Warning: Smoking may cause eviction
New smoke-free policy takes effect Aug.1 for all RRHA properties, including 4,000 public housing units in city
Residents of public housing in Richmond are facing a ban on smoking in three months.
City doesn’t publicize exemption from trash fees for elderly, disabled renters
City Hall is quietly blocking elderly and disabled renters from receiving free trash and recycling services, the Free Press has learned — a benefit the city has offered for nearly 14 years and which currently is worth $23.79 a month or $285.48 a year.
Herring’s new policy seeks to eliminate cash bond system
Richmond Commonwealth’s Attorney Michael N. Herring is stepping up his efforts to eliminate the cash bond system that forces people to stay in jail while awaiting trial because they cannot afford to put up the money or property for bail or to pay the fee of a bail bonding company willing to do it.
Mixed feelings about Winnie Mandela
Re “ ‘Mother of South Africa’ dies at 81,” an obituary on Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, Free Press April 5-7 edition:
‘The choice is ours’
I believe God is the spirit of love and compassion. The devil is the spirit of evil, with no compassion. I believe God wants all of us to love people more than money.
Medicaid expansion is ‘designed to plunder from taxpayers’
Re Letter to the Editor, “Medicaid expansion is a moral imperative,” Free Press April 19-21 edition:
Problems with protecting consumers
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is supposed to “protect” consumers from fraud and predatory lending. But since 45 has ruled the roost, he has empowered exploiters to extract too much money from consumers.
Economic justice and fair housing
“The housing problem is particularly acute in the minority ghettos. Nearly two-thirds of all non-white families living in the central cities today live in neighborhoods marked with substandard housing and general urban blight. Two major factors are responsible. First: Many ghetto residents simply cannot pay the rent necessary to support decent housing. In Detroit, for example, over 40 percent of the non-white occupied units in 1960 required rent of over 35 percent of the tenants’ income. Second: Discrimination prevents access to many non-slum areas, particularly the suburbs, where good housing exists. In addition, by creating a ‘back pressure’ in the racial ghettos, it makes it possible for landlords to break up apartments for denser occupancy, and keeps prices and rents of deteriorated ghetto housing higher than they would be in a truly free market.” – Report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders (the Kerner Commission), 1968 Former Vice President Walter Mondale, who co-sponsored the Fair Housing Act along with U.S. Sen. Edward Brooke, the first popularly elected African-American in the U.S. Senate, was interviewed recently on the occasion of the Fair Housing Act’s 50th anniversary.
Confronting racism
There was a time not too long ago when businesses in Richmond and across the South would call the police to arrest black people who sat down at lunch counters because they wanted to order. So we found a sad irony in the April 12 arrest of two black men in Philadelphia because they sat down at a Starbucks and didn’t order anything.
Step up
We are greatly disappointed by Richmond City Council’s failure Monday night to approve a tax on cigarettes. The 80 cents per pack tax, proposed by Councilman Parker C. Agelasto, would have generated $5 million annually that would have been dedicated to the repair and maintenance of Richmond’s aged and dilapidated public school buildings.
Richmond native returns as star of film, helping others at Richmond International Film Festival
The Richmond of Tamika Lamison’s youth has evolved into a thriving artistic hub. Ms. Lamison, an actor and director who now lives and works in Los Angeles, grew up in South Side in the 1980s. “When I come home, I certainly see a huge effort to completely infuse a great deal of artistic life into Richmond,” Ms. Lamison told the Free Press in a telephone interview last week.
UniverSoul Circus celebrates 25th anniversary in Richmond through May 6
The UniverSoul Circus returned to Richmond this week in celebration of its 25th anniversary. The circus under a single-ring big top opened Wednesday, April 25, and will run through Sunday, May 6, at Richmond Raceway, 600 E. Laburnum Ave.
City to host international violin competition in 2020
Richmond will host the 2020 “Olympics of the Violin” — the International Menuhin Competition, it has been announced.
Retired Army major earns salute on the golf links
Retired Army officer Duncan Hardcastle has become the golfing star with the stripes. The 51-year-old Midlothian resident also draws attention for being a rare African-American at some of the bold-letter golfing events in the area and around the state.
VSU on the lookout for its next great running back
Auditions for the marquee role of the next Trenton Cannon are now underway at Virginia State University. Realistically, the All-American tailback will be nearly impossible to replace. Finding a replacement might be compared to trying to find a fill-in for the Statue of Liberty.
VSU opens football season in Norfolk at Labor Day clasic
Virginia State University hopes to start its 2018 football season the same way it opened the 2017 season — by defeating Norfolk State University in the Labor Day Classic.
Ballard, Rodriguez leaving VCU
Jeremy Ballard, having served two stints as Virginia Commonwealth University’s basketball assistant coach, is leaving Richmond to become head coach at Florida International University in Miami.
Hal Greer, Philadelphia 76ers all-time scorer, dies at 81
Hal Greer, the Philadelphia 76ers’ all-time scorer and a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, has died.
VSU opens football season in Norfolk at Labor Day classic
Virginia State University hopes to start its 2018 football season the same way it opened the 2017 season — by defeating Norfolk State University in the Labor Day Classic.
