Category Archives: editorial

Olinger’s Storefront Canard

Posted on by
1

This past Wednesday evening, City of Richmond Planning Director Mark Olinger and planner Maritiza Pechin did a Zoom presentation for Oregon Hill residents. It was primarily a discussion of Oregon Hill’s proposed future land use in accordance with the Richmond300 planning.

What needs to be understood by everyone is that land designation is used to justify future zoning. Objective #1 of the Richmond 300 plan is change zoning to match the future land use designations. Any SUP will be recommended for approval by planning if it matches the future land use designation. Oregon Hill neighbors worked hard for our appropriate R-7 zoning and we need a future land use that matches it!

What Olinger kept coming back to during the Zoom meeting is that he and other planners would like to see ‘old storefronts’ brought back to commercial use and that is why they are insisting on giving Oregon Hill “neighborhood mixed use” land designation despite repeated demands by the Oregon Hill Neighborhood Association and many residents that would like for Oregon Hill’s land designation to remain ‘residential’.

This is not to say that OHNA and neighbors are against ‘old storefronts’ returning to commercial use. The overall record (voting included) makes it very clear that Oregon Hill has encouraged more small commercial return to the ‘old storefronts’. The reality is the storefronts that are currently not operating as businesses are homes and people are living in them. If they wanted to run a business, they simply have to ask for a special use permit, and they would most likely get it. The proposed change in land use designation is solving a problem that doesn’t exist.

It’s not just nomenclature though. The proposed change in land designation also opens the door to knocking down houses and building apartments and commercial spaces for taller buildings. Olinger suggests that the Planning Department, government, and neighbors would still have some say and control over replacement structures. But Oregon Hill neighbors know from the recent ‘805 W. Cary’ development that that simply is NOT TRUE! If anything, the decks were stacked strongly against any neighborhood say or control.

The city zoning code defines a story as 15 feet in height. The appropriate, current R-7 zoning has a height limit of 35 feet, which matches our historic two-story streetscape. Four stories mixed use would allow a height limit of 60 feet, almost double the current zoning!

Oregon Hill neighbors know that we cannot have our R-7 zoning undermined by this mixed-use future land use designation that allows multi-family projects 4-6 stories. This will be a green light for developers to buy up Oregon Hill to build ad hoc dormitories (and may explain recent 70% increases in land values on property assessments). If this happens, its pretty clear that the historic Oregon Hill neighborhood that residents and visitors love and cherish will be lost within a decade or two.

OHNA and individual neighbors have repeatedly asked Richmond300 planners for Oregon Hill to keep its hard-won ‘residential’ land use designation. Thankfully, Councilperson Lynch has indicated that she supports this. She was successful in establishing the residential future land use designation for most of the Randolph neighborhood in the Richmond300 plan.

Also, Oregon Hill is not the only neighborhood to question who the Planning department is really working for. Many residents in the Fan are now concerned about a recent proposal to raise the height limit on Broad Street to twenty stories after previously having an agreement for a twelve story limit. For this to happen during a pandemic with limited public interaction is outrageous.

It’s understandable that Olinger was originally hired as the City’s planning director in order to bring more density to the City of Richmond, especially along the Pulse corridor of Broad Street. But at this point, many Richmond citizens are questioning if he is the right person for the job.

Who Will Be Richmond’s Next Mayor?

Posted on by
Reply

With a lot of voting already underway, many Richmonders are confronting the reality that they still don’t know who to vote for Mayor.

Sadly, as with the last Mayoral election, the corporate media is trying to paint the election as being between two headline candidates, incumbent Mayor Stoney vs. challenger City Councilperson Gray, and a litmus test on Stoney’s tenure.

But for many Richmond citizens, its not nearly so cut and dried. Many find the frontrunners in both the Mayoral and Presidential elections to be extremely unpalatable, and it has not been unexpected in that regard (and I can’t help but wonder how different these elections would be with needed reforms like ranked choice/instant runoff voting). For Oregon Hill residents, questions still zero in on what ALL the candidates can and will do for THIS neighborhood.

For example, both Stoney and Gray have failed to act on the Monroe Park debacle, which is a fiscal and environmental disaster under the private ‘Conservancy’. The Sierra Club Falls of the James recently endorsed Alexsis Rodgers, based on some sort of green promise. But it is not very well defined and says nothing about Monroe Park, Richmond’s most historic PUBLIC park.

Oregon Hill residents know how important it is to exact promises now, especially given the existing threats and still-existing threats.

Only mayoral candidate Justin Griffin has said he will act to terminate the Conservancy’s lease on Monroe Park. Furthermore, Griffin has also stated:

This is not an out-right endorsement, for we still need to know more about Griffin’s overall stances, but his tagline does ring true, “Because we deserve better”.

We know Richmond overall deserves better, and we would love to hear specifics on what candidates plan to do about many other issues, including everything from the water to the sun.

Former Governor and Mayor Wilder has also made this observation. Hopefully his upcoming debate will bring the fire.

As has been made clear from past elections, Oregon Hill residents vote and their votes matter- if Mayoral candidates want to win, they need the Central 5th District, and thus they need Oregon Hill.

Terminate The Monroe Park Conservancy’s Lease!

Posted on by
Reply

This coming Tuesday, Mayoral candidates will be participating in a forum hosted by The Metropolitan Business League. Unfortunately, it is unlikely that the state of Monroe Park will come up as a topic, but it should, for both incumbent Mayor Stoney and City Councilperson Kim Gray (who sits on the Monroe Park Conservancy board!) are responsible due to their inaction. Both of them have failed the public on this important issue. Perhaps they care more what the VCU administration wants.

Oregon Hill Neighborhood Association President Todd Woodson once again asked that elected leaders be accountable and do the right thing by terminating “the Conservancy”‘s lease on the park.

Dear Friends

A year and a half after a complete 7 million dollar plus renovation, Monroe Park’s pathways are unusable. The Monroe Park Conservancy, who has a lease on the park for $1 a year, CHOSE to not follow the master plan which the City paid over $700,000 for, and along with design firm 3North and City Capital Projects Supervisor Donald Summers, proceeded to remove all public restroom facilities, destroyed the historic tree canopy, installed faulty bollards (many are now gone), defaced the WWII Memorial and installed superfluous signage which detracts from the parks natural beauty.
In spite of leaving the park an unusable wreck, the “conservancy” still holds the lease which as their website states- “can be terminated at any time”.
The most recent form 990 for the Monroe Park Conservancy lists liabilities of over $200,000.00.
Once again, I respectfully request that this lease be terminated and the park- our City’s oldest and most historic, be returned to the management of our wonderful Department of Parks, Recreation and Community Facilities. A plan must be crafted to reinstall the restrooms, fix the pathways, replace the bollards, fix the WWII Memorial and restore the historic tree canopy. The taxpayers are out over 4 million dollars here and are on the hook for at least another 2 or 3 due to mismanagement by the “conservancy”.
Please consider this reasonable request.

Sincerely,

Charles T Woodson

Let this be a lesson- When neoliberal privatization schemes go bad, the public is left with the mess. It’s very telling how certain local commentators and media outlets are still silent on this debacle while some of us in the community have put our necks out by speaking out about it from the beginning.

City Planners Determined To Ignore And Destroy Oregon Hill Community

Posted on by
1

Tomorrow, July 13th, is the deadline for public comment on the Richmond 300 Draft Plan, which is supposed to be the city’s vision for the next 20 years. Sadly, ‘the city’s vision’ does not include the Oregon Hill community’s.

The last three decades have seen great changes for Oregon Hill. Despite much turmoil, the community has worked hard to try to keep a vision as a real neighborhood where families could settle and live. It has had successful historic preservation and affordable housing programs. It has honored early inhabitants’ abolitionist roots. It has developed its green spaces and connections. More probably could have been done, but much time and effort has been used instead on battling unwelcome, inappropriate development from the VCU administration and unscrupulous developers whose overall goal is to gradually chip and scrape away Oregon Hill’s historic integrity and dismantle it’s residential character. It’s also very telling that VCU is not interested in entering into a written agreement of any type with Oregon Hill – the neighborhood has been asking for a Memorandum of Understanding for over a decade.

Sadly, what Oregon Hill has worked for and fought to become (supplying a great tax base and attraction for the City, we might add), is now terribly threatened.

The number one principle of successful planning is to involve the affected community.

Oregon Hill has participated in the process from the beginning but our input has been ignored. The planning process is illegitimate if the input from the affected community is ignored. We have consistently demanded a residential future land use designation for our residential Oregon Hill Historic District.

Sadly, it’s been to no avail so far. City officials just don’t seem to care. Under the guise of the Richmond300 plan, City staff, with coaxing by the VCU administration and greedy developers, could determine that buildings of eight or more stories are consistent in Oregon Hill. Every block could see demolition of historic housing stock and new development like what happened at 805 W. Cary.

It’s important to recognize the ticking time bomb that the Richmond300 is planting:

As the Richmond300 process heads to its conclusion, we can anticipate some of their positions and responses:

City: “Don’t worry about the future land use designation impacting future rezoning of Oregon Hill because the neighborhood will be closely involved in the process.”
Oregon Hill response: A stated objective of the Richmond 300 plan is to rezone the city in accordance with the future land use plan. The city planning department has ignored the input of the affected neighborhood when preparing the Richmond 300 plan and will likely ignore the input of the affected neighborhood when the city moves to redefine the zoning districts. The mixed use future land use designation is incompatible with the desired R-7 zoning of the Oregon Hill Historic District.

City: “The neighborhood mixed use future land use designation is the closest designation to the R-7 zoning.”
Oregon Hill response: Oregon Hill fought hard for the R-7 zoning which is a residential zoning with a 35 foot height limit. The mixed use designation is not compatible with the R-7 zoning either in function or building height.

City: “The Richmond 300 plan lowered the number of future land use designations, so the mixed used designation is now the closest to fit Oregon Hill.”
Oregon Hill response: The city arbitrarily removed the medium-density residential and single family future land use designations that matched Oregon Hill’s R-7 zoning. With these removed, the “Residential” future land use designation remains the closest match for the form and function of the Oregon Hill Historic District. It’s important to recognize how the City has purposely time taken away any ‘middle ground’ over time. The neighborhood could not even get the urban business zoning it wanted for W. Cary street corridor. City planners blocked that too, less they upset VCU admin and their developer buddies.

City: “Oregon Hill is a mixed use neighborhood, you have two of the finest restaurants in the city and we want more businesses.”
Oregon Hill response: Within the R-7 zoning of Oregon Hill 99% of the 650 buildings are residential dwellings of two story in height. It is inappropriate to set a future land use to match 1% of the building functions within the Oregon Hill Historic District. (It’s also worth noting that if you look at the ugly new development at 805 W. Cary, its been corporate chains moving in. Not to mention that prior to the coronavirus pandemic, Richmond restaurants had oversaturated the city, and now it will be lucky if 50% of the City’s independent restaurants will survive). Yes, there are existing nineteenth century storefronts that could be brought back to commercial purposes, but we are sure that what this Richmond300 plan portends is demolition, not renovation.

City: “The new neighborhood mixed use designation is meant to increase affordable housing in the city.”
Oregon Hill response: Oregon Hill has been a resource for affordable housing since the 19th century. Many residents strongly believe in affordable housing and had worked and volunteered with the Oregon Hill Home Improvement Council and other affordable housing groups in the City, that does not mean we want to see our historic neighborhood demolished. The mixed-use designation will undermine the successful residential function of the neighborhood.

City: “Don’t worry, the Richmond 300 plan has a priority objective for preserving historic neighborhoods.”
Oregon Hill response: The preservation of the Oregon Hill Historic District will be undermined by an inappropriate mixed-use future land use designation with inappropriate function and building height limits.

City: “Don’t worry about the future land use designation because the city will help Oregon Hill obtain the city historic designation.”
Oregon Hill response: Any discussion of an historic district designation is a non sequitor that is not germane to the appropriate future land use designation of Oregon Hill in the Richmond 300 plan. (It should be noted that at one point during the 805 W. Cary discussions, City staff told neighborhood leaders that a non-demolition overlay was possible and would be the quickest way to protect the neighborhood. Of course when the neighborhood association pursued it, they stalled and eventually changed their story and said it was not a possibility. They had thrown us a red herring).

In short, it is not Oregon Hill which is being unreasonable, despite all the efforts to portray it that way.

Again:

The number one principle of successful planning is to involve the affected community.

Oregon Hill has participated in the process from the beginning but our input has been ignored. The planning process is illegitimate if the input from the affected community is ignored. We have consistently demanded a residential future land use designation for our residential Oregon Hill Historic District.

We hope that elected officials and the public understand what is happening here. Please take the time to contact our 5th District council rep Stephanie Lynch to let her know your opposition to the Richmond300 plan: stephanie.lynch@richmondgov.com

Mask Up!

Posted on by
Reply

Saw this report from a friend:

A face-masked walk on Belle Isle yesterday was a real eye opener for me. It was really crowded with people, uncomfortably so even for non-covid times, and I estimated that maybe 1% of the people had masks or any coverings on their faces! I fear that this does not bode well for our community…

Regardless ofwhat the government does, its important to recognize that the coronavirus pandemic is still raging and is still in danger of intensifying.

Voting By Mail, Ballot Access, and RCV (During A Plague)

Posted on by
5

The Richmond Free Press has an article this week on Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring’s announcement this past Tuesday that he agrees with a federal lawsuit seeking the temporary suspension of the state’s current requirement that voters casting mail-in ballots have someone present as they open the letter containing the ballot and sign the envelope in which the ballot is returned.

The Virginia American Civil Liberties Union and the Virginia League of Women Voters celebrated the decision – “We are thrilled that today’s agreement means voters will not bear the burden of finding a witness for their absentee ballots during a global pandemic,” said Deb Wake, president of the League of Women Voters of Virginia. “We are optimistic the judge will rule favorably so that Virginia voters do not have to choose between their health and their vote.”

At the same time other groups have expressed concern about the possibility of voting by mail becoming the standard during the pandemic. The California Republican Party is suing Governor Gavin Newsom to prohibit the practice of ballot collecting or “ballot harvesting” during two upcoming special elections in the state, arguing it stands “in direct conflict” with social distancing guidelines and Newsom’s shelter-in-place mandate to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Just to the north, the state of Oregon continues to use mail-in voting exclusively.

But lest you think this is just about battling voter suppression or usual political corruption, recognize that many independent voting rights activists have their own concerns and are lobbying for any VBM (voting by mail) to be ‘temporary’ with safeguards put in place to somewhat minimize fraud and disenfranchisement. So, the debate over VBM is most likely going to intensify, pandemic or no pandemic.

Furthermore, this community news site has steadfastly advocated for ranked choice voting (RCV) and will continue to do so, especially as we see American election pressures mount. If Virginia is going to risk voting by mail this year, why not also implement ranked choice voting at the same time? As Fair Vote Virginia has noted, Governor Northam has already signed bills allowing some RCV to proceed. Use emergency powers during the pandemic to give voters more voice!

But getting back more to this week’s developments… of course, what the Democratic Virginia Attorney General and the Democratic Party-leaning ACLU and League of Women Voters have not concerned themselves with is good ol’ fashioned ballot access during this pandemic. They have ignored the Green Party of Virginia’s appeal to waive the petition of qualified voters requirement for ballot access in light of the Governor’s declaration of a state of emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Collecting ballot petition signatures requires close physical contact on the part of both voters and petitioners and the state burdens ‘independent’ or ‘minor party’ campaigns with collecting these petitions, while exempting ‘major party’ candidates. And if you think this is just a state Green Party problem, consider how local campaigns are desperately struggling with these requirements. Some Oregon Hill neighbors have already tried to help Mayoral candidate Justin Griffin with signature by appointment. Electoral reforms like VBM and RCV can only help so much to improve voter choices if candidates are thwarted by ballot access (but perhaps that is the plan by the PTB,’Powers That Be’).

Circling back to the Richmond Free Press… it had this short thought in their editorial section- Something to think about.

Skipping April Fool’s Day This Year

Posted on by
Reply

Sorry, folks, no April Fool’s day stories on oregonhill.net this year. Things are just grim and crazy as is with the pandemic, and I think people are too on edge. I had some wacky ideas, and Charles Pool had some too, but I don’t think they would have gone over well in this climate. This is not the first time I have decided to skip, see this 2014 post. Everyone work on staying healthy, be glad the coliseum scheme was beaten back, find laughs elsewhere, and we will do next year.

Busy Weekend Ahead with ‘Shiver In The River’ and War Memorial Ribbon Cutting

Posted on by
Reply

It’s forecast to be a sunny but chilly weekend ahead here in RVA, and neighbors can expect a lot of weekend visitors as the 6th Annual Shiver In The River celebration happens down at the riverfront and the Virginia War Memorial is having a grand opening for its finished expansion.

So, no raining on the parades, but worthy of some consideration-

Shiver In The River combines a lot of activities- a community clean up that helps keep our neighborhood and riverfront clean, a 5 kilometer walk/run that allows appreciation of the natural beauty of the area, and lastly, a group dip or ‘polar plunge’ into the James River designed to raise money for Keep Virginia Beautiful.

On the surface, all of these activities sound fun and worthwhile, and they might still be, but citizens should also be aware of the backstory- Keep Virginia Beautiful’s mission is programming that supports litter prevention, community outreach, education, recycling and beautification for the Commonwealth of Virginia. It started as an offshoot of Keep America Beautiful, a national organization that was founded in 1953 by group of businessmen from the beverage and packaging industries who were concerned that government would make them responsible for solving the litter problem by regulating their industries.

In the early 1970’s a new campaign was launched with the theme “People Start Pollution, People Can Stop It”. Environmentalists were not happy with the campaign theme and wanted KAB (Keep America Beautiful) to focus on making producers responsible for packaging waste, but the organization’s industry backers refused. In 1974 KAB publicly opposed California’s proposed bottle bill. However due to reactions that the organisation was self-serving, they decided to drop any official position on the issue. KAB changed their approach to promote alternatives to bottle bills instead. In 1975 KAB introduced a Clean Community System campaign which encouraged local communities to clean up their litter and had the effect of keeping interest in bottle bills at bay. In 1976, more than a dozen environmental and citizens groups quit KAB after a member of the board of directors called for the organization to oppose four upcoming bottle bills. In the 1980s the Clean Community System expanded and became more focussed on encouraging people to recycle. In the 1990s there was a new campaign theme “Let’s not waste the 1990’s” which purported to support a sensible strategy to managing waste with source reduction, recycling, composting, incineration and sanitary landfilling. In practice, however, the campaign did not attempt to implement any real methods or targets for achieving improvements. And so it goes…it should be noted that in recent years KAB have launched a cigarette butt litter prevention program with support of Philip Morris. As part of this they have undertaken a significant public service announcement campaign stressing the fact that cigarette butts are a significant pollutant and that the chemicals leaching from them into our soils and waterways are a severe environmental concern. And, the plastics industry has become an even greater support of Keep America Beautiful.

Locally, RVA Cleansweep and other groups have continued to work with Keep Virginia Beautiful, and that is understandable. (Editor’s note: I have taken part in the litter pick ups and the James River Jump in past Shiver In The Rivers). On the whole, the organization does great work and its leaders should be appreciated, but it’s important that the ‘greenwashing’ potential be explained and information shared. This is more important than ever now that we know that we can never recycle or ‘litter pickup’ our way out of the plastics crisis, and that this crisis is becoming more and more pressing.

In a similar vein, there are things to know about the Virginia War Memorial.

Where the War Memorial is today used to be Oregon Hill ‘proper’. Technically, what is known as Oregon Hill today was known as Belvidere Hill, a subsection of the original neighborhood. It’s important to recognize that part of the neighborhood was sacrificed for the Virginia War Memorial and that was not just ‘blank land’ where it stands today. From the National Parks Service:

“In 1847, the Harvie Family platted their property east of Belvidere and south of the penitentiary as the Oregon Hill subdivision. The community’s name came from the witty geographic observation that a pedestrian excursion trip from the center of Richmond to Oregon Hill seemed the equivalent of a trip to Oregon by the standards of the day. The original portion of Oregon Hill consisted of modest houses east of Belvidere and south of Spring Street. Its early occupants were a mixture of white and African American laborers and artisans. This area, just outside the boundary of the district, was demolished to construct the Virginia War Memorial and state office buildings.”

Oregon Hill residents hope the Virginia War Memorial will continue to be a good neighbor and help protect our river views.

Another thought is that, while most people are not against memorializing those who have died in battle, many do wish our country was expanding its peace efforts instead. The ‘endless’ foreign wars in the Middle East keep supplying a trickle of new names for the War Memorial. Some of the wars are ‘covert’, but the names keep coming. Between Hollywood Cemetery and the Virginia War Memorial, there are some strong solemn presences around the neighborhood.

DISHONORABLE AND DISGUSTING ‘Business Leaders’ Pressuring City Councilperson’s Employer

Posted on by
1

The Richmond Free Press newspaper yesterday published an article on the doomed ‘Navy Hill’ project, in which it also confirmed what 5th district residents have already been hearing- ‘business leaders’ who live in the surrounding counties are putting pressure on our City Councilperson though her employer. That’s not just inappropriate, it’s deliberately attempting to subvert democracy. It’s VILE, DISHONORABLE, AND DISGUSTING.

It’s great to see the community-oriented Richmond Free Press buck the system and make this particular story known, but more has to be done to dig this scum out. Earlier this week, we saw more corporate media, notably the Times Disgrace newspaper, run articles that not so subtly conveyed ridiculous threats- that if ‘Navy Hill’ does not happen, sick children would suffer and jobs would be lost and it would all be City Council and ‘activists” fault. Never mind that Richmond schools would again lose or that VCU Medical as a massive nonprofit hospital is not exactly penniless, or that Richmond citizens are under NO obligation to provide sweetheart deals to any corporation and we don’t have to give up more real estate to VCU’s empire.

Now, sadly, this is nothing new for Richmond. Citizens have heard many other tales of infamous arm twisting of decision makers by ‘business leaders’ who want to coerce government. And this sort of thing is happening at every level, from City Council and City department, to Urban Design Committee to even neighborhood association.

It’s part of Richmond’s dirty secret- that while there are good opportunities here with amazing natural and historic resources and Southern charm, the civic scene is one of oppression. Yes, the United States has become a country increasingly under the undue influence of corporations in commerce, society, and government, but Richmond’s top-down, almost aristocratic, corporate rule is overwhelming.

It has been for a long time a deep corruption where public concerns and priorities are thrown aside for corporate ones. Decade after decade, Richmond citizens have seen this again and again in everything from arts, to parks, from riverfront planning to even down to our water utility payments.

It should be made immediately clear that what happened to Councilperson Lynch reflects poorly on ALL of Navy Hill’s backers- Venture Richmond (previously known as Richmond Renaissance), RVA Chamber of Commerce, Retail Merchants, VCU administration, and, of course, the monopoly that controls our State Capital, Dominion. The public should hold them all in contempt until there are sincere apologies.

What should citizens do?

Of course, they should shame these people and groups’ DISHONORABLE AND DISGUSTING arm twisting tactics for this, and previous transgressions.

Last week, the Oregon Hill Neighborhood Association, having heard these allegations, immediately voted at its January meeting to oppose the Navy Hill Dominion-VCU coliseum scheme in its current form. Other civic guards should do the same- reject the Navy Hill scheme WITH PREJUDICE and STAND BY AND SUPPORT our PUBLIC officials, at least the ones are honest and have not given in to the corporate slime.

Furthermore, citizens should look to reform measures- not only ones that promote transparency, but ones that beat back corporate influence altogether. On the local level, consider that the City of Charlottesville joined localities all across the nation and passed a resolution in support of the Move To Amend movement, which would overturn the Supreme Court’s terrible Citizens’ United decision and establish that corporations are not people and money is not speech. Why not the City of Richmond? Why not for both the federal AND state constitutions?

Speaking of state, support HB111 in the General Assembly. Let’s take this City and state back from Dominion control!

In the wake of the public exposure of the corporate hegemony, now’s not the time to go on with business as usual, but to revolt and demand better. If RVA is truly going to live up to its potential, we need to throw the corporate welfare mavens out for good!

Burger’s Bernie Belly Crawl Challenge II: The Sequel

Posted on by
17

Well, it’s been four long years…and, sadly, here we are again…and again, I insert the disclaimer that I do not portend to represent ALL of Oregon Hill residents’ opinion on anything (unless, perhaps, when I am wearing my crown)…

Many Oregon Hill residents, and citizens in general, are pinning hopes on the Senator from Vermont in his renewed run for President. While I truly like Bernie’s story and many of his stances (but not all of them), the reality is that the Democratic National Committee will never, ever allow him their nomination. They don’t want anyone who will rock their corporate sponsors’ boats, go anti-war, or sincerely promote the idea of single payer health care for the United States. They will dishonesty smear one way or another, cheat (again) one way or another, or worse to prevent him from receiving the nomination.

For his part, Sanders has promised to support whoever does receive the Democratic nomination. Harnessing fear and the noise of the ‘But Trump’-ets’, the Democrats will undoubtedly select someone who is very similar to their last Presidential candidate (note that Clinton has been meeting with Warren already), coming dangerously close to the 2016 strategy (but hopefully not repeating the previous, disgusting mistake of elevating Trump’s racism).

I repeat my friendly wager/challenge- I hereby announce that if Senator Bernie Sanders does become the Democratic Party’s nominee for President, I, Scott Burger, promise to crawl on my belly south from Idlewood Avenue down to the James River. (In the unlikely circumstance that I lose this bet, I will concede my loss on a date of my choosing, and upon losing, and I will fulfill my promise to do this crawl on a time and date of my choosing.)

So, if you want to help Bernie or would enjoy seeing me punished and brought low for my political thoughts, I urge you to vote in the Democratic Primary on March 3rd and see if you can help prove me wrong. Will any ‘Bernie bros’ (or gals) dare to bet against me- pledge to do the belly crawl if I am right and he does not receive the nomination? (By the way, I am certainly not alone in this crude speculation and if you would like to bet real money, there are already websites that will cater to this.)

The sequel to my 2016 challenge with the same thoughts- as with some other bets, I sincerely hope I am wrong. This country needs a big change in direction- it needs the left wing populism represented by Sanders as an antidote to the right wing populism unleashed by the Conman-In-Chief, Donald Trump.

With Virginia’s electoral votes likely going to the blue team again, I am personally planning to continue my Green Party streak. But if I am sadly correct about the situation, the real question is what will Sanders supporters do when he is no longer in the race. With electoral reform still far off, I am not optimistic about the country’s direction, even if Trump is defeated.