ARLnow’s now-former Assistant Managing Editor Jo DeVoe worked her last day here last week.
Throughout her nearly four year tenure here, Jo published nearly 1,500 articles, edited many others, and made periodic appearances on the Fox 5 “DMV Zone” newscast.
While Jo covered everything from restaurant openings to the twists and turns of pandemic-era Arlington, she will probably be best remembered for her detailed coverage of education and public policy matters.
Jo’s last article for ARLnow will be published later this week. In the meantime, we asked about which articles she is most proud of from her time here.
One of the articles I’m proudest of is the recent Press Club on modernizing civic institutions, which seemed to strike a chord with many readers and, I heard, accelerated the bylaw review of membership requirements for one civic association. Other top Press Club stories are my deep dives into the county’s technology struggles and the forthcoming article this month on Arlington’s independent policing auditor — stay tuned.
I’m grateful to those who came to ARLnow with information I could use to pull on tangled threads, from the financial troubles at Arlington Independent Media to those within the local teachers union to poor living conditions at the Serrano Apartments — where our coverage was cited as a catalyst for change. I’m also grateful to those who came forward to discuss the incarceration of unhoused people and the lack of resources going to programs such as bond diversion as well as how Arlington Public Schools should tackle opioid abuse among students.
Covering Arlington ignited a sleeper passion for zoning and development. I loved finding and writing about “quirks” such as duplex and patio projects that needed County Board approval. I appreciated the warm reception to my stories about the role of garden apartments in Arlington’s landscape, filed the night before my first child was born, and how a detached garage somehow still stands across the street from a Metro station. Both stories began as vague ideas and I was pleasantly surprised by the outcome.
I will not forget the one time an article I wrote was one of the most-read stories of the year and a singular contribution to the cicada buzz of 2021: mysterious bites by mites who emerge when cicadas do.
These stories weren’t high-profile but they reminded me of the important role journalists can serve as an outlet for “customer service” complaints, like when the call line for Washington Gas was not serving people well and when mail delivery slowed in certain Arlington neighborhoods.
Photo via Fox 5