Governor McAuliffe Statement on Final Approval of $1.9 Billion Federal Loan for Rail to Dulles

Washington Dulles Airport Train [Explored] (Photo credit: J Sonder)

Governor Terry McAuliffe released the following statement following the final approval of a $1.9 billion Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) loan to support the completion of the Metrorail to Dulles project in Northern Virginia:

“The U.S. Department of Transportation’s approval of this TIFIA loan represents an enormous economic boost for Northern Virginia and the entire Commonwealth. This loan will contribute to the successful completion of Phase 2 of the Rail to Dulles project and help the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority meet its goal of keeping toll rates on the Dulles Toll Road steady for Virginia commuters.

“I was honored to work with the Department of Transportation and our bipartisan congressional delegation to bring this important financing to Virginia. The approval of this loan, the largest in U.S. history, is an enormous step toward fully completing this project so that we can begin realizing the benefits that Metrorail to Dulles will bring to Virginia’s commuters and our economy.”

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Governor McAuliffe Statement on Lynchburg Train Derailment

Official seal of Lynchburg, Virginia (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Governor Terry McAuliffe released the following statement on the Commonwealth of Virginia’s response to the train derailment and fire in Lynchburg, Virginia:

“This afternoon my Public Safety team informed me of the train derailment and fire in Lynchburg. Immediately after those reports were received the Virginia Department of Emergency Management, the Virginia State Police, and the Virginia Department of Fire Programs were instructed to coordinate with local responders and mobilize the resources necessary to respond to this incident.

“Deputy Secretary of Public Safety and Homeland Security Adam Thiel has been dispatched to the scene and will provide my team and me with constant updates as this situation unfolds. I have also spoken with Lynchburg Mayor Michael Gillette and offered him any and all resources he needs to respond to this incident and keep Virginians safe.”

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Governor Terry McAuliffe Announces Virginia is “All In” for Increasing Diversity in Clinical Trials

Clinical Trials (journal) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

RICHMOND - Governor McAuliffe today announced Virginia’s support for the “I’m In” campaign to encourage greater diversity of volunteers in clinical trials.  The “I’m In,” campaign launched by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America and the National Minority Quality Forum, seeks to raise awareness about participation in clinical trials among historically underrepresented populations through strategic outreach and partnerships. “I’m In” also supports the Forum’s Clinical Trial Engagement Network (CTEN) which enables prospective volunteers to connect with clinical trials and provides industry, physicians, researchers, and academic institutions with data to help focus clinical trial recruitment.

“This collaboration among many of the Commonwealth’s leading health care providers is a step forward in our effort to reduce harmful and costly health care disparities,” said Governor McAuliffe.  “By raising public awareness of the importance of patient volunteers for clinical trials and by improving our clinical trial infrastructure, Virginia will also be well-positioned to be one of the leading centers for biopharmaceutical research in the country.”

Clinical trials are important to the economy of the Commonwealth.  Over the last 15 years in Virginia, biopharmaceutical research companies have conducted more than 3,800 clinical trials of new medicines in collaboration with the state’s clinical research centers, university medical schools and hospitals.   Of these, more than 1,500 target the nation’s six most debilitating chronic diseases—asthma, cancer, diabetes, heart disease, mental illnesses and stroke. 

Without the patients who volunteer to participate in clinical trials, the development of new treatments would not be possible. Yet, only a small percentage of Americans participate in clinical trials and Hispanics, Asians and African Americans are alarmingly underrepresented in clinical research.  Increasing diversity in clinical trials can help to ensure more effective medicines and treatments for patients across all ethnic and racial backgrounds.

This collaboration, which is still inviting new participants, will increase public awareness of the critical need for patients and other volunteers for clinical trials; raise the visibility of participating hospitals as clinical trial centers of excellence; facilitate infrastructure improvements through public-private partnerships; and establish Virginia as the first state in the union to demonstrate how the public, clinical sponsors, medical providers, and government, working collaboratively, can power a world-class medical research network that is sensitive to patient diversity.  

More information on the “I’m In” campaign can be found at http://www.joinimin.org

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Governor McAuliffe Announces Virginia Small Business Financing

Flag of Virginia (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Governor McAuliffe Announces Virginia Small Business Financing Authority Receives An Additional $5.9 Million from U.S. Treasury to Assist Small Businesses

Virginia will use funds to help increase private lending and investment in small businesses located in the Commonwealth by partnering with Virginia’s banks.

RICHMOND - Governor Terry McAuliffe announced today that the Virginia Small Business Financing Authority (VSBFA) has secured an additional $5.9 million to help finance Virginia’s small businesses through a second disbursement from the U.S. Treasury Department’s State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI). 

These SSBCI funds will support Virginia’s programs which are designed to help banks lend more to small businesses.  Popular programs such as the VSBFA’s Cash Collateral Program, Capital Access Program, Economic Development Loan Fund, and the Loan Participation Program will be available to more businesses as a result of this funding.  In addition, the VSBFA will use some of the funds to partner with Virginia’s Center for Innovative Technology (CIT) to enhance CIT’s GAP Fund which is designed to assist Virginia entrepreneurs in Virginia-based technology, clean tech and life science companies.

Speaking about today’s announcement, Governor McAuliffe said, “Supporting and growing Virginia’s small businesses is at the heart of my vision for growing and diversifying Virginia’s economy. I am pleased that Virginia’s success in assisting small businesses has been recognized by the U.S. Treasury and that Virginia has been rewarded by the receipt of these additional funds to be used to grow this critical segment of our economy.  With the help of Virginia’s banks and private equity investors, we hope to leverage these funds to generate millions more in private sector dollars for Virginia’s economy.”

Through the fiscal year to date, the VSBFA has helped Virginia’s banks lend over $16 million to 98 businesses which have created 357 new jobs and retained 413 existing jobs for a total of 770 jobs in the Commonwealth.

Secretary of Commerce and Trade, Maurice Jones, added, “Virginia’s small businesses and entrepreneurs are a vital part of Virginia’s economy.  The VSBFA’s successful deployment of these funds, the additional investment by our banks, and the job creation provided by small businesses as a result, demonstrates that Virginia’s economy and its businesses remain dynamic and is one of the reasons why Virginia is the best state for business.”

“Small businesses have been able to expand and hire new workers as a result the successful partnership between Treasury’s State Small Business Credit Initiative and the Commonwealth of Virginia,” said Cliff Kellogg, the Director of the State Small Business Credit Initiative.

“These funds will build on that success by providing local entrepreneurs and small business owners greater access to new sources of capital to help create jobs and promote growth among Virginia’s small businesses.”

About the Virginia Small Business Financing Authority and Virginia’s Center for Innovative Technology

The VSBFA was created in 1984 and is an important tool in providing the necessary capital to help the Commonwealth’s small business sector grow.  Created in 1985, CIT, a non-profit corporation, plugs gaps at the earliest stages of the Innovation Continuum – commercialization and seed funding – as it helps entrepreneurs launch and grow high-growth technology companies and create high-paying jobs for the future.  More information about the VSBFA and CIT can be found on their respective websites.  For VSBFA:  http://www.vabankers.org/VSBFA.aspx .  For CIT:  http://www.cit.org.

Gloucester, VA School Board, Animal Control and Buying It Used Connections?

In the above picture we see a vehicle that is being used by a school board employee and it's parked at McDonald's in the Courthouse area.

License plate number so that there are no questions as to who has it.  This was early Tuesday morning, April 28th, 2014.   The employee, a female, parked at McDonald's and went inside.

About 25 minutes after seeing this same vehicle and employee at McDonald's, we see her car as we are driving down to the other end of the county.  We made a U-turn to see if in fact this was the same car.  It was.  This woman was in Buying It Used.  We do not know if she was just stopping to do some personal shopping or if she may have been conducting county business.

  Why this question is important.  Buying It Used, when they opened up, looked a lot like a Gloucester County school board outlet store.  We have found and reported with photo evidence that Buying It Used has sold Gloucester County School Board property in the past.  Why is this an issue?  Buying It Used is owned by a county employee who works for Animal Control here in Gloucester.  Some facts and issues that come to mind.  County excess and old goods must be either dis-guarded properly or sold via auction.  When goods are sold via auction, Gloucester County employees and their families are prohibited from purchasing any goods through auctions.  Most of the items found at Buying It Used come from local auctions but are not to say that they are from local government auctions.

  With the fact that Buying It Used has sold Gloucester County school board property in the past, it makes us wonder if the woman pictured above may have been doing a pickup for school board items that may have been sold through that store?  It's a question that we do not have an answer for and can only ask about.  Either way, what was she doing there that could possibly be considered school board business for either being at McDonald's or Buying It Used?

  And all of this on top of our last report showing all of the other county vehicles in places that are not being used for county purposes.

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Gloucester, VA Local Government Employees Shot

We shot these pictures in early morning within several hours over two days.  Monday and Tuesday.  And these are the ones we were able to photograph.  There were others we did not get our cameras out in time to catch.  (No one was shot with a gun and no one was hurt during our own shooting with cameras).  What these pictures show and other concerns we saw and will be showing with the video clip below is that Gloucester County employees use government vehicles for all kinds of personal use all the time for every conceivable issue.

  Why should anyone care?  For one, it's against the Gloucester County employee rules handbook.  It's also against state law.  It's also at a cost to all taxpayers in Gloucester.  Since it's a violation of the employee code of conduct and the employees are blatantly ignoring such, how can the county expect to enforce any other policies if they can not even enforce something this simple?  If the county has no issues with any of these actions, then the county should change the policy and the state law to boot.

  Now we will say that Brenda Garton; Gloucester County administrator,  has done a pretty decent job of getting the word out to the one side of the county employees although there are still a few rouges we catch here and there.  But overall, this side of the county government has rained in a number of abuses.   What we are finding most of these days are School Board employees abusing this system and rather extensively.  We are finding these employees shopping, eating inside of the fast food restaurants, pulling off to the side after getting food inside and eating in parking lots, banking and more, on your tax dollars.  According to a past email from The Kiser, he sees nothing wrong with your money being wasted.

The above video clip is a little tour of some of the photos in our collection over the past year that gives an idea of how pervasive the issue is.  This was not even half of our collection and we did not use any photos more than once.  A comment made recently from one Board of Supervisor member said he didn't care if someone stopped for coffee.  The expression given back was to then change the county code.  We think that employees who do not have access to a county vehicle should get special considerations because they do not have access to these same privileges and it would seem a violation to not give them such consideration since the same has to be done when it comes to breaks and health care insurance and pay grades.  That is only fair now isn't it?

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