Category: Harrisonburg Issues
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Data shows police use-of-force encounters are rare but disproportionately involve black people
Over the course of two years, 9,587 people were arrested in Harrisonburg, and during that time 86 encounters involved use of force— amounting to less than 1% of the arrest totals. But the confrontations in which an officer used force beyond handcuffing a person disproportionately involved black people, according to arrest and use-of-force data the Harrisonburg Police Department released Friday.
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‘It’s like putting Band-Aids on a broken house’
Even after Harrisonburg’s police chief has spent much of the nearly two years in the job reviewing and implementing department policies, the efforts haven’t prevented black JMU students from fearing the police.
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Facing $6m budget hit, city council makes cuts to education, public safety and public works
The city of Harrisonburg expects to take a hit of about $6 million in the next fiscal year that begins July 1, mostly in lost revenue from local taxes as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, the Harrisonburg City Council unanimously approved an amended budget that reduces spending for schools, public safety and public works.
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For local artists, pandemic has created struggles but also a ‘coronaissance’
Local rapper Gabriel Curry started using the term “coronaissance” as a joke term with friends as a way to describe the effect that the global pandemic was having on local art and culture. But it soon became apparent it was more than a joke. Something was happening.
Local high schools’ class of 2020 get their diplomas to go
About 1,300 local students graduated over the last several days, with Harrisonburg High School seniors receiving their diplomas one at a time in a near empty football field and county grads celebrating in front of a sea of cars at the Rockingham County Fairgrounds.
Two months into its online ordering approach, farmers market vendors are still adjusting
Since shifting to an online ordering system for its weekly Saturday markets, the Harrisonburg Farmers Market vendors have faced new challenges. Some have opted out of participating and many of those that haven’t, have experienced slower business than a normal June.
‘We are going to make a change.’ Efforts toward racial justice take shape across Harrisonburg
A silent crowd marched through downtown Harrisonburg with a single voice on Monday. Hands pointed skyward in unison at a community prayer event earlier that evening. And hundreds more gathered Wednesday evening in an online town hall to hear calls to action. Racial justice advocates across Harrisonburg — all of different races, ethnicities and ages — have mobilized peacefully and en masse in the past week. They have employed a variety of tactics to protest systemic racism and police brutality, to pay respects to George Floyd and other black Americans killed by police and to call for change.
City schools begin bracing for a new year of online and in-person teaching and learning
Superintendent Michael Richards told the School Board Tuesday that the city schools might rely on a hybrid system of remote and in-person learning in the fall, but school officials are waiting for the state to release guidelines for reopening schools.
