NORFOLK, Va. (WAVY) — The first-ever climate assessment for the state of Virginia is sounding the alarm for the Commonwealth’s coastal regions.

The study out of George Mason University claims that sea levels are rising at a moderate rate currently, but could accelerate greatly in just the next few decades.

“What we expect in the future, particularly after 2050, is an acceleration in that rise due to warming in the global climate system,” said Dr. Jessica Whitehead, director of Old Dominion University’s Institute for Coastal Adaptation and Resilience and a co-author on the recent Virginia climate assessment. “Then we expect that acceleration to growth higher rates per year.”

It’s a rising issue in the future that will affect the children of today.

“Somebody who is in our middle school system in Hampton Roads here right now, those kids are the ones who are going to be challenged the most by making sure that we’re able to deal with this rise in the future,” Whitehead said.

Whitehead said the concerning rise in sea levels is due to a multitude of factors, some unique to Hampton Roads.

“Tens of thousands of years ago, we had the impact from a meteor in the region,” Whitehead said. “That is one of the areas where we have land that’s sinking a little bit faster than the land everywhere else. Our drinking water is coming mostly from deep, deep aquifers. But drawing down on that aquifer also leads to the sinking. We’re beginning to lose coastal forests that are becoming saltwater marshes, so they can’t continue to trap sediment and get taller faster than the sea levels rising.”

Whitehead said the rising sea levels will have a direct impact on urban flood mitigation.

“Our stormwater systems were built in some places over 100 years ago,” Whitehead said, “so as the sea level is rising, that sea level is rising into those systems, so they have less capacity to be able to process stormwater.”

The environmental risks are ones that come with economic costs.

“We very often think of this as an environmental issue, and it is, but there’s also economic costs for us,” Whitehead said. “The potential home values that are at risk, that’s in the billions of dollars. Our ports have to be right where the water is. That cargo has to be able to move in and out those ports. These are all things that are at risk. Yes, it’s about the environment, but it’s very much about us, too.”

The good news, as Whitehead puts it, is that Hampton Roads as a region is active in addressing these rising sea levels and risks, but that major projects to fully address the issue will take time, and in some cases, decades.

Know more

If you’d like to see the climate assessment for yourself, see below:

An assistant principal in Virginia and his brother were arrested at an airport while en route to Las Vegas where they allegedly wanted to meet with “like-minded individuals” and plan violence against Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers.

John Bennett, 54, and Mark Bennett, 59, were both busted at Norfolk International Airport on Wednesday — less than a week after they allegedly hatched the deranged anti-ICE plan, WTKR reported.

An off-duty officer with the Norfolk Police Department claimed he overheard the brothers four days earlier discussing “how ICE agents are kidnapping individuals and that they need to do something about it” while dining at a restaurant in Virginia Beach, according to a criminal complaint obtained by the outlet.

Mark Bennett allegedly told his brother about his intentions to fly to Las Vegas and meet with “like-minded” people to formulate “enforcement ideas and plans,” according to the complaint.

The elder brother also allegedly confessed that he had recently purchased an assault rifle specifically because “it utilizes the explosive rounds that are needed to penetrate the vests” worn by ICE agents, according to the complaint.

John Bennett, an assistant principal at Kempsville High School in Virginia Beach, piped up and said he wanted to tag along on the trip to Vegas and “go hunting,” as alleged in the complaint.

The complaint states that Mark Bennett bought a ticket to fly to Sin City on Wednesday. It’s unclear if his brother ever purchased one as well.

John Bennett was placed on leave following his arrest, WTKR reported.

He did take a one-year break from teaching and tried his hand at police work, according to his LinkedIn, before hanging up his badge and returning to teach high school mathematics.

The brothers are charged with one count of conspiracy to commit malicious wounding.

They were both granted bond after their arraignment on Thursday, 13 News Now reported.

West Virginia could soon see its borders shift for the first time in more than a century, as lawmakers weigh a proposal that would formally add new territory to the Mountain State.

State Senator Chris Rose said he is introducing a resolution to adopt several counties in neighboring Maryland and Virginia, including Amherst, Bedford, Botetourt, Floyd, Pulaski, and Rockbridge.

“Exciting update on our Appeal to Heaven movement for freedom in Appalachia! Due to overwhelming interest and support, I’m thrilled to announce we’ve expanded our Senate resolution inviting even more Virginia counties, along with counties from Maryland, to join West Virginia,” he wrote on X.

“Now including Amherst, Bedford, Botetourt, Floyd, Pulaski, and Rockbridge, counties that share our values of freedom, Second Amendment rights, and rural prosperity. Let those country roads take you home. Break free from out of touch policies and unite for a stronger future.”

Altogether, the resolution invites 27 Virginia counties to join the state of West Virginia, as well as three Maryland counties.

The initiative originally targeted only a handful of neighboring counties, but Rose says the scope widened after residents from deeper inside Virginia reached out, urging him to add their communities to the plan.

The proposal mirrors growing movements in other states, including California, Illinois and Oregon, for independent or merged states.

In California, organizers of the New California movement want to split the state, they say has become a “totalitarian one-party system” in two and create a new state. In Illinois, organizers of the New Illinois campaign want to do broadly the same thing.

Meanwhile, in Oregon, organizers behind the Greater Idaho campaign say they want to transfer more than a dozen rural Oregon counties into neighboring Idaho, arguing that their communities have little in common with the state’s liberal, urbanized western half.

Rural–Urban Divide Driving the Campaign

The same rural–urban divide underpins the push in West Virginia, where advocates say cultural and political differences have grown too wide to ignore.

A statement published by Senator Rose said the counties were selected based on their “geographic, economic, cultural, and historical connections with West Virginia, including a strong Appalachian heritage, rural lifestyles, and a focus on individual liberties.”

“This resolution is about empowering communities to choose governance that truly reflects their values and needs,” he added. “West Virginia was born from the spirit of self-determination, and we’re extending that invitation to our neighbors who share our way of life. By uniting, we can foster economic growth, better infrastructure, and a stronger voice for Appalachia.”

In an interview with ABC 13, Rose added that the movement is about residents in those counties, which lean Republican, having their voices heard.

“We want our voices to be heard, we want our vote in elections to matter,” he said.

Unlike Maryland, West Virginia is a solidly Republican state. As of August 2025, Republicans outnumber Democrats in registered voters by a significant margin. There are over 170,000 more registered Republicans than Democrats in the state. And the state has voted Republican in every presidential election since 2000.

Nonetheless, campaign organizers say politicians from Democrat leaning areas in the two states have too much influence.

“For too long, rural communities in Western Virginia and Western Maryland have been ruled by distant politicians in Richmond and Annapolis who don’t share our values,” campaign organizers said on their website.

In the 2024 presidential election, the Richmond metro area in Virginia voted decisively for the Democratic ticket. Richmond city itself gave 82 percent of its vote to the Democratic candidate. And Annapolis, Maryland, is strongly Democratic; in the 2025 mayoral election, Democrat Jared Littmann won with 74 percent of the vote.

For campaign organizers, that is a problem. “They restrict your Second Amendment rights, raise your taxes, indoctrinate your children, and funnel your hard-earned dollars into radical green experiments and government waste. Meanwhile, just across the border, West Virginia stands strong—defending freedom, faith, family, and the Constitution,” they said.

A Nearly Impossible Path Ahead

But the hurdle is steep. For any county to shift into West Virginia, lawmakers in each affected state would have to pass authorizing legislation, and Congress would then need to sign off on the boundary change.

For that reason, some lawmakers doubt that the campaign’s aims are realistic. “I wasn’t aware of it and it’s not going to happen,” Virginia Senator Tim Kaine told ABC13.

But Senator Rose is still optimistic. “If that would happen, West Virginia would be more than happy, willing and able to take the counties in and provide the freedom and representation they so much deserve,” he told ABC13.

“I would definitely take the frustration of your constituents seriously, because they feel like they are not being heard in their states,” he added.