Good morning, RVA: Collective bargaining, James River sewage, and a potential raise for teachers

I'm an opossum supporter.

Good morning, RVA! It's 35 °F, and we're back to winter weather. Today you can expect highs in the mid 40s with lows tonight dipping below freezing. And to think, I spent most of yesterday afternoon in a hammock!

Water cooler

As we nervously watch Omicron continue to spread around the country and while we wait to learn more about the variant, here's a look at Virginia's cases, hospitalizations, and deaths caused by COVID-19. That downward trend from this past fall has slowed to a plateau and maybe even started to tick upwards. Remember though: Regardless of any new, more transmissible variant, a cold-weather increase in the spread of the coronavirus was always in the cards (just look at the case rates from all of these chilly northern states). We still haven't had a report of Omicron in the Commonwealth just yet, but that's sure to happen any day now, and we don't yet know just how the new variant will impact folks—especially fully vaccinated people, and double especially boosted people. I think the appropriate attitude to take at the moment is Cautious Wait and See. The New York Times has a nice Omicron map that you can use while Wait and Seeing to track which states have detected Omicron (like our northern neighbors in Maryland).

Last night, the RPS school board voted to approve collective bargaining, Virginia's first locality to do so. Here's Richmond Times-Dispatch education reporter Kenya Hunter on Twitter (tap through for a fun video): "Richmond Public Schools became the first school district in the state to pass collective bargaining, ending a decades long restriction on the Richmond Education Association’s ability to have a meaningful say in employee work conditions." RPS Superintendent Kamras had his own congratulatory tweet, saying, "Looking forward to partnering with future bargaining units to #LeadWithLove together. Onward and upward!"

Mel Leonor at the RTD reports that Northam's outgoing budget will include a 10% raise for teachers over the next two years. First, we'll see if Youngkin, whose entire education platform is "restore excellence in education," maintains these proposed increases or not. Second, Northam plans on localities contributing to these teacher raises based on the Local Composite Index. From Leonor's piece: "How much each locality would need to contribute would depend on the state’s funding formula, the local composite index, which takes into account each locality’s real estate values and average earnings." I don't know enough about how the LCI works to tell if the local portion of these raises ends up as an unfunded mandate for localities like Richmond—tiny geographical area, high poverty, rising real estate values. For now, I'm somewhere between interested and skeptical!

This seems bad: Sarah Vogelsong at the Virginia Mercury reports that "Three environmental groups are suing Henrico County over what they say is a failure to fix chronic problems with its sewage collection system and treatment plant that has led to more than 66 million gallons of raw sewage being dumped into the James River and its tributaries since 2016." I write about sewers and sewage a lot in this newsletter, mostly because Richmond has a combined sewer system, which...combines...stormwater and poopwater during big rain events (rain events that will be more and more frequent due to climate change). However, this is not the case in Henrico! Vogelsong clarifies that "Henrico’s system, however, has separate pipes for stormwater and wastewater," and points out that Virginia's old cities that use combined sewer systems have been tasked by the General Assembly to replace them to, you know, keep raw sewage out of the Commonwealths waterways. We'll see if this legal action can force Henrico to do the same.

Not everyone agreed with my thoughts on taking down the Robert E. Lee plinth! It's complicated, for sure, and Whittney Evans at VPM has a few more details and a picture of the removal, which started yesterday. I liked this quote from a member of History is Illuminating, "We kind of understand what's happening. We’re a little upset about it. But the reality of what’s going on is that we need to get this pedestal down and in the hands of museums ASAP before Youngkin can clean it."

Oof, from the Peedmont, Richmond's satirical Onion-like publication: "RPD To Convert Lee Monument Circle To Tear Gas Training Ground."

This morning's longread
Meet Appalachia’s Misunderstood Marsupial, the Opossum

I used to be an opossum hater, but they're fascinating animals particularly suited to live alongside urban humanity—the most urbanist of marsupials!

Opossums are one of nature’s clean-up tools, scavenging for overripe fruit, chasing down cockroaches, and snapping up rats and mice. They have an amazing amount of teeth, nearly 50 by some counts, which allows them to eat a wide range of substances. While opossums are often known for rooting through people’s trash cans, in reality, it is more likely that the opossum you just saw chugging through your yard was scavenging for rodents and other pests — perhaps even devouring ticks. Scientists estimate that a single opossum eats around 5,000 ticks every season, making them an essential tool in the fight against Lyme disease.

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