330 Upland Shores Drive, in the Water’s Edge subdivision of Franklin County, owned by Jonnie Williams, a friend to both Gov. Bob McDonnell and Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli. | Photo by Stephanie Klein Davis | The Roanoke Times

To get to one of the most noteworthy homes of late on Smith Mountain Lake, you head east on Virginia 40 from Rocky Mount. Pass the one-horse communities of Redwood and Glade Hill. Soon you’ll come to Penhook and the local landmark known as Carl’s Place, a friendly diner and gas station.

Just past Carl’s, follow some back roads for 3 to 4 miles to the lushly landscaped golf community called Water’s Edge. A little ways off a cul de sac at the end of Upland Shores Drive, you’ll find No. 330, a house owned by Jonnie and Celeste Williams.

Built in 1993, the cedar and stone-sided mansion stands on two waterfront acres, behind some shade-providing trees on a point that juts out into the lake’s Blackwater River side. There’s a stone-paver driveway with a turning circle, six parking spaces and an attached, two-car garage. It’s currently listed for sale at $3.9 million. (More pix are here).

There’s another waterfront home in Water’s Edge which Jonnie Williams owns with his son, Jonnie Jr. It’s at 125 Sconset Drive, and is smaller and is also for sale — for $649,000. )More pix are here.)

125 Sconset Drive, in the Water’s Edge Community of Franklin County, owned by Jonnie Williams and his son, Jonnie Williams Jr. | Shot by Dan

Neither home is particularly noteworthy at Smith Mountain Lake, where scores of similar mansions dot 500-some miles of shoreline. Instead, the recent prominence comes from the friends of Williams — a car dealer turned tobacco magnate — who he’s gifted with lake vacations in recent years.

One is Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, the Republican candidate for governor, who’s vacationed three times at Williams’ expense. Twice, in 2011 and 2012, Williams gave the Cuccinelli a week in the summer (value of each: $3,000), according to the attorney general’s recently amended financial disclosures.

Once, in 2010, Williams provided a place to Cuccinelli for a four-day Thanksgiving retreat (value: $1,500). For that, Williams also provided a catered dinner.

Another is Gov. Bob McDonnell. In 2011, according to the governor’s financial disclosure, Williams gave McDonnell $2,268 worth of lodging and entertainment at Smith Mountain Lake. Williams has lavished other gifts upon the governor as well.

READ THE REST OF THIS COLUMN HERE.

Gov. Bob McDonnell | AP Photo

What do you think his chances are?

Mitt Romney passed over Gov. Bob McDonnell as his running mate in the 2012 election, in favor of the Rep. Paul Ryan, a congressman who has a bit more stature than McDonnell in more ways than one.

Then CPAC snubbed the governor by not inviting him to their annual conference of right-wing wackos.

But none of that has dimmed speculation that McDonnell would himself make a run for the top of the GOP ticket in 2016.

Today, more fuel got poured on that fire, when McDonnell’s Opportunity Virginia PAC sent out this email:

“Dear Friend,

Last night The Washington Post released a new Virginia poll. Read more »

AP Photo from CBS News

Gov. Bob McDonnell has come under all kinds of questioning lately about his relationship to Jonnie Williams, CEO of Star Scientific, a company that makes some kind of nutritional supplement from tobacco. Much of it focuses on the $15,000 in catering Williams covered for the governor’s daughter’s wedding, and the the nettlesome fact that McDonnell initially failed to disclose the gift.

This morning on a Richmond radio station, McDonnell explained why. It was a gift to his daughter — not him! Of course! Why didn’t we realize that before now?

From Roanoke.com:

Gov. Bob McDonnell says he always viewed a $15,000 check from a political backer to pay for catering at his daughter’s wedding to be a gift to his daughter, not to him, and felt no need under the law to report it.

I’m sure the FBI, which is investigating the case, will find this interesting. No doubt they will carefully scrutinize the payee line on that check. While the probe drags on, there’s an important lesson for us all to keep in mind: Invite Jonnie Williams to your daughter’s wedding! You might want to enclose the catering contract with the invitation.

(BTW McDonnell isn’t the only pol facing questions over “gifts” from Jonnie Williams.)

I wonder what Miss Manners would say?

MrPrada | Wikimedia Commons

Note from Dan: After decades of twiddling its thumbs over transportation funding, Gov. Bob McDonnell and the Virginia General Assembly enacted a very flawed but necessary transportation funding scheme this year. It increases the general sales tax and  bunch of other taxes and fees on fuel and vehicles. It does away with the per-gallon tax but replaces it will new wholesale taxes. Instead they should have increased the per-gallon tax and indexed it. Here’s the last big scheme Gob. Bob put forth, from a column that originally ran Sept. 9, 2010.

Gov. Bob McDonnell was unequivocal in his January State of the Commonwealth speech:

“We will not turn our economy around by taxing Virginians more. … Therefore, if you pass a bill in this recession that raises taxes on the hardworking families of Virginia, I will veto it. And if you pass a budget embedded with those same tax increases, I will not approve it.”

Now McDonnell seems to have changed his tune when it comes to privatizing Virginia’s state-controlled liquor industry.

Although his administration took pains to deny it at an announcement Wednesday, the various levies McDonnell is proposing as part of his complex privatization plan look, sound and act like new taxes. Read more »

Sign outside a uranium mine and mill in Church Rock, New Mexico. | EPA | Wikimedia Commons

Not everyone has given up . . .

Note from Dan: The issue of uranium mining in Virginia fizzled to a close in the recently concluded General Assembly session, after the legislature wisely refused to lift a moratorium it enacted decades ago. But some stealth efforts remain underway to set up the commonwealth for uranium mining down the road. The letter below from two state lawmakers for Gov. Bob McDonnell sends that message loudly and clearly.

February 22, 2013

The Honorable Robert F. McDonnell
Governor
Patrick Henry Building, 3rd Floor
Richmond, VA 23219

We write to support the suggestion that you direct the responsible executive branch agencies to promulgate regulations addressing the potential mining of uranium in Virginia pursuant to the Administrative Process Act (APA).

We supported legislation this session to life the current moratorium on uranium mining, while others opposed or took no position on it.  Regardless of one’s view on the ultimate question of whether the moratorium should be lifted, it is abundantly clear that future legislative deliberations on the issue–in the various committees we chair and in the Legislature as a whole–will be aided by knowing what substantive and procedural safeguards the regulations will contain. Read more »

Museum of Lincolnshire Life | Green Lane | Wikimedia Commons

For 16 years or so, state and federal lawmakers and bureaucrats have tinkered around with measuring public education.

This has resulted in Virginia’s Standards of Learning, the feds’ Adequate Yearly Progress, and all kinds of other metrics and measurements and statistics and and charts. Lots of charts.

Now they seem to be admitting all that previous effort just doesn’t cut the mustard. Because this year, the geniuses in Richmond have hit upon a new scheme, pushed by Gov. Bob McDonnell and Sen. Bill Stanley, R-Franklin County: letter grades for every public school in the commonwealth. Both the House and the Senate have passed the bill.

Alas, nobody I’m aware of has ever asked education leaders to grade those measurement-minded lawmakers. That seems unfair. So I gave some area school board members and administrators that opportunity this week.

None seemed more eager than Fuzzy Minnix, a five-year veteran of the Roanoke County School board. He was a 12-year county supervisor before that.

We must forgive Minnix if he sounded a bit frustrated. You see, he ardently believes in turning mediocre schools into good ones and good schools into excellent ones. But his head is spinning from all the different edicts. And Minnix has lost his faith that state government leaders share his goals.

He ticked off some of his own measurements to explain why: Richmond has slashed $14 million in state funding from Roanoke County schools in the past four years. His school system has lost 115 teachers, cut 236 positions, and it’s looking at closing three schools down the road.

“I graded the governor, and he’s in my own party, and he did not get a good grade,” Minnix said. He launched into a long-winded explanation of all the points he deducted for the affronts listed above. The bottom line is, Minnix’s grade was a “D.”

READ THE REST OF THIS COLUMN HERE.

(This post has been updated to correct the number of positions cut in Roanoke County schools.)

qJake | Wikimedia Commons

Note from Dan: Lots of people have been wondering why on Earth Gov. Bob McDonnell wants to kill the gas tax, but at the same time implement a new $100 a year tax on hybrids. I simply assumed some cynics in a Richmond conference room came up with this idea after one of them said, “How can we stick it to those environmentally conscious wackos who never vote for us?” But Bill Carstensen of Blacksburg has given it more thought.

By Bill Carstensen

I have been searching for a good reason that we hybrid owners should pay more to register our vehicles than others under the new “no gas tax” plan (gee, that sounds a lot like “no car tax” doesn’t it? That certainly went well for the state treasury).

Here is the plan’s logic as I see it:

Spread the cost of building and maintaining roads to all who spend money in the state through a sales tax increase and a removal of the state gas tax.  I can go for that, at least in principle, as we all benefit from roads whether we use them personally or not. Someone uses them to bring us most of what we own and what we eat. For added revenue, charge a bit more to everyone who registers a vehicle in Virginia.  I can also see that plan as we all should pay toward the roads we drive on through registration fees.

And, best of all, for more added revenue, charge a special rate of $100 per year to those who have made the decision to drive hybrid or electric vehicles (Virginia was 8th nationally in such registrations in 2009 so I am certainly not alone here).  So, let’s try to understand the economics of the last part of this decision. Read more »

Wikimedia Commons

Your daily Letter to the Columnist — Jan. 25, 2013

Hello sir.

I have re-read your article from this past Sunday, “Reactions to McDonnell’s gas tax plan mixed.” I own a 2005 Ford Escape hybrid and am frustrated that Virginia wants to charge an extra $100 for owning a hybrid.

I purchased this vehicle for many reasons, two of which are saving gas and to be at least somewhat environmentally friendly.  In the past, there have been tax cuts for owning a hybrid as an incentive to purchase. Granted, $100 isn’t much, but they should be giving a cut instead of adding a charge.

The Escape Hybrid uses much less gas and weighs less than a standard Escape, which translates to less wear on roads.  Localities such as Nags Head, N.C. reward hybrid owners by providing a parking space closest to the front door of a local Food Lion.

They shoould do similar in other areas to encourage hybrid ownership. I am against the proposed changes in the Virginia gas and sales taxes. We will be paying more taxes over time with the changes.

Scott Fowler
Hardy, VA

Wikimedia Commons

Your daily Letter to the columnist — Jan. 21, 2013

Dan,

Just wanted you to know that you did a great job on the gas tax etc on Sunday.

Two issues Gov. McDonnell  has not addressed to my knowledge: Currently 20-25 percent of our gas tax is paid by out-of-state buyers traveling through the Commonwealth. I like them sharing our costs.

With the Gov’s plan all that would be paid by Virginians, leaving about 3$00 million on the table for us to make up if my memory of the numbers is correct.

Also, what keeps the gas companies from raising the price after no gas tax is in effect to match the price of surrounding states so gas is pretty uniform?

With states all around us having higher gas taxes than we do, do you see that much difference in the cost of fuel when you visit there? Not in my trips north, south and west of the Commonwealth. Just thought I might throw these out as I am not sure the no tax Gov or his staff has thought this out yet.

As you might know as a transportation person all my life I have significant interest in this and just hope we find some way to fix our roads and do for Virginia what is desperately needed.  I still believe we do not want to increase the burden on Virginian’s when we can gain a lot from our millions of out of state visitors.

Bev Fitzpatrick
ROANOKE

Savannah, Ga. | Lukelastic | Wikimedia Commons

The price of regular gas is around $3.15 per gallon, give or take. I bet you’d like to see that dip below the $3 mark, right? Who wouldn’t?

That’s one of the things Gov. Bob McDonnell is counting on with his eyebrow-raising proposal to end once and for all Virginia’s 17.5-cents-per-gallon tax on gasoline in order to solve Virginia’s long-running transportation-funding problems.

But reaction seemed mixed among Roanoke Valley motorists last week shortly after McDonnell trotted out the idea. I drove around town and pestered them at the pumps for their thoughts.

Before we get to those, here’s a brief outline: McDonnell would end Virginia’s tax on gasoline (but not diesel fuel) and he estimates that will save Virginia motorists $3.5 billion at the pump over 5 years.

To replace that lost revenue, the General Assembly would increase the general sales tax from 5 percent to 5.8 percent. That would apply to clothing, food at restaurants, furniture, appliances, autos, and just about any other item you purchase other than medicine or groceries or vehicle fuel. The current 2.5 percent sales tax on groceries would not increase.

READ THE REST OF THIS COLUMN HERE.