When Virginia’s top environmental regulator received an analysis warning of data center pollution, it took him less than five minutes to forward it to seven people on his staff. The Piedmont Environmental Council had sent the report to Michael Rolband as a courtesy two days before publicizing it in March. It ignited a scramble within the agency to poke holes in the analysis, which raised concerns about the health effects of an AI facility that stands at the vanguard of the state’s fastest-growing industry. … Internal emails obtained by POLITICO through a public records request paint a portrait of an agency that moved quickly to defend the only data center in Virginia that is powering itself — in what former officials and environmental health advocates described as an unusual effort to shape the debate around an industry whose global epicenter is in the state. … Behind the scenes, Rolband’s request was met by opposition from some DEQ staffers who said that assessing the report’s assertions on health effects fell outside of their environmental training.

A Freedom of Information Act request filed by The Times-Dispatch returned emails containing new details pertaining to NC State’s decision to buy out the back half of its home-and-home basketball series with VCU. The FOIA request also returned the contract signed by VCU and NC State, which is attached to this article below. The Wolfpack paid the Rams $190,000 not to play at the Siegel Center this coming season after NC State beat VCU 85-79 in Raleigh on Nov. 17, 2025. … The emails exchanged between the athletic departments provide insight into how such negotiations are conducted and include a couple alternative paths proposed by each university.

County Board members went into their two-month summer break after 15 minutes of verbal fireworks over Missing Middle housing policies currently tied up in litigation. Three Board members — Maureen Coffey, Julius “JD” Spain, Sr., and Takis Karantonis — castigated colleague Susan Cunningham for a proposal made without much advance notice at the tail end of the Board’s July 21 meeting. It was a rare public spat among Board members who typically try to keep major disagreements out of public view. … “This is just not respectful to us as your colleagues — just not acceptable,” said Coffey, who like Spain and Karantonis had only learned of Cunningham’s plan at the July 21 meeting. … Cunningham had given Board Chair Matt de Ferranti a heads-up that her proposal was coming, but de Ferranti said he understood the others’ concerns about having the matter sprung on them at the Board meeting.

Shenandoah County’s Citizens Advisory Committee (CAC) is weighing whether residents need a formal role in rewriting the county’s data center rules, bringing a fourth county body into work already involving the Board of Supervisors, Planning Commission and Water Resource Advisory Committee. Members debated whether to recommend a new citizen panel or use the CAC itself after supervisors adopted the county’s first data center ordinance. … CAC member Rochelle Dornatt said residents who packed county meetings and left angry after the supervisors’ June vote needed a way to take part while the rules were still being written. She proposed a group modeled on the panel that helped develop the county’s utility-scale solar ordinance. Dornatt said the committee should “find a way to harness the energy and input from all those citizens that stood in line to talk.”

Loudoun County Supervisor Juli E. Briskman (D-Algonkian) received sharp criticism from her fellow board members during a Wednesday night meeting for her actions dating back five years that culminated in her being removed from her position as chair of the board’s finance committee. … Publicly censuring a fellow board member is a rare action that has occurred only twice in recent memory[.] … County Chair Phyllis J. Randall (D-At Large) said there were multiple reasons behind the change including a social media post by Briskman in 2021 where she referred to Supervisor Caleb A. Kershner (R-Catoctin) as a member of the KKK, a 2023 reference to a county staff member that Randall said was both untrue and hurtful, an effort by Briskman earlier this year to withhold pay increases from sheriff’s deputies until policy changes were made by Sheriff Mike Chapman, posing for a photo with what Randall said was an effigy of Chapman, and a video posted by Briskman last summer at a No Kings Protest that was overlaid with the “FDT” song by YG, also known as F— Donald Trump, that includes multiple uses of the N-word. … Briskman, who attended the meeting remotely, called the move a political one and said she has never violated the board’s code of ethics. “I think this is a manufactured crisis that has nothing to do with board business. This has been a months-long pressure campaign in an attempt to force me to stand down from my stance against data centers, Dominion Energy, and to silence my criticism of policy, which has given big corporations a pass while our residents suffer the consequences,” she said.