News
People out at Gravelly Point on a warm early spring day (Flickr pool photo by Jason Gooljar)

Beyer Blasts Trump Tariffs — “Trump’s mass tariffs are stupid. The White House is predicting the largest tax increase in history. Trump likes tariffs because he’s a bully, because he’s an authoritarian, because he doesn’t care who gets hurt.” [Rep. Don Beyer/X]

Worries About Regional Economy — “The Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond told Virginia lawmakers Wednesday that D.C., Maryland and Virginia could see significant economic challenges in the near future amid the mass federal layoffs. The Fed made a presentation to a special subcommittee that was created to address any economic fallout from federal layoffs and spending cuts.” [NBC 4]

Authorities Attend Immigrant Event — “In addition to an immigration lawyer, there are two police officers and a sheriff’s deputy taking questions, part of a community engagement team designed to build connections between residents and law enforcement. Commonwealth’s Attorney Parisa Dehghani-Tafti, the county’s top law enforcement officer, had one message for the group. ‘We want you to know that we are here to keep you safe, and no one’s going to get deported until they get a conviction.'” [WAMU]

New Local Billionaires — “The latest edition of the World’s Billionaires List published Tuesday anoints Mike Sabel and Bob Pender, founders of Venture Global Inc., as newly minted billionaires. The duo took their Arlington-based liquefied natural gas company public in January, giving them each, at the time, a net worth of $23.7 billion…. Sabel, a former investment banker, lives in D.C. and Pender, a longtime D.C. attorney, lives in Falls Church.” [WBJ]

ACSO Rebrands Visitation Program — “Hosted around major holidays such as Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and during the various seasons, Hugs of Hope events allow children to reconnect with their parents in a safe, nurturing environment that doesn’t feel like a jail. The initiative is rooted in the belief that incarceration should not sever the bonds of love and trust between parent and child.” [Arlington County Sheriff’s Office]

Longtime Firefighter Retires — “After more than 34 years of service, the senior firefighter in the department, FF/EMT [Charles Cake] is retiring effective April 1, 2025. We wish Chuck and his family health and happiness during his well-deserved retirement. Chuck, take care and thank you.” [ACFD/X]

It’s Thursday — There is a slight chance of showers before 8am and after 2pm, with patchy fog expected between 9am and 10am. Cloudy conditions persist with a high near 80 and southwest winds at 14-17 mph, gusting up to 28 mph. Precipitation chance is 40%. Thursday night, showers and thunderstorms are possible, with mostly cloudy skies and a low around 64. Southwest winds will be 7-10 mph and a 50% chance of precipitation. [NWS]

Flickr pool photo by Jason Gooljar


Around Town

Good Wednesday evening, Arlington. Let’s take a look back at today’s stories and a look forward to tomorrow’s event calendar.

🕗 News recap

The following articles were published earlier today — Apr 2, 2025.

📅 Upcoming events

Here is what’s going on Thursday in Arlington, from our event calendar.

🌧️ Thursday’s forecast

There is a slight chance of showers before 8am and after 2pm, with patchy fog expected between 9am and 10am. Cloudy conditions persist with a high near 80 and southwest winds at 14-17 mph, gusting up to 28 mph. Precipitation chance is 40%. Thursday night, showers and thunderstorms are possible, with mostly cloudy skies and a low around 64. Southwest winds will be 7-10 mph and a 50% chance of precipitation. See more from Weather.gov.

💡 Quote of the Day

“The only way to achieve the impossible is to believe it is possible.”
– Charles Kingsleigh

🌅 Tonight’s sunset

The MonumentCam screenshot above is used with permission of the Trust for the National Mall and courtesy of EarthCam.

Thanks for reading! Feel free to discuss the day’s happenings in the comments.


Sponsored

This regularly scheduled column is written by Eli Tucker, Arlington-based Realtor and Arlington resident. If you would like to work with Eli and his team in Northern Virginia and the greater D.C. Metro area, you can reach him directly at [email protected].

Question: How much of an impact do you think the ROAD to Housing Act will have on housing affordability in Arlington?

Answer: The Road to Housing Act became law ten days ago, with the stated goal of improving housing affordability in the United States.

I don’t see many policies in the Act that will improve affordability in the Arlington/Northern VA/DC Metro markets, outside of incentives for more affordable multi-family housing, but there are policies that should improve affordability in other markets that are more saturated with institutional investors that own swaths of single-family homes (e.g. Atlanta and Phoenix) and for manufactured/mobile homes.

The Local Conversation Needs to Change

If we are going to improve affordability in our market, most of the change has to be done locally/regionally, not nationally, but it requires a paradigm shift in how we discuss and solve for housing affordability.

Affordability Disconnect: Near Term Expectations Not Realistic
A disconnect between housing affordability expectations and reality prevents the right community and political conversations from happening. We expect/demand housing affordability immediately, ignoring the difficulty, and consequences, of achieving it that quickly.

Stable and healthy housing affordability is a long-term process requiring gradual change over a 10-15+ year period.

Demand-Side Solutions Won’t Work
Demand-side solutions, such as lower interest rates or easier financing, artificially inflate home values, as seen during the COVID-era housing boom and early 2000s. They are not a good long-term solution to affordability because they push values even higher (along with your property taxes) and affordability gets worse when rates/lending normalize and no longer provide artificially low monthly payments.

Supply-Side Solutions Are Not Immediate
Most policy discussions focus on supply-side solutions: building more/faster and denser housing (e.g. Arlington’s Missing Middle/Expanded Housing Option), incentivizing more existing home sales, or disincentivizing concentrated ownership by companies and individuals. Econ 101 tells us that more supply = lower prices = affordable housing (winner winner!).

This is the only path to stable, long-term housing affordability…BUT, at current interest rates, prices must drop 30-35% in the United States to become affordable, at current income levels. A 30-35% drop in home values would devastate the economy, so a supply-side solution won’t (shouldn’t) provide immediate affordability. (more…)


News

The Arlington County Board is considering a $9.6 million repair project on a 1950s-era bridge over Four Mile Run.

Officials are set to vote this Saturday on a contract for Fort Myer Construction Corporation to replace the superstructure and repair the substructure of the Arlington Ridge Road bridge.


News

An Arlington-based venture capital firm has announced it will pour $32 million in funding into cybersecurity startups.

Runtime Ventures, based out of Arlington and Austin, Texas, officially announced the capital commitment today (Wednesday).


Around Town

A new gelato shop and a fast-casual Guatemalan restaurant are celebrating their debuts at the Pentagon City mall this week.

Amorino Gelato al Naturale opened yesterday (Tuesday) at the Fashion Centre at Pentagon City (1100 S. Hayes Street), while Pollo Campero is expected to celebrate a grand opening on Friday with free giveaways.


News

A motorcyclist suffered serious injuries this morning in a crash along N. Glebe Road.

The crash happened around 11 a.m. in the northbound lanes of Glebe, just south of the Henderson Road/Quincy Street intersection, near Ballston.


News

A Palestine-themed alphabet book will remain on the shelf following a review by Falls Church staff, but it’s moving to a different part of the library.

A resident’s complaint in February about “P is for Palestine: A Palestine Alphabet Book” prompted a flood of nearly 4,500 emails to the city, library director Megan Dotzler told the Library Board of Trustees at a meeting last week. The vast majority of emailers called for removing the book, which critics have accused of antisemitism.