Norris flexes some City muscle November 25.
PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

Rivanna Water & Sewer Authority chair Mike Gaffney opened an assemblage of four local governing bodies November 25, but it was Charlottesville Mayor Dave Norris who appeared to be steering the ship. Ever since Gaffney dodged a key pipeline issue and the City responded by unanimously demanding new data before it would agree to move forward on a controversial 50-year water plan, some pro-plan officials have been in a panic.

John Martin, for instance, considered at least part of the discussion “very frustrating.” A member of the Albemarle County Service Authority, Martin slammed the motives of plan detractors and challenged the Mayor to provide “factual basis” for demanding new information.

“I think we need to address the question whether government must be paralyzed just because someone doesn’t like the outcome,” said Martin, who was recently placed on a task force to study dredging the Rivanna Reservoir, and yet declared, at an early-September meeting of that body, that dredging to augment the local water supply is “off the table.”

And at Tuesday’s multi-board meeting, Martin indicated that he hasn’t budged. The task force, he said, may recommend that dredging (more)

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International horror hits Nelson County, as images of Scherr and his daughter take the front of the Lynchburg newspaper website.
LYNCHBURG NEWS & ADVANCE

Along with his 13-year-old daughter, a leader at a Nelson County spiritual retreat center has been slain in the Indian terror attacks, according to the center’s website. As first reported in the Lynchburg News & Advance, Alan Scherr, a Vedic astrologer and leader of the Synchronicity Foundation, and his daughter Naomi were gunned down in a restaurant inside the Oberoi Trident hotel while on a meditation visit organized by the center.

According to the report, four others in the 25-member entourage were also shot in the Oberoi carnage, but survived.

“It is with great sadness that we have learned of the passing of two of our loved community members Alan and Naomi Scherr who were tragically killed in the recent events in Mumbai,” reads a message on the front page of synchronicity.org. Scherr’s wife, Kia, the mother of the slain girl, lives at the monastery but did not go on the trip.

Synchronicity was founded in 1983 by Charles Cannon. Now known as Master Charles, he utilizes audio and meditation to achieve inner peace and transcendent thought. An alleged 2006 sighting of the so-called “Blessed Mother” at the Nellyford-area retreat center brought renewed interest as well as skepticism to the Synchronicity program.

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If history is any indicator, UVA men’s basketball coach Dave Leitao, seen here in 2007, may lose more than his jacket after last night’s loss to Liberty.
PHOTO BY JUSTIN HENRY/FLICKR

Last night, when Virginia Cavaliers men’s basketball stepped on their home court at the John Paul Jones Arena, they could not have expected to fall at the hands of Liberty University. After all, Cavaliers entered the game undefeated, and the Flames were coming off an embarrassing 84-56 loss at home against UNC Asheville.

Forty minutes of basketball later, the John Paul Jones Arena scoreboard made the nightmare performance official: Liberty 86, UVA 82.

In case wobegone Cavalier fans were curious about the last time the UVA men’s basketball team lost to Liberty, it was on January 7, 1998, when the team from Lynchburg triumphed 69-64.

It doesn’t portend well for Wahoo Nation, either. UVA would go on to lose 13 of the next 16 games, leading to a disappointing 11-19 record and the firing of head coach Jeff Jones.

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All gas is gone at 2206 Ivy Road.
PHOTO BY WILL WALKER

Last week, the underground storage tanks were pulled from the popular Ivy Road service station, the IDG Citgo, a.k.a. “We Pump It,” dashing the last hopes of customers that a white knight might ride in to rescue the station and save them from ever again having to pump their own gas.

It’s not to be. The station is available for a $4,500-a-month lease, and its owner, Barbara Talbott, is looking for a long-term tenant, according to Ed Brownfield with the commercial real estate firm of Grubb & Ellis.

“Someone could come in and build their own building,” says Brownfield. Which means the current 1,300-square-foot building with its touchless carwash would be a teardown.

The station’s last day open was September 30. Its owner, Mansfield Oil in Georgia, decided to close its only retail store, leaving the station’s loyal customers even more disoriented than when gas went over $4 a gallon and the attendants had to double the price on the pumps, which were unable to calculate such highs.

Long known for offering gas at prices matching the giant Shell station next door, We Pump It allowed customer to fill-up while tapping their Blackberries or bantering with the staff, who would check the oil and other fluids for no extra charge.

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Despite university and other local growth, demand fell after the 2002 drought and never fully rebounded.
DATA: RIVANNA WATER & SEWER AUTHORITY

By issuing a letter in which he blasts the very foundation of the community’s controversial 50-year water supply project, Albemarle County’s top water manager, Greg Harper, has committed such apostasy that he has found himself getting scrutinized by top local government leaders.

“Who is this County staff person giving this opinion?” asks incredulous Rivanna Water & Sewer Authority board member Gary O’Connell in a late-May email [pdf] to Harper’s boss. (Until he changed course last month and began pressing for harder numbers on the total cost of a planned dam/pipeline system, O’Connell, who is also the Charlottesville City manager, was widely considered one of the water plan’s biggest backers.)

“Is it true,” O’Connell continued in the email to Albemarle County Administrator Bob Tucker, “one of the county staff is challenging the demand numbers?”

Indeed it is true.

The long-touted claim by the Pennsylvania-based (more)

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Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Rocky Mount, left) and challenger Tom Perriello (D-Ivy) fought the closest Congressional race anywhere in Virginia.
PHOTO COURTESY OF VIRGIL GOODE/BY JEN FARIELLO

It’s official. On Monday, November 24, the State Board of Elections certified Tom Perriello (D-Ivy) as the new Congressman-elect from Virginia’s Fifth District by the narrow margin of 745 votes in an election that saw over 315,000 cast.

Within hours of the certification, Congressman Virgil Goode (R-Rocky Mount) called a press conference, not to concede, but to officially request a recount.

“The morning after the Election Night, with all precincts reporting, we were ahead by 446 votes,” said Goode. “Since that time, over 3,200 votes have changed– the largest changes coming from cities and counties that voted for my opponent.”

Goode acknowledged that the recount will be “an uphill battle.”

“I think we were lucky to get it as close as we did,” says Goode, “given the climate, and the fact that we were outspent if you count the 527s and the DCCC.”

When it comes to getting out the vote in Perriello’s favor, though, Goode gives the credit to the young people of Central Virginia. “There was a huge student turnout in Charlottesville and Albemarle,” says Goode. “My opponent had a 25,000 vote lead out of Charlottesville and Albemarle, and that was tough to overcome.”

Asked what the future might hold should this result hold, Goode said simply, “It’s too early to talk about that.”

Goode says he expects the recount to be complete within “the first or second week of December.”

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With this move, Virginia joins 14 other states in paying Amtrak for in-state service, and local rail service spikes by about 70 percent.
PHOTO BY HAWES SPENCER

Christmas came early for longtime passenger rail booster Meredith Richards. All she wanted was a train to Washington; but beginning next fall, Charlottesville will get a daily round-trip to New York, thanks to a multi-million-dollar subsidy from the state.

“It’s a minor miracle,” says Richards. “This is an incredibly difficult budget year.”

The state plans to spend $17 million for a three-year pilot program to cover the projected gap between ticket revenue and Amtrak’s expenses in both the Piedmont corridor and a start-up in the I-95 corridor linking Richmond to D.C.

According to a report Amtrak issued in January, the new Piedmont route— which would have its southern terminus in Lynchburg— simply extends an existing service between D.C. and New York. And Amtrak envisions maintaining that train’s full complement of four passenger coaches and one dining car.

The proposed schedule shows (more)

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Helen Hatzenbeler spied two visitors in her Redfields neighborhood in August.
PHOTO COURTESY HELEN HATZENBELER

Helen Hatzenbeler had the windows open and was standing on a ladder painting her living room in August when she looked down and saw two bear cubs looking at her. “What makes you scared is wondering, where’s mama?” she says.

It wasn’t the first time bears had visited her Redfields neighborhood– she’d found her bird feeder trashed in June. She snapped pictures of the cubs with her Blackberry and a few hours later, she was sitting in her family room when the mother bear walked onto her patio.

“I screamed,” recounts Hatzenbeler. “When they’re 10 feet away and glass is in between, you don’t feel too safe. She’s intimidating.”

Hatzenbeler noticed one of the cubs was pulling the cover off her hot tub, and she opened her door to scare him away. “The mama took one, two, three steps toward me,” says Hatzenbeler. “She puffed up like a cat does. Her head was huge and she was standing fully tall.” Hatzenbeler quickly shut the door.

In Wintergreen, the bears were bolder. A bear that had learned how to operate a door latch entered John Claman’s house one night in May. “We didn’t hear a thing,” he says. “The next morning, we found the freezer door open and food on the floor and in the driveway.” (more)

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Paul McCartney, seen here at a 2005 concert in London, joins fellow U.K. rockers Radiohead on the label founded by Dave Matthews and manager Coran Capshaw in Charlottesville.
PHOTO BY ANDY MACLARTY/FLICKR

Just when you thought Dave Matthews and Coran Capshaw couldn’t get any bigger than they are in the music industry, they went and signed the man whose face and voice might be the most recognizable among all living rock musicians. Next Tuesday, November 25, Matthews and Capshaw’s Charlottesville-based ATO Records will release Electric Arguments, the latest album from none other than Sir Paul McCartney.

But don’t go searching for this album from the former Beatle under “M” in your local record store. McCartney is releasing the album under the pseudonym “The Fireman,” a name he’s used twice before in the ’90s for two LPs McCartney deemed too experimental for release under his own name: 1993’s Strawberries Oceans Ships Forests and and 1998’s Rushes. But while those two albums were instrumental forays into electronica and sound collage, Electric Arguments features 13 new songs written and performed by McCartney. The album was completed in 13 days, with McCartney starting a new song from scratch each day in the studio.

Already, the album is receiving rave reviews. Rolling Stone gave it four stars, calling it “good ol’ psychedelic rock for the ex-Beatle’s headiest music in years.”

This is the second coup for ATO in a little more than a year. Last October, Capshaw and company signed U.K. rockers Radiohead and earned the rights to sell their 2007 album In Rainbows in stores after the band had made the album available online for whatever fans wished to pay for it (including $0). The album would go on to sell 3 million copies in stores.

No word yet on whether this means McCartney will be releasing any albums under his real name via ATO, but the last McCartney album, 2007’s Memory Almost Full, came out on Starbucks’ Hear Music label, which folded this year.

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The estate has been used as an equestrian haven for the past several years.
PHOTO ALBERT BURNEY AUCTION COMPANY

In a volatile real estate market, a key to attracting a crowd may be through unconventional means. For Keswick estate owner Dr. Emile Allen, that means dividing his 43.5-acre property into various parcels and offering them auction-style Tuesday, Nov 18.

“When you’re really ready to get an estate like this one sold in a market like this, it can help to do something out of the ordinary,” Allen said in a press release.

The property, which Allen has renovated since 2004 to include Albemarle County’s largest indoor horseback riding arena— the property is well-equipped to house up to fourteen horses— includes a four-bedroom house and an outdoor riding ring. For the auction, which is being managed by the Alabama-based auction house Albert Burney, Allen has divided the estate into four lots— the main house and barn, the outdoor ring, and two comprising woodlands and pasture.

“The auction allows the property to be sold in parcels or in a combination that will bring the highest price,” says Carl Carter of Albert Burney. “In this environment, an auction allows us to reach more buyers.”

Despite the perception of instability the current state of the real estate market projects, some find the prospect of auctioning properties a bit over the top. For Charlottesville real estate broker Ray Caddell of Century 21, the premise of an auction is little more than fluff.

“Most people see auction and think that whoever makes the highest bid gets it all,” Caddell says. “Auction ads attract people— they think they can get a great deal, that someone will steal something.”

According to Caddell, real estate auctions are not usually lucrative in eliciting a bid compatible with the property’s worth. In the case of low bidding, the property usually will not sell, Caddell says. However, in terms of successfulness, the concept of auctioning a property rather than listing it traditionally is neither new nor necessarily worthwhile.

“It’s a new sort of party to get people excited about the sale,” Caddell says. “Do I think, as a real estate guy, that it’s important to look for more aggressive ways to sell property? Absolutely. But it’s just a marketing strategy— not a scheme or a scam, just a way to try to get people more excited.”

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Just a year before Halsey Minor stepped down as CEO of Cnet in 2000, the tech industry news website he founded in 1992, Fortune estimated his net worth to be $394.1 million.
FILE PHOTO BY JAY KUHLMANN

Charlottesville’s most-hotly anticipated building project, the Landmark Hotel, has erupted into controversy, as $24 million in bank loans disappeared last week, according to the hotel’s owner, Internet millionaire, Charlottesville native, and UVA alumnus Halsey Minor.

“It’s a mess,” says Minor. “I’ve already got my money in this. I put up $7 million in equity up front. They had until Friday to pay $1.1 million, and they just didn’t. They flat-out did not pay.”

Minor, who says he’s considering litigation, says the only silver lining with Georgia-based Silverton Bank is that the alleged lack of explanation gives him more legal leeway.

“It’s actually easier for me now,” says Minor, “given that they didn’t try to say that they didn’t pay because I didn’t do something.”

That’s a contention with which Silverton Bank disagreed in a statement issued on Friday November 14, the day after Minor’s comments hit the Hook’s website.

“We disagree with Mr. Minor’s comments,” the statement read. “Construction continues at the project site, and the funding of the loan is proceeding per the terms clearly specified in the loan agreement.”

That same day, Bill Goggins, chief contractor on the project for Norfolk-based Clancy & Theys, said that any problem had been resolved.

“The money has been paid from Silverton,” Goggins said, “and work continues.”

Indeed, on the morning of Monday, November 17, the sound of saws and the sight of workers atop the nine-story structure were there for all passers-by to see and hear.

According to the project’s developer Lee Danielson, the issue with the money was not the bank’s but Minor’s. Danielson says that (more)

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