A Staples in Virginia Square could become a Spanish immersion daycare and preschool for more than 100 children.
The proposed change in use for the 62-year-old, one-story commercial building has area residents and civic associations on edge about hours, traffic and noise.
Two Northern Virginia businessmen have chosen the location for a franchise of Tierra Encantada, a national preschool provider offering Spanish immersion, hands-on education and from-scratch meals and snacks. It would operate Monday through Friday from 6:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. and serve up to 150 children.
A use permit associated with their proposal is set for a discussion by the Arlington County Board for today (Tuesday), after being pulled from its consent agenda — intended for non-controversial items — on Saturday.
A county report notes that the Staples will close in the near future after a long search for a replacement tenant.
“The property owner has been searching for a new tenant for the property for some time and seeks to lease the space to the childcare center,” the report said.
An employee at Staples said he was unaware of the potential closure and an attorney handling the proposal did not return a request for a clearer closing time frame before this article’s deadline.
Ahead of the Board’s vote today, residents and nearby civic associations sent letters to the county raising their objections and requesting relief if the permit is approved.
“The hours, size, and traffic flow of Staples are an excellent fit for our residential area. We believe the current proposed number of students for Tierra Encantada will cause too much traffic and noise for the awkward location and poor access of the Staples site,” a letter from several Ashton Heights residents said.
“We would prefer to not have a daycare center at the site (especially of that size), but if the center is approved, we want to make sure that steps are taken to mitigate the potential impact on neighbors. Including: ensuring that traffic flows properly, parents cannot park on neighborhood streets, and the playground is constructed to mitigate noise,” the letter continued.
Ballston-Virginia Square Civic Association members noted that they have observed speeding and “other dangerous vehicle behavior” on N. Oakland Street, related to the traffic signal at Wilson Blvd, according to joint letter from this civic association and the Ashton Heights Civic Association.
“We share these concerns that parents rushing to drop off/pick up the projected capacity of 148 children at the new child care center could well exacerbate these existing problems,” the letter said.
In response to these concerns, franchisees Mustafa Durrani and Zargham Amid have agreed to build a 6-foot fence, which will provide privacy and sound mitigation when children are playing outside.
County staff say they understand the use change will be an adjustment but argue other tenants could generate more traffic and noise.
When a contractor for Arlington County embarked on work to renovate a county-owned childcare building near Courthouse, it ran into some costly problems.
The county contracted with Landivar & Associates in December to oversee plans to update the Arlington Children’s Center (1915 N. Uhle Street), which has housed a childcare facility for county employees for several decades. It will be updating the building to meet current daycare standards, comply with the Americans with Disability Act and provide an interior refresh.
Work began this April, but with just 10% of work done, the contractor has already blown through half of its allotted contingency funding — nearly $264,000 — “to repair unforeseen structural damages revealed during interior demolition,” per a county report.
Over the weekend, the Arlington County Board approved a $100,000 contract increase to “address additional unforeseen conditions that are likely to be revealed during the remaining 90% of the project,” the report continued.
Now, the total contract is worth $1.2 million, up from $1.1 million.
Although work began this spring, the building closed nearly two years ago. At the time, the county and the childcare service provider — which had been in the building for 17 years — could not reach an agreement over a contract extension with the renovation work pending.
This stressed some parents who found themselves scrambling to find daycare amid a shortage of options.
Arlington County expects the renovation work to wrap up and the facility to reopen in early 2024, according to a project webpage. The county already has a contract with a provider — the nonprofit Easterseals — which the Board approved this January.
“Enrollment preference will be given to children whose parent or guardian work for the County, followed by children whose parent or guardian work or live in Arlington County,” the webpage said.
Goodwill of Greater Washington and AHC Inc. are teaming up to build affordable housing above a new second-hand store and donation center on S. Glebe Road.
DC Urban Turf first reported the news.
The national nonprofit has not embarked on something like this before, writes land-use attorney Andrew Painter, in application materials filed with Arlington County.
“The proposed redevelopment would be the first such project for the organization as it seeks to further its nonprofit mission and values,” Painter said. “The proposal will also deliver a modern and efficient retail store and donation processing center for a successful nonprofit organization that provides important services and benefits to Arlington County’s disenfranchised populations.”
The nonprofit proposes to demolish the existing store at 10 S. Glebe Road in the Alcova Heights neighborhood and build a five-story, mixed-use building. There will be a Goodwill retail store and child care center on the ground floor, a donation processing center on the second floor and 128 apartments above that.
All of the units will be offered to households earning between 30-60% of the area median income for a period of 30 years, though the exact unit mix will be finalized during the financing process. About three-quarters of the affordable apartments consist of 2-3 bedroom units.
The units units will be available for a single person earning up to $63,300 and a family of four earning up to $90,420, according to the county.
AHC, which Painter says is Arlington County’s largest non-profit affordable housing developer, is its joint development partner and will oversee the apartment side of the building’s operations once construction is done. AHC will also choose the operator for the child care center.
“AHC hopes to replicate the success we’ve had in other communities,” AHC spokeswoman Jennifer Smith tells ARLnow. “That means bringing a mission-aligned childcare partner to the new Goodwill site, with priority enrollment for onsite residents and Goodwill Greater Washington employees, then availability to the larger community.”
Parking for residents, childcare, employee and overflow customer parking will be located in a 152-space underground garage. Retail, visitor and future resident parking will be in a 16-spot surface parking lot.
In preparation for the temporary closure of the S. Glebe site, Goodwill is currently negotiating a lease for an alternate donation drop-off location close by. That is expected to open in 2024.
Meanwhile, Painter says, Goodwill encourages its customers to shop or donate at its 20 other area locations, including a store on Columbia Pike.
A local preschool operating in North Arlington church will soon shut its doors — but another childcare center is already lined up to replace it.
Overlee Preschool, a cooperative, parent-led school out of the Church of the Covenant (2666 Military Road) will close next month. Children’s Weekday Program — currently operating out of Redeemer Church of Arlington in the Alcova Heights neighborhood — will take over.
Founded in the 1940s by a group of mothers, Overlee Preschool is closing after reduced enrollment complicated by Covid. The school weathered the pandemic by moving fully outdoors.
“We are very sad to be closing the doors of an organization that has played such a significant role in the lives of many, many Arlington families,” school president Melissa Farrar told ARLnow.
“The times, however, have changed, and the fully cooperative model — which requires every family to spend time in the classroom and have a school ‘job’ — has been more difficult to market to local families, who have a multitude of competing pressures on their time,” she continued.
Farrar thanked the teachers, particularly Louisa Stetekluh, who taught for more than 20 years and is “the beating heart” of the school.
“Her charisma, depth of experience, and gentle and respectful connection with our children has drawn family after family to Overlee,” she said. “It is impossible to speak of Overlee’s successes and what makes us special without mentioning her in the same breath.”
If there is a silver lining here, she says, it is that another preschool will replace Overlee.
“While our story is coming to an end, we will be glad to still hear the laughter of children on the playground as we walk by, and we wish the incoming tenant every success and growth in the coming years,” Farrar said.
Children’s Weekday Program intends to more than double the number of children for whom it can care. It has applied for a use permit to serve up to 71 children — a 136% increase over the 30 children Overlee Preschool was permitted to serve. The Arlington County Board is scheduled to approve the permit during its meeting this Saturday.
“We are really excited about the new space and look forward to moving into the building in August,” Children’s Weekday Program announced on its website. “CWP’s doors will open in September 2023 for Meet the Teacher events prior to the first day of school.”
Registration is ongoing for new and returning families, per the website.
County staff says the site can accommodate this proposed capacity increase with two indoor and outdoor play areas, divided up based on age, and a proposed staffing level of 16 employees. The program will operate on weekdays from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.
The report says approval is recommended because the new school will not have negative impacts on the neighborhood, and the local civic associations either support it or have expressed no issue with it.
Arlington has long had a childcare shortage problem and the tight demand helped childcare programs survive the pandemic. The county has tried to encourage more daycare centers by loosening zoning regulations and helping people find options via a website and provider map.
Arlington County has accepted a site plan application for a senior living facility proposed to replace a church in the Alcova Heights neighborhood.
Sunrise Senior Living, a McLean-based senior living provider, proposes to demolish a church building at 716 S. Glebe Road to build a four-story, 60-foot-tall building with 108 assisted living units, 55 parking spaces, common and service areas, a covered porch and an outdoor garden.
Kedrick Whitmore, the land use attorney representing Sunrise Senior Living, says the development would add sorely needed assisted living facilities in Arlington County.
“This facility would provide or coordinate personal and health care services, 24-hour supervision, and assistance (scheduled and unscheduled) for the protection general supervision and oversight of the physical and mental well-being of aged, infirm, or disabled adults,” he said. “The current supply of such facilities in Arlington County is insufficient to meet the current demand.”
So far, the applicant isn’t looking to go beyond base density, and proposed community benefits include streetscape and sidewalk improvements, utility and affordable housing contributions and sustainable design, per application documents.
As the change in use would displace two child care programs, county planning staff are urging Sunrise to incorporate child care into the development.
“The County has a need for child care services,” county planner Leon Vignes said. “Please consider the possibility of collocating a child care use with this development to maintain an existing use.”
There are two programs operating inside the church, Children’s Weekday Program and Rainbow Road Preschool. County staff said one of the programs in operation there does not have the necessary approvals to do so, but did not specify which.
“A previously approved use permit for childcare uses affiliated with the existing Methodist church was discontinued with the operator noting the potential to resume operation,” associate planner Anika Chowdhury said in staff comments on the application. “A revelation confirmed by the applicant was that an existing daycare is currently operating at the existing church. There is no valid use permit approval on file for this operating use and a use permit is required for child care use(s) per the ACZO.”
If Sunrise were to consider incorporating a child care center, it would have to request changes to how the property is zoned, Chowdhury says.
County planner Matthew Pfeiffer, meanwhile, urged the applicant to increase the number of trees it will plant and make the architecture appear more historic.
“Recommend altering architectural style to match existing historic properties, such as Colonial Revival,” Pfeiffer said. “The most important site design aspect will be ensuring that there is a strong vegetated buffer on the western property line to screen The Alcova,” a historic property next door.
The building’s owner, Arlington United Methodist Church, sold the property to Sunrise last year, leaving a different Christian congregation that meets there, the Redeemer Church of Arlington, the child care programs and a clothing bank in search of a new home.
Sunrise has two other senior living centers in Arlington, in the Glebewood and Boulevard Manor neighborhoods.
A private secondary school in Ballston is looking to move to Rosslyn.
The Sycamore School, which has operated at 4600 Fairfax Drive since it began in 2017, will soon lose its home to a residential redevelopment. So it is asking Arlington County for permission to relocate to 1550 Wilson Blvd, near Fire Station 10, offices, apartments and an Arlington Public Schools building
The Sycamore School proposes operating a private school for up to 140 students grades five through 12, along with 40 staff members and teachers, according to a county report. Its campus would comprise 14,000 square feet on the third floor, divided into seven classrooms, a canteen, an art studio, an exercise room and other administrative rooms and amenities.
“The Applicant provides a valuable educational service to the County’s residents by serving a diverse cross-section of students,” writes land use attorney Andrew Painter. “As part of its personalized learning approach, The Sycamore School offers small class sizes at a ratio of one teacher to six students, and provides individualized instruction with self-paced learning and a focus on student choice.”
The Sycamore School’s proposed opening hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., with classes occurring Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Occasional school-related and community-based events may occur in the evenings, and are required to conclude by 11 p.m.
Meanwhile, the County Board approved a new childcare tenant in a nearby office building last month. The Gardner School will set up in the ground-floor retail space of an office building at the corner of Clarendon Blvd and N. Quinn Street (1776 Wilson Blvd).
The Gardner School has locations in seven states, the closest being in Herndon, Virginia.
The child care center will take up about 17,670 square feet, divided into 13 classrooms for preschoolers, toddlers and infants, playrooms and 400 square feet of outdoor play area. There will be up to 28 staff and up to 186 enrolled children.
But with two schools moving into an area with offices, apartment buildings, Arlington Public Schools’ H-B Woodlawn Secondary Program and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver Program, and Fire Station 10, the Rosslyn Business Improvement District expressed some concerns about transportation management.
The Rosslyn BID encouraged the county to “take a holistic approach” to evaluating APS’s transportation management plans for its two programs against those of the new daycare and private school.
Doing so, the BID said, could “help mitigate potential logistical and safety impacts, particularly during pick-up/drop-off hours,” per the report.
Driver Crashes into Trooper’s Cruiser — A Virginia State Police trooper was radioing in a license plate during a traffic stop on I-395 near Shirlington when his cruiser was rear-ended. The trooper finished giving the tag number before telling the dispatcher about the crash. [Twitter]
Circulator Strike Continues — “The first day’s negotiations between a bus drivers union and the operator of D.C. Circulator since workers began striking were unsuccessful through Wednesday evening, increasing the prospects of a potentially lengthy outage of the city’s only public bus service.” [Washington Post]
Marymount Planning Child Care Center — “Marymount University is setting up a new child care center on campus in a renovation project that it said is designed to fill a critical, and deepening, local workforce need as those with young children return to the office. The Marymount Early Learning Academy for children aged 3 to 5 will open in the summer or fall of 2023, reviving the idea of an on-campus preschool that the university used to run in the 1990s before it closed down.” [Washington Business Journal]
Sexual Battery Incident in Pentagon City — “500 block of 12th Road S…. at approximately 11:40 p.m. on April 29th the male victim had entered into the elevator of a secure residential building when the unknown suspect followed behind him. The victim exited the elevator and walked down the hallway, during which the suspect grabbed his buttocks. The suspect then fled the scene.” [ACPD]
Air Force Colonel on Trial — “An official with the California National Guard charged with indecent exposure in Arlington in March is scheduled to go to trial in Arlington on July 18… the suspect entered the business and exposed himself to female victims, according to the ACPD.” [Patch]
Falls Church Lowers Property Tax Rate — “On Monday night, the Falls Church City Council approved a $112.8 million Fiscal Year 2023 (FY23) that invests in public schools, core government services, walkability and traffic calming, environmental sustainability, and more, all while reducing the real estate tax rate by 9 cents… To mitigate the 11 percent overall increase in real estate assessments, the adopted budget includes a decrease in the real estate tax to $1.23 per $100 of assessed value.” [City of Falls Church]
It’s Cinco de Mayo — Mostly cloudy, with a high of 67 and low of 56. Sunrise at 6:07 am and sunset at 8:06 pm. [Weather.gov]
A new childcare center could be coming to a gutted restaurant space between Clarendon and Courthouse.
Ladybug Academy LLC is requesting county approval to convert about 4,391 square feet of vacant, ground-floor restaurant space at the corner of Wilson Blvd and N. Cleveland Street into a daycare and preschool. The space at 2500 Wilson Blvd was home to Minh Vietnamese Restaurant until 2016.
“The use at this location will fill a ground-floor commercial space that has been vacant for a number of years and the site has sufficient space on-site to support outdoor play and parking requirements,” a county report said.
Ladybug Academy LLC looks to be affiliated with a Ladybug Academy location in Merrifield.
This is the second daycare company to request to take over the space. Last August, ARLnow reported a music-based Montessori preschool program had filed to open a franchise location in the same spot, but that appears to have fallen through.
Ladybug Academy plans to employ up to 14 staff to care for up to 76 children. Kids will have access to an outdoor play area at the back of the property’s frontage on N. Cleveland Street, the report said.
The hours of operation would be Monday through Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Drop-off will occur between 7:30-10 a.m. each morning, and pick-up will occur from 4-6 p.m. each evening.
Eight parking spaces in the surface lot and adjacent garage would be provided for staff and parent use. On-street parking available is also available in the area.
The County Board is set to hear the request during its meeting this Saturday.
Local child care centers will have to stay the course with longer quarantine and isolation periods, says Arlington County’s Public Health Division.
That could mean multiple contingency plans for parents with kids in child care, who have already weathered holiday closures and winter-weather closures. (Many facilities follow the snow closure or delay lead of Arlington Public Schools, which was closed all week.)
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shortened isolation and quarantine periods last month to five days for the general population. This week, the CDC announced it will be bringing its guidelines for K-12 schools in alignment with the shortened quarantine and isolation.
But the changes have been met with some criticism. The American Medical Association called them “confusing and counterproductive” and other medical providers have said they’re “reckless.”
There’s one place where the new quarantine and isolation guidelines won’t go into effect, save for fully vaccinated and boosted staff: Arlington’s child care settings.
That’s because Arlington’s littlest kids either should not wear a mask or do not wear them reliably, meaning the spread of the highly transmissible Omicron variant is highly likely in these settings, according to the public health division.
“A full 10-day isolation and quarantine period was recommended because of the difficulty to enforce mask wearing in such a young population (i.e. children under 2 years old should not wear a mask),” Public Health spokesman Ryan Hudson told ARLnow.
The interim guidance came out Wednesday, as Arlington and the Northern Virginia region continue to see high levels of COVID-19 transmission, and will be in effect until the CDC comes out with guidance specific to child care settings — which are known as places where kids pick up all kinds of germs.
“The CDC’s recent updates to shorten the isolation and quarantine period are for the general population, including K-12 school settings,” Hudson said. “In absence of specific guidance from the CDC regarding child care centers, Arlington County Public Health provided interim guidelines, subject to change based on updates from the CDC.”
One local child care provider that had started implementing the new CDC guidance acknowledged the flip-flop may cause disruption for families.
“We had been following the recent CDC 5 day isolation period, which we confirmed with [the Virginia] Department of Health last week,” the facility’s director wrote. “However, in light of the omicron variant and the current surge, Arlington County has recently announced interim guidelines for child care settings which we must follow. We understand that this recent change is frustrating but we are our trying our best to follow the policies, which do keep changing.”
Pre-pandemic child care was in short supply in Arlington, as it was in many parts of the country, in part because of a shortage of child care workers. The pandemic has exacerbated these realities and forced many parents, especially mothers, to quit their jobs.
Board Chair Katie Cristol, who has worked on a number of efforts to fight the local child care shortage, says she’s still learning about the new recommendations and the tensions that public health professionals and child care providers have to navigate right now.
But the biggest challenge facing child care providers during the pandemic remains staffing, which the guidelines could exacerbate.
“From my conversations with providers, their biggest challenges over the last year have been with staffing,” Cristol said. “I think this reflects the general upheaval in the labor market, as well as the ongoing difficulty of affording high-quality staff in a very low-margin business, and — at least anecdotally — the challenge of recruiting and retaining staff seems to be making it hard for some providers to expand hours or capacity as they try to adjust back to ‘normal’ after the first year of the pandemic.”
To boost child care employee recruitment during this time, the county has provided training and is working with the local Richmond delegation to pass legislation that would improve how benefits like retirement and health care get to employees.
“It remains a big challenge, for certain,” she said.
The county also supports centers through ongoing health consultations and informational resources, and has run targeted vaccination clinics for child care providers and employees, Cristol noted.
The new Arlington Public Health guidelines for local child care providers are below.
Pandemic recovery, childcare and criminal justice reform will be receiving millions in federal and county funds.
This week, the Arlington County Board voted to put federal COVID-19 relief funding and unspent county budget dollars toward these areas and other equity initiatives. Members also signaled the county’s commitment to these priorities by adopting them in their state legislative priority package.
On Tuesday, the Board allocated $29.5 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds for pandemic response and local assistance programs.
It also put more than $6 million in surplus from the 2020-21 budget, or “closeout” funds, toward retention bonuses and compensation of county employees, support for restorative justice initiatives, review of body worn footage cameras and a new position in the Sheriff’s Office.
“Our American Rescue Plan and closeout funding allocations focus on our continued responsibility to keep our community healthy and safe, providing funding for testing, vaccine support and COVID response,” County Board Chair Matt de Ferranti said. “We also are investing in mental health care through the Crisis Intervention Center and childcare, a critical issue that the pandemic has revealed as more pressing than ever, as well as transportation and our employees.”
Since the plans were introduced in October, the county added some line items to the ARPA and “closeout” spending plans. Two of particular note include money to establish a childcare capital fund and to hire a quality assurance employee for the Arlington County jail.
The Board left $2.4 million ARPA funds unallocated to meet any unforeseen needs determined in 2022, as well as $14.1 million in unallocated close-out funds to address financial pressures in upcoming 2022-2023 budget.
Direct pandemic response — such as testing site and vaccine clinic support — received $9 million while local programs, ranging from housing assistance to the expansion of the Crisis Intervention Center for behavioral health services, received $20.5 million.
New to the ARPA spending plan is $5 million to develop affordable childcare options, spearheaded by childcare champion and Board Vice-Chair Katie Cristol.
“ARPA federal guidelines highlight some of the uses for it: they include investment in new or expanded learning services, support for pandemic-impacted small businesses and support to disproportionately impacted populations and communities. One thing at the center of those three circles of the Venn diagram is childcare,” she said during the Board meeting on Tuesday. “This has emerged as one of the top needs during the pandemic.”
Arlington has increased the number of available childcare slots, but they are not affordable to those making 50% or less of the Area Median Income, she said.
The county would put the $5 million toward a new childcare capital fund to be accessed by providers and developers who agree to set aside some affordable spots on an ongoing basis in exchange for a one-time infusion of dollars.
The result would be permanently discounted childcare spots created at the time a provider signs a long-term lease or a developer receives approval to build a childcare center, she said.
Before Tuesday night, the Board had previously allocated $2 million in ARPA funds for small business support and $3.8 million for restoring libraries, community centers and other important community facing programs.
(Updated 12:30 p.m.) A shuttered Vietnamese restaurant between Courthouse and Clarendon may be converted into a music-based childcare center.
Rock and Roll Daycare is requesting Arlington County approve child care as a use for the site, which comprises about 4,391 square feet of unused, ground-floor restaurant space at the corner of Wilson Blvd and N. Cleveland Street. Rock and Roll Daycare offers music-based Montessori instruction to infants, toddlers and preschool children, according to the company’s legal representation, land use lawyer Nick Cumings.
The company is eyeing the former location of Minh Vietnamese Restaurant, at the base of a five-story office building at 2500 Wilson Blvd. The building is lined with other ground-floor retail and has 189 parking spaces, wrote Cumings, from the firm Walsh Colucci, in a letter to the county dated February.
“The Applicant is a family-run daycare provider in Massachusetts that is seeking to establish its presence in the D.C. metropolitan area,” Cumings said. “Rock and Roll Daycare… provides a unique music and arts program, international cultural education, and self-directed learning programs tailored to each child.”
The pending franchise location in Arlington follows the opening of two others in the D.C. area, one in Alexandria and the other in Reston.
The daycare will provide five classrooms: one for preschoolers and two each for toddlers and infants, Cumings said. There will be eight to 10 staff members and up to 58 enrolled children. Classes will be held year-round, Monday through Friday, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
An outdoor play area about 995 square foot in size will be fenced in and contain play equipment, he said.
Approval “will bring a unique and much-desired child care option to Arlington County while continuing to activate the corner of Wilson Boulevard and North Cleveland Street,” Cumings said.
The request is one of five site plan applications that will be heard at a County Board meeting this fall. After the August recess ends, the County Board will begin meeting again on Saturday, Sept. 18, but a spokeswoman for the Department of Community Planning Housing and Development said she expects it will go before the board in October.
