Anatomy of a stimulus effort gone wrong

Contributors

   Column by Chris Graham [email protected] It all sounded good. A Small Business Administration workshop leader told a group of small-business owners in Harrisonburg this past summer about a new loan program funded under the Recovery Act that was designed to help struggling small-business owners deal with short-term cash-flow issues resulting from the ongoing financial…

Focus | Groundbreaking development at new WSH

Chris Graham

Governor in town to help mark occasion Story by Chris Graham [email protected] With AFP Video Government doesn’t have a reputation for doing something that makes as much sense as the work that is going into the construction of the new Western State Hospital, which is being built adjacent to the current WSH campus in Staunton…

uva football

UVA Football: Assessing the candidates for the head coaching job

Chris Graham

Before we get to the next UVA Football coach topic, I have a commentary on a point raised in Daily Progress sports editor Jerry Ratcliffe’s column on the sacking of Al Groh. Ratcliffe wrote that it was “bush league” for the athletics department to have informed the news media of Groh’s dismissal before he could…

Groh not ‘retained,’ given $4.33M buyout

Chris Graham

National search begins for new UVa. coach Story by Chris Graham Al Groh’s tenure as head football coach at the University of Virginia has come to an end, with an announcement from athletics director Craig Littlepage that Groh, 59-53 in nine seasons at his alma mater, would not be retained. In a statement released by…

Moats, Thorpe honored by CAA

Contributors

Staff Report James Madison senior defensive end Arthur Moats (Portsmouth, Va./Churchland) was named conference defensive player of the year and Dukes’ redshirt freshman quarterback Justin Thorpe (Richmond, Va./Varina) league rookie of the year in the Colonial Athletic Association Monday. Moats during the 2009 season led JMU in tackles with 90. He tied for the CAA…

Dukes win fourth straight

Contributors

Staff Report Redshirt freshman quarterback Justin Thorpe (Richmond, Va./Varina) threw for 259 yards and a career-high three scores and James Madison had five touchdown plays of 31 yards or longer in a 43-12 Colonial Athletic Association football victory over Towson at Bridgeforth Stadium/Zane Showker Field Saturday. Thorpe hit on 14 of 21 passes, and the…

Focus | Perriello ’10: A safe bet? Hardly

Chris Graham

Story by Chris Graham We’re about a year away from the November 2010 elections, though you wouldn’t know that by watching local TV and seeing the wall-to-wall commercials telling you about what Fifth District Congressman Tom Perriello has been doing up in Washington. First it was the U.S. Chamber of Commerce with an ad in…

Photography subject of Historical Society lecture

Contributors

Staff Report Photography in Virginia takes center stage at the third and final event in the Harrisonburg-Rockingham Historical Society’s Fall 2009 Strickler Lecture Series. On Thursday, Nov. 19, Jeffrey Ruggles, curator of prints and photography at the Virginia Historical Society, in Richmond, will discuss the history of photography in Virginia, 1840s to present. He also…

So, what happened?

Chris Graham

Column by David Cox No question about it, Virginia Republicans had a field day. Congratulations rightly go to Mssrs. McDonnell, Bolling, Cuccinelli, and Cline and, in the nonpartisan local elections, to re-elected Supervisors Ford and Lewis. No question about it, too, they all face huge problems, both in Richmond and, as a result, locally. But…

Restorative justice

Ken Plum

Column by Ken Plum The week of Nov. 15-22 has been designated Restorative Justice Week to draw attention to the important work being done to make offenders take responsibility for their actions and try to repair the harm that they have done. The traditional criminal-justice model of a crime followed by a court conviction and…