Possibly moving to Richmond, VA area. Need feedback from any locals

Well, if you are in Virginia in mid June, the Richmond Regions annual car show is June 20th at the Richmond International Raceway, come see us.

Ohhhh, perfect. We will be there the week of the 15th so we should be able to make it to the show in Saturday.

Ohhhh, perfect. We will be there the week of the 15th so we should be able to make it to the show in Saturday.

Great!!! be sure and introduce yourself. Visit our website, take a look at our photo section and the newsletter for our activities.

Richmond Region Web Site (I don't know why I helping Tommy steal my prospective new member-Wayne:cool: )

http://www.richmondaaca.com/

Once the trip gets closer I will be in touch so I can make plans to meet some of you guys. The more connections I can make there the better. Always nice to know people who I can ask about local mechanics, contractors, good place to get a steak and so on.

Great!!! be sure and introduce yourself. Visit our website, take a look at our photo section and the newsletter for our activities.

Richmond Region Web Site (I don't know why I helping Tommy steal my prospective new member-Wayne:cool: )

http://www.richmondaaca.com/

I just think it has something to do with you just being an all around nice guy!!! Besides, where the hell is Warsaw, Va anyway?

Oh. my. goodness. Even we up here in the Southside know where Warsaw is! (OK I admit- I had a good friend in tech school who was from down toward Warsaw. Callao actually.)

Someone got a good deal on that property in Tappahannock. Even if they have to spend another $70k on it they're still ahead of the market, especially with all that garage in the back.

John- watchoo talking about our pretty red clay soil? It grows a fine crop of sandbriars and Jimson weed!

Glenn,

I was kidding Wayne, some people do know where Warsaw is. What part of Southside do you live? Just wondered, I grew up in Amelia.

Roughly halfway between Danville and South Boston. About 2 miles from VIR, is I guess would be most familiar landmark.

Rocketraider, My mom came from Madison County, Virginia. My father-in-law had a farm in Summer's County West Virginia. That red clay gets slick when it rains and you can hardly drive on it plus it will not come off your shoes. Now I'm fifty miles from F-I-L's farm and 150 from Grand daddy's farm and never want to deal with red clay again. I love living in the hills.

I was just looking at a ranking of all the school districts in VA. We found some really great houses in Petersburg but it is ranked dead last in the state, 118th. Mechanicsville is close to Richmond and they are 6th but the prices are silly. Most of the top ranked schools are close to DC or out on the peninsula, neither of which is appealing to us. I don't mind putting our kids in private schools but I don't really want to live in a town where educations is such a low priority.

The Crescent from NoVA down thru Tidewater is, to be blunt, where the money is in Virginia. Take away the NoVA and Hampton Roads government and military presence and you'd probably see a lot of difference in those areas. To be even more blunt, some of the poorer-rated school systems (Petersburg City as an example) serve mainly inner-city and urban schools. It may not be that they don't prioritize education but without an affluent tax base, these schools are cash-strapped. Hence they're poorly rated even though they may have outstanding programs and high-achieving students. You'd see this even if the Commonwealth enacted those heinous school district taxes.

I'll admit there's times I think Richmond is oblivious that it serves communities south and west of I66 and I95, and that mindset prevails in a lot of the Crescent area. As an example, North Carolina and Virginia both have lifestyle magazines: Our State for NC and Virginia Living for VA. NC's version (published in Greensboro) covers the entire state, coast to mountains, northern border to southern, warts and all. Virginia Living (published in Richmond) concentrates on the Crescent area with the occasional and rare foray to Charlottesville or Roanoke, and is clearly geared to a very affluent readership. I gave my Mama subscriptions to both magazines and after a year of VL she told me not to renew the subscription. Her typically terse reasoning? "I can't get into foxhunting."

We out here in the Vajenya hinterlands get short-sticked on a lot of things, notably road money. The Crescent is developing and outgrowing its infrastructure so fast that its roads cannot possibly keep up with traffic, and those areas scream till they get the lion's share of road money- while infrastructure in the rest of the state goes begging.

But, nothing any other state doesn't experience.

I keep forgetting that I need to look at this a different way than life in NY. Here pretty much all schools get the same amount of funding (certain amount per student). Some spend the money better than others and the education shows. Sometimes like you said no matter how good the school is it still depends on the students and maybe more importantly the parents at home. In lower income areas the parents are likely to be uneducated and therefore do not spend the time needed to help their kids get good grades.