The week’s top stories
-The inevitable whir of data center discourse has reached the city of Fredericksburg. Joey LoMonaco reported on a pre-application filed by Penzance, a development firm that is eyeing a data center campus near Cowan Boulevard.
-A tornado tore through the gated community of Lake Caroline Thursday night, damaging 30 homes and leaving seven uninhabitable, writes Taft Coghill Jr.
-Fredericksburg’s new (transitioning) elementary school will bear the name of Gladys West, a “hidden figure” and pioneer in the field of GPS.
-When FOODE moved into its current home on Princess Anne Street, founding partner Joy Crump went to great lengths to preserve the layout of the 1819 building. A $50,000 grant should help with that, writes Noelle Clark.
-Break out the books and put away the cell phones. School is back in session across the Fredericksburg area, starting with transition days. On Monday, Kathy Knotts saw the first batch of area students back to class.
What they’re saying
“Stopping children and teenagers from reading books isn’t going to prevent them from figuring out who they are or what they’ll become,” -King George Middle School seventh grader Artemis Park, on renewed book challenges in the school’s library.
Go figures (numbers that made the news)
–Eight: The number of gas stations already operating within a mile of a proposed Sheetz location in Spotsylvania County. Residents and members of the county’s planning commission made it clear they’re not interested in making it nine.
Pressing on (a look at the week ahead)
-The Free Press examines an issue that’s been bubbling beneath the surface in Fredericksburg’s Mayfield neighborhood since the 1960s.
