INSIDE Looking back on the life of a public servant > page 2
Volume 59, Number 6 • February 7, 2013
County approves Benedictine plan By Ken Odor jodor@goochlandgazette.com
Photo by Ken Odor
Harry “H. F.” East mans his post at the information desk at the Goochland County Administration Building. He volunteers there three days a week while he looks for a job. East suffered a life-threatening battle with Methicillinresistant Staphylococcus aureus and a host of complications 10 years ago from which he is still recovering.
Goochland man working to achieve more independence only has the use of his left arm (he’s naturally right-handed), is still dealing with the aftermath of a nightmarish sequence of events that began almost 10 years ago, By Ken Odor when what began as a flu-like jodor@goochlandgazette.com series of symptoms landed him Harry East wants to be able to in the hospital fighting for his life against MRSA (Methicillin-resistant get around better. Staphylococcus aureus). A stroke So he can find a job. East, 36, a double amputee who and a case of endocarditis (inflam-
Van would make it easier to find work
mation of the inner layer of the heart) added insult to injury for the young man, who was on intensive care and spent two months in MCV. But he left the hospital determined to rehabilitate himself. He spent seven weeks in 2012 at the Woodrow Wilson Rehabilitation see East > page 8
Goochland County has approved Benedictine College Preparatory Schools’ plan of development (POD) for its move to the River Road Campus in Goochland, said County Administrator Rebecca Dickson last week. “The plan of development was approved yesterday,” Dickson said on Jan. 30. “They’ve complied with all the conditions from the county’s standpoint.” “This is it – the last hurdle,” said Benedictine Headmaster Jesse Grapes. “If construction moves according to schedule we plan to open the academic campus in the fall of 2013. We are very excited to have reached the culmination of this process.” Dickson said the county’s main concern had been Benedictine’s not having adequate road width required to put in the necessary turn lanes but that the school had purchased the land needed for that. The school already uses the site for most of its sports programs, but the idea of moving the academic part there was placed on hold last summer while Benedictine worked to acquire a small piece of property near the entrance to the campus so it could create an easement wide enough to meet state roadway standards. That happened in November, and the county subsequently approved the idea. The approval puts back into motion the school’s imminent departure from its longtime home on Sheppard Street in Richmond.
File Photo
Goochland has approved Benedictine’s plan of development for its campus at Benedictine Abbey.
Benedictine was founded in 1911 by monks from North Carolina as a Catholic military school for boys in West End Richmond. But the school’s campus for years has been land-locked and a source of continuing expense for the financially strapped monks, and a decision was made to sell the property to the neighboring Virginia Museum of Fine Arts and move the operation to the monk’s other property, the 50-acre tract in Goochland. After much debate about the fate of the property, the Catholic Diocese of Richmond ultimately stepped in and bought it, in part to help protect nearby St. Benedict Catholic Church. But Benedictine, which is affiliated with but not formally part of the diocese’s school system, maintained its desire to move west. Grapes said Benedictine would begin improvements in the academic facility while awaiting permits for road and site work, a see Benedictine > page 4