Author: Ethan Rothstein

Five Concerts Remain in Potomac Overlook Summer Series

By Ethan Rothstein

West on 66 performs (photo via Facebook)The Potomac Overlook Regional Park summer concert series is in full swing, with half of its slate of concerts still on tap through mid-September.

The concert series has been an annual tradition at the 70-acre park in North Arlington just off the GW Parkway, providing free outdoor performances of local and regional acts in a family setting, said Park Manager Roy Geiger.

“It’s a kick-back-and-relax time,” Geiger said. “You’ve got whole families coming down, kids in strollers, all ages up to senior citizens. So along come the blankets, lawn chairs, picnic baskets and even some dogs sitting there quietly.”

The crowds at the outdoor venue — which Geiger describes as a Wolf Trap-like feel but “without the big crowds” — vary depending on the weather, but reach into the hundreds on the nice Saturday evenings. The concerts are all put on from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. Below is the schedule for the remainder of the season.

  • Aug. 3 — Surrender Friday (classic rock)
  • Aug. 17 — West on 66 (classic rock, pictured above)
  • Aug. 31 — Michael Mulvaney (blues and folk)
  • Sept. 7 — Andrew Acosta (bluegrass)
  • Sept. 14 — Second Wind (Southern rock)

Photo via Facebook

Taj of India Coming To Cucina Vivace Space

By Ethan Rothstein

Cucina Vivace in Crystal City, now closedAn Indian restaurant is going to fill the former Cucina Vivace space in Crystal City this fall.

Owner Sahjahal Mia, who owns Taj of India in Georgetown, said he’s been looking to open a second Taj of India location in Virginia for a couple of years. Once the location on the 23rd Street S. restaurant row opened up, he knew he’d found a home.

“There are a lot of restaurants on that strip, but no Indian restaurants,” Mia told ARLnow.com. “I’ve been visiting 20-30 times, and every time it’s crowded. I think we’re going to do well.”

Mia’s Georgetown location has been open since 2002 serving traditional Indian fare and offering customers carry-out and delivery, including online ordering through services like Seamless and GrubHub. He said the offerings at the Crystal City restaurant, slated to open in mid-September, will be the same.

Mia’s observation of the 23rd Street restaurant row differs from that of Gordon Vivace, who owned Cucina Vivace.

“That strip is not in good shape and is simply no longer a location where an upscale restaurant can survive,”  Vivace said when he closed his doors in March.

The only other Indian restaurant in the Crystal City/Pentagon City area is Kohinoor Dhaba on S. Eads Street, so Mia feels he is better positioned to succeed. In fact, he said, he has had several calls for delivery to Crystal City from his Georgetown restaurant. Although it was out of his delivery range, he has told his drivers to make the trek anyway, just to build up a following.

“We have a lot of customers who have come from Crystal City hotels to our restaurants,” he said. “We needed to be here.”

Window Cleaner Wanted for Jewelry, Medication Thefts

By Ethan Rothstein

Justin HonakerA window cleaner is wanted by Arlington County Police for allegedly cleaning out jewelry and medications from some of the homes he worked on.

Justin Honaker, 33, of Falls Church, is suspected in a string of residential larcenies in Arlington and Fairfax counties, police said this afternoon.

“Employed by a window cleaning crew, Honaker stole jewelry and prescription drugs from numerous residences in Arlington and Fairfax counties during work hours,” according to a police press release. He’s wanted on grand larceny charges.

Honaker is described as a 5’10” white male, weighing approximately 185 pounds. Police say Honaker might have targeted additional houses, and are asking anyone else who might have been burglarized to come forward.

“If anyone has information on the whereabouts of this individual, please contact Detective Patricia Pena of the Arlington County Police Department’s Burglary/Larceny Unit at 703.228.4183 or at [email protected],” the press release said. “To report information anonymously, contact the Arlington County Crime Solvers at 866.411.TIPS (8477).”

Democrats Push Education, Bash GOP Ticket in Annual Fundraiser

By Ethan Rothstein
Terry McAuliffe speaks in front of Arlington Democrats
Rep. Jim Moran speaks to Arlington Democrats
Arlington Democrats mingle before the speakers at the Jefferson-Jackson dinner
Arlington Democrats watch speeches at the Jefferson-Jackson dinner
Attorney General candidate Mark Herring speaks to Arlington Democrats
Arlington Democrats President Mike Lieberman speaks at the Jefferson-Jackson dinner
Lt. Gov. candidate Ralph Northam speaks in front of Arlington Democrats
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(Updated at 1:45 p.m.)

Arlington Democrats hosted the entire statewide Democratic ticket at their annual Jefferson-Jackson fundraising dinner Saturday night.

The party’s nominees for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general give passionate campaign speeches. Terry McAuliffe, the Democrats’ gubernatorial candidate, arrived late but closed the event with the keynote address, touching on the effects sequestration will continue to have on Virginia’s economy, noting Arlington’s place as a hub for defense jobs, in particular.

“The stakes have never been higher,” McAuliffe told the crowd of several hundred local political leaders and donors. “You want a governor who knows the ups and downs of business.”

Arlington County Democratic Committee Chairman Mike Lieberman delivered the first speech of the event, held annually at the Westin in Ballston, chronicling the past 12 months in Arlington politics.

“We have had an amazing last year,” said Lieberman, who is in his final year as chair of the local party. “We went eight-for-eight in general elections on three different election days.”

The dinner — which cost $125 a plate for the general public and $250 for VIPs — is the organization’s biggest fundraising event. The Dems also raised money with a silent auction during the dinner.

Through June 30, McAuliffe has raised almost $12.7 million, compared to almost $7.7 million for his Republican opponent, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, according to the Federal Election Commission.  Lieutenant governor candidate, state Sen. Ralph Northam, has raised more than $2 million compared to $390,683 raised by his GOP opponent, E.W. Jackson, and Attorney General candidate Sen. Mark Herring has raised $1.6 million to Republican Sen. Mark Obenshain’s $1.2 million.

Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) gave a fiery speech after Lieberman, lambasting the Republicans in the House of Representatives who he said have been obstructionists, hurting the country by blocking meaningful legislation.

“There’s always going to be people who want plunder villages for their own benefit,” Moran said.

Herring and Northam spoke in more tempered tones than Moran and McAuliffe, emphasizing their strongest issues — Herring on the social issues that have come to the fore in Cuccinelli’s tenure as Attorney General, Northam on the Chesapeake Bay and healthcare.

“I will be a bulwark against the radicalization of Mark Obenshain, E.W. Jackson and Ken Cuccinelli,” Herring said.

Monday afternoon, the Republican Party of Virginia issued a response to the Democrats’ speeches.

“It’s only fitting Terry McAuliffe, Ralph Northam, and Mark Herring all landed on the ticket together, because they support higher taxes, more spending and burdensome regulations,” said Jahan Wilcox, spokesman for the Republican Party of Virginia. “With liberals like McAuliffe, Northam and Herring wanting to usher in a new era of job-killing tax hikes, Ken Cuccinelli and the Republican Party are advocating pro-growth economic policies that will lower taxes and create jobs for Virginians.”

McAuliffe also spent time talking about the state’s transportation issues, commending Gov. Bob McDonnell on his work to pass the state’s new transportation bill. He railed against Virginia’s low pay of teachers, and promised to opt into the Medicaid expansion clause of the Affordable Care Act.

Concluding his remarks, McAuliffe said he plans to be the one to break the Virginia’s habit, since 1977, of electing a governor from the opposite party of the President of the United States.

“I have to stop a 40-year jinx,” he said. “Whoever wins the White House, the other party has won the governor’s race, but I’m going to break it.”

Clarendon Dog Park Opening Delayed Again

By Ethan Rothstein
Clarendon dog park construction delayed again
Clarendon dog park construction delayed again (file photo from July 26, 2013)
Clarendon dog park construction delayed again
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The dog park in Clarendon county parks officials hoped would open in spring, then was delayed until July, has had its opening date pushed back again.

This time, Parks and Recreation Department spokeswoman Susan Kalish said the main features of the park have been installed, but issues with fencing and Americans with Disabilities Act compliance have pushed the park further off schedule. Kalish this time did not give an expected date, but said the park should open by the end of the summer, and “hopefully sooner.”

“We’re in the home stretch,” she said in an email.

James Hunter Park, as it’s called, is located at N. Herndon and 13th Streets. It’s planned to be a 0.71-acre park with both dog- and people-friendly features like a community canine area, pathways, site furnishings, public art, lighting, and landscaping, all of which have already been installed.

The park was delayed in the spring because of unforeseen issues with the park site, characterized as difficult soils, grading issues and “buried structures.”

This time, the specific ADA regulations regarding fencing and railing pushed the opening back. ADA requires dog parks and recreational spaces to have such facilities installed and then approved by compliance officers before the park can open to the public, Kalish said.

“We cannot open the park until the site is ADA compliant and all final inspections are approved,” Kalish wrote in an email.

The renovated park had an original opening date of summer 2012 before being pushed back to February 2013, then late spring of this year, and, in March, park planners said they expected to be open in July.

“We share the community’s frustration over the delayed opening and continue daily inspections of the contractor’s work to provide the best product as expeditiously as possible,” Jane Rudolph, Arlington’s Park and Recreation director, said in a press release. “The good news is that despite the timeline extension, the County has remained within the [$1.6 million] park construction budget.”

Private Detectives Offer Online Dating Background Checks

By Ethan Rothstein

Pedestrians on Rosslyn sidewalk (file photo)Brian O’Shea has a story he likes to tell: an Arlington woman met a guy online, and they hit it off. Eventually things were going well enough for them to meet in person, and when she gets to his house, a middle-aged woman answers. It turns out, the woman at the door was her online beau’s mother.

He was 13.

These are the perils of online dating O’Shea is trying to prevent. O’Shea is a private investigator with Striker-Pierce, which started offering comprehensive online dating background checks in November. Before launching the service, O’Shea researched the background checks several online dating sites were offering and found they didn’t go very far.

“We purchased these reports [the sites offered], and they were really substandard. I really felt they were putting people in danger when they did these reports,” O’Shea said. “When we do these checks, we actually make a call to a second- or third-removed acquaintance and get a feel for the person. In addition we try to get a cyber footprint on them and what they’re doing online to make sure they’re not involved in anything too shady. We try to look out for the warning signs instead of the black-and-white criminal records.”

Since O’Shea started offering the service, it’s grown in popularity, he said. He’s run the gamut of calls, too, from 25 to 60 year olds, from people having just met to people doing one last double-check before getting married to someone they met online.

Sometimes he fields calls from parents who aren’t as trustworthy of online dating sites as their children, but more often than not, O’Shea tends to “coach the parents toward letting their children in their mid-20s go.”

O’Shea isn’t seeking to expose some dark truth about the online dating world. On the contrary, he has good news for those who have met someone online and haven’t used his company.

“I would say in most cases, thankfully, we’re just basically proving what they already know,” about the other person, O’Shea said.

Striker-Pierce charges a $200 flat fee for the service. What does a typical investigation unearth when O’Shea finds the subject has been dishonest?

“We find a lot of embellishment; height, weight, education, success, and it doesn’t necessarily disrupt the relationship but it gives people a transparent view,” O’Shea said. “We also find a lot of people who say they love dogs or cats and don’t. People say they own dogs when they don’t to attract dog lovers.”

O’Shea declined to say if any particular dating site attracted more dishonest members than others, but said the sites that ask more questions tend to attract more honest users.

“The sites that ask you the fewest questions are going to open themselves up to that,” he said. “As a joke, I made a profile on one of these sites as an Eskimo caveman who lives in the desert, and they let me put the profile up.”

Twenty-five to 35 year olds tend to be the most dishonest age group, O’Shea said.

“Well,” he said. “Not counting the 13 year olds.”

Arlington Transportation Projects Approved For Funding

By Ethan Rothstein

Lane closures and traffic approaching the Glebe Road/Rt. 50 bridgeFour Arlington transportation projects were approved for funding in Fiscal Year 2014 last night by the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority.

The authority approved funding for the Columbia Pike Multimodal Improvement Project, the Crystal City Multimodal Center, four additional ART buses and improvements to the Boundary Channel Drive/I-395 interchange; a total of $18.835 million.

In addition, the NVTA approved $5 million for the design of WMATA traction power improvements on the Orange Line, and $7 million for 10 new buses on Virginia Metrobus routes.

The package approved was the first to be directly allocated funding from the controversial transportation bill, HB 2313, passed by the General Assembly in the spring. About $270 million is estimated to come to Northern Virginia in funding this fiscal year, $190 million of which was available to be allocated by the NVTA.

The other $80 million will be distributed directly to localities. Arlington is projected to receive $11 million in direct funding, which it expects to direct to its Transportation Capital Fund.

The NVTA voted unanimously to approve $116 million in pay-as-you-go funding and more than $93 million in bond funding, pending a bond validation. Of Arlington’s approved projects, only $4.3 million for the Boundary Channel Drive/I-395 interchange will go through the bond process.

The state began collecting funds for the projects July 1 when a series of tax increases and other funding measures took effect. Over the next six years, HB 2313 is expected to raise more than $1.5 billion total for the region and close to $200 million for Arlington alone.

Other projects that were approved for funding that could have an impact for Arlington residents include $838,000 to the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission for the study of transit alternatives on the Route 7 corridor between King Street and Tysons Corner and five new DASH buses in Alexandria.

Two projects that impact Arlington — a $4 million VRE Crystal City platform extension and $5 million for upgrades to interlocking and platform girders at the Reagan National Airport Metro stop — were denied funding by unanimous vote.

One project that did not come up in the discussion was the Columbia Pike Streetcar project. Critics of the streetcar were calling the lack of funding another loss for the controversial project, but Arlington officials did not submit it for consideration.

At Virginia Hospital Center, Birth Rates Continue to Rise

By Ethan Rothstein

Exterior of Virginia Hospital Center's maternity wardNeed evidence that more and more young families are putting down roots in Arlington, beyond the rapid growth in school enrollment? Just look to Virginia Hospital Center.

The hospital, at 1701 N. George Mason Drive, completed a four-year-long renovation of its maternity ward earlier this year, adding beds and capacity to keep up with rising demand. But the number of births at the hospital continues to grow.

In the last five years, the hospital has gone from delivering 3,700 infants in 2008 to a projected 5,000-plus in 2013. In that time, the hospital’s Women & Infant Health Center has added 10 beds, formed a partnership with National Children’s Hospital to expand its Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, and reorganized the Labor and Delivery unit to add additional capacity.

The growth in birth rate “has been pretty substantial for our size,” Adrian Stanton, Virginia Hospital Center’s vice president of public affairs, said. To accommodate the expansion, some administrative offices were moved to the hospital’s Carlin Springs Road campus.

“Years ago, this was [considered to be] a mature market,” Stanton said. But that has changed, and hospital leaders still aren’t sure how much bigger the Arlington baby boom will get.

“There isn’t a desire to move west or south as there had been. There’s more of an appeal to the Arlington area for young families,” he said. “I think we are struggling with the question, how much will Arlington continue to grow? Where is the growth going to be? I’m looking at the schools’ numbers, the planning departments numbers to try to figure it out.”

Stanton said there is still some room to grow for the maternity unit, but any expansion has to be done “in place,” since there are no plans for major construction projects on the horizon. The hospital’s unsolved problem is akin to Arlington’s high schools, which have all completed renovations in the last couple of years but remain overcrowded.

Stanton has identified one possible source of the upward trend in births, noting anecdotally that many families seem to want three children, as opposed to last generation’s average of two and a quarter children per household.

In addition to childbirth, another area of significant growth for Virginia Hospital Center has been joint replacement. The bulk of the joint replacement patients: active baby boomers in their 50s and 60s. Could the growth in joint replacements and childbirths be linked?

Asked whether it was perhaps the “echo boom” generation — the children of post-World War II baby boomers — who were accounting for the growth in births locally, Stanton wasn’t sure. But he did say that the baby boom generation in general has impacted hospital planning.

“As the baby boomers move through the system, they dictate a lot of what happens in society,” he said.

Poncho Sanchez Featured In September’s Jazz Festival

By Ethan Rothstein

Rosslyn Jazz Festival (photo via Rosslyn BID)Renowned percussionist Poncho Sanchez is the headliner for this year’s Rosslyn Jazz Festival.

The Rosslyn Business Improvement District, which puts on the annual event — now in its 23rd year — announced its Sept. 7 lineup this week. It includes Sanchez, a Grammy award winner,  joined by saxophonist and clarinetist James Carter, performing a tribute to John Coltrane.

Before Sanchez goes on stage as the headliner at 5:30 p.m., Soul Rebels, featured in the HBO show “Treme,” will perform at 4:00 p.m. Soul Rebels, made up of New Orleans jazz scene veterans Lumar LeBlanc and Derrick Moss, fuse a jazz foundation with principles of hip-hop in their music.

Opening the show will be a local band, the Kenny Rittenhouse Septet. Rittenhouse is a professor of jazz trumpet at George Mason University and performs in the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra.

Following Rittenhouse on the stage will be Naomi Shelton and the Gospel Queens, a female gospel quartet that has played, among other places, New York City’s famed Lincoln Center.

The Rosslyn Jazz Festival will be held at Arlington Gateway Park on Sept. 7, starting at 1:00 p.m. and running until 7:00. The concert is free and open to the public, and it will be emceed by on-air personalities from jazz station WPFW 89.3.

Photo courtesy of the Rosslyn BID. Disclosure: Rosslyn BID is an ARLnow.com advertiser.

Abandoned Chickens on the Rise In N. Va.

By Ethan Rothstein

Chicken (file photo)The rise of backyard chickens in Northern Virginia has sparked a heated policy debate in Arlington, but it has also led to an increase in abandoned chickens showing up at shelters.

In 2011, Prince William County approved a measure that allowed raising birds on some residential properties. Since then, the number of chickens that the Prince William County Animal Shelter has taken in has risen.

In 2011, the shelter — which also accepts chickens from Arlington, since the Animal Welfare League of Arlington does not house poultry — saw 23 chickens. After Prince William passed its new ordinance, the number of chickens at the PWCAS jumped to 33 in 2012 and 29 already in 2013.

According to Laurie Thompson, an administrator with the PWCAS, the first 16 chickens the shelter took in this year were strays, a number she noted was both unusual and likely attributable to abandoned chickens.

“If somebody knows how to handle a chicken and they keep their numbers down low and don’t have roosters that are going to crow, then it’s probably okay having one or two hens for eggs,” Thompson told ARLnow.com. “But sometimes, people can get excessive with these things, keep bringing them in, and then it becomes a health hazard with chicken feces. It’s not really good for an urban area to have all those feces to deal with, because those can bring in rats.”

Arlington residents are allowed to raise poultry in an enclosure 100 feet or more from property lines, but a debate has grown in the past year around reducing the limit. Last month a majority of the county’s Urban Agriculture Task Force, created in 2012, recommended reducing the enclosure limit to 20 feet from a property line, but allowing no more than four hens, no roosters and requiring permission from neighbors.

The recommendation is being considered by county staff, which will then make its own recommendation to the County Board. The Board is not expected to take action on the subject until the fall.

Animal Welfare League of Arlington spokeswoman Kerry McKeel said the organization participated in a discussion about backyard chickens with the task force, but hasn’t otherwise offered any opinions about the implications of additional urban hen raising.

“At this point a decision has not been reached on how the ordinance will be changed, so at this time AWLA does not have a position on the issue,” she said. In the past year, McKeel said the AWLA has picked up four roaming chickens and sent them either to Prince William or farm sanctuaries in rural Virginia or Maryland.

(more…)

League Shakeup To Impact Arlington Schools

By Ethan Rothstein

Yorktown High School football player (file photo)

This article was co-written by Audrey Batcheller

As fall sports season approaches for Arlington’s high schools, varsity athletes must adjust to the new Virginia High School League realignment and reclassification for post-season competition.

The athletic departments of Arlington schools have been aware that this shakeup was coming, but now that the plan is finalized and the 2013-14 school year is quickly approaching, many are wondering what exactly this means for their teams.

Virginia high schools had previously been organized by districts that were grouped by proximity. These districts were then classified based on enrollment size. The highly populated schools were in Group AAA, schools with average populations were in Group AA, and the smallest schools were in Group A. All three Arlington high schools were members of the AAA National District of the Northern Region.

While the National District is staying intact for regular season play, the playoff system is getting a major overhaul. The three statewide groups are being split into six, the smallest schools in Group 1A and the biggest in Group 6A.

Each group will crown its own state champion in each sport, except lacrosse, which will now crown two state championships as opposed to the one, unified championship given out since it became a VHSL-sanctioned sport in 2006.

Washington-Lee and Yorktown will continue to play the state’s biggest schools in Group 6A and will be joining National District rival Hayfield as part of Conference 6. Wakefield, with several hundred fewer students, will be in Conference 13 with the other local Group 5A schools.

“The reclassification offers those schools with a smaller student enrollment a fair shot at playing similar sized schools,” Noel Deskins, the Director of Student Activities at Wakefield High School, said in an email.

Bishop O’Connell High School is not affected by the reclassification because it is not a member of the VHSL. O’Connell competes against the Washington Catholic Athletic Conference.

Previously, the regular season was followed by a three-round, single elimination district playoff, where teams would compete against schools within their district for the title of district champions. The top four teams from each district then advanced to a Regional tournament, where the top two teams would advance to an eight team state championship.

Now, with the introduction of the conferences a new playoff system has developed. The playoffs start off similarly to the previous procedure, but schools will now be competing to be conference champions. After the conference playoffs have concluded, only the top two teams will advance to the regional tournament and the state tournament now will consist of only four teams.

Football is the only exception; the conference playoffs are bypassed and the top 16 teams will go straight into regional playoffs. Wakefield, which ended last season winless, will no longer play in the Northern Region with Yorktown and Washington-Lee — renamed the 6A North Region — instead, they will be in the 5A North Region.

Football is the sport perhaps least affected by the reclassification. Because teams can only play just one game a week, they were already divided into six divisions for state tournaments. Last year, Yorktown went undefeated until it fell to Stone Bridge in Ashburn in the Northern Region championship.

All three high schools will match up against each other and the rest of the National District during the regular season in an effort to maintain rivalry games.

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