’s Public Safety Committee met yesterday and voted to continue RES. 2020-R048 until September. That’s the paper that asks the Richmond Police Department to stop using certain less lethal weapons to control unlawful assemblies. Considering the membership of the committee—Councilmembers Trammell, Gray, and Hilbert—this is unsurprising, as those same councilmembers were some of the most outspoken in support of the current policing status quo at this past Monday’s full Council meeting. Only one of three is running for reelection (Trammell in the 8th District), so make sure you ask candidates what they would have done in this situation with this resolution (you can find the list of candidates and their contact information here). Anyway, while I didn’t think RES. 2020-R048 had much of a chance passing full Council, I didn’t expect it to get hung up in committee—especially given the current (and growing) state of protests in Richmond. I’m not sure what the process is for full Council to vote on something that’s been continued by a committee, but I doubt there would be the votes for whatever that is either.

Speaking of police reform, C. Suarez Rojas has an update on Henrico County’s efforts to create a independent Civilian Review Board for their police department—an effort led by Supervisor Tyrone Nelson. There’s a lot of work to do in Henrico, especially when you’ve got Supervisor O’Bannon who “isn’t sure if there is a policing problem the county needs to solve” and wonders if “[a review board] could be a new program in the division of police.” If you’re a Henrico resident, consider emailing the Board of Supervisors in support of an independentCivilian Review Board. I still think this PDF from the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement is the best primer on CRBs, so maybe send that link along when you reach out to your elected representative!

I only learned about this George Floyd hologram thing after yesterday’s email went out, and I’m bummed I didn’t get a chance to tell y’all about it. The pics are wild! Johanna Alonso at the Richmond Times Dispatch has a recap of the event, which took place in front of hundreds at Marcus David Peters Circle and included some words from George Floyd’s family.

Budget nerds and normal people! Councilmember Addison has a column in the RTD about participatory budgeting and how this moment of defunding the police (those are my words, he says “as we look to reimagine public safety”) is the perfect time to implement a PB pilot. I say “normal people” because the participatory budgeting process is exactly built for normal people to get involved and have a say in how their public money gets spent in their neighborhoods. See: “The city administration must recognize the immense knowledge that resides on every street and honor resident experiences by giving them some decision-making power. Participatory budgeting uniquely is structured to bridge the knowledge and experience gap between government and people. There is no better time than right now to bridge that gap in Richmond.” Read this column, and then stay tuned for how Councilmember Addison plans to lead the charge on bringing participatory budgeting to Richmond.

Mayor Stoney announced that he’ll put somewhere between $25–50 million in the City’s five-year Capital Improvement Program for “the commemoration and memorialization of Richmond’s complete history”—that includes investments in “the Shockoe Area, various African American burial grounds and the Slave Trail. The effort will begin with a $3.5 million investment in the Shockoe Area Memorial Park.” Sounds like a win for the Shockoe Alliance folks who’ve been working towards doing some sort of memorial in the area for a while now. The current CIP (PDF) does have page for the “Heritage Center / Lumpkin’s Jail (Devil’s Half Acre)” (p. 177) which says we’ve got about $8M socked away for that purpose. I also seem to remember the State earmarking a bunch of money for a museum about Virginia’s role in the trade of enslaved people. I don’t know how any of those things relate or don’t relate to this new announcement!

Via /r/rva, check out this incredible 3D render of a 1957 map of Virginia. Make sure you tap in and zoom around the full, hi-res image. Whoa. Makes me feel like I’m watching the sunset from the Blue Ride Mountains.

This morning’s patron longread

How Taiwan’s Unlikely Digital Minister Hacked the Pandemic

Submitted by Patron Casey. Lots of interesting takeaways in this piece about Taiwan’s use of technology in their democracy. I’m particularly interested in how we could use pol.is locally for community engagement. Bowling Green has an interesting case study if you want to dig in a little further.

It’s safe to say that most governments are not staffed by officials who share much in common with Tang, a trans woman, open-source software hacker, startup entrepreneur, and the youngest (at 35, in 2016) person ever to be appointed a cabinet member in Taiwan. But when the topic is the successful integration of civil society, technological progress, and democratic governance, it’s also safe to say that most countries don’t share all that much in common with Taiwan, either. At least not yet.

If you’d like your longread to show up here, go chip in a couple bucks on the ol’ Patreon.