Good morning, RVA: New tone from the RPD, hotel fees, and “oiliness”

Bring on True Winter! I’m ready for it!

Good morning, RVA! It's 35 °F, and today looks bright, clear, and a bit cooler than yesterday. You can expect highs right around 50 °F, with temperatures dropping below freezing tonight. I don’t know about you, but I’m ready to move fully into True Winter and leave this transitional weather behind!

Water cooler

Today, the Richmond Police Department will graduate their 125th Basic Recruit Class, which will add 12 new officers to their ranks. First, I’m fully and deeply aware that the police often get to write their own, unchallenged narrative and often that narrative is not an accurate portrayal of reality. Second, I think the language in RPD’s press release about these new recruits is really interesting: “These men and women join RPD and bring with them diverse backgrounds and perspectives. A brand new mother who completed training after giving birth to her son, an Iraqi who has past experience from a war torn country, and an elected female class president of the 125th BRC stand to bring fresh perspective, drive, and conviction to change the stigma of law enforcement officers. Relating to the younger generation and feeling the impact of the events of 2020, these twelve officers are inspired to be the catalyst for change. Empathy and awareness stand to support bringing about a new public perception of law enforcement officers.” Again, take the content with a grain of salt, but the tone here is definitely a marked shift from the typically defensive and paternalistic RPD releases I’ve read in the past. I wonder if this change comes from the department’s new leadership? More importantly, I wonder if we’ll see on-the-ground actions that match this shift in public tone.

NBC12’s Henry Graff has some early details on a proposed Richmond Region Tourism Improvement District, which would add a 2% fee to hotel rooms across the region to pay for marketing and advertising designed to lure people into Richmond’s eternal embrace. Richmond Region Tourism, our regional tourism and marketing group, estimates that the new fees would generate $8.2 million the first year, and City Council’s Organizational Development committee will hear a presentation on the proposal this coming Monday, which you can flip through here. I like that this fee is distributed evenly across localities and would apply to “all lodging properties of 41+ rooms located within the boundaries of Chesterfield, Hanover, and Henrico counties, Town of Ashland, and the cities of Richmond and Colonial Height.” Side note: This proposal makes me want to remember how our lodging tax works, the vast majority of which, I think, currently funds debt payments on the convention center. I wonder if it’s time to revisit how that agreement shakes out.

Axios Richmond’s Ned Oliver is the first reporter I’ve seen to start chasing down potential candidates to fill Rep. McEachin’s House of Representatives seat. From the piece: “We talked to every Richmond politician who would answer the phone Wednesday, and so far, Del. Lamont Bagby, a Democrat from Henrico, appears to have emerged as one of the most likely contenders for the seat.” Tap through for a few additional names and a couple to cross off the list.

Ian M. Stewart at VPM reports on a neat oral history initiative in Chesterfield County called Chesterfield Remembers. If you’ve got a story about the County you think people should know and remember, fill out this nomination form to get started. I love oral history projects, and this one needs lots more entries—so spread the word!

Whoa, this column in the Richmond Times-Dispatch from Del. Don Scott about the Governor’s recent missteps with the K–12 history curriculum is heated. While I’d totally understand if you’d prefer to skip this kind of political discourse (which I’m not sure does much of anything anyway), I will say that this piece contains the word “oiliness” and I think that’s great.

Via /r/rva, a disturbing real-life version of that rabbit/duck optical illusion. It took me a while, but eventually I stopped being horrified.

This morning's longread
A Tweet Before Dying

Listen, I know it’s boring to keep reading about the over-exaggerated death of Twitter and its floundering clown king, but I just cannot stop. Plus, this piece in Wired underscores how simply wonderful a good PDF can be! PDFs!

RIP the revolutionary internet, 1997–2022. I’m grieving a little over here. But life must go on, despite who wins the US midterm elections, who owns Twitter, and how ridiculous the metaverse might be. That’s why every morning, sometimes before breakfast, when I am in despair, I remember the three letters that always bring me comfort: PDF. And then, when I can, I go digging. I read about Gato, a new artificially intelligent agent that can caption images and play games, or the mathematics underlying misinformation, or “digital twins,” which are simulations of real-world things like cities that consulting firms seem able to sell these days. One site, scholar.archive.org, has PDFs going back to the 18th century. It’s empowering to look for this stuff instead of waiting for it to be socially discovered and jammed into my brain.

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Picture of the Day

Good life advice.