BY JANE BLOODWORTH ROWE PUNGO — This year’s growing season got off to a soggy start with heavy rains that damaged the strawberry crops and delayed planting for both grain and produce farmers. May’s hot, rainy weather damaged some strawberries,… Continue Reading
BY JOHN-HENRY DOUCETTE COURTHOUSE — Four candidates are lined up to challenge Virginia Beach City Councilmember Barbara Henley, the incumbent in the Princess Anne District who has represented the city’s southern communities for much of the past four decades. Five… Continue Reading
BY WILL HARRIS OCEANFRONT — Call it a green carpet event. The paparazzi may not have been swarming around the Virginia Beach Convention Center on Thursday, March 22, but for the city’s agriculture community, the event going on within its walls… Continue Reading
Dear Editor: The agricultural reserve program, or ARP, is Virginia Beach’s best idea. It is a mistake to cast this program aside with so little transparency and discussion by reducing it to dollars and cents within the budget. The ARP… Continue Reading
BY JOHN-HENRY DOUCETTE COURTHOUSE — The Virginia Beach Agriculture Advisory Commission on Friday, April 13, voted to recommend that the City Council maintain the agricultural reserve program while supplying some money for a project to address flooding in Ashville Park… Continue Reading
Dear Editor: My opponent in the Princess Anne District, City Councilmember Barbara Henley, helped create and voted for the agriculture reserve program, or ARP, in 1995. Many years later in 2013, as a sitting member of the Virginia Beach City… Continue Reading
BY SCOTT MORRIS PLEASANT RIDGE — I am a 12th-generation farmer of land in the Pungo area, and I would like for my son to have the option of being the 13th. We sat at the Virginia Beach Excellence in Agriculture… Continue Reading
Dear Editor: Virginia Beach City Manager Dave Hansen believes that the agricultural reserve program, or ARP, is no longer needed. That statement in itself should set off flares. Remember that City Councilmember Barbara Henley, who represents the Princess Anne District,… Continue Reading
BY VENI FIELDS VIRGINIA BEACH — In December, David Trimmer, the director of Virginia Beach Department of Agriculture, held a breakfast meeting at Eddy’s Café in Red Mill with members of the committee that selects each year’s Excellence in Agriculture award.… Continue Reading
BY JOHN-HENRY DOUCETTE VIRGINIA BEACH – A Lago Mar resident who in January gained attention for verbally sparring with Mayor Will Sessoms says he is running for city council in the Princess Anne District. Tim Worst said he will challenge… Continue Reading