FREDLINES
Steve Watkins, ADVANCE EDITOR
Fredericksburg Free Press
A game-changing purchase: Caroline purchasing Legacy Park Sports as new parks and rec hub
By Taft Coghill, October 14, 2026
The Caroline Board of Supervisors on Tuesday unanimously voted to adopt a resolution to purchase the sprawling 112-acre Legacy Park Sports property off U.S. 1 for $3.6 million.
The property includes eight baseball/softball fields, a 40,000-square-foot indoor facility that can host an array of events, a 14,000-square-foot indoor turf area and eight batting cages, two full-sized basketball courts, a weight room, observation tower, and an onsite restaurant/concessions area.
King George school board and community spar over public comments, ACLU lawsuit
By Adele Uphaus, October 13, 2026
Comments that King George School Board Chair Colleen Davis made about a citizen last month drew criticism from another resident at Monday’s board meeting.
“I want to address the behavior of School Board Chair Davis and her conduct during the Sept. 11 meeting—particularly her response to comments concerning her father-in-law, Pastor Sherman Davis,” said Kathy Phillips, a resident of the James Madison district.
The board called a meeting on Sept. 11 at 8 a.m. to vote on a policy change allowing students to organize and participate in extra-curricular organizations at the middle school with proof of parental permission. As part of the public comments portion of that meeting, board vice chair Carrie Cleveland read aloud a letter from county resident Martha Sheffield.
“As a community member, I am concerned that school board meetings are being used as a one-sided Bible study,” Sheffield wrote. She was referring to the frequent public comments made during school board meetings by Sherman Davis, pastor of Tabernacle Baptist Church — and particularly to Davis’s Aug. 17 public comments.
Stafford County meeting on data centers on Route 3 corridor canceled
By Jonathan Hunley, October 14, 2026
A Stafford Planning Commission meeting scheduled for Wednesday to discuss a large grouping of proposed data centers in the southeastern part of the county has been canceled.
The meeting was to include public hearings on four related projects that add up to 11 million square feet of proposed data center space across 48 buildings, 14 electric substations and 1,405 total acres.
“Following discussions between the applicant and county staff, both parties agreed to move the public hearing on the Forest Lane, Simms Farm and Sisson North and South projects to November 18, 2026,” a notice from the county government said. “This additional time will allow for further review and refinement of several aspects of the applications to ensure the matter is fully prepared for consideration by the Planning Commission.”
Spotsylvania to join regional lab school partnership
By Adele Uphaus, October 14, 2026
The Spotsylvania School Board voted unanimously on Monday to join the Academy of Technology and Innovation, a regional lab school partnership between the University of Mary Washington and Fredericksburg area school divisions.
The first cohort of 10 Spotsylvania students will begin their 9th grade year at ATI, which is located on UMW’s Stafford campus, in August 2027.
The Free Lance-Star (All article are paywalled)
Restoration project planned for Hugh Mercer statue in city
By Pilar Davis, October 14, 2026
The City of Fredericksburg is seeking the best the area has to offer to preserve a piece of Fredericksburg history.
In August, the city issued a request for proposals from skilled contractors to assist in restoring the General Hugh Mercer monument. The statue, which looms prominently at the intersection of Washington Avenue and Fauquier Street in the Washington Avenue Historic District, is crafted from bronze, and the base is made of stone.
The United States government commissioned Edward V. Valentine to create the bronze statue.
The monument was erected in 1906 to honor Mercer, who fought and died in the Revolutionary War in 1777. Mercer’s good friend and fellow soldier, General George Weedon, built the famous Sentry Box house for both his own family and Mercer’s widow after Mercer’s death at the Battle of Princeton. The historic home lies on the corner of Caroline Street in downtown Fredericksburg.
Event offers families a place to lay loved ones’ cremated remains to rest
By Pilar Davis, October 14, 2026
Historyland Memorial Park and Arboretum will join the country in honoring National Permanent Placement Day (also known as National Cremation Placement Day) on Saturday, Oct. 17.
This will be the first time Historyland will participate in the annual day when people hold community memorial services honoring the cremated remains of their loved ones. The event aims to allow families to respectfully place the cremated remains of loved ones that they have kept in their homes.
Independent candidate Randall Terry focuses on one issue
By Pilar Davis, October 14, 2026
Randall Terry is an Independent candidate running to represent Virginia’s 7th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. Terry is running against incumbent Congressman Eugene Vindman (D), as well as Alaha Ahrar (I), Joshua Ertle (I), Taner Demirci Lopez (L), and Douglas Ollivant (R).
The Free Lance-Star sent a questionnaire to each candidate and invited them to share their responses.
Terry declined to answer five of the six questions on the questionnaire, which were related to traffic, veterans, data centers, federal workers and his projection for four years from now. He answered the first question, saying that he is a one-issue candidate advocating for anti-abortion legislation.
ADVANCE READS
Donnie Johnstron, Steve Watkins, Phil Huber
Landline Elegy
By Donnie Johnston, ADVANCE COLUMNIST
By the 1970s, almost every home in America had a telephone. We now call them “land lines” because calls needed wires for transmission. Nobody called them that back then because the term had not been coined. They were just telephones. Some were still rotary dial.
For the first 75 years of telephone service, the wires were overhead, which made them susceptible to high winds, ice storms, and falling trees. In the early 1970s Ma Bell, pretty much the only telephone company in America, began putting the cables underground for more security and reliability.
If you were driving down the highway and had car trouble you could go to almost any house and use the home phone to summon help. Most people had no problem helping out a stranger.
Fast forward to 2026….
Proposed Amendments Panel, Down Home Ball, Regional Housing Summit, and Other Press Release Releases
Compiled by Steve Watkins, ADVANCE EDITOR
The Regional Housing Assembly is holding its 4th Annual Regional Housing Summit Thursday, Oct. 15, from 9 a.m.-4 p.m. at the Fredericksburg Expo and Conference Center. The theme is “From Vision to Impact.” The summit will bring together key stakeholders in the housing industry to discuss the current state of housing and the future solutions for attainable housing throughout the region.
For more information, visit the event website.
Affordability Is Not a Public-Relations Problem
By Phil Huber, ADVANCE COLUMNIST
President Trump says the economy is good. His advisers cite growth and other encouraging numbers, then suggest Americans have not fully appreciated the good news. President Biden made a similar mistake. Biden spoke of jobs, wages and falling inflation while families faced higher grocery bills, rents, insurance premiums and credit-card balances.
Voters in both cases were asking for economic respite. They did not want a lecture about statistics. They wanted relief at the grocery checkout, the gas pump, the pharmacy counter and the kitchen table. Inflation slowing does not mean prices have returned to where they were. Families live on paychecks, bills and what remains after both.
STATE OF THE STATE
VaNews/VIRGINIA PUBLIC ACCESS PROJECT
Report: State’s AI rules don’t effectively weigh risks
By KATE SELTZER, Virginian-Pilot (Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
A third of state agencies are using or piloting artificial intelligence tools, such as constituent-facing chatbots and fraud detection tools. And most state employees are using general-purpose AI tools, like ChatGPT or Claude. But the Virginia Information Technology Association is falling short of the effective oversight of AI required to prevent misuse. And that could pose problems for state data security. That’s according to a new report from the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission, the state’s nonpartisan research agency. JLARC told lawmakers Tuesday that VITA will have to up its game.
Perry Proposes State-Wide Data Center Moratorium Bill
By HANNA BLOOM, Loudoun Now
Sen. Russet Perry on Tuesday released draft legislation that would enact a state-wide data center moratorium for three years. SB843 seeks to prohibit localities from granting approval for data center applications that require a rezoning, special exception, special use permit or site plan. It also would prohibit the state from issuing any permit, certificate, registration, license or other form of approval in connection with the development or siting of a data center bill or authorize the construction of any facility designed to provide electric distribution service, interconnection, on-site generation or related services for a data center.
Greer to retire as director of legislative watchdog agency
By MICHAEL MARTZ, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Subscription Required)
Virginia’s legislative watchdog agency will begin looking for a new leader to succeed Hal Greer, who will retire in January after 32 years at the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission, including 13 years as the fourth staff director in its 52-year history. Greer, 64, has led the bipartisan commission’s staff as it has tackled some of the most complex and pressing policy challenges in Virginia government ...
Richmond and its suburbs pay more state taxes than they get back
By DAVE RESS, Richmond Times-Dispatch (Subscription Required)
When it comes to paying state taxes and getting state services, the city of Richmond, although it’s considered a “double distressed” community, pays more than it gets back. That’s true as well for the city’s suburbs — especially for Goochland County, which ranks No. 1 in terms of the gap between what residents pay and the services they get, a new analysis from the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission says.
Warner seeks final term as Mizusawa makes case for change
By MARKUS SCHMIDT, Virginia Mercury
U.S. Sen. Mark Warner says he wants one final term to help undo the damage he believes President Donald Trump has caused. His Republican challenger, Bert Mizusawa, argues Virginia would be better served with a senator Trump will actually listen to. The two candidates made their cases in two separate phone interviews with the Virginia Mercury on Monday, three weeks before the Nov. 3 election. Warner, a three-term Democrat, is seeking a fourth term against a retired U.S. Army major general who has extensive national security experience but little money to compete with the incumbent.
By BEN SWENSON, Cardinal News
During the last weekend of September, Jeff Phillips received hundreds of pictures to post on Star City Whitetails, a popular Facebook page he administers for Virginia hunters to share photos of successful hunts. It was an annual two-day youth hunting weekend ... Yet in large swaths of the commonwealth, white-tailed deer hunting season had already been open for three weeks. How many pictures did Phillips receive during that lengthy stretch? Only a few. It seemed as though Virginia hunters weren’t eager to take to the woods too early in the season — especially because they were only allowed to take antlerless deer. That reluctance to participate in hunting opportunities highlights the challenges facing the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources and local municipal governments as they grapple with the reality of booming deer populations and not enough hunters.
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Articles from newspapers throughout the Commonwealth and Washington D.C. Firewalls will block you from reading some, but you’ll at least have some idea about what’s going on from the headlines and summaries. CLICK HERE.
