The Jefferson Journal
Commentary
Weeks after the release of the “Special Review of the U.S. Route 460 Corridor Improvements Project,” submitted last month to Transportation Secretary Aubrey Layne, important questions remain about how the Commonwealth could have paid $250 million to US Mobility Partners, the design-build contractor on the $1.4 billion project, and run up...
Ten years ago Virginia started down the road of lifting the federal government’s moratorium on offshore drilling. Late last week, the Obama Administration announced it was going to allow seismic testing off the Atlantic coast so that energy companies could use updated technology to determine just how much oil and...
Cover crops, Virginia says, “…comes at considerable expense to agricultural producers…” Virginia’s WIP (Watershed Implementation Plan) wants cover crops on 10% of available cropland. Financial incentive programs will be available. Virginia’s WIP claims there are approximately 27,000 farms in Virginia managing approximately 1.5 million cattle. Virginia officials state “Achieving livestock...
State DOT’s are planning cutbacks in various projects as the Federal Highway Administration begins reducing reimbursement payments next month to a level that can be sustained by existing federal highway funding sources. Just to cover existing contractual obligations through Dec. 31st of this year would require an additional $8 billion,...
The national labor market continues to slowly improve, but so many people with work experience are still seeking jobs. This is making it another tough summer for high school and college students who want to work as well as new college graduates entering the workforce. Making matters worse, the mounting...
Have the Culture Wars peaked? Is the national debate over God, Gays and Guns on the downward slide? Michael Lind, a conservative thinker and co-founder of The New America Foundation, thinks the end is foreseeable. Just as the Civil War didn’t end after Gettysburg — the Confederate states still had a...
The recent state court ruling that the Opportunity Educational Institution (OEI) is a violation of the Virginia Constitution leaves thousands of Virginia schoolchildren consigned to schools with decades-long records of failure. It’s a missed opportunity, but one that can and should be corrected next year. Here’s one way.
... When crime rates began rising in the 1960’s and too many Americans felt unsafe walking in their neighborhoods, the idea of putting more people in prison — and keeping them there longer — made sense. For the next three decades, our nation did just that, as public unease propelled lawmakers...
(The Jefferson Policy Journal ran a column on June 19, 2014 highlighting the positive aspects of how Indiana has expanded Medicaid, This column offers another perspective.) It is time to stop, take a breath and ask some basic questions about health care: Do we want to see greater government control...
(George Allen wrote a column run by the Jefferson Policy Journal on June 5, 2014 and this column by Tim Carney offers the other side of this debate.) Subsidizing exports benefits the subsidized exporters. That doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. This summer and fall, we’ll see a serious debate...