Stafford County’s sheriff’s office wrote annual all-expenses-paid Las Vegas trips into a five-year dispatch software contract. Fredericksburg just walked away from a projected $23 million data-center payday. And a Manassas school board fight has now reached a member’s own children.

On this Thursday, August 27, 2026 edition of the Potomac Local News Podcast, Uriah Kiser walks through the stories driving Stafford, Manassas, Fredericksburg, and Spotsylvania this week.

FOIA records show the Stafford County Sheriff’s Office sent four employees — one lieutenant and three dispatchers — to a spring 2026 conference at the MGM Grand. Flights and hotels were built into a multi-year 911 Watch dispatch software contract for four of five years. The county still issued per diems on top of that. The sheriff’s office and the vendor both said the trip  ...