Man Shot By Arlington Sheriff Worked for TV Show — Julian Dawkins, the 22-year-old man shot and killed by an off-duty Arlington deputy sheriff in Alexandria early Wednesday, worked as a shuttle bus driver for the PBS Newshour in Shirlington. He was also the cousin of  Washington Mystics player Tierra Ruffin-Pratt. [NBC Washington]

Chamber’s ‘Best Business’ Awards — The Arlington Chamber of Commerce has handed out its 2013 Arlington’s Best Business awards. The winners were: John Marshall Bank (Business of the Year), Dante Consulting (Business of the Year), InfoLock Technologies (Technology Small Business of the Year), Minuteman Press Crystal City (Service Small Business of the Year), House of Steep (Retail Small Business of the Year), AHC Inc. (Non-Profit Small Business of the Year), BbG Fitness (Home-Based Business of the Year Award). [Sun Gazette]

Arlington Sells $77 Million in Bonds — Arlington County issued $77 million worth of bonds at an average interest rate of 3.6 percent on Tuesday. The bonds will help fund the acquisition of the office building at 2020 14th Street N, for use as a year-round homeless shelter and for county offices, and for the affordable housing redevelopment of Buckingham Village 3. [Arlington County]

Photo courtesy CG Liacouras

The Office Depot at 1515 N. Courthouse Road is closing next month.

Signs and flyers inside the Courthouse store say it will close its doors on June 29. Customers are being encouraged to instead shop at the Alexandria store at 6211 N. Kings Highway or the Falls Church store at 3536 S. Jefferson Drive.

Flyers being handed out by employees offer a $10 discount on purchases of $50 or more at the Alexandria or Falls Church stores. Those who need office supplies in Arlington also have the option of going to the Staples store at 3804 Wilson Blvd in Virginia Square.

Employees told us they’re not sure what will be replacing Office Depot once it closes.

Hat tip to Rob Stern

Owners Hans Hess and Cord Thomas, Hess’ nephew, are planning to sell the 50-cab fleet to Veolia Transportation, which operates more than 2,400 taxicabs around the country. Among Veolia’s local holdings are the SuperShuttle airport transportation service and a third of the Washington Flyer cab fleet.  Hess also owns the Ballston-based Elevation Burger restaurant chain.

The Arlington County Board must first approve the ownership transfer, per a condition of Envirocab’s taxi licenses. County staff is recommending that the Board approve the sale at its meeting on Tuesday.

The sale has been in the works since at least February. In March, Veolia’s SuperTaxi subsidiary, which will operate Envirocab, told county staff that it plans to offer the following benefits for Envirocab employees and the cab-riding public:

• “SuperTaxi will maintain operations and key personnel as well as stand dues at current levels.”
• “SuperTaxi will provide consumers with new smartphone apps to reserve a taxicab along with a 24 hour, 7 days per week call center with customer-service trained staff.”
• “SuperTaxi will hold regular meetings with drivers to improve service and safety and provide driver award programs.”
• “SuperTaxi will use incentives to provide service during peak demand periods.”
• “SuperTaxi will add at least one wheelchair-accessible taxicab to the fleet (while still keeping its fleet size at 50 taxicabs as authorized under the existing certificate issued to Envirocab).”

Earlier this month the Arlington Transportation Commission unanimously voted to support the ownership transfer. In a report, county staff concluded that the sale “will not adversely affect the health, safety and welfare of the traveling public nor will it adversely affect the Arlington County taxicab industry.”

In December, the County Board denied Envirocab’s request for additional taxi licenses, despite a recommendation from County Manager Barbara Donnellan that the company receive 10 additional licenses.

The Arlington County Board is considering an amendment to its zoning ordinance to allow outdoor cafes on private property to stay open year-round. The county was previously enforcing an uncodified interpretation of the ordinance that requires all outdoor cafes to be seasonal in nature — typically only open from April to November.

Sidewalk cafes located on public property will still be regulated under the seasonality requirement, but will only be required to close for three months of the year.

The amendment proposal comes just over a year after the Westover Beer Garden, which is on private property, defied the county’s seasonality requirement, calling it an “imaginary rule.”

The zoning amendment provides other policy tweaks and clarifications for outdoor cafes on private property. Among them:

• Use of televisions, radios and other electronic media will be permitted at outdoor cafes from 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. The outdoor use of electronic media will still be regulated by the county’s noise ordinance.
• Outdoor cafes “in side or rear yards adjacent to or across an alley from an ‘R’ or ‘RA’ [residential] District” must be closed between 11:00 p.m. and 9:00 a.m.
• Outdoor cafes must have fewer seats than the main restaurant, and cannot be used when the main restaurant is closed.
• All outdoor fixtures must be removable.
• Only restaurants may have outdoor cafes

The amendment also carries a new legal definition for outdoor cafes. It’s described as “An area that contains portable seating and tables, intended solely for the consumption of food and beverages that are also included in the standard menu of the restaurant, outside the exterior walls of a restaurant (excluding rooftops).”

The Board is scheduled to vote on the measure on Saturday.

The t-shirt was created by PikeBuzz.com, a new website that offers deals and events at Columbia Pike “town center” businesses, and will be given away at the site’s launch party Wednesday night. The first 100 attendees at the event will receive the shirt for free.

(Disclosure: PikeBuzz is an ARLnow.com advertiser.)

PikeBuzz owner Greg Godbout, who also owns the Arlington Cinema & Drafthouse, says the t-shirt isn’t meant to be controversial – like the bus stop – just humorous.

“We were looking for something funny to put on a shirt,” he said. “The national level attention that the bus stop got in our neighborhood made for an easy target. We also see the Columbia Pike neighborhood changing significantly for the better and thought it would be funny to use the bus stop as a silly measurement of that improvement.”

The shirt takes a jab at the northern half of the county with a scoreboard that shows “South Arlington 1, North Arlington 0.”

“The reference to the scoreboard is to make light of the home grown competitiveness between the two sections of Arlington,” Godbout explained. He continued:

Prior to moving to South Arlington 13 years ago, I would not have been able to tell you the difference between North Arlington and South Arlington, except that one is south of Rt. 50 and the other north of Rt. 50. But after meeting people in the neighborhood, the general belief shared by some is that “North Arlington” has it better… better schools, more funding, more representation on the County Board, etc. So for some in South Arlington, the feeling is that we don’t have it as good. The reality is quite the opposite. I live in the Penrose neighborhood of South Arlington and love it here. My daughter goes to Patrick Henry which is exceptional. My business is in South Arlington and has enjoyed a resurgence in recent years. I love the advantages that South Arlington offers.

Godbout described PikeBuzz as a site that “promotes local businesses and allows us to increase the number of events offered on the Pike” by bringing more people to the area.

The site’s launch party will be held Wednesday from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. at the Drafthouse (2903 Columbia Pike). In addition to the free t-shirt, the event will feature free food, Karaoke and live acoustic music.

Crystal City Wine Shop — a for-profit business owned by the nonprofit Washington Wine Academy – will open a 1,500 square foot store at 220 20th Street S., in the former Revolution Cycles CityHub space. The store will carry 300 different wines and 150 types of beer, according to Washington Wine Academy president Jim Barker.

In addition to selling wine and beer, the store will “focus on educating people through tastings and events,” Barker said. Like the current store at 401 12th Street S., the new location will hold wine and beer tastings on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays.

Barker says he hopes to open the new store at some point this summer, possibly in August.

Even though the two stores will only be a few blocks away from one another, Barker says he believes having a new store “in the heart of Crystal City” will help attract new customers who don’t necessarily want to walk to the existing store, on the north end of Crystal City.

Barker said the Whole Foods Market set to open a block away from the wine shop’s 12th Street location in 3-4 years is “obviously a concern,” but thinks that there’s room for both businesses. He pointed out that the apartment building in which the Whole Foods will be built will add residents to the area, and that the new Boeing headquarters will also add to Crystal City Wine Shop’s base of potential customers.

Photo via Google Maps

The new Residence Inn by Marriott hotel in Ballston (650 N. Quincy Street) is welcoming its first guests this afternoon.

The hotel, which is part of the Founder’s Square development, has 183 hotel suites, 1,880 square feet of retail space, 110 underground parking spaces, an indoor pool, fitness center and a landscaped terrace. It was built to LEED Gold sustainability standards with features like a green roof and reduced water use and energy consumption.

The groundbreaking for the $36 million, 11-story hotel took place in October 2011. Its construction was completed ahead of schedule, according to a press release from The Donohoe Companies, which built and is now managing the hotel.

Residence Inn is Ballston’s first extended-stay hotel, according to the company. An official “grand opening” ceremony is planned for June.

Last week, I closed with a reference to the change in parking regulations for food trucks. If you talk to people in the restaurant business, they might find disagreement with what I had to say. It is not that they do not appreciate the the ability of entrepreneurs to start up a business. Their issues are more with the challenges they face in an area with a high cost of doing business. And, they take issue with the way Arlington County treats our existing business by way of taxes, fees, permitting issues, etc. Food trucks, they would argue, have it relatively easy by comparison.

It’s hard to argue with this perspective.

Our County Board once infamously took several hours to debate permits for the placement of sidewalk cafe tables for just two local restaurants. You had to be there to really appreciate the ridiculousness of the length of discussion. In fact, if you talk to most long-standing business owners around Arlington, they can probably tell you at least one story dealing with the county that will make you shake your head in disbelief.

The county certainly has not been able to fill ground floor retail space in new developments that had been promised. Yet, they have famously put businesses like the Westover Market through the wringer.

The way to benefit our employers and improve the options for consumers is to ease the burdens on our existing brick and mortar businesses. Here are three goals to start:

1. Arlington should increase the efficiency of its permitting process. To further this goal, it should clarify its zoning rules and ensure greater consistency in their application.
2. We should cut the commercial property tax surcharge in half permanently, or at least until it might be required for the ill-advised trolley project. Currently, this property is taxed at a rate 12.5 percent higher than residential properties. By cutting it in half, money would still be available for targeted transportation upgrades. More dollars would be left in our local economy, and it would not be at the expense of general fund dollars that go to county services.
3. County Board members should investigate reducing or eliminating the Business Professional Occupational License (BPOL) tax. The BPOL tax is based on gross receipts rather than a tax on profits. In essence, it’s an additional sales tax that our businesses must remit. And, it is an additional paperwork headache for our small businesses.

In short, Arlington should constantly look for ways to hang a big “Open for Business” sign on the door. Encouraging more businesses to open and thrive will benefit all of us with more jobs for people who need them, more choices for consumers, and ultimately more taxpayers to help shoulder the load.

Mark Kelly is a former Arlington GOP Chairman and two-time Republican candidate for Arlington County Board.

WJLA and NewsChannel 8 for Sale — Rosslyn-based TV station WJLA (ABC 7) has been offered for sale by Allbritton Communications. The company is seeking to sell WJLA and its companion cable channel NewsChannel 8 in order to continue investing in new media, like its Politico website and newspaper. Disney, owner of the ABC television network, is thought to be a likely buyer. [WBJ, Washington Post, Politico]

Brink, Lopez Announce Reelection Bids — Dels. Bob Brink and Alfonso Lopez announced their bids for reelection to the Virginia House of Delegates at last night’s Arlington County Democratic Committee meeting. As part of his speech, Lopez made fun of a Republican effort in the state legislature to study the creation of a Virginia-based currency. Lopez joked that he wanted his face on the Virginia $5 bill and Brink’s on the $10 bill, so that “in Virginia it would cost a Brink and a Lopez to buy a pizza.” [Blue Virginia]

‘Over the Edge’ Fundraiser in Crystal City — Today, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m., people will be rappelling 15 stories down the Hilton Crystal City at 2399 Jefferson Davis Highway as part of a fundraiser for the Special Olympics. Among those scheduled to go “over the edge” today is Washington Nationals mascot Screech. The fundraiser will also run from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. tomorrow (Friday). [Event Calendar, Special Olympics Virginia]

County Sells $206 Million in Bonds — Arlington County sold $206 million in bonds on Tuesday. The bonds were sold at a low 2.5 percent interest rate. The refunding of older bonds under the low rate will save the county about $5 million. [Arlington County]

Police Looking for Wallet Thief — Arlington police are looking for a man who allegedly stole a victim’s wallet in the Clarendon area last month. [ACPD]

Flickr pool photo by Wolfkann

LOFT, formerly known as Ann Taylor LOFT, sells “upper moderate” priced women’s clothing for for work and home. The company’s two stores in Arlington — at the Pentagon Row and Market Common Clarendon shopping centers — closed recently to undergo some remodeling.

The Pentagon Row location is expected to reopen this Friday (May 3) and the Clarendon location should reopen at some point next week, according to company spokeswoman Marie Larson.

“This new concept store is complete with plush seating and open space encouraging interaction among clients and larger groupings of mannequins in order to show our guests additional outfitting options,” Larson said.