Author: Peter Rousselot

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

The Arlington County Board designed a fundamentally flawed process in its Western Rosslyn Area Planning Study (WRAPS) charge. The principal flaw was to require the WRAPS group to proceed without first disclosing a Letter of Intent between the County and a private developer (Penzance) that was a precondition for the site’s redevelopment.

By later issuing the more holistic (and County-wide) Community Facilities Study group charge, the County Board implicitly acknowledged imposing unreasonable constraints on the WRAPS process by trying to accomplish too many objectives on this one small site.

The Board set July public hearings to review the County’s proposed plan for this portion of Rosslyn. Seeking to defend that plan, Board Chair Mary Hynes argued:

The proposed plan seeks to balance the need for open space in Western Rosslyn with the need for a new school with associated gym and playing field accessible to residents, a new fire station and more affordable housing in collaboration with commercial redevelopment.

Measured by this standard, the proposed plan fails miserably.

The plan makes a small park much smaller and disproportionately favors commercial redevelopment over scarce green space in a rapidly urbanizing area. It also conflicts with several existing plans–The Rosslyn to Courthouse Urban Design Study (2003), the Natural Resources Management Plan (2010), and the Draft Rosslyn Sector Plan (2015) –all calling for increased open space and/or no loss of open space.

The Board’s final, approved plan for this site must assure that the entire current, contiguous acreage of Rosslyn Highlands Park remains dedicated to park use in perpetuity.

To that end, the final site plan should adhere to these principles:

• Each current land owner should retain ownership of its land;
• Rosslyn Highlands Park should be preserved in its entirety as public parkland;
  APS should proceed with building a new structure to house the HB Woodlawn program on the land it currently owns;
• Penzance may develop the land it currently owns and should be relieved of any obligation to pay for a new fire station on the site;
• The County should follow existing procedures by conditioning the award of any bonus density on contributions to affordable housing and other community benefits, if Penzance seeks bonus density on this site, and
• If the County determines that the current site of Fire Station #10 is the only appropriate County site for a new fire station serving Rosslyn, then it should finance that new fire station’s construction with general obligation bonds.

CONCLUSION:

Preserving existing parkland is more important than giving one of Rosslyn’s largest private developers a new development opportunity that current market conditions would not otherwise support.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

In an April column, I outlined these lessons learned from Arlington’s Artisphere fiasco:

• Arlington needs a new arts policy,
• The new policy must reflect current fiscal realities,
• Current fiscal realities require that core services should receive priority funding,
• Taxpayer support for the arts should be based upon artistic merit (as determined by a qualified citizens advisory group), not based upon hard-to-quantify “economic development” potential.

On June 11, ARLnow.com published a revealing new story on the Artisphere based upon documents provided to ARLnow pursuant to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the Arlington County government.

That story and the documents provide additional lessons about arts funding, Arlington County’s mismanagement, and what we should do moving forward.

The Artisphere’s Mission Was Muddled

This comment to the latest ARLnow story best captures the Artisphere’s muddled mission:

Artisphere never figured out if it wanted to be a mini-Kennedy Center or a mini-Torpedo Factory. Local artists and artisans were promised a gallery/shop where they could sell what they created. As the article pointed out, a popular local theater company was kicked out. If Artisphere had wanted more local attendance, it should have brought in more of the local arts community. Instead, it turned its back on us, trying to be something it never stood a chance of being.

We could argue endlessly whether the Artisphere should have focused on being a mini-Kennedy Center or a mini-Torpedo factory or something else. If public taxpayer dollars were not involved, this would be a decision strictly up to the private sector. If such a private-sector venture failed, then the private backers would suffer the financial loss. But if our tax dollars are involved, we should insist on a clear mission.

Arlington County Mismanaged The Artisphere

The Arlington County government compounded the risk posed by the Artisphere’s muddled mission by:

• agreeing to an open-ended taxpayer subsidy arrangement supporting this costly facility,
• prematurely launching the Artisphere before key hires (e.g., executive director, marketing director) were in place,
• trying to rationalize the mounting red ink by seizing upon the Artisphere’s alleged economic development potential to boost Rosslyn.

The Way Forward

From the ashes of the Artisphere fiasco, we can move forward to an exciting and fiscally-sustainable future for the arts in Arlington. I disagree with those who say Arlington should stop all support for arts funding.

Arlington’s continued strong commitment of our tax dollars to support the arts should:

• avoid future arrangements in which Arlington assumes fiscal responsibility to fund any and all losses of a facility housing artistic ventures,
• emphasize targeted direct grants from Arlington to artists and arts groups,
• recognize that funding for core services (e.g., schools, parks, roads) requires priority.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

The County Board might adopt in July a new “Affordable Housing Master Plan.” There is justified concern in the County about “affordability.” But, rising property taxes also adversely affect affordability.

I support an appropriate level of taxpayer subsidies for affordable housing. However, it is poor public policy to commit the County to specific numerical affordable housing goals and other controversial policy changes without a thorough community conversation about:

• direct costs to taxpayers of these subsidies,
• opportunity costs (i.e., what tax dollars cannot be spent on core services (e.g., schools, parks, roads) in order to fund these subsidies), and
• other neighborhood impacts (i.e., increased density).

The County has neither requested from its staff nor provided the community with these dollar costs and impacts. Therefore, final Board action on the plan should be deferred.

Based on a report prepared for the Arlington Civic Federation:

• The plan would commit Arlington to adding up to 15,800 subsidized housing units over the next 25 years to meet a goal that 17.7% of Arlington’s housing should be affordable to low-income families.  There is no analysis of how to pay for this, or of the impact the additional population would have on:
  • Arlington’s already overburdened schools,
  • neighborhood density, and
  • other public services.
• The plan would consider changing zoning to enable duplexes, triplexes and other multi-family housing in single-family neighborhoods contrary to the County’s long-standing “Smart Growth” promise to preserve Arlington’s single-family neighborhoods.
• The plan eliminates the county’s long-standing specific goals for County-wide geographic distribution of affordable housing. This unduly would concentrate new affordable housing in Arlington’s poorest neighborhoods, adding to the burden on those Arlington schools whose students are most challenged.
• The plan contemplates building housing on parks, if co-located with another facility such as a recreation center. This puts even greater pressure on our already inadequate amount of parkland.

The County needs to:

• Provide a detailed analysis of the impact of this plan on other County services, our neighborhoods and our taxes.  The analysis must include estimates of the impact on our already overcrowded schools.  Up to 15,800 new housing units means a lot of new families and new students.  Where will we put the schools?  How will we pay for them?
• Then facilitate a balanced community conversation about all of the plan’s potential impacts.

It will take time to perform and communicate the detailed analysis required. The community then needs an adequate amount of time to review the analysis and offer its views. For these reasons, final adoption of the plan should be postponed until after the November 2015 election.

The County Board that will implement the final plan should be the Board that debates and adopts that plan.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

Will some Arlington students get their entire Arlington Public Schools education in trailer-based classrooms?

It’s a startling prospect for our “world class” community. But, that possibility became clearer in the latest plan proposed by APS Superintendent Patrick Murphy:

Murphy’s plan… calls for 27 new relocatables for elementary schools in South Arlington by fall 2020. By fall 2019, Murphy plans for middle schools around the county to add 44 new trailers. In five years, that would bring the total number of trailers for middle schools and South Arlington elementary schools to 120.

It’s been evident for some time that without financially feasible new plans to build new school facilities on specific sites, APS will ramp up its reliance on “relocatable classrooms” (aka trailers) in perpetuity. The numerous students for whom there are no classrooms already occupy 124 trailers.

It’s highly unlikely that the completion of the Community Facilities Study magically will eliminate the need for many dozens of trailers. Arlington probably won’t be able to retain its AAA/AAA bond rating over the next 10 years if it tries to finance the construction of all the new school facilities needed to provide enough seats — and ditch the trailers.

That still will be true even if APS does the right thing by substantially revising its Architectural Digest philosophy of new school design and construction. Furthermore, it remains to be seen if repurposing county-owned properties for schools will relieve enough congestion at an affordable price.

The County Board stubbornly has refused to take the steps needed to require developers like Vornado to pay their fair share of the cost of the new school facilities needed because of new development. And our highly educated community is unlikely to put up with a massive increase in class size as a means of trailer elimination.

Stop pretending trailers are temporary

APS needs to stop pretending that these “learning cottages” are temporary. Instead, APS must candidly admit that trailers are permanent.

Studies have shown that trailers can raise serious environmental and health concerns. These concerns are serious enough when trailers are temporary, but are greater when they are permanent. Health and environmental risks are magnified when trailers are used on the same site at which new school facilities or renovations are being constructed.

Launch a search for new models

APS should switch to new, more environmentally friendly and energy-efficient trailers. One possible model is the one used by the Waldorf School in Charlottesville. Many other examples are available here.

CONCLUSION

APS should:

• admit that its relocatable classrooms are a permanent feature, and
• appoint a joint citizen-APS task force to identify new models to fill APS’ growing capacity gaps.

Peter Rousselot is a former member of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party of Virginia and former chair of the Arlington County Democratic Committee.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

How can Arlington improve its business environment?

In a recent column, I highlighted steps the Arlington County government should take to encourage a civic minded business community. That column explained why Arlington needs to improve its business environment in order to meet its public facilities challenges.

This column continues that discussion. It is based on input from a business owner who moved a business from Arlington to Fairfax. Among this owner’s key observations are these:

• How does a business benefit from locating in Arlington, or remaining in Arlington? My checks were quickly cashed, but I never received a message of appreciation for remaining in Arlington nor congratulations for growing a business year-after-year. What can the County offer businesses? Perhaps appreciation is the most affordable thing. How about a pleasant phone call from time to time, an email that connects them with a county business liaison if they have questions, an offer to discuss business futures with them, or inviting them to seminars and gatherings?  It’s a conversation worth having.
• The County knows how much in gross receipts taxes and BPOL taxes every firm pays. They can easily tell which ones are increasingly paying more in taxes. They could then connect and engage. Applications for occupancy permits for new office space could provide yet another opportunity to make meaningful contact with businesses that are growing and staying in the County.
• When I called the Arlington Economic Development office to ask for help finding new office space for my growing company, I was told to contact a local commercial real estate agent. When I left a year later, no one ever called me about the motivations for my decision. So market retention is at least equally important to economic development because you don’t have to fill empty office space if the business stays in Arlington. The County needs to implement changes based on what they’ve learned from exit surveys — if they actually do them systematically (or even retroactively).
• If more than 50 percent of all new businesses in Virginia are woman-owned, perhaps understanding the psychology of women business owners would make a difference in how the county does business with them. This is an opportunity for the county to offer customized help to small, woman and minority owned businesses.
• It’s widely acknowledged that small businesses are the backbone of the economy, and yet in Arlington it seems that only large businesses and federal leases get the attention.  While we’ve listened to the sad story and witnessed the very real impacts of BRAC relocations, small businesses are being ignored.  Small businesses pay their share of taxes, too.  Why don’t they get meaningful attention or assistance?

Arlington: are you listening?

Peter Rousselot is a former member of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party of Virginia and former chair of the Arlington County Democratic Committee.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

Regrettably, Virginia has earned the title of the “East Coast capital of predatory lending.” Fortunately, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring is working to fix that.

What’s the problem?

According to Virginia’s State Corporation Commission:

[I]n recent years, Virginia-based payday lenders have annually made more than 440,000 loans totaling more than $170 million to more than 137,000 borrowers. The borrowers take out an average of more than three loans a year to stay afloat at an average annual interest rate of 289 percent. Virginia-based car title lenders also issued more than $206 million in loans in 2013, up from $180 million in 2012, to more than 150,000 borrowers, with an average APR of 216 percent. More than 17,000 borrowers had their car repossessed and more than 13,000 had their car sold.

Predatory lenders have flocked to Virginia because surrounding jurisdictions, such as Maryland and DC, have enacted stricter laws, including laws that cap interest rates. Virginia has 20 licensed payday lending companies and 28 licensed motor vehicle title lending companies. Virginia also has open-end lenders that are effectively unregulated.

Right here in Arlington there are branches of the car title lender Title Max at 5265 Lee Highway and 3045 Columbia Pike (“If you are in need of some fast cash”). For pay day loans, you can choose from several Arlington options, including ACE Cash Express at 311 N. Glebe Road or Advance America at 2514 Columbia Pike (“It Only Takes 10 minutes. Apply Now”).

What’s the solution?

Attorney General Herring has committed to focus on a wide range of strategies, including:

• Enforcement Actions, using his office to crack down on lenders violating existing laws.
• Consumer Education, providing assistance to create financial literacy courses and credit mentoring guidelines to community organizations.
• Partnerships with the federal Consumer Finance Protection Bureau (CFPB), other states, advocacy groups like ProgressVA, and other stakeholders to take action against lenders operating across state lines.
• New Virginia Legislation, based on what’s working in other states, what new enforcement authority is needed by the Virginia Attorney General’s office, and what loopholes lenders have found in current Virginia law.
• Alternative Lending Solutions, exploring ways to help consumers gain access to affordable, non-predatory low-dollar loans, and reducing the number of individuals and households that cannot borrow or cannot borrow enough through traditional banks.

Attorney General Herring’s partnership with the CFPB is particularly promising. The CFPB is the federal agency whose creation was championed by now-Sen. Elizabeth Warren after the 2008 financial collapse. The CFPB is considering new federal rules to curb predatory lending.

CONCLUSION

Congratulations to Attorney General Mark Herring for his progressive leadership in targeting predatory lending in Virginia.

Peter Rousselot is a former member of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party of Virginia and former chair of the Arlington County Democratic Committee.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

The School Board recently voted 3 to 2 to push forward with its controversial 1:1 initiative — the plan to give every student their own laptop or tablet for educational purposes.

What should the Board do now to address the many justified criticisms leveled at its 1:1 initiative?

DISCUSSION

The School Board should direct Superintendent Patrick Murphy to hold a series of public meetings, beginning in mid-May, among concerned parents, teachers, APS administrators, and the general public, to discuss collaboratively the most critical issues that have been raised.

APS needs uniform developmentally appropriate guidelines in areas such as:

Teacher training/professional development

One of the most serious criticisms of the 1:1 initiative is its complete lack of vision or goals to train teachers on how best to integrate the devices into curricular offerings. To address this deficiency, the public meetings should discuss in detail APS’ plans to:

• set clear and measurable goals;
• give devices to schools in the summer, not in the fall;
• have quality apps that are equitably available on devices at all schools and aligned with curricular goals;
• use a curriculum that contains expectations for the devices to be used to attain a goal, with assessments that follow this pattern: using the iPad/Macbook and “X” software, students will …;
• require professional development that would help teachers use “X” software to achieve that desired outcome;
• sustain professional development so that teachers could go back to review and re-learn (could be online);
• evaluate appropriately teacher and student usage.

Individual total daily screen time on all devices/safety

Particularly at the elementary level, parents are very concerned about the total number of hours per day (at school, at home and on transportation) that their children will be in front of a screen. This issue needs a collaborative solution. System-wide rules are needed for something as simple as “don’t use the camera to harass or embarrass your fellow students.” Filters should be placed on iPads to block inappropriate content.

Transparency in budgeting

Teachers are NOT issued MacBook Airs or iPads. This seriously interferes with their ability to develop detailed, evidence based curricular plans, but there is no provision in the APS budget to provide these devices to teachers. Nor is there any meaningful, long-term annualized budget estimate of total hardware and software costs. Accurate total costs are essential to enable the community to weigh the costs of the 1:1 initiative against the benefits.

CONCLUSION

APS badly flunked the transparency test in the roll-out of this initiative. Technology and devices are critical. APS must prepare our children to use them. But, the current 1:1 initiative isn’t the only way.

APS should candidly acknowledge that this initiative has flunked and needs to be re-booted.

Peter Rousselot is a former member of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party of Virginia and former chair of the Arlington County Democratic Committee.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

What are the major lessons we should take away from:

• the Artisphere subsidy arrangement?
• last December’s $5 million bailout of Signature Theatre?
• taxpayer support for the arts generally?

Arlington County needs a new arts policy

Arlington’s current arts policy was adopted on December 8, 1990.  In a column I wrote two years ago about Signature’s $250,000 first bailout, I called on Arlington to update its arts policy. Last December, at the time of Signature’s $5 million second bailout, the Manager promised that Arlington would update its arts policy. It hasn’t happened. Why must we lurch from bailout crisis to bailout crisis without a new policy?

The new arts policy should reflect current fiscal realities

Arlington’s current arts policy was adopted a quarter century ago. It may have served us well for a long time. Parts of the policy may be just as valid today as when those parts were adopted. But, it is now long past time for a new policy because Arlington is facing new issues such as the capacity crisis in our public schools.

Current fiscal realities dictate that core services should receive priority

I strongly favor continued public support for the arts with our tax dollars. But, the arts are not a core government service in the same way as schools, roads, sewers, and public safety. Because the arts are not core government services like those, the County Board should fund a higher percentage share of the “wish lists” for schools, roads, sewers, and public safety than the share the Board funds for the arts.

Funding the arts based upon “economic development” should be reconsidered

It’s a very slippery slope to justify the costs of funding an arts project based on the project’s alleged contribution to economic development. The county has entered into some of its most ill-advised deals, like those with the Artisphere and Signature, by trying to justify those deals as important to the economic development of Rosslyn and Shirlington, respectively.

It would be better and more forthright to provide public taxpayer funding based strictly on artistic merit, relying on the recommendations of a qualified citizens’ advisory group. Even when artistic merit is the sole criterion, Arlington should only enter into agreements that cap Arlington’s financial exposure.

Peter Rousselot is a former member of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party of Virginia and former chair of the Arlington County Democratic Committee.

Peter’s Take is a weekly opinion column. The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ARLnow.com.

In a recent Progressive Voice column, the author observed:

“If we want to move forward with new school construction, family-friendly parks, a properly staffed police department, and a safety net for those less fortunate, we must continue to encourage the presence of a strong and civic-minded business community.”

I agree. Recognizing the substantial regional economic headwinds that are beyond the control of county government, there are some concrete steps that our government can take to encourage the presence of a strong and civic-minded business community.

Arlington Economic Development

This past December, the county hired Victor Hoskins as the new Director of Arlington Economic Development (AED). He has an impressive résumé. He could bring a much-needed fresh perspective to enable Arlington to attract and retain businesses.

However, Mr. Hoskins has joined a county staff whose past practices and budget priorities raise a whole host of questions, including:

• Does Arlington do any sort of exit interviews when it learns of businesses leaving Arlington? If so, what are the most common comments and lessons learned?
• Starbucks is planning to open soon on Columbia Pike at Penrose Square. Chipotle also is close to signing a lease for a Pike location. What is AED planning to do to capitalize on these developments? What specific Columbia Pike business development initiatives does AED plan in FY 2016?
• A recent Washington Post story highlighted Monday Properties’ empty Rosslyn office building at 1812 N. Moore Street. The story quoted a company spokesman as saying “he has not considered lowering the rents he’s asking.”  “Pricing has not been an issue,” he claimed. Say what? How can we ask county taxpayers to contribute millions more in public funding for AED’s economic development efforts when private developers are unwilling to respond to market forces by reducing their rents?

County Staff’s Business Unfriendly Retail Plan

Earlier this year, only the vigilance of a small number of citizen activists, combined with the strong opposition of the Arlington Civic Federation, prevented the adoption of a County-staff-proposed “Arlington County Retail Plan.”

The staff plan contained overly-prescriptive, business unfriendly provisions, including:

• Allowing only a limited number of options for street-level retail (such as preferring restaurants while banning personal services) from prime locations;
• Using detailed maps specifying a small set of retail uses supposedly appropriate for each indicated spot on the map, while offering no discernable demographic or economic analysis to support the designations.

Conclusion

The County Board must help AED director Hoskins by adopting new policies that

• root out existing County staff practices and procedures that discourage business, and
• encourage private developers and other businesses to participate fairly in addressing the challenges facing Arlington

Peter Rousselot is a former member of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party of Virginia and former chair of the Arlington County Democratic Committee.