RICHMOND, Va. — In October 2010 the VCU InSight website is moving from this WordPress site to a new home at Virginia Commonwealth University, http://insight.vcu.edu.

The move better uses available university technology resources and enables easier student access. The WordPress site includes 175 story posts since its January 2008 launch. It replaced a traditional website that was online since at least 2006.

VCU InSight is a 30-minute TV news show produced by undergraduate students in the VCU School of Mass Communications that airs monthly on WCVW-TV Richmond PBS. The show began in 2003.

Every Saturday for the past two years, people in need from the community have found relief with Northminster Baptist Church’s Free Market. It provides a free meal, clothes and household items for people that apply.

“We believe that people in poverty need support, physical support and if we can walk beside them, through the journey, then they can walk themselves out of poverty,” Founder Cassie Matthews said.

The Free Market is run off donations of the church members and others who help from the community. They are in partnership with the Central Virginia Food Bank and also supply patrons with a bag of groceries in addition to the clothes and other items they pick up.

“I find it spiritually uplifting here. Everything that they do, you know, is from the heart,” Phillip Mckee said, patron of the Free Market.

Volunteers at the market tutor both children and adults in an attempt to held them receive their high school diploma or their GED.

“It’s not just for me, it’s for all of us, so we can go beyond color, we want to change the community, we want to be friends, we want to change the world one person at a time,” Matthews said.

The Free Market is extending its hand into the Haiti relief effort, and will be making moves to go there this summer to help out. For more information on this and the free market visit http://northminsterchurch.com/community#freeMarket

April has seen near record high levels for pollen in Richmond. The pollen levels from oak and pine trees peaked at 3700 in early April, the highest it has been since 1998. This pollen is responsible for the yellow haze that can be seen on cars and on road or sidewalk.

“It’s really around April that we see everything bloom quite a bit, again oak and pine is really what you’re going to have the worst problems with and a lot of allergy sufferers really battle the oak and the pine,” WRIC-TV’s Meteorologist, Jason Myers, Said.

The high heat contributed with a lack of rain to help create the conditions for the excess pollen. However, Myers said that having a lot of pollen around this time of year is not uncommon.

Richmond, VA –Tough times are about to get a little tougher for state-funded services, as almost $4 billion in state spending has been cut out of the budget for the next two fiscal years.

Of that $4 billion, $800 million will be cut from healthcare funding resulting in less state spending on medicaid and academic hospitals like MCV.

“The key thing is that it’s a joint effort, where every dollar the state spends on this program is matched by federal health care dollars,” said Michael Cassidy, executive director of the independent, non-partisan, non-profit Commonwealth Institute for Fiscal Analysis.

This works the other way, too. Every dollar the state does not spend is essentially doubled since the federal government won’t be matching the funds.

Therefore, for the next two fiscal years virginia healthcare will cut funding by not $800 million but instead $1.6 billion.

RICHMOND, VA – Richmond is undergoing some serious changes in it’s landscape. American and Winged Elm trees are posing a danger by being too close to the city’s power lines and need to be replaced.

Luke McCall, an arborist with Richmond’s Urban Forestry Division, says the program is not only about removing the hazardous trees but encourages community members to be aware of their environment.

“This program is about education and about elevating people awareness about getting the right tree in the right place and getting proper tree underneath power lines so that they don’t present a safety or maintenance problems, which some of these trees do,” McCall said.

VCU’s student run organization, Green Unity, promotes environmental awareness around VCU. Green Unity Officer Joshua Lamm agrees that spreading environmental awareness will only benefit the future of the urban forest.

“We have to plant these roots here somewhere as we go off and do our own thing, that’ll grow – this base will grow, we’re the future basically,” said Lamm.

In March, Richmond City arborists began marking the dangerous trees with “X’s” and notifying residents that some trees on Cary St. were being removed.

Lyea Phillips, a VCU student, says she understands why this is an important program from a personal experience.

“I have seen it when trees have got in electrical lines and they have sparked small fires and there’s a lot of buildings there,” Phillips said.

The Urban Forestry Division is replacing the dangerous Elms by city appropriate Yoshino-Cherry and Serviceberry trees.

“This isn’t about structurally changing the urban forest of affecting some change on a wide scale this is about a small scale demonstration project,” said McCall.

The Urban Forestry Division received a grant of $5,000, but the demonstration will cost about $12,000, with the City of Richmond covering the rest of the project funds.

The issue of fair play for air play has been causing some controversy on Capitol Hill between the recording industry and radio broadcasters.

The Performance Rights Act is a new bill in Congress that if passed would make radio stations pay performers, not just song writers, when their music is played over the air. The amount the radio stations will pay will be based off of their annual revenue.

Radio stations have been paying royalties to songwriters for years. The National Association of Broadcasters opposes the bill.  Reggie Baker, Program Director and on-air host for Praise 104.7,  says if the bill goes into effect it will lead to job loss.

“Because of the money that would be paid to these artists, so to say, will cut into things that could be going through the company in general to help keep people employed in different communities,” said Baker.

Stations that make around a million dollars a year would pay about 5,000 dollars. But for stations like Radio One who has four stations, who makes close to seven million dollars a year, they could end up paying tens of thousands annually.

But earlier this month the US Department of Commerce said in a letter to the senate committee handling this issue that providing compensation to performers was a matter of fundamental fairness. Member of the Music First Coalition, Marty Machowsky, told us via email, “What we are seeking is fair compensation for artist and musicians for use of their copyrighted work. A.M. and F.M. radio stations earn billions each year without compensation the artists and musicians who bring music to life and listeners’ ears to the radio dial. We think that’s wrong…”

VCU’s student radio stations WVCW the bill will have little to no effect because they broadcast online instead of over the air.

Business Manager for WVCW Lauren Geerdes says, “So at this very moment WVCW will pretty much be in the clear because we pay performers through sound exchange.”

Sound exchange is a non-profit organization that handles royalty payments for internet only stations.

Artists in support of the performance rights act include Mariah Carey, Sheryl Crow, Jay-z, and Celine Dion. Committees in both the US House and Senate have recommended it for a vote.

RICHMOND, Va – Battling Robot’s were the main event at VCU’s Verizon Wireless Center on March 19th and 20th.

VirginiaFIRST combined the best of sporting and technology when they held their annual Robotics Competition with participants from more than 60 Virginia High Schools.

Pattie Cook, the Executive Director of VirginiaFIRST, spoke with VCU Insight during an in-studio interview.

March was pothole “blitz” month in Virginia after Gov. Bob McDonnell ordered the Virginia Department of Transportation to focus on repairing the thousands of potholes pocketing the Commonwealth’s roads.

A record-setting winter left Virginia’s roadways in particularly bad shape this spring. After the first few weeks, V-DOT reported having repaired more than 43,000 potholes statewide, with over 4,000 fixed in Richmond alone.

An average of 200 Richmond residents called in the first few days to report a pothole to V-DOT. According to V-DOT spokesperson, Taya Jarman, this number has been drastically reduced since the blitz began.

“If we’re also using our citizens letting us know as a guide, we haven’t received as many emails or concerns,” Jarman said. “So that might be a way for us to gauge, to know that we are doing a good job out there.”

Jarman also said that she can’t remember there ever being this many potholes to fix before.

RICHMOND, Va – Word that a British exchange student went missing spread fast around VCU and the Richmond community. Now, weeks later, there are still no answers.

Jonny Dorey, a 22-year old geography student, was last seen March 2nd.

With only a thousand VCU students being international, few can identify with the culture shock. But, Andrew Shipley, senior Health and Physical Education major, can relate to Dorey.

Shipley left his hometown in England to come to VCU in 2007.

“It was pretty hard since I…first time I had actually really been away from my family, like all my family was in England and there’s me, I’m by myself, taking everything in,” said Shipley.

Dorey’s disappearance has made international headlines but it’s VCU Police that are heading the investigation and search for the missing student, a situation that Police Chief John Venuti says is uncommon.

“Situations like that extend over an extended period of time are very, very rare,” said Venuti.

Venuti has kept in close contact with Dorey’s parents, who came to Richmond from their home in Gurnsey, an island in the English Channel, to help in the search for their son.

Dorey’s parents released a video plea for their son to return home safely and for anyone with information to contact VCU Police.

VCU and Dorey’s home Universiry, The University of the West of England, have both proposed a $5,000 reward for information leading to Dorey’s location.

Students and community members have been doing there part in the efforts with several search parties, fliers, and Facebook groups. And student’s like senior, Tristan Brown, noticed.

“I will say that I’m pretty proud of the VCU community and how they’ve truly rallied together. I mean they used every necessary resource,” said Brown.

Shipley says this should open every international student’s eyes. Being in an unfamiliar area is difficult.

“When you realize he’s British, it’s like, wow. It’s like, take it back, it’s like that could have been me ‘cause I’m British as well,” said Shipley.

RICHMOND, Va.–Tiffany Jones , a Fashion Design senior,  is one of the winners for the “Who’s Who Among Students in American Colleges and Universities.”

To be nominated, students had to be in good academic standing, were involved on campus and in the community.