The week’s top stories
-The Stafford County Planning Commission recently recommended approval of a data center project on U.S. 1, north of the intersection with Centreport Parkway, after a bit of a rare happening: A speaker came to a public hearing not to criticize the plan, but to praise it.
– Vern Lunsford returned to his alma mater in fine fashion recently, winning his first game as head football coach at Spotsylvania High School. has the details.
-U.S. Sen. Mark Warner and Rep. Eugene Vindman last week criticized what they said was low staffing at the new Veterans Affairs Fredericksburg Health Care Center in Spotsylvania County. The Democrats didn’t mince words when criticizing the Trump administration at a roundtable discussion in Fredericksburg.
-Like jazz? Enjoy live music? Or both? Maybe you should check out the Fredericksburg Jazz Collective. Stephen Hu has the story behind this local phenomenon in Free Time, our weekly entertainment newsletter.
-Is it a commercial building, or a home? You’ll have to watch last week’s Biz Beat Clip to find out the truth about this William Street enterprise.
Go figures (numbers in the news)
$100 million — The University of Mary Washington’s endowment has now passed this figure, as the institution raised a record $37.9 million in gifts and pledges during the fiscal year that ended June 30. Bill Freehling has this news and other financial notes in Biz Beat Roundup.
Scenes from the sideline
Photojournalist Jeff Kearney caught up with one of the area’s top high school football programs, the Colonial Forge Eagles
What they’re saying
“When your housing values are going down, crime is rising and the education that your kids are getting is slipping, that is a dying community and that is a place that no one wants to be. Once you get that reputation, it will be decades before you get it back, and I don’t want that to happen to where we live.” – Chris Yakabouski, chairman of the Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors. He was talking about it being better to live in a growing area than a declining one.
Pressing on (a look at the week ahead)
-The Free Press will hold the second of its local candidate forums, at 5:30 p.m. Sept. 10 at Germanna Community College (Kevin L. Dillard Health Sciences Building, Room 228, at the Stafford County Center, 25 Center St., Stafford, VA, 22556). This forum will feature candidates for Stafford County Board of Supervisors and School Board.
