By Reid Goldstein
With high school, middle school and a portion of elementary school boundary adjustments behind us, this is a good time to reflect on the recent boundary processes and consider how we can collectively improve future ones.
Opinion
Keep your eyes peeled for another round of snow and wintry mix tonight into tomorrow morning.
It seems March has plenty of cold weather left, with evening an outside shot at some snow Sunday night in the forecast.
Arlington residents and County government have had a tortured, fitful relationship with streetlights — a key piece of infrastructure on which everyone depends.
That relationship is complicated by the fact that Dominion Energy — not Arlington County government — owns a majority of Arlington’s approximately 19,000 streetlights (Slide 4):
Two Thumbs Down to the County Board for advertising a tax rate that nearly doubled the county manager’s proposed increase.
Apparently a 4.7 percent spending increase is not enough “flexibility” for Board Members in setting spending priorities. If they passed their proposed rate increase, it would allow for nearly 6 percent spending growth versus the current fiscal year.
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The following Letter to the Editor was submitted by Gary Shapiro, the president and CEO of the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), who writes in support of Amazon’s plans to open up a new headquarters in Crystal City and Pentagon City.
The Crystal City-based group lobbies on behalf of more than 2,200 consumer technology companies, Amazon included, and it has recently come out in strong support of the company’s vision for Arlington. Shapiro appeared at a recent forum of Amazon executives and regional leaders, and the CTA even organized a pro-Amazon demonstration at the event.
By Charles Head
Gerrymandering: an odd partisan game played by politicians. A quaint tradition of American electioneering played out in smoky back rooms, but of little consequence. Is that really true?
It may not be the snow we saw earlier this week, but the weather is looking a bit wet this weekend.
Forecasters expect a full day of rain Saturday, though most showers should clear out by Sunday.
A year ago, my fellow ARLnow.com columnist, Mark Kelly, posted a column welcoming the legislative defeat of a bill sponsored by House Del. Patrick Hope (D-47th District). Hope’s bill would have granted the County Board the option to utilize a ranked-choice (or instant-runoff) voting system in County Board elections.
Ranked choice voting has been adopted in an increasing number of jurisdictions, including San Francisco, Oakland, Utah and Maine.
Arlington County Manager Mark Schwartz is set to unveil his proposed budget over the next few days at a County Board work session and the regular monthly meeting.
According to a Schwartz email, his budget will include just $5 million in cuts to existing staff and programs. This is $30 million less than the worst-case scenario laid out over the the past few months.
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By Sheila Fleischhacker
“I don’t have any friends.”
Enjoy this unseasonably warm weather while you can, as the holiday weekend looks set to feel a bit more like February.
Forecasters say a cold front will roll through tomorrow (Saturday), giving us the chance of seeing a bit of snow, or perhaps just rain. But the worst of that should fizzle out by tomorrow night, with a dry Sunday and Presidents Day on tap after that.
Two stories posted on ARLnow.com last week underscore the urgent need for the County and School Boards to expedite long-range public facilities and fiscal planning.
The first story (“Never Let A Crisis Go To Waste”) quoted various activists and County Board members stressing the need to make Arlington housing more affordable by up-zoning in order to substantially increase housing supply. (Up-zoning = approving more dense development than permitted by current zoning.)