Richmond Laws, Loopholes & Lies (city transparency, weird Virginia laws, Flock cameras, etc) — Unscripted #047

Vera Creative Club Merch:
https://veraclub.myshopify.com/

Shop Blackbyrd Goods:
https://blackbyrdgoods.com

In this episode of Vera House Unscripted, we discuss a range of Richmond topics including strange Virginia laws, government transparency, surveillance concerns, Carytown, and the growing tension between Richmond’s charm and its dysfunction.

We start with some of the weirdest and most outdated laws still associated with Virginia, including long-running myths and bizarre legal history, before moving into conversations around jaywalking, aggressive crosswalk culture, and everyday behavior around the city.

A major portion of the episode focuses on Richmond government transparency, including the city being named a “City of Darkness,” FOIA concerns, public records access, and broader conversations around accountability and trust in local institutions. We also discuss surveillance systems like Flock cameras, data retention, leaked communications, and the growing role of technology and AI in politics and public messaging.

Later in the episode, we talk about Carytown, modernization, Richmond restaurant and nightlife laws, and what parts of the city could look like with better planning and vision moving forward.

Topics include weird Virginia laws, Richmond government transparency, FOIA requests, City of Darkness, Flock cameras, surveillance concerns, Mayor Danny Avula, ChatGPT in politics, Carytown, Richmond nightlife laws, jaywalking culture, and Richmond city development.

Quick interjection to invite you to Vera House Studios. If you are a local Richmond business, entrepreneur, brand owner, or service provider—and you know you need to create better content to get your products and services in front of the right people—we can help.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Welcome back to the Vera House podcast. It has been wellness week the past couple weeks. We've talked a lot about wellness and health and RestFest and Sportsbackers and the Monument 10K and Pyre sauna and all this stuff. And we are back to our unscripted episodes. Yeah. And we're hitting you right in the beginning with missionary position, by the way, is illegal in the state of Virginia. Mind boggling. Can't do it. So y'all perverts out there, don't be doing anything crazy. We're all screwed. Missionaries illegal in the state of Virginia. There's a bunch of crazy old laws in the state of Virginia. And on this episode, we run through all of them. And we also talk about shocker city corruption. There's money laundering, there's hidden tech screenshots, there's surveillance, there's uh private propaganda messages going on. We got nothing going on over here. Yeah, the duality of Richmond is crazy. It's like it's so great and amazing, and it's like so concerning and weird at the same time. But today was a super fun episode. What uh I mean, we covered a bunch of stuff. What else did we get into?

SPEAKER_01 1:03

We did. We did cover a bunch of stuff. We talked about one of my favorite or my new favorite topics: bold crosswalking and jaywalkers. People thinking that they are invincible and cannot be struck or damaged or injured by two-ton metal vehicles and just jutting out into the stream with no regard, assuming that people will stop. Uh, I think we we get into a lot of that stuff. We talked about Carrytown as a whole, what Carrytown potentially could be with the right vision and with some modernization and some little updates. We definitely love and have a sweet spot for Carrytown. In addition to some laws that are crazy, we talked about some new laws that may be really good for the city. One of them being the change in the alcohol versus food percentage for restaurants, which is huge. As someone who used to work in the service industry, that was something that we always had to deal with and manage. So I think it's one step in the right direction for the city when it comes to restaurants and bars. And mushrooms may be legal very soon. Go psychedelics.

SPEAKER_02 2:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

Yeah. So stay tuned. We get into all of it. The Richmond crosswalks are a wild situation. Yeah, it's it's it's it's like the wild west again, except it's moms and strollers and college students squaring up against suburbans and Jeep Wranglers.

SPEAKER_03 2:47

Well, I feel like Richmond for such a long time, you know, like growing up here, riding my bike around here, driving my car around here, for a city, you can get around Richmond pretty quickly. And I think that's starting to change. And so if you're a driver, you're being forced to like learn patience on the job.

SPEAKER_02 3:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 3:08

Which I think is a lot to ask for people that are that have lived here for a long time. You know, and I'm just speaking from personal experience, like zipping around the city, it's like you can get to the whole other side of the city in just a few minutes. And that's changing because now there's more cars, there's more people. It's just more difficult. There's more stuff going on. There's these big tractor trailers that are just always parked in the middle of the road now, dropping off inventory and whatever for all these businesses popping up everywhere. And I guess the city's solution was to they tried a lot of different things, right? They put those things that were stuck into the pavement.

SPEAKER_01 3:46

Man, that just that grinds my gears, is a good way to put it. It's just I knew those weren't gonna last. Everybody knew that they weren't gonna last. Who thought that was a good idea? Hey guys, here's a good way to spend a million dollars of city money. Let's buy signs from Costco, put a sticker on it that says against the law, and then drill them into the middle of the street where people drive and hope that nobody runs them over.

SPEAKER_03 4:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

Because obviously that wouldn't ever happen.

SPEAKER_03 4:20

I mean, I can't think of any city that I've been to where you see something like that where it's worked. And even outside of the main part of the city, even if you go over to like Brooklyn Park Boulevard and where it heads out to like Laburnum, you've got this crazy janky situation where they put all these plastic poles one after another. There's literally like hundreds of them just in this one intersection to try to like protect the bike lanes and the crosswalks and stuff. And don't get me wrong, you definitely see it. It's quite an eyesore, but when you're driving up to it, it's almost so crazy that you don't even know what you're looking at. It's like the inner the entire intersection is now confusing. You don't even know where to turn into. It's kind of crazy. And yeah, when they put those things up in the fan, people like you and I, we knew, like, yeah, dude, these things are gonna get obliterated. And that's exactly what happened. They tried to replace them again, they got obliterated again because for whatever reason the city doesn't realize that the people that drive in the city don't always live here. Yeah. So they don't care and they don't even know how or what those signs are indicating or how to follow them. So then I guess they did the bump outs with the curbs, which I think was one of the first things we talked about on like episode one or two or three of this podcast was right around the time that they did that. So early summer last year. And I think that maybe that's helped a little bit, like intentionally putting these curbs in the intersection so that way the cars don't park as close and you can see a little bit better and stuff. I think that was a good idea. And it wasn't like a total waste of money, and it makes this city look okay because you can put plants and stuff like that. But you're also creating areas for drunk people to just vomit in and pee in and whatever. And yeah, now it's basically like you said, the game of chicken, where people that maybe just moved here from other cities that have better crosswalk infrastructure, they're just used to getting across the street in a manner that works. Yeah, like if you go to DC, you don't typically just walk out in front of the cars because it's like, yeah, good luck doing that. Because the cars aren't gonna stop. Right. It's DC. Right. Same thing with any other big city, even Austin and stuff. Like the crosswalks are just functional and they work. And there's street signs, and you for the most part, you follow them. Yeah. Because you're like, all right, I'm not gonna risk it unless the unless the street is totally clear and you're like, all right, and then you walk across. But in Richmond, it's like a different vibe because even just driving through Carrytown, just get here through the studio to the studio.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

It's almost running people over.

SPEAKER_03 6:57

Yeah, they just walk out right in front of your car.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:00

And I don't know, I don't know how it's supposed to work. And I don't think the pedestrians do either. So it's everybody's just kind of guessing.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

That's it's probably the biggest thing, but it it it had this adverse effect where the pedestrians became emboldened as if they weren't already emboldened and given this sense of entitlement that they belong in a safe manner in the street where the cars belong in the in a safe manner. But that's where the cars were designed to be, is in the street. Because that's what it's it's made out of asphalt, and that's where the tires that's that's where the cars go. And then when you go out into the street where the cars go and expect the cars not to bother you because you are a person and and you have rights as a person, it's just it's a I don't like the entitlement, the attitude that people take into uh call it jaywalking or even in the crosswalks. You know, it's different in bigger cities because there is a mutual understanding, these are the rules. You don't go into the street because you're going to get hit by a car. Yeah, there is not a question about well, maybe the car will see you and slow down, and what they won't hit you because you're visible, you're a person. Well, how the hell did you not see me? There isn't even a question about that, specifically in DC. That's a big problem. I have friends that live up there. Whenever I go to visit, they say, Don't walk into the crosswalk when the light, the the sign says don't walk because the the cabs, the Ubers, they will hit you. Yeah, they do not care and they will drive away and get away with it. But here, man, it's like oh, I'm a pedestrian. I don't I have rights, and you better slow down. Did you not see the sign? It's like, you mean the sign that was there, that's there today, but it wasn't there yesterday? And there wasn't a memorandum, there wasn't an email, there wasn't a publicly made statement by the city officials that this is now the law. That was never the case with those signs in the middle of the street, the second round of putting them all back after they got run over, and then now with the bump outs, and then they just put those signs at other s either end of the crosswalk. There wasn't like a statement that said, Hey guys, by the way, we're going to try and help pedestrian traffic by putting these signs up. When you see someone waiting at a crosswalk, that means they're ready to walk. When you see them at the crosswalk, you're supposed to slow down and let them cross. Now, even if they did do that, I still think it's not the best way to do that because what you're doing inadvertently is disrupting a smooth flow of traffic, which is going to piss people off. There's no way to get around that.

SPEAKER_02 9:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:41

You're taking a two-lane, one-way, like main article, like main artery of Richmond, Main Street and Carrie Street. And you're telling people to stop at not a stop sign and not a stoplight. You're telling people to stop in the middle of the street because one person needs to cross the road.

SPEAKER_03 10:56

Yeah. And the only indicator is just like a like the bricks in the road. There's there's no like signs or anything. No. And I walk everywhere and I ride my bike everywhere. So I would like to think, and and I really don't drive that much, but I see frustration on both sides as somebody who walks from home to Carrytown all the time. I ride my bike through all these main streets, whether it's down Boulevard or the more scenic routes like Riverside Drive and stuff like that, but through Bird Park. So I see a lot of different elements of the city. And I think the one spot that has it kind of figured out and that I think would serve as a good happy medium to help Richmond get to a point where it's a little bit more pedestrian friendly. And not that it's not pedestrian friendly, but there's it's just a weird dynamic, like we just talked about. But on Blanton over by Maymont, like on that, I think it's Blanton that leads to the Nickel Bridge. And if you I know what you're talking about. The curve. Yeah. And right before you go into Maymont, there's a crosswalk there. Yeah. But you don't just want to walk out into that crosswalk. Like there's a sign with a button, just like any other regular street crossing, but it's not a traffic light. You know, if you go to DC, a lot of those crosswalks are underneath traffic lights, right? And they work in tandem with the traffic lights. Well, of course, there's no traffic light there. Yeah. So as a pedestrian or a walker or a runner or a cyclist or whatever, and there's bike lanes there. And they're the bike lanes are pretty well done in that area. And that's because the streets are bigger and it just works better there. It's not like it's not like Carrie Street or Main Street. But there's still plenty of traffic that comes from Nickel Bridge from Forest Hill and all that. So there's a lot of car traffic. And if you want to walk across the street, you could give it a shot and just kind of wing it. And sometimes if there's no traffic, yeah, you just cross. But if there's traffic, there's a button there. And when you press it, the light instantly starts flashing. And it's a big sign that just starts flashing. Yeah. And sometimes people don't stop, but most of the time they do, right? Because it is a bright sign. There's plenty of visibility where people see it when it's flashing. And when you're driving, you can see someone standing there waiting to cross. Right. So you press the button, the sign starts flashing. And then as a pedestrian, you're waiting to just see, like, all right, that person's slowing down, right? Like, and it's like, all right, yes, they're slowing down and you're good. And then you walk across. And then after 10 seconds, the light stops blinking and the cars just keep going. I don't think that's a great, like a long-term solution for busy areas. But if you want to introduce safe pedestrian crosswalks as like a standard in Richmond, I think it's an affordable, because I think that sign is solar powered.

SPEAKER_02 13:49

Right.

SPEAKER_03 13:49

So it's like, yeah, put up some signs that are pretty high up. And yeah, when someone wants to cross, they can cross whenever they want, but they're expected to press a button so that the drivers have an alert and some sort of an indicator that, like, hey, there might be somebody here that's about to walk out in front of you. Yeah. You know, and I think like it's not rocket science.

SPEAKER_01 14:08

Yeah. Like, think about it. Every big city that has crosswalks that are made for pedestrians to interrupt traffic has one of those signs. The the crosswalks here that have street lights for the cars to stop at have a button that you press. Every city has a crosswalk sign that flashes yes to go for pedestrians and no to stop for pedestrians. Now, how many times have you seen people walk whenever they want, regardless of whatever the sign says? I'm gonna answer for you numerous times. Yeah. Literally saw it this past weekend. It doesn't matter that the sign says stop, don't walk. Like there's the the hand, the red hand, don't walk. Because now it's time for the cars. People just walk anyway.

SPEAKER_02 14:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:53

And then they get mad at you as the driver for you coming close to you almost hit me. It's like it was my turn and you're in the way.

SPEAKER_02 14:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:59

You're collateral damage at this point. However, if I do hit you, I'm gonna go to jail. Yeah. So now we're just at a standstill. Man, I the last time that this like the most recent time that this happened, it wasn't a crosswalk with a sign. It wasn't a crosswalk with one of those like stop signs. This is in Scott's edition. And Scott's edition is still very much in development, so there's a lot of construction. But it's super pedestrian heavy. Yeah. Right. There's not very there aren't very many streetlights. I think there's only one streetlight. I think it's on Robinson.

SPEAKER_03 15:34

Yeah, and they're all on the perimeter. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:36

Like yeah, like Nansman, I think, is like the other street sign or street light. Um but once you're in Scott's edition proper, it's all just foot traffic and stop signs, which is pretty straightforward. Now, some of these streets don't have stop signs on them. Some of them are just drive-throughs, and most people end up stopping at them anyway, which is also frustrating. Just there's no stop sign. Don't stop. I'm driving down one of these streets right by ZZQ, and past I believe it's uh Valison and like Kochi Loco, there's a stop sign there if you're going towards ZZQ. At the corner of that street and ZZQ, there is no stop sign. Right. You can just keep driving through. And I'm driving, I'm doing the speed limit. A woman just starts to walk out into the crosswalk. And I didn't initially slow down because there's no stop sign. I wasn't going to stop there. But she gives me a wave as if to say, thanks for slowing down. I was like, I wasn't, I wasn't gonna slow down. I don't want to slow down. Yeah, but now you're in front of me and I have to.

SPEAKER_03 16:42

It's like I hate to tell you this lady, but this is the end. Yes, thanks for the wave.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

And you know, I don't like to drive aggressively, and I don't like to like be like get the road rage sensation, but sometimes it's unavoidable. And it's like I really wanted to to like make a point, but it's kind of hard. I can't kind of can't really make my point.

SPEAKER_02 17:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

But like I got really close to her, like I didn't slow down all the way, and then I just floored it past her. And she like looked back, like, whoa, oh my goodness. He was gonna hit me. It was like, you goddamn right I was gonna hit. Imagine if I was one of those people we were talking about a few episodes back, where I'm one hand on the wheel and the other one on my on my phone.

SPEAKER_02 17:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:20

And I didn't even see your dumb ass, and you wave and you think I see you, but I didn't. Yeah, and I didn't even look up and I'm driving through the intersection, bam, you're dead, yeah. I'm going to jail. Yeah. Because you're an idiot.

SPEAKER_03 17:32

Yeah. Well, you know, and in that scenario, obviously, like if somebody's texting on their phone, you know what I mean? Like, it's like, yeah, it's not good.

SPEAKER_01 17:38

But that's my point. Yeah. You can't assume that just because that they're paying attention. You have like a cool shirt on and you you just left ZZQ, that I'm gonna see you. That's not how traffic works. Yeah, yeah. You have to make sure that you are seen, and that's usually helpful by having those things up on the wall. We can press the button and say, hey, we're here. Yeah. But that's not how it works just by you being there. People assume that, oh yeah, he has to see me. Like, I I definitely didn't.

SPEAKER_03 18:09

I'm totally like, I'm totally guilty of that because like it from a different perspective, I just have a rather idiotic like air of invincibility. I'm like, what are they gonna do? Run me over? And uh the answer is yes. Yes, but uh, but I haven't been run over yet. So um, you know, we'll see, we'll see how it goes. But but I will say when I do that, like for example, there's the it's Auburn and Carrie right there next to fuel pump. When the light when the hand says don't walk, I just look and I just walk anyway. Because that intersection is weird, and sometimes like the light's red, but the hand is also red, and the cars are stopped, and I'm like waiting, looking, they're waiting, everyone's waiting. I'm like, I'm just gonna walk. And uh yeah, one day it'll be me in the crosswalk, and it'll be you in your car, and uh, you'll run me over, and then episode 100 of the podcast will be like, remember that time on episode 45 or whatever? It's like, yeah, we did that, but it was but it was us, and I was the pedestrian, and you were the car driver, and yeah, yeah, I ended up dead, and you ended up in jail, and that was the end of the Vera House podcast.

SPEAKER_01 19:20

We'll do that, and we'll have the follow-through of of a an entire year's worth of entire years worth of episodes, but we'll skip an episode and you'll come back as a ghost. Yeah, because more like a full body cast. Yes, 100%. You'll just be in here, yeah, arms and legs up, strapped to the seat, unbelievably tortured by being in this scenario, but you would not have been killed.

SPEAKER_03 19:51

Yeah, and the nurse will have to come in every 30 minutes and swap out my pea bag. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:55

She's a part of the show now.

SPEAKER_03 19:58

Oh man. Yeah. Carrytown, you know, it's a wild one. I know people talk a lot about like turning it into a walking-only shopping district to where like there's no cars.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

I think we, I don't know, maybe we've talked about this not on the show, but I definitely think we've talked about it before. I've had that thought. And there isn't one specific place that it reminds me of, but I mean, I guess there is one. It makes me think of um I was just blanking now, but um Urban Street in New Orleans. Makes me think of Bourbon Street. Bourbon Street's huge, there's multiple streets, it's it's a massive place. But I picture like when they do the watermelon festival, right? When there's only foot traffic allowed. It's kind of cool.

SPEAKER_02 20:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:43

And if there were that many people there on a regular basis, it could be pretty sick. But I also like being able to drive through it. Yeah. So it's it's a it's a little both.

SPEAKER_03 20:52

I do too. I mean, I would not be surprised. You know, let's say we could snap our fingers and it's five years from now. I really wouldn't be surprised if Carrytown was closed off to traffic. Yeah, I think with all a lot of the development, like obviously they just put in a gas station right there. It depends on how it would be done, but maybe, yeah, maybe that whole section there by like Elwood and the Publix and the Kroger, and basically starting at Burger Batch Forward is all closed off. I mean, imagine like, don't just imagine that, oh, it's closed off to traffic. Imagine there's no street there. So imagine it's almost like Stony Point Mall, where like starting right there is the entrance, and it's actually a pit like uh like a walkway that's gone all throughout Carrytown, and then it stops at Mom Siam and basically that whole section is walking area, right? I don't hate that idea. Do you know how popular that would be, dude? It would be insane because think about it. The middle of it could be all kiosks and markets and vendors and stuff. Like Carrytown would be it would be popping, dude. It would be one of the coolest places. It would be this cool common area. It's a shopping district with bars and restaurants and markets and shops, and it would be walking only. And I think all of the businesses between Burger Batch and Mom Siam would benefit from that, right? Because the only ones that wouldn't would be like the grocery stores, the gas stations. Like they would be crushed if like cars couldn't get in there. That'd be insane. So I I could absolutely see that happening. I don't hate the idea. Yeah. And I do think that it would elevate Carrytown to a whole new level, too.

SPEAKER_01 22:21

I definitely, I agree. And I think it would it would elevate Carrytown to a whole new level. It would also, and I can see it increasing business double or triple.

SPEAKER_02 22:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:32

Because right now, Carrytown is relatively busy on a regular basis. Yeah. It's mostly drive-through traffic. Unless you're going there specifically to go to one or two places. It's not a very like traffic, like walking traffic, foot traffic heavy, unless it's Thursday, Friday, or Saturday. Sometimes Sunday. It's pretty foot traffic heavy. But it's like it's it's pretty chill for the most part. Yeah. Like the busiest places on that block are Like the restaurants, Cancan, um the Indian restaurant that's like right in the middle across from Cancan. Yeah, Jasper, Kerry. Jasper, like those places are always busy. Mellow mushroom. Mellow mushroom. Some of the apparel stores are pretty busy. Um, there's some goods stores that are like usually rocking and rolling. Mongrul's always crushing it. And then you got the bird.

SPEAKER_02 23:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:21

Right. And then there's a handful of like stores and storefronts that are always dead.

SPEAKER_02 23:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

That have no foot traffic because no one wants to go there.

SPEAKER_02 23:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:30

And I would argue, or I would assume even just from personal experience, a large part of the reason that people don't make it to Carrytown is because they don't have a way to get there. They can't drive to the middle of Carrytown. And walking there is kind of treacherous because you get run over if you walk in the street.

SPEAKER_02 23:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

But if you could walk pretty much anywhere, why wouldn't you? It's called what two miles from beginning to end. Why wouldn't you do that? Yeah. You know, it's an easy, it's an easy no-brainer. You park the next block over because City Stadium is right there and it's always parking at City Stadium. Yeah. You walk a block and a half to Carry Town. You walk two blocks, two miles up and down Carry Street. You hit Cary Court, you get a coffee, you get a snack, you get a new pair of shoes, you get a bicycle, you get my little gifts from the Knickknack store. You could get all of that stuff. And then that would increase or entice bigger, more popular storefronts to make an appearance there, which would increase the quality of the stuff that you could potentially get.

SPEAKER_02 24:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

Which we were even kind of talking about this earlier. We're talking with our guys over at Blackbird.

SPEAKER_02 24:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:36

We were talking about how I was talking to Patrick and I was like, hey man, I think maybe you've noticed this too. Mike and I have talked about this before. There is a quality gap, a quality acceptance ceiling, if you will. I could call it the 80% problem. It's like everyone is fairly fine and content with things being 80% of what they potentially could be. That's it to in my mind, this isn't this is an example of what Carrytown could potentially be with some fairly simple construction and some thought.

SPEAKER_03 25:09

Yeah. Yeah. And I think Carrytown's headed in the in the right direction. You know, like Blackbird is a really good example of that shop, right? Like these, these silver chains here. These are both from Blackbird. Um, this is not a sponsor or anything like that of any means. They this is just genuinely from them, from Blackbird. Two great guys running a cool shop there. And we were just hanging out with them talking about the elevation of Carrytown and how Carrytown has had ups and downs and stuff like that. Blackbird is like, you know, high-end goods. It reminded us even of like need supply back in the day when we were younger. Like need supply was like this cool high-end shop that was there. And then, you know, COVID happened and Carrytown kind of went downhill, and a lot of businesses struggled throughout that. And then now it's it's on the up and up. You know, it's it's on an upwards trajectory. I really enjoy being in Carrytown. We are in Carytown, right? For anybody who doesn't know that, like our studio, right here, Vera House Studios, is in Carytown. Um and we love being here, right? Like seriously, cool coffee shops, like new coffee shops opening up, cool concepts. Like, there's always cool stuff going on here. And Carrytown has been a staple forever. You know, I love it. And you mentioned being able to get here. I don't know if you saw this, but so the GRTC, I don't know if it's a definite quite yet, but the pulse line is expanding out to Henrico. So it's a good example of somebody who like you may have people that are not comfortable like driving into the city and being like, where am I gonna park? Or, you know, people that have really nice vehicles and like, dude, I'm not driving into the city. But you could hop on the pulse line and just go into Carrytown shopping for the day and hang out, get some drinks and take the bus back to Henrico.

SPEAKER_01 26:49

That would be in my mind, and I think you probably agree with this. That's what makes a big city accessible, and what makes it a big, bigger city is attracting people and making it easy for them to come there. Yeah. Because a lot of people that that go to a big city don't live in the city. You know that. Like a lot of people that come and visit Carrytown aren't Richmonders, right? They live in the counties, or they sometimes are even from out of town.

SPEAKER_03 27:12

Especially Carrytown.

SPEAKER_01 27:13

Right. Yeah. Specifically Carrytown. So making it easy for them to get here, if you just live 15 minutes away instead of driving, getting on the highway, or if you don't have a car, making public transportation the method that you use to get here, it's a no-brainer.

SPEAKER_03 27:28

100%. So funding for the GRTC Pulse expansion into Henrico has been authorized as officials await state budget clarity. The Greater Richmond Transit Company is steps closer to executing and gathering funds for the Pulse Rapid Transit Western Extension Project that will extend the express bus line further into Henrico County. So this will lengthen the route an additional four miles from Willow Lawn Drive all the way up to Parham Road. Oh, that's great. With a turnaround on Skipwith Road to Parham to begin the return east on West Broad Street. Um six million bucks.

SPEAKER_00 28:06

And uh yeah, the the plan would be completed by August 2027.

SPEAKER_01 28:15

Um I mean, that's almost worth like me using the bus to get out to that part of town.

SPEAKER_03 28:20

Yeah. Oh, and actually this says so the plans would be completed by 2027, bidding would take place from September to November of 2027, construction contracts would be awarded by December, and construction would take place during an 18-month time period from April 2028 to September of 2029. Gotcha. Okay, and so essentially that's when like 2030 is when all the Mayo Island stuff and like all that crazy stuff is going on too.

SPEAKER_01 28:50

I see what they're doing here. Yeah. And I think this is a probably a topic that we've somewhat talked about before. I know it's on everyone's mind, but maybe not something that they talk about because it's it's very hard to ignore is the rapid expansion, growth, and modernization of Richmond. These big projects that are happening not relatively close to they're happening at the exact same time, and they're happening on different parts of the downtown area. It's one thing when there's a large project that's taking place and everybody's like, oh yeah, we're gonna have a new such and such down at Browns Island in a in a year or two. And then a year or two later, it's like, oh yeah, there's gonna be a new park system, or there's an update to the park system that's gonna be happening. And then a year or two later, it's like, oh yeah, in combination with sports backers, they're redoing, they're adding to the Capitol Trail system, and they're making it east to west and north to south. That's so cool. Now this shit's happening all at the same time within the next five years, which is exciting and a little, I mean, for me, it's I think it's just generally cool, but I know for some people it's unnerving because it's never happened in their lifetime.

SPEAKER_03 30:05

Yeah, well, there's a lot of duality to it. You know, like you've been here forever, I've been here forever. You know, I lived in the burbs prior to moving to the city at 18 years old. As soon as I graduated high school, I was like, I'm out, I'm going to the city, and I've lived here ever since, and I'll I'll be 37 this year. And 37? Yeah, 37 this year. And um I'm excited about it. Like, so there's part of me where I'm like, yeah, this is exciting because it's like everything that you want out of city living. But then there's this other part where it's like you don't want to let go of the nostalgia and what you know Richmond as. Yeah. You know, I love alley surfing, you know, throughout Richmond and cutting, cutting through the alleyways and um that nostalgia of going to house parties and basement shows and all that stuff. And it's like you feel that part of Richmond disappearing. And there's been many different elements of Richmond that have just slowly disappeared throughout the past, you know, even just five years. Um, I think about the 17th Street Farmers Market and how you know you used to just go down there and now they've almost implemented kind of what we're talking about with Carrytown, where they just turned it into walking only, and it sort of like killed the vibe down there.

SPEAKER_01 31:18

It didn't sort of kill the vibe, they completely killed the vibe. Yeah. Like even when they do events down there, it's like you have 6,000 square feet, and like 10% of it is occupied when they do any sort of event down there. Yeah. It's like, what'd you do? You've clearly ruined this part of town. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 31:38

You know, Shaco, we could do a whole three-hour episode on Shaco Bottom.

SPEAKER_01 31:43

We gotta do a special, special announcement or a special episode on Shako Bottom.

SPEAKER_03 31:47

It's always, yeah, the the decades of struggle of Shaco. I mean, it's a tough one, you know, but yeah, like I think of the 17th Street Farmers Market. You think of um even the ups and downs of like the Bird Park area, you think about like all the statues and stuff, like even that whole thing, you know, like Monument Avenue used to be a gem, regardless of all the political stuff. It just used to be beautiful. And now all that's gone. And it just looks like every regular old cobblestone road. There's like nothing. Don't get me wrong, the the homes and the and the real estate is beautiful, but yeah, it doesn't have the same vibe and charm as it used to. And um, you know, again, it's hard to separate the architecture and the design and the scenery and the sculpture from the symbolism of it all. So it's not like I'm saying, oh, bring the monuments back. Like I actually don't really have an opinion on it. I don't really care, but it does, yeah, it just, I don't know, it changes the the face of the city. Yeah. Um, even Scott's Edition is so much different than it used to be. You know, Boulevard, you used to be able to like walk down Boulevard, ride your bike down Boulevard. Now you probably get run over. And dude, the freaking apartment buildings are insane. Yeah. Um I'm just looking at them. Yeah, it's it's this duality of like, man, it's exciting to see the growth and be a part of it and to live in Richmond, to see it change. Because I think we're going through a period where Richmond is changing and it's it's not looking back. Like it's it's never turning back. It's moving into, it's shifting into a whole new vibe. Um, with the Carmax Park thing, like everybody's actually had really good things to say about Carmax Park, which is like very nice to hear because I think people were bummed about the diamond closing down. I think people had a sour taste in their mouth after the amphitheater opened and it like wasn't what everybody thought it would be. I've been there a few times now, and I think it's the amphitheater is actually pretty cool, but I think it took a little while to like get its footing. Um, but it seems like Carmax Park is off to like a nice start. I haven't been. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:46

Have you been? I haven't been, but this just makes me think of something very particular and you know, the nostalgic part of being a Richmonder. And why what is it that makes people uneasy or uncomfortable or untrustworthy or untrusting of when things are new, right? Because like that's something that I've known have known and felt being a native Richmonder my entire life being here is that one, there is a subculture of people like the house shows and people that like old crusty Richmond and you know lived and like thrived in that arena have been completely pushed out by like new developments and growth. Call it growth, and it's most of it is positive. And that that punk nature of Richmond is not gone, but it's not nearly as yeah, I think it'll always be here though. I agree, it'll it'll always be here, but like what is it about this place that makes people look at a at a construction sign and a group of people building an apartment building and be like, ugh, not again. Right. What is that? Like you we talk about how Richmond, and I've heard other people say this, how Richmond is two or three, maybe five years behind a lot of other big cities, including our neighbor, Washington, DC. But when we get something that's similar to what they have, or we attempt things that are similar to other cities, people are extremely skeptical, even like reject the entire idea of it, which is oftentimes why it doesn't happen when it's supposed to, because it gets presented and council members and city council committees will vote against it because it doesn't seem like it's in the best interest of their constituents, yeah, who are in denial or in opposition of like, we don't really do we need a new stadium? The diamond is fine. So yeah, what is that?

SPEAKER_02 35:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:49

Well, and I mean, I would actually argue that we're like 20 plus years behind DC. You know, like if you go to DC, I was just up there a couple months ago and I was on top of the um, I forget the name of the building, but I have a picture from up there. When you're up top in DC, up high, and you look at that whole city. I mean, that's like a mini New York City for real. Yeah. Like it's so packed. There's so much happening, there's so many people that live there. There's a lot going on in DC. You know, there's like there's so much infrastructure there. I mean, it's the capital. Yeah. So like when you compare it to DC, we're far, far behind. But if you compare it to something maybe like Austin or something, you know, it's like we're and Austin's bigger and stuff, and you know, they have a head start, but like that's what I compare it to is like Austin, you know, it's like we're kind of following in the coattails of a city like Austin. And I think a big part of it is the actual history of Richmond. Yeah. I think that Richmond is such a cool place, and what a unique experience it is to like live in a place that really does have history. Because if you go to Seattle, Denver, New York, I mean any big city, right? Any big city, it's kind of like it's been developed, you know, it's been being developed for decades. And yes, there's history to it, but Richmond is one of those places where it's the capital of Virginia, but it's sort of outshined by DC. So it's like we're almost like the the little sister capital or the little brother capital. It's like, yeah, we are the capital, but like people just kind of forget about it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:34

You ask anybody from DC, or you tell them you're from Richmond, and they're like, Where?

SPEAKER_03 37:39

Yeah, yeah. You know, I mean, that's not gonna be the case for too much longer, but um I think it's because there's so much like cool history here, and it's just such a weird, unique place. There's there's almost nowhere that you can compare it to. Like, even Austin is not a good comparison. You know, if you think of these other like big cities, you think of New York, LA, Miami, like it's kind of the same shit, man. It's convertibles and fake tits or whatever, you know.

SPEAKER_01 38:10

It's like that's fair.

SPEAKER_03 38:11

Yeah, you know, and it's like here, it's just a different vibe. It's it's on the river, which is kind of why I compare it to Austin. Um, and it's just old. So I think all the new stuff, there's a part of it that it feels out of place, and it just feels like should this be happening here?

SPEAKER_01 38:31

Um yeah, it's like the inherent conflict.

SPEAKER_03 38:35

Yeah. And I think, like, you know, not to go on too much of a tangent about this same topic that we talk about all the time, but just things are done cheaply now. You know, when you look at all this beautiful architecture, you look at Hollywood Cemetery, you look at the old city hall building, and you look at all the old stuff, and it's unbelievable. And then you see these like cheap, crappy apartment buildings go up. That's like, you know, what do they call it? The four over one or whatever. Yeah. It's just garbage, dude. It's just the same cookie-cutter junk, and it's just lame. Whereas if you go to DC, you know, and you have a friend there that's got a, you know, a pricey condo, you're not walking into some brand new stick-billed apartment building. You're walking into like a big marble building that's been there for 80 years that's been converted into condos and like it has charm and character, and it's like different and cool. So I think people don't like this like hollow feeling of like, all right, don't turn our city into this like capitalistic commercial, empty shell bullshit. So it's like all the old stuff's getting stripped away, all the new stuff is coming in, and people would feel the same way about the Carrytown thing. They'd be like, all right, this is our charming little shopping district, and now you've turned it into a stony point.

SPEAKER_01 39:54

Imagine if they, if to the Carrytown point, if with the improvement of some of the storefronts or some of the offerings of businesses in Carrytown, like different types of stores, things that were uh more along the lines of Blackbird and and just uh you know another level up of quality that there was a remodel or a re like a facelift that made it look more like short or made it look more like Stony Point. You imagine that?

SPEAKER_03 40:22

I mean, I'm not I'm not a protester dude, but I might show up at that protest. Yeah, people lose their goddamn minds like just don't bury my carry. Right.

SPEAKER_01 40:31

And I think, if I'm not mistaken, a large portion of Carrytown is protected by the historical society. There's a lot of property in Richmond specifically that's protected by the historical society, which means if you don't know, uh don't quote me, but that basically means that they cannot tear down the standing structure or supporting beams and structures in the property. So they can clean it up, modernize it to a degree, but they can't change the way that it looks, and they can't tear down any supporting beams or structures in the property.

SPEAKER_03 41:04

And I think they can, but then what happens is you lose your tax credit. Right. Right. So you have huge tax benefits by leaving the historic property, you know, the features of the historic properties in intact.

SPEAKER_01 41:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 41:17

Which is good.

SPEAKER_01 41:18

Now that comes with some give and some take, right? You do keep your tax credit and it does keep the historic look of the building. But just like anything else that's old, you have old building problems. Yeah. Right. So maybe the doors are a little bit weird and they don't fit the way they're supposed to, and they don't close that tightly. And you can't take them out because you'd have to replace the entire front of the building because new doors wouldn't fit in the door frame. They also don't make single pane glass like that anymore. So you have to get new glass. You also have to redo your entryway because now it's not a single door, it's like a double door thing. Yeah, it just the list goes on. So it's sometimes it's just cheaper to not mess with it. But doing that, you do have to deal with you know old building problems.

SPEAKER_03 42:00

Well, Virginia's an old place, man, and there's a lot of really weird old laws here. There are. Did you know that you weren't allowed to have any type of sex other than missionary for a very, very long time, all the way up until 2003?

SPEAKER_01 42:13

You know, I think I actually heard that a while back.

SPEAKER_03 42:15

Yeah, like years ago. So, not to air out our dirty laundry, but we might be criminals on the way.

SPEAKER_01 42:22

I mean, if that's the case, then yeah, we're we're definitely criminals.

SPEAKER_03 42:25

Yeah. Uh yeah. So anything other than missionary in Virginia is illegal. So Virginia had statutes that criminalized certain sexual acts.

SPEAKER_01 42:36

Criminalized? What was what was the punishment for that?

SPEAKER_03 42:39

Okay. Um, I think it was like a hundred bucks and you go to jail. Well, all right. Those are two very drastically different things. I agree, but that's like, I don't know, dude. Um oral sex, illegal. 100 bucks. Anal sex, illegal. Dang. Anything outside of traditional intercourse, illegal. Okay. All the way until 2003. And then finally, the Supreme Court ruled that laws criminalizing private consensual sexual behavior between adults are unconstitutional.

SPEAKER_01 43:19

I swear I heard about this. Like 2003. That's like when I graduated high school. Yeah. I think shortly thereafter I heard somebody talking about these laws. Bro, there's a whole laundry list of them.

SPEAKER_03 43:30

I I believe it. Check it. All right. Public swearing in Virginia was illegal until 2020. So using curse words. Okay. Um, the Virginia law literally grouped profane cursing in the same group as like public drunkenness. Oh, damn. So you could be fined just for swearing in public up until 2020. I dare them to try and find somebody for saying the F-bomb. Uh yeah. Adultery crime. That's till today. Straight to jail. So you cheat on your husband or wife, that's a crime. This you are a criminal.

SPEAKER_01 44:07

This is a PSA, I think, because I didn't know that. And I think we're both old enough to know people that have been through adultery or adultery adjacent. Yes. Adultery adjacent, yes. Yeah. I don't, I'm not, this is not a recommendation or uh anything close to that, but you heard it here first.

SPEAKER_03 44:29

Yeah. Against the law. Yeah, dude, it's illegal. So it is rarely used criminally, but it does show up in divorce cases and can affect outcomes. In Virginia, cheating is illegal. Today, right now. It's actually illegal. It's against the law. Y'all heard it here first. Next one spitting in public. Illegal. Can't even spit on the ground. Still today? So I got I just got the urge to go outside and spit on the ground. I know, I know. But yeah, so this came from early nineteen hundreds public health laws. I don't know if it's still active today, but back when diseases like tuberculosis were spreading, spitting was treated as like a public danger. Um, and somehow that law just never went away. So I think it's still a law today. Here's a good one. Hunting on Sunday. You cannot hunt on Sunday unless you're hunting raccoons. Who hunts raccoons? People in Virginia, because that's all that's allowed.

unknown 45:28

Dang.

SPEAKER_03 45:29

Virginia had strict blue laws, so no hunting on Sundays for religious reasons. But then lawmakers eventually carved out an exception, which is raccoons could still be hunted only until 2 a.m. on Sunday.

SPEAKER_00 45:44

That's so random.

SPEAKER_03 45:46

Yeah. So you can't hunt unless it's raccoons and it's late at night.

SPEAKER_01 45:51

Well, I guess I know what we're doing later.

SPEAKER_03 45:53

Yeah. Yeah. And they'll be like, halt, you're under arrest. And it's like, wow, we have three hours. Yeah. They're like, drop the gun. It's like, I'm hunting raccoons. They're like, oh, no. Sorry, sir.

SPEAKER_00 46:03

So random.

SPEAKER_03 46:04

I'll do I love these crazy laws, man. It's pretty nuts, dude. Um, okay, next one. Having sex without being married. Ooh. Illegal.

SPEAKER_01 46:15

What do we call that? What's that as a word for that? It's like premarital sex.

SPEAKER_03 46:20

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So uh this isn't like a very old law either. This lasted into the 2000s. So it's not an act of law today, but it took a court case to strike it down as unconstitutional, and the law wasn't officially cleaned up until 2020. That's crazy. So Virginia was criminalizing consensual adult relationships well into the 2020s.

SPEAKER_01 46:45

This is why no one wants new apartment buildings.

SPEAKER_03 46:48

Yeah. It's like, dude, I finally get an apartment. I can't even have a sexual encounter inside.

SPEAKER_01 46:55

I can't I can't have a sexual encounter unless I'm married and it has to be missionary.

SPEAKER_03 46:59

Yeah. Lame. I'd rather just go hunt raccoons at two in the morning. Same two. Um, next one, you couldn't even live together if you were not married. That was illegal until 2013 in the state of Virginia.

SPEAKER_01 47:13

That's but no one's these are laws that are like no one is enforcing, right? I mean, I don't know. But they're real laws. Yeah. So if somebody was squirrely enough and knew about them, they could bring it up in a court case.

SPEAKER_03 47:26

Yeah. Yeah. So these laws targeted couples that were cohabitating in a way that was seen as immoral. So two adults living together without being married could be committing a crime all the way up until 2013. Immoral. That's not, those are just roommates that like took a noodle. I don't see anything wrong with that. Insert the vine that says, and they were roommates. You ever seen that? I haven't seen that. Like a funny little viral video. That's a throwback, Vine. Yeah, dude. Vine. It's a good time. Okay, we got a couple more. Banned. Kids were banned from trick-or-treating. What? Until when? Some of them still are.

SPEAKER_01 48:07

I don't know. Wait, okay, okay.

SPEAKER_03 48:08

So in Newport News, if you're over 12 years old, trick-or-treating can get you a criminal charge.

SPEAKER_01 48:15

I have so many questions.

SPEAKER_03 48:17

Yeah. Uh there are like so even in many other cities throughout Virginia, there were curfews, like no trick-or-treating after 8 p.m.

SPEAKER_01 48:26

That's insane.

SPEAKER_03 48:28

Yeah. But some of them are still active today. So Newport News in particular, if you are over 12 years old, you cannot go trick-or-treating. Illegal.

SPEAKER_01 48:37

That's that's crazy. Yeah. I remember going trick-or-treating. I'm pretty sure I was at least 12. Yeah. First, and then how straight to jail. And of course, yeah, there's a there's no way you can enforce that. Somebody has to report you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:55

Yeah. Okay. That's wild.

SPEAKER_03 48:58

You must honk when passing another car. What? Yeah. So I think this is a pretty old one. The law said that the slower driver had to move over when given the signal, like a horn or flashing lights. Yeah. Because no one hooks their horn nowadays. Yeah. Um, and nobody gets over, right? Because people are just like surfing Instagram while they're driving.

SPEAKER_01 49:22

Doing their makeup, reading a book.

SPEAKER_03 49:23

Yeah, it's it's in it's insane. It's crazy. Uh, but that, and I don't know if that's an act of law today, but like, yeah, I mean, I guess it is. It's like you have to get over. Like, that's the law, right? But you were able to give somebody a signal like, hey, time to get over. And I'll be totally honest, bro. I do that today. I do it all the time. If I get up some behind somebody and they're not getting over, I'm not, I don't get crazy with it and I don't get pissed. I'm just like, honk honk, time to move. Time to go. I chief says get over.

SPEAKER_01 49:50

I I like the horn, but I don't do it because I know that using the horn as a tool isn't something that Virginians are familiar with. Yeah. Right? That's a that's a New York thing for sure. It's a bigger city thing. I'm from New York. Okay. I was born in New York. So you go to any, you go to DC, right? If you're in the way and you're like paying that, you're not paying attention, or you know, you're looking over there and traffic's moving, beep, beep, beep. Yeah. It's friendly. It's not an aggressive thing. Yeah, it's like beep, beep. Yeah. Like, you know, if you get out of the way. Yeah. But in Richmond, if you even breathe on your horn, somebody is liable to stop, get out of their car, and try to fight you.

SPEAKER_02 50:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:30

That's why I do it.

SPEAKER_03 50:31

Because I'm like, I'm bored, dude. I need something to do. Let's let's I'm just like beep beep. Let's get a brawl on the sidewalk. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go, man. It gives me something to do. It keeps my life exciting. Yeah. You know, a little sidewalk tussle. I get it, man. Sometimes it's just I could use, you know, like every now and then it's like you just want to get scraped up or get in a little tussle or something.

SPEAKER_01 50:51

You know, I gotta have some stories to tell the kids.

SPEAKER_03 50:53

Yeah. You know, it's like nothing's going on, man. We need stuff going on. Gotta keep it exciting. Yeah. All right. So here's some crazy ones. Um, interracial marriage was illegal until 1967. Shocker. Yep. So Virginia had strict racial classification laws. So even defining what counted as white or black, this led to Loving vs. Virginia, where the Supreme Court struck it down. And what's wild is how recent that really is, if you really think about it. Like that's not even one lifetime ago. You know. The other one, this is the craziest one. Forced sterilization was legal.

SPEAKER_01 51:30

For men or for women. I guess I'm gonna assume that's for men.

SPEAKER_03 51:34

Yeah, I think it was for men. So forced sterilization was legal in the state of Virginia. They allowed the state to sterilize people that were deemed unfit. Jeez. This was upheld in the court case Buck versus Bell, one of the most controversial court case rulings ever. Um, it was government policy backed by the courts in the state of Virginia. So they were like, yeah, we don't like you or you look unfit.

unknown 51:58

Whoopah.

SPEAKER_03 51:58

Just slop it off. I guess.

SPEAKER_01 52:01

I mean, I don't know what they really assumed it was more discreet than that, but still it's insane.

SPEAKER_03 52:06

Pretty crazy.

SPEAKER_01 52:07

It's pretty nuts, bro.

SPEAKER_03 52:08

Yeah. So Virginia has had some very, very crazy laws and legal standings throughout the years.

SPEAKER_01 52:16

That's very true. Well, you know, there are a couple of new laws. Speaking of old laws, there are a couple of new laws or laws that are being modified that I think are in line with Virginia and Richmond's new progressive attitude, if you will. The first one is remember how we talked about that percentage of alcohol to food sales that restaurants and bars needed to abide by to stay afloat. Yep. Well, they are reducing the amount of food that you have to sell in comparison to the amount of alcohol that you need to pass the ABC mandate, which is, I think, a huge step. It makes it really beneficial and helpful for smaller restaurants and bars to succeed. Because that was like the biggest hurdle. If you're a small bar, you can only sell but so much food. If you don't have a big kitchen, you can't even really make a lot of food. So the bulk of their sales would likely come from selling drinks. Somewhere like think about the Jasper, for instance. Yeah. Jasper, if they were not attached to Carrytown Cupcakes, which is how their food distribution breaks down. If there was a standalone restaurant, it could not just be a bar. Yeah. They'd have to sell more food.

SPEAKER_02 53:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 53:33

And being a cocktail bar, meaning they're only open at night and serving high tickets, a high dollar amount alcoholic beverages and craft cocktails, they would have a really hard time keeping up with that balance. Yeah. So now it's lower and it's really geared toward those smaller bars and restaurants.

SPEAKER_03 53:53

And I mean, you know, like you and I don't drink. And as much as I'm not a fan of like, you know, getting obliterated and destroying your brain with alcohol, at the same time, I agree. I do think it's a good thing for the city because what it makes me think about is it makes me think about the times that I've been to places like Baltimore. And you go and you go to a comedy show or you go and you know, you go out to a concert or something, and then afterwards, you're like, oh, I want to go somewhere cool. And they have all of these cool like speakeasies and dueling piano bars and all this stuff. And those places like don't serve food. Right. And the only reason they exist is because they don't have laws like that there. And so you have all these like really cool, unique experiences that you can go and have because there's not laws like that that are stopping them. And yeah, it just opens the door for more cool, unique, fun concepts in Richmond, which is just like awesome. You know, you can find a place where yeah, you go in and it is a little like late night jazz bar, like Goldwing. Like Goldwing is sweet. You know, imagine more and more places like that kind of popping up to where you can go do a cool craft, you know, cocktail or like it's just a different vibe. Yeah. And it fits a lot of the conversations that we've had about like third spaces, where it's like, yeah, maybe I'm not here to get drunk. Maybe I'm not here to eat food, but it's like I just want a place to like hang out and do something. And it allows a business that does have that model to be open. 100%. Yeah, definitely a good thing for the city.

SPEAKER_01 55:15

Big fan. So Virginia passed a new law that loosens states' long-standing food to alcohol sales, rules for restaurants with mixed beverage licenses. Previously, most places had to make at least 45% of their sales from food, which made it harder for bars focused, bar-focused spots to operate legally. Under the new system, higher volume restaurants may no longer have to meet the food to alcohol ratio. Mid-sized restaurants may only have to need 30% food sales, and some smaller venues with limited seating may only qualify for the lower 30% requirement.

SPEAKER_03 55:51

Which is kind of crazy to even think about. 45% in food. Because, like, bro, that doesn't even logically make sense. Because, like, let's say you have a meal, right? It's like, okay, let's say I order a hamburger with french fries. Am I just gonna have one beer? Like, the answer is no. I'm probably gonna have two, maybe even three. Now, imagine I'm sitting there hanging out with friends. So I have a meal and then I'm hanging out for an additional hour and a half with friends. I'm gonna have multiple drinks. So the volume of drinks is way higher, right? So, how on earth does it make sense with the price of drinks these days that 45% of your revenue is going to be food? That just logically doesn't make any sense. It doesn't. That is a great example of an outdated law that needs to go.

SPEAKER_01 56:37

100% ridiculous. I'm stoked on it. I'm really excited to see where restaurateurs and bar owners take this because you know, places like Goldwing and the new spot Brooklyn in Scots Edition are, and then take about think about the Jasper. Like the Jasper is the first, I think, example of what is that? What is Brooklyn? Brooklyn. It's a cocktail bar and a restaurant in Scott's edition. Oh, cool. It's a block up, half a block up from Pinky's in Scots. Oh, nice. Yeah, super news by the same people that own the Jasper. Oh, okay. Actually, I I may be wrong about that. It might be the same people as Lost Letter and Lillian. Oh, okay. I think it's Lost Letter and Lillian folks because they're in the same vicinity. Nice. But the Jasper, for instance, is the first place that I can recall that was geared only towards people that wanted a drink. The way that they were able to get around that was because they also owned and were shared a kitchen with Carry Town Cupcakes, which means their business license was the same. Right. So that their food sales from the cupcakes contributed to the percentage of food to alcohol.

SPEAKER_02 57:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 57:49

So with these new restrictions and these loosening percentages, I'm interested to see what you know what businesses pop up and what creative ways they're they're able to use that to their advantage.

SPEAKER_03 58:01

Well, you know, I think the frustrating thing. I am too. And I think like the frustrating thing is like, oh, all these strict laws for restaurants and local businesses, meanwhile, like the administration and the bureaucracy of the city basically just does whatever they want. You know, it's like, oh yeah, you have to follow these rules. Yeah. Rules for the not for me. Yeah. You know, and like, yeah, it's annoying, dude. You know, we just posted this video about the mayor using AI, you know, which is whatever. It's kind of crazy. But then the more you dig into some of this stuff, it's nuts, man. Like, you see, you know, here's the thing about becoming a big city is it's much harder to kind of hide all the sketchy shit that people do. Did you see all these text messages where they're just clearly coordinating and literally creating propaganda so that the city wants, you know, they want people to think that everyone's excited about the flock cameras and it's all just manufactured garbage. Like literally, there's these screenshots of text messages amongst these politicians, like sitting members of bureaucracy, where they're saying, hey guys, thinking about some of the media requests we're getting about Flock, it makes me think we're gonna need to do a full court press on telling stories about where the technology has helped us. Chief, you and I talk about it regularly and we may be doing it, but I think we need to start trying to saturate the public narrative with stories where real-time crime, LPR, gunshot detection, et cetera, have changed the outcome. Right. And you might think like, okay, yeah, this is just normal banter, but it's like, dude, the dominating narrative around the flock cameras is that people don't like them. No thanks. We're not interested. There's really no meaningful statistics showing that there's like a huge change in crime, right? Like they're using it as a pass to do these like pre-emptive stopping crime is like what they want, you know? And dude, they've used it to open the door. I mean, I don't know if you've noticed, but even on the highway now, like all the tolls are being redone. Yeah, all these bright lights are going in. And it's like, bro, in the state of Virginia, like now you're gonna be driving through these things, and it's like, yeah, you got this awesome biometric scan of your face. And some people have this opinion of, like, well, if you're not doing anything wrong, and it's like, okay, that's not really the point. So it's like, okay, so we should all agree that the government can just proactively like what's the word, infringe upon your privacy just to check and make sure that you're not breaking the law. And it's like, yeah, the answer to that should be no. Right. Like, I don't live to serve the government, the government lives to serve me. Right. And that is the whole function of why it exists. It's the whole, it's the whole founding of this country and how it operates. But yeah, anyway, before I go on a whole tangent, but it's just it's just crazy that like they try to do this stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:53

Well, we don't want you to go on a tangent.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:55

All right, dude.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:55

Never then.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:56

We could never have that. I mean, it's all over Instagram too, though. You know, it's yeah, that's kind of crazy. The text messages is like, how do they find the text messages? Yeah. Well, dude, I mean, tech show Richmond officials planning to saturate the public narrative with positive flock camera stories. They're doing this because they want to take a portion of the city and turn it into these like who posted that? Uh, so this is DSA Richmond.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:20

Okay. How do they get a handle or get a picture of the text messages?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:23

So this is Danny Avola's press secretary, Mira Singer. So Signer.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:29

So think about what you just said. The press secretary leaked text messages?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:35

Maybe. Was it on purpose? Maybe.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:40

This is, I mean, this is a text from her to the mayor. Danny, I have some homework for you via Flock. Ask the chief for some good in all capital letters, some good, convincing stories about how they've used the flock license plate reader technology. This isn't urgent, but soon. Keep in your back pocket. But also, I'd love to hear the stories. Kelsey, maybe best to do this next time he and the chief are in public safety meeting. Maybe it is leaked intentionally. I mean, I don't know. I doubt it. But the thing is, like, you know what's crazy? Is um the city goes out of their way to block all these FOIA requests to like not release public available documentation that should be available for anybody to request and look at. But then there was a FOIA request for Mayor Avula's Chat GPT history, and the city actually abided by it. And they gave his entire ChatGPT history to the public. And bro, some of the stuff he puts in there is crazy. Like he's basically asking ChatGPT how to like psychologically manipulate his audience, you know? Um, he's like, dude, I think like on 15 different occasions, he asked ChatGPT, hey, can you make this sound more like more like Mayor Danny Avula? Which I just think is hilarious.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:57

Okay. So because I was curious, I just Googled the definition of what a press secretary does. Press secretary for the state of Virginia, within state agencies, the government office of Virginia State Police, serves as the primary spokesperson managing media relations, crafting public statements, and organizing press events. Key duties include issuing news releases, coordinating media coverage, responding to inquiries, and managing crisis communication that shape the public perception of the state's policies and organizations. Yeah. Calls coming from inside the house.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:34

Yeah, for sure. I mean, here's this text about uh I guess the chief, I don't know what chief means, but like Chief Rick Edwards, he like isn't aware of the legal ramifications of the deadlines for the deletion of the data that's recorded onto these flock cameras. So it's uh that somebody asked him, hey, so after we destroy the flock data after 21 days, is it also erased from Flock's database or do they hold on to it? And he's like, I don't know. I believe they delete full after 30 days. Let me check. You know, but this is like the whole it's crazy, dude.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:08

Yeah, that's the police chief, by the way.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:09

We are soon go okay, got it. We are soon, dude, and yeah, don't even get me started on that. Because even the way that, you know, after there was that shooting in Shaka Bottom where those people were killed like a couple months ago, the way that he spoke about the flock thing was very like it's reading a script. Yeah, very like specific the way that he words stuff around that. Yeah, because they want you to think that this is a good thing. And so it's sad because it's like, yeah, they're using the loss of life as a pass to further their agenda. So it's like that's the perfect opportunity for them to jump on and say, see, this is what could have prevented this and and whatever else. And it's like, I don't know about that, dude. Yeah. So he says, We're soon gonna put out the hit and run fatal media release. We will highlight the importance of the cameras and flock. The cameras were helpful, but it would not have led to an arrest without Flock. It's like, dude, you can't say that. It's like, what are you talking about? You're using technology to replace your job. You're saying there wouldn't have been an arrest. It's like, first of all, you wouldn't, we would never know that. It's easy to just say that that's the case. It's like, yeah, but you're just gonna do less of your detective work because now you're relying on technology. Right. And that's the whole, that's what it's always been, dude. It's it's been safety and protection, protection in exchange for loss of privacy. Right. That's always what it's been. It's been that way since 2001, since we were kids, and 9-11 happened.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:31

It's interesting that all of this is happening alongside all of the stuff like these, like the development, like the the improvement of city property. That just makes me picture and and envision this whole grand plan for moving or forcing Richmond into the quote unquote the future.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:58

Because, like you mentioned earlier, I said five years behind DC, you're saying more like 20 years. What this seems like is a poor attempt at trying to force Richmond into a future that it's not ready for from the top down.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:14

Infrastructure, government policy, privacy, security. It's just it's interesting.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:25

Fortunately, it doesn't directly affect me right now, but it's very much it's very likely that it will in the very near future.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:32

Well, I mean, I'll tell you something interesting, like the way that technology brings race into things in a biased way, right? Because technology is just a computer, right? And so what it does is it just uses statistics and numbers, whether they're fair or not, right? Whether it's a fair assessment of something or someone or not, right? So the city and the government already knows. That if they use technology, what's going to happen is that these cameras are going to be taking pictures of tens of thousands of citizens and that it's going to categorize them because that's what a database is. It's going to say, okay, this is this person's race based on this picture. This is their license plate. This is their criminal record. This is approximately their age. This is their hair color. This is this. This is all the information we have about them. Oh, they drive this type of vehicle, and this type of vehicle is more likely to be associated with a criminal record and whatever. So they're going to have a big database of all these things. And who does that hurt? It hurts low-income people, it hurts minorities, it hurts people that are more susceptible to those types of things and that are often treated unfavorable by the law. So then when that happens, what does the what do the police go and do? They try to get ahead of it. And so there's even screenshots of where they know this. So they're trying to get certain minority groups on their side before they release this on the public. Yeah. So the chief goes and meets with the NAACP to say, hey, we're doing this great thing. Like uh we want to introduce Flock and it's going to help and it's going to do all these things. One, it's actually probably going to hurt those particular minorities. Yeah. So he goes and meets with the Richmond NAACP. And then he's in a text message here saying, Had a conversation with the Richmond NAACP about Flock. I'm not sure if they're ready to be publicly supportive, but they're planning on coming to city council and having a public safety meeting. I'm sharing this article with them. And then he's trying to share articles created by Flock, right? So it's not some third-party study. It's not some independent study. He's using the company, the for-profit company that makes the technology and then giving that information to the NAACP to say, hey, look at all this great information that shows how great Flock is. It's like, oh, well, where'd that come from? Well, it came from Flock. That's like, dude, it's like Coca-Cola saying, hey, try our soda. It's fantastic. It's like, well, yeah, that's because you made it. That's why you're saying that. Corruption at the highest level. Yeah. You know, so it's like you say, like, oh, it doesn't affect me, but it's like, I don't know, you know, I don't know. It's like you're a young black male, and it's like now you have these cameras that are making assumptions potentially about you based on your skin color and you're the car that you drive and what you look like, without any sort of human rationale involved in the process. So you've got these cops that are saying, like, oh, this is this is uh this we would not have been able to solve this without this technology. It's like, well, actually, if you use human intuition and your skills and your talents and your detective work and your actual job, like has like what's been done for decades, if not hundreds of years, yes, maybe you would be able to solve this. But the easy thing to do is to say, oh, well, actually, we're just taking millions of dollars in taxpayer funding and all these grants and all this lobbying money because people want to install technology in a new upcoming smart city like Richmond because all the money's here. Yeah, it's not in these big other cities. Like we are a big up and coming city, so all the opportunity is here. So all these big tech companies want to get up in here and get all their tech in the mix and say, oh wow, we just landed a huge multi-million dollar contract with the city of Richmond. So we're gonna get in and have meetings with the mayor and fucking meet with the chief of police and get all this stuff in here. So anyway, I said I wasn't gonna go on a rant and a- There we go. We got a rant. But you see what I'm saying, right? So it's like, oh, on the surface, like, oh yeah, it's just like technology to make the city safer. No, it's not. It's an inside job. People are in this for money, dude. And brings me to my next topic, which is money laundering in the city of Richmond. So uh I knew corruption was bad in the city, but really? Recent audits and investigations have uncovered significant corruption, waste, and abuse in Richmond, Virginia, involving millions of dollars in employee credit card misuse, fraud in the election office, and fraudulent invoices from city contractors. Over $5 million in questionable transactions was identified, highlighting weak controls. This is not just like a Reddit article. This is directly from um ABC8 News. So their investigative reporters and journalists dug into all this stuff. And the key Richmond government corruption cases that were found in 2024 and 2025 were the PE card program misspending. So a 2025 audit found that employees misspent millions of dollars in city taxpayer funds with $5 million in questionable transactions involving everything from potential conflicts of interest, bribery, and misuse of apps like Venmo, where employees were just sending themselves money on Venmo, literally just stealing taxpayers, me and you stealing our money that we're paying in taxes and just sending them to themselves. And I'm not gonna name her, but I have a friend that works at the Department of Transportation. And she was like, Yeah, we literally, and she's talking about these cards. And she was telling me this like a year ago or two years ago. She was like, Yeah, we literally just have these city cards and like we just buy Starbucks and donuts and like dinner and whatever we want on them. And I was like, What? I remember thinking, like, and nobody like checks these. And she's like, No, they're literally just like an endless spending card. We just do whatever we want with them. What? I'm like, what the hell? And I thought that was so crazy. And yeah, here it is. Another one is the election office fraud, right? So top election officials committed fraud and wasted nearly $500,000 and broke multiple city policies. Former city council candidate Tavaras Floyd was indicted on felony charges for submitting false campaign finance reports. Now, this happens in every city. This happens in every city, but it's like we see all this, oh, all this big stuff happening. It's like, dude, a lot of this stuff is like not going by the books. People are very interested in what's happening here and they want part of that money, you know, and it's these big tech contracts, like there's just crazy stuff going on, dude.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:45

Yeah, well damn.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:48

Okay. Not good. Um I'm moving. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:53

I'm moving, I'm moving to uh Nebraska.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:56

I mean, it does kind of come full circle to what we're talking about about why do people feel like they love it and hate it at the same time. Right. I think it is like the natural cycle of like the urban to suburban living. I think when you're young, you some, you know, some kids grow up in the city for sure. But you know, you grow up in the suburbs, then as an adult, you're like, dude, I want to be where things are happening. So then you move to the city and then you get pushed out of the city and you grow out of it, and there's a new generation coming up. And maybe this is the result of the iPad generation. Who knows? You know?

SPEAKER_01 1:13:28

Who knows, dude? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:29

And then there's you and I getting older, and it's like, huh, I actually don't recognize this place anymore. Yeah. And it's like, well, it's been a fun run, and I did love being a part of it, but maybe I'm just gonna buy a castle in Ireland and call it a day. That sounds good to me, dude.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:43

See what I'm saying? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:44

I think there is a point in which we all get to a period of time where we've I don't want to say just had enough, but yeah, you've had your fill of stories like this, city corruption, so on and so forth, whether it affects you directly, indirectly, or not, and the frustrations, although that do they do come hand in hand with some of the joys and the benefits of living in a city, any city, pick a city, it's just it's the same everywhere. This is just Richmond's version of it. And then yeah, you're like, you know what? I think I'd rather spend half as much on a house in Chesterfield than I do on my one-bedroom apartment with one parking space, buy another car, travel, spend a week in Iceland, and then accidentally buy a house there. Yeah. That's yeah that that's what happens when you retire, call it retiring from living downtown. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:46

You know, and yeah, maybe uh there are definitely people who just ride out their days in the city and they just love it. It's just who they are.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:55

Well, you've seen those people, they're usually sitting at the end of the bar grizzled and angry. Yeah. Those are the people that live here and stay living in this the downtown area.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:06

Yeah. Well, I think you know, it's easy to be doom and gloom, and like it's always 50-50. It's like there's amazing things happening, and there's crazy things happening.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:14

There is there is definitely amazing things happening. And my last little bit about one more pretty cool change to our our laws and our legal system is that psilocybin mushrooms might be legal very soon.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:29

All right. Yeah. Well, you know, leave it up to the government to like hop on a trend, see something happening, and they're like, oh, hold on. People are doing this and making money and doing this. We need to get in this, we need to take over, we need to regulate it, and then we need to make all the money.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:44

Which is fine because it does benefit some people here. And I think you and I both are on the same page. Mushrooms are awesome.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:54

Whether you're into drugs or you just need a little mental psychological stimulation, you want to help, you know, you need help with PTSD. There are a myriad of things that psychedelics can do, whether it's entertainment, pleasure, or health and wellness. We're all we are familiar with all of those things. So I think any step in that direction is going to be a good thing.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:16

Yeah, you know, and like the word drugs, right? It's like when I think of drugs, you think of like, yeah, if somebody's sitting in a Walmart parking lot huffing nitrous oxide, you might be like, Yeah, that person's on drugs. Or somebody like smoking meth or cracking an alleyway, you're like, Yeah, that person's on drugs. Yeah. Um, or if somebody, even cocaine, like, you know, in the 80s, cocaine used to just be cocaine. Now it's like, oh, get some laxative and some fentanyl with like a little bit of cocaine in it. Um, and so when you talk about like tobacco, weed, mushrooms, those aren't drugs, dude. Those are just like confusing plants.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:53

Seriously.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:54

That's really all it is. Yeah, it's like, but same thing. Government gets involved, big tobacco and corporations get involved, and they're like, oh, what a great little thing. Let's make it more addictive. Let's regulate it, let's up the prices, let's put it in stores, let's charge people to get a license for it. Let's get involved in the medicinal community and make sure that the MDs get a hold of it. And then now you got to get a license and go wait in line and show your card. You got to renew it every year. Of course. Now you can get your psilocybin mushrooms. Of course. It's like, bro, I was just picking these in the woods 20 years ago. Like, what is this about? And it is. So it's, and you you already know me. I'm so I'm like, yes, I see the corruption in it, but I do agree. It's also a great thing because it takes something that previously could have gotten people in trouble, which that's what I have a problem with, is nobody should be in trouble for eating a mushroom. Like, it's ridiculous. It's like, anyway. Um, but taking it and saying, okay, we are gonna regulate this, we're gonna make it safe, we're gonna make it more accessible to people that want to use it for anxiety and things like that. I do think that's a great thing. And I do think that's super cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:55

I agree. So lawmakers are clearing the way for the use of psychedelic mushroom compound, psilocybin as potential medical treatment once a formulation is approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Senate Bill 379 directs the state board of pharmacy to reschedule psilocybin consistent with the federal scheduling as soon as the FDA approves a formulation to be utilized in the medical setting. The bill does not address decriminalization and is specified for a clinical setting according to the bill's sponsor, Senator Janet Boisko D. Herndon. That's a long name. Um psychedelics, including psilocybin, are Schedule I substance defined as drugs that uh no accepted medical use and a hypertension for abuse according to the FDA. Drugs with the schedule may not be prescribed, dispensed, or administered, but this bill is supposed to ease that if the FDA finds a formulation or a combination of a compound, including psilocybin, that they can declassify it as schedule one or reduce the schedule of it.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:05

Question for the court please explain the abuse, please explain the crime.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:10

Yeah, I read that and I don't think you can.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:15

This isn't and I this is why I think these types of movements, however late and overdue, are still very important. We would argue the benefits versus the inherent or whatever you want to classify it as situation or schedule in the positive, by leaps and bounds, and like by fucking yards is there a positive influence on someone's life. Now, I don't know when it was classified as a Schedule I substance, but I would imagine a long time ago when people had very little understanding of what it was actually doing, and then you could just lump it in with things like cocaine or heroin or crack.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:59

And basically the definition is it doesn't have any medical use and you can't it can't be prescribed and it alters your mental state illegal. Yeah. That's basically what you do, you just slap an illegal banner on it, and you're like, Well, you shouldn't have this because there's really no need for it. It doesn't do anything for you that we can measure, and we can't give it to you in a doctor's office, so you can't have it.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:22

Well, our brain sits in what's called the default mode network. Yep. And essentially we have these neurons that fire in our brain, and you can think of it as they create grooves in our brain. So you build your habits and your beliefs and your patterns of thinking. And just saying, the government wants you to stick to exactly that. They're like, hey, don't do drugs, don't do anything that we tell you not to do. Go to school, go to college, get alone, be in debt, work for the rest of your life, and then die. And then we'll bury you around the corner. And that's their family.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:53

Pay us to use a plot of land on your dead body.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:55

And when you take mushrooms, they alter the default mode network and you start thinking outside of those neurons, right? And you have you start to fire different pathways, you start to think a little bit differently. And that's not in the nature of bureaucracy and a system and you know all that stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:09

So they don't want you to think at all. They just want you to subscribe, yeah, pay your monthly fee, and then die.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:15

Thinking is illegal, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:18

Along with missionary. Well, I don't know about you, but along with missionary. Uh, I might do some mushrooms this weekend. Yeah, dude. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:29

I feel like I'm on mushrooms right now. So I think I just think I just haven't eaten all day. But um, that sounds great, dude. That sounds great. This weekend's a good one. The following weekend or two weeks from now is River Rock. So that's coming up. We'll see everybody at River Rock. That'll be cool. I'm gonna do some trail running. We'll probably be there bopping around, having fun. Yeah, lots of cool stuff coming up, man. Good, good uh 2026 Richmond summer is is well on the way. Could not have waited any longer.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:56

I'm glad it's here. This podcast was recorded at Vera House Studios in Richmond, Virginia, and produced by Perry Young and Mike Metzger.