Fry’s Spring is a mostly residential neighborhood that once had an electric streetcar and an amusement park
It was also yet another area of Charlottesville that used racial covenants to legally prohibit the sale of property to Black people.
Residents rage to City Council on the ‘hidden tax increase’ coming next year
Rising real estate assessment values will inflate Charlottesville tax bills further in FY2024 unless the Council lowers the tax rate.
Researchers are still trying to identify the enslaved people buried in unmarked Pen Park graves
They hope making a database publicly accessible by this summer will help them identify the descendants of those who were enslaved on the former plantation that is now a public park.

Charlottesville’s ‘tooligans’ are teaching people to fix up their homes — and lending out the right tools for the job
The Charlottesville Tool Library offers memberships on a sliding scale, $1 for every $1,000 you make per year.
A developer’s proposal could bring a grocery store back to Fifeville
Woodard Properties proposed a supermarket, community space and new apartment building to the Charlottesville Planning Commission last week.
Starting your summer vegetable garden? Here’s why you might ask a Charlottesville High School student for help
The nonprofit Cultivate Charlottesville built its first school garden in 2010, and now two schools offer courses for credit on how to farm.
Find Charlottesville Tomorrow journalists at two professional conferences this week
On Thursday, we’ll be at the annual meetings of the Association of College & Research Libraries and the Virginia Coalition for Open Government.
Listen: With 500 restaurants in a 10-mile radius, Charlottesville chef Atwon Brinson says there has to be a better way to staff them
In My Humble Opinion’s podcast has a candid conversation with Brinson about his perspective on life in restaurants in central Virginia.
A car crashed into her living room — and it was all terribly inconvenient
Katrina Spencer learned to detach from disasters a long time ago. So when a car punched a hole in her home, life went on.

These stories were published as a part of Charlottesville Inclusive Media’s First Person Charlottesville project. Have a story to tell? Here’s how.


Charlottesville is our place and tomorrow is our focus.
The Big Stories
COVID relief funding has ended and now the rural town of Scottsville has to cut its budget by 25%
The town’s mayor hoped a proposed apartment project would save them, but Council voted it down.
UVA Police locked down campus during Sunday night’s manhunt, but did not alert community members living blocks away
“It’s scary to think that a shooter was loose in my city for so long and I had no idea,” Paige Robinson said. “We’re the same community.”
After 50 years of busing Westhaven kids away from their neighborhood school, City Schools votes to rezone Venable
The children in the predominantly Black public housing community have been zoned away from Venable since integration.
A decade of data tells a story of how Charlottesville’s neighborhoods are changing
This year, we’re telling 19 stories about 19 neighborhoods using data, history and voices of the community.
More news
Charlottesville’s only homeless shelter for elderly and seriously ill people is about to close, but construction of the housing that will go up in its place has been postponed
“Developing this type of housing is never simple and straightforward,” said Julie Anderson, with Virginia Supportive Housing.
Now that City Schools is the sole owner of the local technical high school, officials must figure out how to pay the $5.5 million price tag
Albemarle initially tried to purchase CATEC to do major renovations and updates, but Charlottesville said no, citing concerns for its students’ continued access.
City Schools naming committee recommends Johnson Elementary School become Cherry Avenue and Burnley-Moran become Blue Mountain
The schools were named for people who were leaders during the Jim Crow era of legal racial segregation.
Charlottesville’s homeless shelter staff say demand for beds this winter is double what they can accommodate
It’s difficult to know how many people are experiencing homelessness at any given time, but available data and shelter staff experience show it is increasing dramatically.
City Schools wanted to address staffing issues by hiring formerly incarcerated people. State lawmakers said no
The proposal was one of six legislative priorities, most of which aimed at addressing the school system’s ongoing staffing issues that have sourced back to before the pandemic.
Albemarle County forced to reconsider allowing school workers to collective bargain after more than 100 people descend on meeting
“If we want to keep the best teachers we have in Albemarle County, we have to recognize that this is something we have to deal with,” said School Board member Graham Paige.
Four-term School Board member Leah Puryear is Charlottesville’s new City Council appointee
Council selected Puryear for her experience on the school board and because she “has had people criticize her before” and “has thick skin,” said Mayor Lloyd Snook.
How should Central Virginia spend $1 million in housing-related funding? Area consortium wants community input
“We don’t want people to think this funding will completely solve the national housing crisis,” said Laurie Jean Talun with the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission.
Survey shows that many Charlottesville residents want to walk, bike or take public transit — but don’t feel safe doing so
“My brother and a good friend were both hit by vehicles while biking in Charlottesville,” a respondent wrote. “I do not feel that this town is safe for bikes, which is a real shame since the distances are manageable.”
These are the names that could replace Johnson and Burnley-Moran elementary schools
The School Board could vote on renaming the schools as soon as March.


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