Updated 3/27 After an intense several weeks involving a county audit, a board president’s resignation and a mass layoff of all staff members, Arlington Independent Media is attempting to turn a new leaf.
The beleaguered nonprofit’s board members, now the only operational staff of the longstanding public access television and radio broadcaster, sketched out a tentative path forward yesterday (Monday) while fielding questions — and occasional accusations — from members of the public.
Serious crimes remain on the rise in Arlington as the Arlington County Police Department continues to seek more officers.
Simple assaults increased in 2023 for the fourth year in a row, while narcotics offenses surged 19% compared to the previous year, Chief Andy Penn told the Arlington County Board at a budget work session on Thursday. Every major category of offenses — crimes against persons, property and society — went up last year, he said.
Arlington Public Schools is pausing for one year the rollout of changes to its Spanish immersion programs at Claremont and Escuela Key elementary schools.
The pause and how it was communicated have upset parents of students most affected by the shift: rising second-graders. In speeches to the School Board, an online petition and interviews, this group of parents is calling on the Arlington School Board and school administrators to reverse course.
A year after the passage of Arlington’s “Missing Middle” ordinance last March, the jury is out on the long-term implications of the zoning change.
Challenges include a substantial slowdown in Missing Middle applications and continued opposition from some residents.
To generate some savings in its new budget, Arlington County is targeting low-performing bus routes in North Arlington.
It proposes axing one route between Courthouse and Ballston, along Lorcom Lane, that saw just 2.1 passengers per hour in the 2023 fiscal year (ART 62) for a savings of $348,613. Two bus routes — ART 61 and 53, serving the Ft. Myer and Radnor Heights neighborhoods and the Ballston to East Falls Church Metro stations — saw just 3.4 and 4.3 passengers per hour, respectively could be combined for a savings of $316,940.
An Arlington summer camp teaching teenagers firefighting skills could go up in smoke this year.
Camp Heat, which annually enrolls around 25 teens, is on the chopping block in the county’s budget draft. Cutting the free five-day camp to save $47,000 is part of a plan to maintain the Arlington County Fire Dept.’s current $76 million budget in Fiscal Year 2025.
(Updated at 11:05 a.m.) Arlington Public Schools Superintendent Francisco Durán has proposed a 2024-2025 budget that he says avoids new expenses in a lean fiscal year compounded by state funding uncertainty.
He presented an $824.7 million budget — which increases the current budget by $12.2 million, or 1.5% — to the Arlington School Board last week.
Arlington’s police and fire unions are vying for more funding in the county’s proposed $1.62 billion budget to fix compensation issues they say fuel attrition and vacancy issues.
County Manager Mark Schwartz, meanwhile, makes the case in the 2024-2025 budget that the county has been and is committed to meeting these problems with funding while balancing other budget priorities.
The Arlington County Board is considering a potential property tax hike that could be even higher than what County Manager Mark Schwartz proposed.
Board members yesterday (Tuesday) voted 5-0 to advertise hearings on a maximum property tax rate of $1.038 per $100 of assessed value, a 2.5 cent increase from 2023. That is 1 cent higher than the increase of 1.5 cents that Schwartz proposed in his $1.62 billion budget proposal for Fiscal Year 2025.
When Carrie Lombardi left her New York City finance job to teach at Burgundy Farm Country Day School, she was surprised to hear clucking from a colleague’s classroom one day.
The students, she learned, were raising chickens as part of their science curriculum.
An intensifying climate and ongoing impacts of the shift to remote work will transform Arlington over the next 25 years, experts say.
At the same time, the county’s workforce will need to become more nimble to keep up with changes driven by artificial intelligence.
More dirty details have emerged in the county’s $175 million plan to start using sewage for consumer-friendly fertilizer and renewable energy.
The first step is a $32 million budget authorization, set to be considered by the Arlington County Board this Saturday, to begin new upgrades the Arlington County Water Pollution Control Plant.
