Tropical storms Florence and Gordon are set to hammer other parts of the country quite a bit harder than Arlington, but the D.C. region is still in for a wet weekend.
The forecast is calling for scattered storm chances tonight and Saturday, with wettest conditions set for Sunday, so get your outdoor activities out of the way before then.
That means the weather should be decent, if a little dicey, for the Rosslyn Jazz Fest tomorrow. And if you need other ideas to fill out the weekend, head to our event calendar.
If it gets too wet out there, you can always stay inside and catch up on our most popular articles of the past week:
Arlington’s School Board has signed off on members of a committee to guide the renaming of Washington-Lee High School, tasking 23 people to suggest new names for the school over the next three months.
The Board quickly agreed to form the new committee at its meeting last night (Thursday), and the group will soon begin meeting to offer up options ahead of a planned December vote on a new name for the school. The Board decided in June to strip Confederate general Robert E. Lee’s name from the building as part of a broad review of the school system’s naming policies, though a trio of Washington-Lee students are challenging that move in court.
The new committee will be led by a professional facilitator and the school system’s assistant superintendent for school and community relations, Linda Erdos — neither will have a voting role on the committee. The remaining members, selected following an open application process, include the following:
John Holt — Current Student (Grade 12)
Chloe Slater — Current Student (Grade 11)
Ana Regina Santos-Caballero — Current Student (Grade 10)
Thornton Thomas — Current Student (Grade 9)
Patrice Kelly — Current Parent
Allison Chen — Current Parent
Duane Butcher — Current IB Transfer Parent
Hiromi Isobe — WLHS Staff
Jackie Stallworth — WLHS Staff
Dave Peters — WLHS Staff
William Moser — WL Alumni Representative (Class of 1952 – 1970)
Julia Crull — WL Alumni Representative (Class of 1971 – 1985)
Peter Strack — WL Alumni Representative (Class of 1986 – 2005)
Dana Raphael — WL Alumni Representative (Class of 2006 – 2018)
James Rosen — Ballston-Virginia Square Civic Association
Allan Gadjadhar — Cherrydale Civic Association
Nikki Roy — Lyon Park Civic Association
George Keating — Waverly Hills Civic Association
Melissa Perry — Arlington Civic Coalition for Minority Affairs
George Wysor — Arlington Historical Society
Gregg Robertson — WLHS Principal
Erdos told the Board during an Aug. 28 work session that applicants looking to serve as student or parent representatives to the committee were selected via “random, double-blind lotteries” conducted by the leaders of the school’s student government association.
She added that the committee will now meet once every two weeks, leading up to the planned December vote on the matter.
However, Board Chair Reid Goldstein questioned Erdos on whether there’s a true “drop-dead date” for the renaming process to wrap up. He’s frequently questioned the timing of the school’s renaming, arguing in the work session that “whether the committee is done in this month or that month, it doesn’t impact anything.”
Erdos did stress, though, that the school system is hoping to have the new name in place in time for the 2019-2020 school year and the school will need to know the new name soon to start purchasing new athletic uniforms.
“They need to have that in place so they can begin planning,” Erdos said.
While Washington-Lee is the only school in the county being renamed, the Board also appointed naming committees for several new schools Thursday: the building on the former Wilson school site in Rosslyn that will one day house the H-B Woodlawn and Stratford programs, the new middle school on the Stratford site and the school system’s new Montessori program.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Colorful bikes decorated with flowers in Crystal City and Pentagon City. (courtesy of Sally Clouse)
Colorful bikes decorated with flowers in Crystal City and Pentagon City. (courtesy of Sally Clouse)
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
Mysterious flower artwork between Crystal City and Pentagon City.
(Updated at 2 p.m.) A series of spray-painted flowers have bloomed on streets and trails around Pentagon City and Crystal City — but no one we’ve talked to is quite sure who’s responsible for them.
Eagle-eyed ARLnow reader Margot Duzak says she first spotted the flowers popping up in the area last Thursday (Aug. 30), without any explanation.
The flowers come in a whole host of colors and designs, with some running along 12th Street S., between S. Fern Street and S. Eads Street, on curbs and a trail not far from the Pentagon City Metro station.
From there, the artwork extends on curbs, sidewalks and bike lanes on S. Eads Street up until it meets 15th Street S., near the road’s intersection with Jefferson Davis Highway in Crystal City.
But the flowers aren’t the work of the county government — spokeswoman Jennifer Smith says she couldn’t find anyone responsible for the blooms, noting that staffers with the county’s Department of Environmental Services, Walk Arlington and Bike Arlington were all unaware of the flowers.
Crystal City Business Improvement District Chief Operating Officer Rob Mandle was similarly stumped.
Some colorful, flower-decorated bikes have also started popping up in the area of spray-painted flowers.
While the artist responsible may be unknown, for now, Duzak says the art is quite the welcome addition to the neighborhood.
“The bike lanes and sidewalks have never looked better,” she said.
Arlington County’s bus service saw another substantial dip in ridership this spring compared to the same time last year, new numbers provided to regional transportation planners show.
Arlington Transit recorded a 15 percent drop in riders in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2018, covering April through June, compared to the same period a year ago.
The latest figures forwarded to the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission show that the bus service recorded 745,850 passenger trips over that three month stretch, down from 874,695 a year ago.
That number is actually a 6.6 percent increase from ART’s ridership figures covering January through March. But those numbers were also disappointing ones for the bus service, as they represented a 17 percent drop from the same time period in 2017, meaning that ART has recorded ridership declines for the last two quarters in a row.
The latest ridership statistics represent an even steeper drop still from the same time period in 2016, when ART recorded 905,661 passenger trips — equivalent to a 17.6 percent decline.
These figures come as bus services nationwide cope with ridership declines, as the D.C. region as a whole struggles to convince riders to embrace public transit. The NVTC’s numbers also show that Metrobus ridership in Northern Virginia localities dipped by 9 percent this quarter compared to a year ago, though Metro ridership did tick slightly upward at most Arlington stations.
“The depth of erosion in bus ridership has been more than what we were expecting,” County Board Vice Chair Christian Dorsey previously told ARLnow. “As riders returned to Metro after SafeTrack, we would’ve expected a modest reduction, but it’s just been more substantial than we thought.”
The county has indeed previously blamed some of the decline in bus ridership on riders returning to Metro after the aforementioned intense rehab work, though the rail service has continued to deal with lengthy delays due to construction, which recently resulted in some riders embracing bus options this summer. Other potential culprits include the increasing popularity of ride-sharing or telecommuting.
Dorsey says the county’s approach to reversing that trend will remain the same as ever: “keep investing in places where people want to go.” He added that the county is also working to “refresh” some of its older ART buses, which could help lure riders back to the service.
“We’re investing in new coaches for greater comfort, which is always helpful,” Dorsey said. “When ART was introduced, one of the benefits that convinced people to move to the bus was they were cleaner and quieter. But as they’ve aged, that competitive advantage has declined. We just need to reinvest in ART a little bit.”
Dinner items at Le Kon in Clarendon (via Tiffany Gordon)
A new Mexican-Japanese fusion restaurant backed by a former “Top Chef” star is open for business in Clarendon.
Le Kon started serving up food on Sunday (Sept. 1) at a space located at 3227 Washington Blvd, according to spokeswoman Wendy Gordon. The restaurant replaces the short-lived Park Lane Tavern on the ground floor of the Beacon at Clarendon apartment building.
The eatery will be the first D.C. location for chef Katsuji Tanabe, who appeared on the Bravo program back in 2014 and has since opened restaurants in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York.
Its menu promises seafood-themed small plates, taco platters and entrees from a “Sonora-style grill.”
Gordon says Le Kon will start serving brunch this Sunday (and will eventually offer it on both days of the weekend), and is offering happy hour deals from 3:30 to 7 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays.
The restaurant has space for around 200 seats, and will offer an outdoor patio as well.
Arlington Science Focus School (photo via Arlington Public Schools)
(Updated at 1 p.m.) The Arlington Science Focus School and Key Immersion School will swap buildings sometime in the next few years — school officials just need to hammer out the details on when.
After the School Board decided last year to convert Key into a countywide option school, meaning it would no longer have set neighborhood attendance boundaries, the school system was faced with an unusual dilemma.
Parents in the area could once choose between Key and Arlington Science Focus, should they not want to send their students to the school’s Spanish immersion program. But after making the change, neighborhoods throughout Northeast Arlington were directed into only ASFS by default. That meant that many students newly mandated to attend ASFS actually lived closer to the Key Immersion School at 2300 Key Blvd, as ASFS now sat outside its own attendance boundaries.
With a new round of boundary changes approaching to prepare for the opening of Alice West Fleet Elementary School next year, Arlington Public School planners are taking another look at ASFS’ status to ease some of that confusion. Instead of adjusting its attendances lines this year, however, Superintendent Patrick Murphy is planning a building swap between Key and ASFS, to take place in either 2020 or 2021.
“This decision is a wise decision because we’re a growing school division, we’re adding capacity, and we really have come to this point,” Murphy told the Board at an Aug. 28 meeting.
He added that he doesn’t see any need for the Board to formally sign off on the plan, which would move the Key program to the ASFS building at 1501 N. Lincoln Street and vice versa, but the Board will get to help APS decide when the move happens.
That prompted a bit of unease among Board members. While no one openly opposed Murphy’s plan, some members did express some reservations about how exactly the process might work.
“I know some people will be excited about the prospect, because for some it means they can walk to school more easily,” said Board member Monique O’Grady. “For others, the walkability is tougher… and when there’s uncertainty about the future, it creates a lot of angst and people will feel unsettled.”
For instance, Board Chair Reid Goldstein pointed out that both schools are currently over capacity — as of 2017, ASFS had 128 more students enrolled than it was designed to hold, while Key is 86 students over its designed capacity. ASFS and Key required six and four trailers last year, respectively, and the division is projecting that both buildings will be even more overcrowded this year.
“It’s a tough nut to crack,” Goldstein said. “That’s going to create problems if and when boundaries are drawn.”
Additionally, Key’s building is designed to hold about 100 more students than ASFS, and 58 more students attended Key than ASFS last year, another area of concern for Board members.
“If the Arlington Science Focus building is smaller and the immersion program is bigger, we’re not going to be able to grow immersion program,” said Vice Chair Tannia Talento. “So we need to think about: what’re our goals for the long term with the immersion program?”
But APS officials argue that the current ASFS site has room for additional trailers to accommodate the larger number of students coming over from Key. The school system also hopes to control enrollment there moving forward, because the immersion program is based on student applications, rather than neighborhood populations.
Lisa Stengle, APS director of planning and evaluation, added that the new Reed school will add additional capacity when it opens in Westover in 2021 and ease some of the strain. She also noted that the school system’s initial plans suggest that “students and staff at both schools could largely remain intact,” though that will depend on when APS executes the swap.
If the school system switches the buildings in time for fall 2020, Stengle points out that ASFS would see its boundaries adjusted immediately afterward, as staffers draw attendance lines to cope with the opening of the Reed school. But if APS waits until 2021, she said officials “might not be able to move everybody together,” scrambling each school’s enrollment a bit more.
By January, the school system plans to publish a “community engagement timeline” to collect feedback on when, exactly, to make the swap.
In the meantime, the Board is set to approve new boundaries for eight other elementary schools later this winter.
Runners are splashed with water during the 2017 Army Ten Miler (Photo via John Sonderman/Flickr)
The modified 2018 course for the Army Ten-Miler (via the U.S. Army)
Construction on the Arlington Memorial Bridge has convinced organizers of the Army Ten-Miler race to change up its course, marking the first time in the race’s 34-year history that participants won’t cross the bridge.
The 10-mile road race, set for Sunday, Oct. 7, starts and finishes at the Pentagon. Since 1985, the race has directed participants along the Memorial Bridge to reach D.C., but with rehab work necessitating a series of traffic disruptions in the area, organizers announced today (Wednesday) that they’re opting for a few changes to the course.
Now, runners will start on Route 110 and continue into Rosslyn, using the Key Bridge to cross into the District.
Then, competitors will turn onto the Whitehurst Freeway and use the Rock Creek Parkway to eventually pick up last year’s course near the Lincoln Memorial.
“This year’s modified course will reduce congestion within the first two miles and allow the runners the opportunity to settle into their pace,” Race Director Jim Vandak wrote in a statement. “We believe our 35,000 registered runners will be pleased and the changes will improve the runners’ experience.”
Participants in wheelchairs and “Wounded Warriors” will start the race at 7:50 a.m., with subsequent waves of runners following soon afterward. All participants must maintain a 15-minute-per-mile pace or better, complete the entire course, and finish the race within two-and-a-half hours to receive an official race time and results.
Organizers estimate that they attract 35,000 participants and 900 teams each year. Full details on the new course and other logistics are available on the race’s website.
Arlington police are still investigating after a man awoke to find a would-be burglar inside his Northwest Arlington home last week.
Police say the incident happened around 11 p.m. last Wednesday (Aug. 29), when the resident of a home along the 3400 block of N. Dickerson Street was startled awake by noise inside the house.
The man turned on several lights and found items tampered with, when he then saw a man dash out of the house.
Officers arrived soon afterward with a police dog in tow to try and track down the man, but they were unsuccessful.
Full details on the incident from a county crime report:
BURGLARY, 2018-08290263, 3400 block of N. Dickerson Street. At approximately 11:14 p.m. on August 29, police responded to the report of a breaking and entering just occurred. Upon arrival, it was determined that the victim awoke to noise inside his residence. When the victim went to investigate, he located multiple lights turned on, items tampered with and then encountered an unknown male suspect inside the residence. Following the encounter, the suspect fled on foot prior to police arrival. Arriving officers canvased the area and a K9 track was initiated with negative results. No items were reported missing. The suspect is described as a short, Hispanic male with an accent, wearing a ski mask and dark clothing. The investigation is ongoing.
And here are more highlights from crime reports for the past week, including some we’ve already reported:
BURGLARY (late), 2018-09030127, 2400 block of S. Walter Reed Drive. At approximately 4:34 p.m. on September 3, police were dispatched to the late report of breaking and entering. Upon arrival, it was determined that between July 17 and August 30, an unknown suspect(s) gained entry to the victim’s residence and stole items of value. There is no suspect(s) description. The investigation is ongoing
INDECENT EXPOSURE, 2018-08290258, 1800 block of N. Oak Street. At approximately 11:10 p.m. on August 29, police responded to the report of an indecent exposure. Upon arrival, it was determined that an unknown male suspect entered a business and engaged a female employee in conversation. The suspect then began touching himself inappropriately and exposed himself, before fleeing prior to police arrival. The suspect is described as a dark-skinned black male in his early 30’s, with dreadlocks, wearing a white tank top, black shorts and carrying a black backpack. The investigation is ongoing.
ROBBERY, 2018-08290016, 220 20th Street S. At approximately 1:10 a.m. on August 29, police were dispatched to the report of a robbery just occurred. Upon arrival, it was determined that the victim was inside his residence with four known subjects, whom he had invited over, when he became suspicious of their behavior. The victim then observed the suspects stealing his personal belongings. The victim chased them out of his residence and became engaged in a struggle in which one suspect assaulted him. The suspects then fled with the victim’s belongings, prior to police arrival. The victim was uninjured. Suspect One is described as a black male, 20-22 years old, 6’0″, heavy set, with short black hair, wearing a gray shirt with dark gray horizontal stripes, dark colored shorts and black shoes. Suspect Two is described as a black male, 20-22 years old, 6’0″, thin build, with short black hair, wearing a blue t-shirt, dark shorts and sneakers. Suspect Three is described as a black male, 20-22 years old, 6’0″, average build, bald or closely cropped hair, wearing a black t-shirt, black shorts and black sneakers. Suspect Four is described as a black male, 20-22 years old, 6’0″, average build, wearing a light colored hat, red t-shirt, white shorts, light colored sneakers and a watch. The investigation is ongoing.
Arlington’s School Board is asking a judge to toss the lawsuit challenging the renaming of Washington-Lee High School out of court.
Attorneys for the Board and the school system filed a motion Friday (Aug. 31) pressing for the dismissal of a case brought by three current students at the school, who are looking to stop the Board from following through on its plans to strip Robert E. Lee’s name from the school later this year.
The Board argues that the attorney for the students made a series of legal missteps in crafting the suit, and that the students don’t have standing to sue in the first place. Accordingly, they want to see an Arlington Circuit Court judge dismiss the case with prejudice — Jonathon Moseley, the attorney representing the students, didn’t immediately return a request for comment on the Board’s latest motion.
Chiefly, the students argue that the Board didn’t follow its own stated procedure for renaming the school, when it voted this June to change its policy governing all school names and immediately initiated the process for renaming Washington-Lee. They even introduced a recording of Board member Tannia Talento as evidence earlier this month, claiming that her admission that “there was never any intentional engagement to the community about specifically changing [the name of] Washington-Lee” helps support their claims.
But attorneys for the Board and Arlington Public Schools countered in their motion that the “internal guidelines adopted by the School Board do not establish any legal mandate on the part of the School Board,” making claims about how the renaming process proceeded irrelevant.
Even still, they add that the students failed to prove that the Board even “failed materially” in following its own procedures — name change opponents claim the Board promised an additional round of community engagement before deciding to change the name, which is now set to be ready in time for the 2019-2020 school year. The Board circulated a variety of potential timetables for such a change, including one calling for a lengthier debate on the change, but did ultimately follow the stipulations of a September 2017 memorandum from Superintendent Patrick Murphy on the process.
Additionally, the Board points out that the three students involved in the case are all seniors at Washington-Lee, meaning the name change won’t take effect until after they’ve graduated. The attorneys argue that means they don’t have standing to sue in the first place, as they won’t be impacted by change.
“Any alleged damage after graduate is entirely speculative,” the lawyers wrote. The students have claimed that any name change would hurt their prospects for college admission, as schools might not associate Washington-Lee’s strong academic reputation with its new name, and that “developing students psychologically identify their school as a source of personal identity and security and are harmed by feeling that their school is bad.”
The Board’s lawyers even point out that Virginia law only allows for “parents, custodians or legal guardians” to ask a court to overturn a school board’s decisions as further evidence showing that the students don’t have any legal standing on the matter.
A judge has yet to schedule a hearing on the Board’s motion, but the renaming process is moving ahead, in the meantime.
The Board is set to appoint members of a renaming committee on Thursday (Sept. 6), which will meet several times over the coming months to determine possibilities for new names for Washington-Lee. The Board is aiming to vote on a new name in December.
A rendering of improvements at the intersection of Wilson and Clarendon Boulevards (via Arlington County)
Construction on Clarendon Blvd in Courthouse
Construction on Clarendon Blvd in Courthouse
Work is wrapping up on improvements to one of Courthouse’s trickiest intersections, with some night paving set to close a few streets this week.
The county is putting the finishing touches on some changes to sidewalks and bus stops around the intersection of Wilson and Clarendon Boulevards, near the Courthouse Metro station. Starting last night (Tuesday), workers began paving the area and the county expects the work to last through Friday (Sept. 7).
Arlington officials are advising drivers to avoid the area where Clarendon Blvd meets N. Veitch Street and 15th Street N. during the paving, set to run from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. through the rest of the week.
Workers permanently closed the lane turning from Clarendon Blvd. to 15th Street N. in March, and have spent the ensuing months widening the sidewalks in the area and adding a new bus stop to accommodate additional Arlington Transit service in the area. The county hopes the project “will improve pedestrian safety, circulation and access in and around Courthouse Plaza,” per its website.
Construction was originally set to wrap up sometime this winter, but the county says it’s now “nearing completion, ahead of schedule.”
