Category: Harrisonburg Issues
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New solid waste management fee is latest ripple effect of changes to recycling industry
With no good solution in sight to the challenges that have faced Harrisonburg’s – and pretty much every other community’s – recycling program, the city will enact a new solid waste management fee structure effective Jan. 1, 2021. For many city residents, it will actually result in modestly lower payments, with the current $15-per-month solid waste management fee falling to $11 per month.
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Council approves plan to spread CARES Act funds, bans most gatherings of more than 50 people
The $4.6 million in federal CARES Act funding will go toward paying for school technology, personal protective equipment and facility cleaning, as well as providing assistance for businesses and the city’s housing insecure population. The Harrisonburg City Council voted unanimously on Tuesday to approve that spending plan and then to implement a 60-day ban on many large gatherings in time for the return of college students to town.
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What’s in a name? When it comes to Hburg streets, it’s sometimes hard to tell
The city council on Tuesday will review street naming policies. As for existing streets, efforts to rename them aren’t on the council’s agenda. And a closer look at the history of those names shows more mystery than certainty thanks to a lack of official record-keeping and a hodge-podge of ways Harrisonburg streets were named in the past.
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After relocating and amid a pandemic, there is ‘Hope’
Mehretu Tekle dreamed of opening Hope Eritrean and Ethiopian Restaurant as a place of unity for the Harrisonburg community, where people could enjoy music and authentic food from the eastern African nations. All that was about to become a reality, but the COVID-19 pandemic put at least part of Tekle’s dream on hold.
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JMU’s class of 2020 balances disappointment with hope after graduation was postponed — twice
Today was supposed to be the start of the pandemic-delayed graduation ceremony for JMU’s class of 2020. But after months of anxiously and eagerly waiting, JMU 2020 seniors learned through a July 6 email that the rescheduled Aug.7-8 ceremony would be delayed. Again.
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United Way releases new ALICE Report, into COVID’s shadow
According to the United Way’s just-released 2020 ALICE Report, 61% of households in Harrisonburg struggle to make ends meet. While that represents a 4% drop from the first ALICE report, published in 2017, it does not factor in the pandemic’s effects. In any case, Harrisonburg still has one of the highest rates of ALICE households in Virginia.
Resource officers to stay in Hburg schools this year — but with a more limited role
The five police officers stationed in Harrisonburg City Public Schools will be charged with focusing only on protecting schools and the people in them as opposed to monitoring student culture or “morality” this academic year, as the division works to revise its memorandum of understanding with the Harrisonburg Police Department.
