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VPM Daily Newscast: General Assembly updates, HCPS budget

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VPM Daily Newscast

The VPM Daily Newscast contains all your Central Virginia news in just 5 to 10 minutes. Episodes are recorded the night before.

Listeners can subscribe through NPR One, Apple Podcasts, Megaphone, Spotify and wherever you get your podcasts.

Here’s a recap of the top stories on the morning of Jan. 30, 2025:

EPA report details unaddressed issues with Richmond’s aging water system
Reported by VPM News’ Patrick Larsen, Jahd Khalil, Dean Mirshahi and Dave Cantor

Wilfred Cutshaw, a onetime Confederate soldier, became Richmond’s city engineer in the 1870s. He’s ostensibly responsible for the capital city having a modern waterworks, according to Christina Vida, the general collections curator of The Valentine Museum.

In addition to plotting out the water system, Cutshaw designed the city’s stone and granite Gothic revival pumphouse building in 1881. It was opened two years later and placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2002.

A 2017 city finance document indicated some of Richmond’s water mains date to the 1840s, and another from 2022 said “about 1,000 miles of water mains and 9 pumping stations” are from the 1880s. City communications staff were not able to offer more recent information.

A 2022 Environmental Protection Agency audit of the water system found that no asset management plan was in place for Richmond’s drinking water infrastructure. A separate 2024 internal city audit details those missing systems.

An EPA spokesperson said the results of the audit were discussed with DPU leaders in 2022. A spokesperson for the city department didn't respond to questions about when the city became aware of the report and what accounted for a delayed response to its findings.

Hanover school board proposes 3% pay raise, plus extra bump for teachers
Reported by VPM News’ Lyndon German

The Hanover County School Board is still searching for a permanent superintendent, but interim Superintendent Lisa Pennycuff said she’s confident the division’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2026 has “a clear vision in mind.”

Under the proposal, Hanover would spend roughly $265 million on operating costs in FY26 (which runs from July 1, 2025, to June 30, 2026) — a 6.3% increase from FY25.

The district’s proposal includes a 3% salary increase for all eligible employees, plus $4.5 million to further increase the teacher salary scale, which would give teachers an average total increase of nearly 7%.

Hanover is also planning to continue a pandemic-era substitute incentive program previously paid for with federal relief money and fund two school psychologist intern positions. And it’s looking to replace Mechanicsville Elementary School, one of several aging school buildings the division identified in a 2018 study.

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VPM News is the staff byline for articles and podcasts written and produced by multiple reporters and editors.