Feds pull grant to help Historic Jamestown cope with rising water levels

Good morning! It's Thursday, May 22. It's our 4-month anniversary. Also in the news: York County looks at indoor firing range exception, and a look at Memorial Day Weekend celebrations and memorials.

May 22, 2025

Jamestown at extreme high tide. (Courtesy Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation)

We changed our minds, the Feds recently told Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation.

As part of its cost-cutting efforts, the federal government recently cancelled a grant it awarded the group last summer to help its multi-million-dollar effort to spare Jamestown Island’s architectural treasures from rising water levels.

Jamestown was named one of the country’s 11 most endangered historic places by the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 2022. Encroaching wetlands, sea-level rise, extreme storm events and a rising saltwater aquifer are imperiling the site’s archaeological deposits, including human remains that can be dissolved completely by water.

The Foundation announced a five-year program, which could cost up to $40 million, to stabilize the historic site, said Foundation spokesperson Angela Johnston.

“Jamestown is America’s birthplace. If we don’t take action now, more than 60% of the archaeological site, containing the untold history revealed in artifacts lost or left behind, will be permanently underwater in just 50 years,” Foundation President James Horn said at the time the grant was announced.

(video courtesy Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation)

In June last year, the National Endowment for the Humanities announced Jamestown had won one of four Climate Smart Humanities Organizations grants for $300,000. The grant would have paid for analysis and surveys to come up with solutions for the island’s problem.

But NEH came into the crosshairs of the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency, leading to termination notices to 65% of its workforce and elimination of more than 1,000 grants, according to Inside Higher Ed.

“Even though the grant has been rescinded, we are still continuing with this work,” Johnston told us. “It's imperative that we find solutions to our flooding issues as soon as possible, rising waters are already impacting archaeological resources.”

So far the Foundation has raised around $16 million of the $40 million or more it will cost to protect the island, Johnston said. The Foundation is a subsidiary of Preservation Virginia, a statewide preservation nonprofit that jointly manages Jamestown with the National Park Service.

The Foundation is looking for more corporate sponsors and seeking donations at its website.

So far the group has repaired the existing seawall on the island and recently began elevating some of the pathways onsite. Johnston said the organization will need more hydrological studies or extensive permitting to complete the rest of its work, which includes elevating buildings, roads, installing flood berms and improving infrastructure.

York County supervisors are willing to consider changes to the zoning code that would allow the Lafayette Gun Club to expand its indoor firing range for a youth program.

That project cannot take place right now because the club is located in a Resource Conservation zoning district, which encompasses schools, parks and lightly populated residential areas.

At their meeting Tuesday night, the supervisors asked the planning commission to look at the implications of amending the code so that a firing range could be permitted in such districts under narrowly targeted criteria.

The club asked District 4 Supervisor G. Stephen Roane, Jr. to champion their request with county staff.

District 5 Supervisor Thomas G. Shepperd said the planning commission should understand that such permits must be carefully vetted, because “I don’t want to be opening the door for weapons ranges” in conservation areas.

Supervisors voted unanimously to request the commission study the matter and how it would be applied across the county.

Riverwalk Landing celebrates its 20^th anniversary with a concert Thursday night, kicking off a four-day celebration with special events over the weekend, Administrator Mark L. Bellamy, Jr. told the supervisors. There will be another concert Friday night and shops are offering 20% off for the weekend, when beachgoers usually crowd the riverfront.

York County will host its Memorial Day remembrance ceremony on Monday, May 26 at York Hall at noon, Bellamy said. There will be a performance by the Fifes & Drum band and wreath laying at grave sites.

Four months and counting – want more?

This edition marks four months since we launched Williamsburg Watch as a place where serious people could get serious news about their local governments and institutions.

My goal was the same I had as CEO of Tribune’s Virginia newspapers, The Daily Press, Virginia Gazette and Tidewater Review: to help you get the information you need to make informed decisions as a voter and citizen.

In that time, we’ve looked into why we have a shortage of doctors in our area; analyzed how local government spending outpaces inflation and population growth; looked at which schools are doing the best job of educating students; introduced you to new local political candidates and tracked their fundraising. We’ve kept track of home sales and home prices in Williamsburg, James City and York Counties. Our guest opinion pages provide room for thoughtful discussions by citizens from all walks of life and all political persuasions. And we’ve also had fun with stories like the young violinists learning to play on plastic violins printed in the Williamsburg Regional Library’s 3D printers.

In short, what a good local newspaper was able to do in my heyday.

Williamsburg Watch is now a media partner for WHRO, supplying their website with news about the Historic Triangle. We are adding hundreds of subscribers monthly, who view our stories more than 40,000 times a month. Our newsletter open rate is over 60%.

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State News Headlines

Virginia Congressman Gerry Connolly dies at 75.

Gov. Youngkin joins 19 Republican governors supporting Trump budget bill.

Southwest Virginia storm chaser tracks vicious tornadic supercell across Kentucky

Guest Opinion:

Wittman Votes to Disenfranchise Millions of Americans

By Dennis Litalien

On April 10, 2025, Rob Wittman, a nine-term Republican congressman representing Virginia’s 1^st District, voted for the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, which if allowed to become law, would disenfranchise millions of American citizens.

Wittman has become a willing accomplice in support of President Donald Trump’s long running, baseless attacks on the integrity of U.S. elections.

Consider these facts provided by the Center for American Progress regarding the SAVE Act:

“It requires all Americans to prove their citizenship status by presenting documentation-in-person-when registering to vote or updating their voter registration information. Specifically, the legislation would require the vast majority of Americans to rely on a passport or birth certificate to prove their citizenship. While this may sound easy for Americans, more than 140 million American citizens do not possess a passport and as many as 69 million women who have taken their spouse’s name do not have a birth certificate matching their legal name.

“Because documentation would need to be presented in person, the legislation, in practice, will prevent Americans from being able to register to vote by mail; end voter registration drives nationwide; and eliminate online voter registration overnight—a service 42 states rely on. Americans would need to appear in person, with original documentation, to even simply update their voter registration information for a change of address or change in party affiliation (imagine how that would impact military voters and American citizens living overseas). These impacts alone would set voter registration sophistication and technology back by decades and would be unworkable for millions of Americans, including more than 60 million people who live in rural areas. Additionally, driver’s licenses—including REAL IDs—as well as military or tribal IDs would not be sufficient forms of documentation to prove citizenship under the legislation.

“In short, the SAVE Act is disastrous legislation that would drastically alter the way every American citizen registers to vote. The legislation completely disregards the resources available to most Americans—Republicans, Democrats and Independents—could be disenfranchised. Leadership in the U.S. House of Representatives has declared that passing the legislation is one of their top priorities for the 199^th Congress.”

This senseless and dangerous legislation does nothing more than satisfy the revenge fantasies of a president who could care less about election integrity. It’s discriminatory, un-American and unequivocally wrong.

Last year, 90 million eligible American citizens didn’t vote. If anything, we should focus on encouraging them to vote by making it easier instead of harder.

We have the capacity and technology to do so without jeopardizing election integrity. Wittman has become no more than a rubberstamp for Trump. He stopped listening to constituents long ago and proven himself unworthy of another term in Congress.

Wittman believes disenfranchising millions of American citizens is perfectly fine. We can do better by electing a new U.S. Representative in 2026. We could hardly do any worse.

Dennis Litalien, a retired Marine, is a former supply chain logistics manager who lives in Williamsburg. He is a registered Democrat.

Memorial Day Weekend Events:

flag of America lot on grass field — Photo by Belle Collective on Unsplash

Riverwalk Landing 20^th Anniversary Celebration. May 22, 6:30 – 9 pm. Free. Riverwalk Landing, Yorktown.

Putts Fore Paws tournament benefitting 4Paws Animal Rescue. May 23. $150/person, $600/team. 8 a.m. – 1 p.m. Kingsmill River Course.

Colonial Williamsburg Public Auction. May 24, 1-2 p.m. bid on select items from CW stores and other items.

World Bee Day, Jamestown Settlement. Honeybee tastings and activities, included with museum admission. 9 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Fifes & Drums March. May 24. 12:30 p.m. – 12:50 p.m. Join the corps as they march down Duke of Gloucester Street.

Yorktown Market Days. May 24. 8 a.m. – noon. Riverwalk Landing, Yorktown.

Colonial Williamsburg Memorial Day Commemoration. May 26. 10 a.m. – 10:30 a.m., Palace Green.

York County Memorial Day Ceremony. May 26. Noon. York Hall lawn, 301 Main Street Yorktown. Fifes and Drums of Yorktown will mark to York Hall starting at 11:45 a.m.