Community leaders met today to update the public on the progress of the 50-year Community Water Supply Plan and to outline the findings of the initial underground survey work done in preparation for the construction of a larger Ragged Mountain dam. The plan, approved by the Boards of the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (RWSA) and the Albemarle County Service Authority as well as the elected bodies of the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and the City of Charlottesville City Council, calls for a dam to be built at the Ragged Mountain reservoir to replace two older dams to increase the area’s water capacity and meet future community needs.

The remaining major components of the plan include a new pipeline between the South Fork and Ragged Mountain reservoirs that will replace the aged Sugar Hollow Pipeline, rehabilitation or replacement of aged piping, pumping, and treatment systems, and expansions to water treatment capacity. The plan provides improved stream flows to area rivers, preserves 75,000 feet of stream with wide buffers in a permanent conservation easement, provides 200 acres of new forest and four acres of new wetlands, avoids impacts to endangered species and preserves habitat and enhances water quality for the Buck Mountain watershed.. As the public process evolved this plan was considered to be the most responsible solution to providing an adequate and healthful water supply to City and County residents for many decades to come and has subsequently been determined by the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality to be the most environmentally- friendly and practical option available.

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Popularity: 13% [?]

Quick! Go buy some of those “no rate change” stamps! Tonight at midnight the price of a first-class stamp will increase from 41 cents to 42 cents. If you are reading this on Monday you are out of luck–your stamps are now 42 cents. Your government at work, lame.

Popularity: 23% [?]

The IRS sux, but they are giving us money. Almost everyone qualified for the economic stimulus rebate. But when are they coming? Check this schedule to find out.

Stimulus Payment Schedule for Tax Returns
Received and Processed by April 15

http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=180247,00.html

Good times are here, my friends. And none too soon, I’m starving. I’m gonna buy myself a shirt made of gold that says, “remember what W did for you”. What are you gonna spend your rebate on?

Popularity: 25% [?]

Yay! It’s finally here! Government Services Day on the DT Mall. Police will be dropping from the tops of buildings. Students will be yelling at each other about something or other under the Free Speech Monument. I’m talking about fire trucks, tours of the Paramount, prizes, giveaways and all kinds of good stuff! Even Mayor Dave Norris will be there. You can even talk to your local utilities about their current and upcoming projects.

If you’re down there around lunch time, you’ll probably see me.

Link for more details.

Check the weather and bring your rain coat, though. Have fun.

Popularity: 30% [?]

**Please read the update to this thread**  

I recently stumbled upon a site by the name of Legistorm. If you go to the site, you will discover that does strive to be “transparency’s sidekick” as an informative resources about congressional staff salaries and many other things.

As a sister site to our recently reviewed Richmond Sunlight, you can find all sorts of crazy things on Legistorm. You can learn about salaries of congressmen and their assistants, you can learn about trips they took and you learn that most expenses are not itemized and, I quote, “good faith estimates.”

While the good faith estimates opens a whole can of worms, I was searching around and apparently, you can see all tax payer money that has sent politicians on trips to Charlottesville.

You can also see who invited the politicians and the reason for the event. Take for instance a trip on May 22nd, 2005 in which Senator Evan Bayh spoke at the UVa Law Graduation Ceremony. He charged taxpayers $821.41 for this trip.

Shouldn’t UVa have paid for his trip, not the federal government? It seems like a waste of money to me and somehow doesn’t seem right.

Check out the list for yourself. You can see taxpayers have given politicians almost $100,000 to come to Charlottesville since 2000. What do you think? Did you find anything else interesting on the site?

Important Update: LegiStorm chimes in and lets us know that this trip and many others were paid for by the sponsor… although it isn’t very clear on the site.  Sorry for the mixup!
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Popularity: 29% [?]

Recently a Chicago contractor was awarded with a $58.5 million dollar contact to build a 46 acre facility for a “Joint-Use Intelligence Analysis Facility” slightly north of Charlottesville. The facility will house over 1,000 jobs and is expected to bring a total of 1,500 jobs to the area by its expected completion date in 2010.

The Daily Progress reports that the facility will be located slightly north of the CHO airport and across 29. This sounds great, but what about traffic? 29N traffic is already a nightmare.

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Popularity: 25% [?]

The Charleston Daily Mail reports that 1 in 6 West Virginians is on food stamps. Wild and Wonderful? Good golly.

And then I got to thinking, how many Virginia residents are on food stamps? Also, how many people in Charlottesville and Albemarle County receive food stamps?

I think everyone knows that West Virginia is the poorest state in the Nation, but where does little old Virginia and Charlottesville compare? The answers and details are below. »Read More

Popularity: 33% [?]

Virginia State Police have announced the arrest of a second unnamed suspect in the Interstate 64 Shootings.

Slade Woodson, 19 and the unnamed 16 year old face two felony counts of malicious wounding, two counts of using a firearm to commission a felony and four counts of maliciously shooting at an occupied vehicle.

Given that the 16 year old lives in Crozet, it is likely that this student attends Western Albemarle High School. We aren’t interested in naming names for a juvenile, so don’t.

Further Reading from cVillain:

Slade Woodson, MySpace and a Community Discussion

Initial Coverage of the shooting incident

Full Press Release as of March 28 from Virginia State Police after the break… »Read More

Popularity: 23% [?]

An avid birdy by the name of Laura send us a link that explains that solving obesity does not save the government money because those people live longer and require more health expenditures.

I did a little researching and found the actual published paper. Read it here.

The authors conclude:

Although effective obesity prevention leads to a decrease in costs of obesity-related diseases, this decrease is offset by cost increases due to diseases unrelated to obesity in life-years gained. Obesity prevention may be an important and cost-effective way of improving public health, but it is not a cure for increasing health expenditures.

That’s unfortunate given our debate on protecting people from their own eating habits. Survival of the fit-ist anyone? More like survival of the most expensive.

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Popularity: 15% [?]

Budget information is below for your readership pleasure.

The overall budget increase is 8.5% over last year. AWESOME, LOWER THAN HOUSING!!!! (angry face)
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Popularity: 15% [?]