r/RVAmag

On Monday night, close to 300 to people packed into Studio Two Three in Richmond for a town hall about data centers, moderated by Gray Montrose and co-hosted by Henrico Civic Action and Data Center Defiance. 

I went to get a better sense of where Richmonders are from the activist side, and to better understand the issue myself. Virginia has spent years building the largest concentration of data centers in the world and the decisions being made now will affect all of us for decades to come. 

Speakers came from the Sierra Club Virginia Chapter, Friends of Hanover and Stop Hanover Data Centers, Data Center Defiance, The Brockovich Report and The Balm in Gilead. 

This wasn’t a room full of people complaining about data centers as almost everyone there seemed aware of the issue at this point. This was more of a community conversation about how to get organized and, ultimately, how to stop these projects, or at least force more public input.

“We keep hearing we’re not mad enough,” moderator Gray Montrose told the crowd near the beginning of the night. “I think everybody in this room is pretty mad, but we’re learning a lot more details about why.”

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/i-went-to-the-data-center-town-hall-at-studio-two-three.html

It’s that time of year when the U-Hauls come rolling in, parents are circling the block looking for parking, and thousands of new VCU students are about to move in and get their first real taste of Richmond. There are about 4,500 new students and 1,500 transfer students coming in, so you might want to avoid the chaos around Monroe Park this weekend.

Sooner or later, all those students will want something to eat. If you would rather spend your money supporting local without breaking the bank, Richmond has a ton of options. From pizza and dumplings to diners, food carts, and coffee shops, we can help you get through the weekend and the school year.

Here is our guide to eating local around VCU’s campus on a budget. As always, if we missed anything, drop us a line.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/eatdrink/skip-the-chains-vcus-guide-to-cheap-ish-local-eats.html

On a hot day in June, while visiting The Veiled Mirror and talking with them about collecting old books and DVDs, I was told that next door would be opening as a VHS video store soon. All throughout July, several of my friends who knew of my movie library habit started sharing with me news stories about the opening of Monster Video in downtown RVA. Putting 2 and 2 together, I thought it would be a great idea to stop in and talk to the shop’s proprietor, Cody Denzler, about the importance of having a personal media library, rekindling feelings of what it felt like browsing video store rows, and redistributing actual pieces and artifacts of the collective story of pop culture by finding them new homes.

The first thing I noticed walking into Monster Video was a giant Frankenstein in the window and a My Pet Monster sitting in a vintage school chair, both such important icons and precious to my own childhood growing up in the ’80s.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/be-kind-rewind-welcome-to-monster-video.html

For a decade, the mural outside the Romantix adult store, formerly Taboo, on Midlothian Turnpike has been one of Richmond’s most debated pieces of public art. Now it’s gone, replaced by a new collaboration between tattoo artist and muralist Jesse Smith and Miami-based artist Tatiana Suarez.

The original mural, painted by Smith and Peruvian artist Miguel de Cuadro in 2015, became one of Richmond’s most talked about public artworks. As news outlets covered the project, Smith said the conversation took on a life of its own. 

“We didn’t think anything of it, and then all of a sudden the news started showing up because they were getting complaints,” Smith said. “People thought the girl was too young. Other people thought the apple represented sin. People were just kind of pushing their own ideas onto what the mural meant.” 

Smith said none of those interpretations reflected the artists’ intentions. “Miguel paints women all the time, I do critters, and we just put it all together. Then all of a sudden people are talking about the age of the woman on the wall and pedophilia and all this weird stuff. It’s crazy.” 

Looking back, Smith believes the reaction had less to do with the artwork itself than where it was painted. “I think the real problem is they just don’t want a sex shop. They don’t want attention brought to it. If it was on the side of an ice cream store or something, I don’t think people would have been upset.”

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/art/street-art/richmonds-famous-romantix-mural-gets-a-new-chapter.html

Just announced: Cosmic Echo Live, taking place at the historic Hippodrome Theatre on September 13, will celebrate the life, music, and legacy of Richmond-born cosmic jazz icon Lonnie Liston Smith. The event will feature live performances, stories from across his remarkable career, and a heavy-weight lineup of some of Richmond’s most accomplished musicians and artists.

For many, Lonnie might not be a household name. But among DJs, producers, jazz, soul, funk musicians, hip hop artists, and vinyl-lovers who’ve spent decades searching and sampling his forgotten masterpieces, he’s long been regarded as one of the great architects of modern music. 

And over the last five decades, Lonnie’s records have become some of the most sampled in rap and hip hop history, finding new listeners through artists like Jay-Z, Digable Planets, J-Cole, Stetsasonic, Madvillain, Chance the Rapper, and Mary J. Blige. At the same time, records like Expansions became foundational to DJ and club culture throughout the United Kingdom and Europe, helping usher in a generation of dance music that extended far beyond American audiences.

From a musical family in Richmond’s Church Hill neighborhood, Lonnie grew up immersed in music. 

ia RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/music/funk-jazz/cosmic-echo-live-richmond.html

Editor’s Note: Writers Block is an occasional series featuring personal essays, reflections, and creative nonfiction from Richmond-area writers. In Seeing Richmond Through Their Eyes, Gabriella Ryan shares how a month spent showing her Italian cousins around Richmond changed the way she sees the city she calls home.

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The world looks different now. The eyes of my Italian cousins have opened mine. They have been here for over a month, and I’ve shown them Richmond. Now I see the wonder in which we live.

Elisabetta is in her fifties, and Sofia is seventeen. They have never flown on an airplane or been very far away from Montagnana, a medieval, castle-walled Italian city of 9,000. We picked them up from Dulles Airport, kissing and hugging for as long as we could reasonably do so.

On the two-hour ride home to Richmond, our cousins were shocked at the size of the cars and the streets. The highways were intersecting, and some were rising into the air. It was a ride of oohs and ahhs about all the cement.

Later, in contrast, trees lined both sides of the highway. They were very impressed by the number, beauty, and size of our trees!

When we arrived at our home in Bon Air, they raved about the size of our house and their bedrooms. They said everything is bigger in America, and even the space around them seemed spacious.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/seeing-richmond-through-their-eyes.html

She decided to finally leave.

Maybe it was after years of abuse, or after one violent night too many. Maybe it was the first time she truly believed that if she stayed, she might not survive. Whatever brought her to that moment, making the call took courage. 

On the other end of the hotline is someone trained to listen, help create a safety plan, and find shelter. They want to help, but there isn’t a shelter bed available, the counseling program has a waiting list, and the organization has reached its limits.

What happens now?

For some survivors, advocates say, there is nowhere else to go. They return to the person they were trying to escape, not because they want to, but because the safety net they were counting on isn’t there.

It’s a reality Mary Maupai, executive director of Safe Harbor, says her staff confronts every day in the Richmond region. “Our shelters are full,” Maupai said. Safe Harbor operates two emergency shelters and two transitional homes, two serving survivors of domestic and sexual violence and two dedicated to survivors of human trafficking. All four are at capacity.

When someone calls the hotline needing emergency shelter, Safe Harbor first tries to place them in a local hotel while waiting for space to open but that’s only a temporary solution. “We can’t put people up in a hotel forever and ever,” Maupai said. “We assist them as long as we can, but if there’s no room in the shelter, it’s kind of like there’s no room in the inn.”

The strain doesn’t end there. Safe Harbor’s counseling program currently has a waiting list of between 75 and 100 people, and Maupai said the organization needs at least two additional counselors but doesn’t have the funding to hire them.

A new report from the Virginia Sexual & Domestic Violence Action Alliance, a statewide nonprofit that supports Virginia’s network of victim service agencies, suggests Safe Harbor’s experience is part of a much broader trend. Since 2020, federal funding for victim services has fallen by more than half, while organizations across Virginia continue to face staffing shortages, full shelters, and growing demand for services. The report found fewer survivors are being served today than five years ago, not because fewer people need help, advocates say, but because many organizations have reached the limits of what they can provide.

via RVA Magazine

Read more, see more: https://rvamag.com/community/as-funding-shrinks-richmonds-safety-net-is-full.html