So, I got a promotion

I am now the "GIS Roadway Centerline Manager" for the Virginia Department of Transportation. I have a staff of five editors working for me, and a QA/QC manager to come (my old assignment). We will be trying to get all of the centerlines up to snuff so we can build a decent linear referencing system.

To date the Interstates build pretty good, and short little subdivision secondaries are OK, but lord what problems in every oher road! We have crazy deadlines for trying to get at least some sort of LRS working. This is causing me to do 50+hr weeks right now because, frankly, I'm a good editor, and have the best understanding of the data model, so I'm doing a lot of it myself.

I'm still an IT consultant, so they can still "fire his ass" at will. Interestingly enough, my main contact outside of VDOT may be my former manager that originally coined that phrase. The job change also resulted in a higher pay grade, and a sizable increase in my hourly rate. Now I'm dealing with my own company where my immediate supervisor is telling me that my getting a raise out of this is "not automatic". Like *expletive* hell!

Recall Update

They're doing pretty well with the petitions I wrote about earlier.

An estimated 2,000 to 3,000 signatures have been gathered by a grass-roots group of volunteers seeking to remove from office four members of the Gloucester County Board of Supervisors.

In the third full day of collecting signatures across Gloucester, residents were lining up at tables from Gloucester Point to Gloucester Court House to sign petitions seeking to oust supervisors Teresa Altemus, Bobby Crewe, Michelle Ressler and Gregory Woodard.

To put that in perspective, Gloucester County has a population of under 39,000 of whom about 30,000 are of voting age. In the election that brought these critters to power, there were only about 1,700 votes cast in my precinct (Crewe won by 218 votes). In the one Supervisor race that was at-large there were under 9200 votes cast (Ressler won by 1,642 votes).

My understanding is that in order for a recall to be authorized, they have to get signatures equaling 10% of the votes cast in the last election. So, 170 or so for Crewe, and 920 for Ressler. Sounds like they'll have that to spare. Which is good, as the judges will throw out the signatures on any technicality.

But, looks like we'll be voting again soon.

Recall

After the great time we've had with our supervisors here, the recall process has begun.

Just after noon Friday, Garr Johnson walked into Burke's of Gloucester on Main Street with copies of 250 petitions that seek to remove four members of the county Board of Supervisors from office.

Within an hour, the petitions hit shops and sidewalks in Gloucester, and residents were already lining up to sign them.

Winnie and I signed this morning. They were set up at a card table in the parking lot of the post office, and they were keeping a line about 5 deep in the few minutes I was there. Shouldn't take too long.

$5,900,000,000 more = "budget woes"

The Governor has announced a hiring freeze (damn!) because of falling general fund revenues.

This year, Kaine implemented a series of cuts based on forecasts of reduced revenue. As a result of those cuts, the state finished fiscal 2008 on June 30 barely in the black -- $5.4 million in a general-fund budget of $17.2 billion.

But, when you look at the budget for previous years, you see the general fund expenditures have increased by a quarter billion dollars just over the previous year ($16.96B), and are still a little above those from two years ago ($17.03B).

The article also whines about the difficulty of making the state's $77B two year budget, when the previous two years totalled $71.1B. Gosh guys, an extra $5.9B from 7.7M residents (~$375/person/year) isn't enough of an increase? Who's getting the money? The state employees aren't seeing any pay raises.

Ah, small town life!

It's so fun to live in a small community, where everyone gets in everyone else's business.

Four members of the Gloucester County Board of Supervisors and the Gloucester sheriff were indicted on a total of 15 misdemeanor charges by a special grand jury Tuesday.

In addition, a Gloucester developer faces 10 felony charges in connection with the forgery of county documents.

Supervisors Teresa Altemus, Michelle Ressler, Robert "Bobby" Crewe and Gregory Woodard each were indicted on charges of transacting public business in private, unlawful warrantless search and computer trespass. Crewe and Ressler also faces charges of coercing and intimidating a county employee as a result of a closed-door meeting on Jan. 8 with former Planning Director Jay Scudder.

Sheriff Steve Gentry faces a single misdemeanor count of malfeasance or misuse of office for conducting unlawful searches and seizures related to the entry of the offices of former county employees Bill Whitley and Danny Stuck.

Developer George Woodhouse, who was Crewe's largest campaign contributor and who also contributed $500 to Gentry's campaign, is accused of forging county certificates of occupancy, which are documents that certify that a structure complies with county ordinances regulating building.

We've all been waiting for this ever since these four decided they were going to personally remake all of Gloucester's government.