A former DCist editor meets the commenters, the Archdiocese of Washington is suing Metro, who is behind NoMa’s explosive growth, and other news of the day over the in the District.
Alex Ovechkin “may or may not be a witting font of Kremlin propaganda.” [NYT]
While this D.C. mansion is owned by a Putin ally and aluminum magnate. [Post]
Ballou, which recently touted that 100% of its graduating class was accepted to college, graduated scores of students who missed more than three months of class. [WAMU]
Life in this corner of Langdon Park is still deeply impacted by a construction dumping impact, despite winning a settlement agreement years ago. [Fox5]
Career Center Site May Expand — The Arlington County Board and School Board have created a joint working group to explore options for adding more high school seats at the Arlington Career Center Site near Columbia Pike. The working group will consider how the site “may be developed in phases to accommodate more high school capacity and new community amenities.” It will also “identify opportunities to expand the Career Center site by leasing space in adjacent buildings and/or through land acquisition.” [Arlington County]
ACPD Warns of Holiday Phone Scams — Arlington County Police are cautioning residents against automatically trusting phone calls claiming to be on behalf of charitable organizations around the holidays. Scammers falsely identifying themselves as charitable solicitors are trying to steal money and personal information. In particular, the police department says, calls claiming to be collecting money on behalf of ACPD are bogus. [Arlington County]
RIP Officer Irving Comer — “On Thursday, November 23, 2017, retired Officer Irving Comer, the first African-American to be sworn in as a police officer for the Arlington County Police Department, passed away at the age of 74.” [Arlington County]
A survey has found that Arlington County residents favor bicycling and support more separate bike lanes.
The survey, conducted by the county’s local transportation research group Mobility Lab and county bicycle education program BikeArlington, found that 89 percent of respondents said they would like to bike more often, and 62 percent said that more separated bikes lanes would help them do that.
More than 1,200 people took the survey at a series of events in August and September, including the Arlington County Fair and Nauck Civic and Community Pride Day. Of those people, 94 percent reported being Arlington residents.
“[The survey] offers yet more evidence that bicycling is becoming a legitimate option for people to get to work in the Arlington and greater Washington, D.C. region,” a Mobility Lab spokesman said. “Mobility Lab recommends that more spending be made available for safer infrastructure – infrastructure that is far easier, faster, and less expensive to get up and running than that for cars and even transit.”
The survey was part of the county’s outreach process for updating the Bike Element of its 2008 Master Transportation Plan.
Staff from the county’s Department of Environmental Services have said previously that the time is right for a revamp given the new “technologies, facilities and best practices” around bicycling.
Accessory dwellings in Arlington (via county staff report)
The Arlington County Board voted 4-1 at its Tuesday meeting to loosen the rules around homeowners adding “accessory dwelling units” to their properties.
Put no limit on the size of an ADU located wholly within a basement
Require that an ADU take up no more than either 35 percent of the combined floor area of the property, or up to a maximum of 750 square feet
Allow detached ADUs in existing accessory buildings (like a garage) and assess more options for setback requirements for new detached accessory dwellings
Remove the annual limit on the number of ADUs that can be created in the county
Require any requirement for the owner to occupy the property, but if the owner does not occupy one of the dwellings, the entire property may be occupied by no more than one family
Only about 20 ADUs — defined as a second place to live on a property, with a kitchen, a bathroom and a separate entrance — have been approved in Arlington since 2009.
A proposal to relax rules in the county’s Zoning Ordinance had been under discussion since earlier this year as the county looks to encourage more ADUs, also known as “granny flats” or “mother-in-law suites.”
“The ordinance we passed in 2008 failed to generate accessory dwellings,” County Board Chair Jay Fisette said in a statement. “We are committed to creating more affordable housing in our County, and to making it easier for Arlingtonians to age in place. An accessory dwelling could create an additional income stream for those on fixed incomes. These revisions will give homeowners more opportunities to create accessory dwellings, while maintaining the character of our single-family neighborhoods.”
Board member John Vihstadt voted against the plan, citing “anxiety” from residents worried about neighborhoods being taken over by ADUs, as well as the worries of some about the impact on trees, stormwater management and other environmental aspects.
During their deliberations, Board members wrestled with how to direct County Manager Mark Schwartz to study requirements for new detached buildings that could be built to house an ADU. Existing structures are allowed to house ADUs right away.
Vihstadt tried to widen the study beyond setback requirements — how far back the ADU should be from the edges of the property — to look at building height and other aspects, but that brought opposition from Fisette.
“It seems to me you’ve opened up a lot more conversation here that will become far more complicated in the days ahead,” Fisette said, urging his colleagues to keep things simple and just study setback requirements.
“Just because a policy is simple to understand doesn’t make it any more sound than if it’s more complicated,” Vihstadt responded. “These are important characteristics that are taken into account in Arlington and elsewhere.”
Board members voted to direct Schwartz to only study setback requirements, and he is expected to provide his findings to the Board in the coming months. Members agreed that needs more work before a final decision can be made.
“Certainly, I think the desire to make sure we are working with homeowners to allow existing buildings to be used for this purpose makes a lot of sense,” Board member Christian Dorsey said. “But moving forward with new buildings, I’m not sure we’ve considered all options available to us to account for the different uses that we are entitling compared to when the Zoning Ordinance was created and as it’s been refined over the years.”
Drivers of electric cars now have one less place to charge their vehicles in Arlington County.
A tipster reported the car charging station in the parking lot of the former Walgreens Pharmacy at 2825 Wilson Blvd in Clarendon was removed last week.
At the time it was first and only station in the county from EVgo, which owned the ports and installed them in 2013. Anyone interested in using them could buy a monthly subscription.
Representatives with EVgo did not respond to requests for further comment, but on its website, the Clarendon charging location has been removed. Other EVgo charging stations remain at the Fashion Centre at Pentagon City mall.
Other charging stations from other companies are available in other neighborhoods, including Ballston, Rosslyn, Crystal City, Pentagon City and Shirlington.
Local all-hybrid taxi service Envirocab is no more.
A tipster reported calling the Columbia Pike-based company last week, but getting a message on the phone saying they were no longer in service.
Calls to the company this week yielded the same result, while its website is “Temporarily out of service.”
“We are sorry to inform you that this service is no longer in operation. Thank you,” the message said. Arlington County Police Department spokeswoman Ashley Savage said Envirocab closed on November 1.
The 50-cab service was sold in 2013 to transportation conglomerate Veolia Transportation, which operates more than 2,400 taxicabs around the country. It began in 2008, and back then was the first all-hybrid fleet in the country. Since then, hybrid cabs have become more commonplace among local taxi fleets.
A Yelp review of Envirocab posted last month complained that the “service continues to deteriorate” and that “the last two times I attempted to use Envirocab, they failed to show up.”
Housing Conservation District proposals via county presentation
The Arlington County Board will vote in December on allowing the creation of “Housing Conservation Districts” to protect affordable housing and make it harder to demolish and build townhomes in some areas.
A proposal by staff would help create the districts within the county’s General Land Use Plan, the primary policy guide for new development that also establishes the character and extent of land uses. It would also add the districts to the county’s Affordable Housing Master Plan and the Zoning Ordinance.
Earlier this year, county staff found in a report that affordable apartment buildings and complexes tend to be located in the following nine general areas:
Along the edges of the Rosslyn Metro station area
Along the edges of the Ballston Metro station area
Central Lee Highway
East Lee Highway
Westover
Lyon Park
Shirlington
Penrose
Nauck/Long Branch Creek/Aurora Highlands
If approved, HCDs would be allowed in areas of the county planned for low-medium and medium residential use, and zoned for multi-family homes like apartments. Any proposed district must also contain two or more apartment buildings or complexes, or one large one.
The HCDs would allow for what staff described in a presentation to the Board as “context-appropriate renovation, addition, infill and redevelopment projects in exchange for affordable housing.”
Development of townhouses would be reclassified as a special exception use within HCDs, meaning it would require site plan approval by the County Board on a case-by-case basis. That change comes after a spate of by-right townhouse development to replace affordable apartment buildings, including in Westover.
“The Board is considering this action to encourage the preservation of affordable housing,” County Board chair Jay Fisette said in a statement.
This plan is the first phase of adding HCDs. Subsequent phases could include giving tax- and zoning-based incentives to developers.
The Board will hold a public hearing on the plan at its December 16 meeting, with the Planning Commission also holding a hearing on December 4. In a letter, Joan Lawrence, chair of the Historical Affairs and Landmark Review Board, said the group supports the planned HCDs.
Post reporters prove their mettle, Sixth and I gets profiled in the New York Times, another local Massage Envy victim speaks out, and other news of the day over in the District.
County Board Approves Affordable Housing Loan — At its meeting last night, the Arlington County Board approved a loan that will help preserve the 294-unit Park Shirlington Apartments as affordable housing. The $6 million loan from the county’s Affordable Housing Investment Fund will allow a pair of developers to buy the complex, rehabilitate it and preserve as much affordable housing as possible. [Arlington County]
Ten Die in Va. Thanksgiving Weekend Crashes — “With overall traffic fatalities already on the increase, the 2017 Thanksgiving holiday weekend proved to be a deadly one… on Virginia’s highways. During the holiday… traffic crashes claimed the lives of eight drivers, one passenger and a pedestrian.” [Virginia State Police]
Video Shows Helicopter Search of Crane — A video, posted by a Pentagon City resident, shows the Fairfax County Police helicopter using its spotlight to search a construction crane Sunday night, as part of a death investigation that was still ongoing as of Monday evening. [YouTube]
FCC Chair Reports Harassing Signs — FCC chairman and Arlington resident Ajit Pai is again being targeted at his home by activists who oppose changes to net neutrality and media ownership rules. This time, signs outside Pai’s home have reportedly referenced his children. The Arlington County Republican Committee called the alleged harassment “disgusting.” [Washington Post, Twitter]
Education Tech Company Sets Up Clarendon Studios — “Higher education is getting the star treatment… in Clarendon. Headquartered in Lanham, Maryland, [education technology firm] 2U recently revamped the former Henninger Media space off Wilson Boulevard to create a satellite office with eight TV studios, where visiting professors can spend a whirlwind three to four days taping lectures and other multimedia course materials designed to supplement live classroom chats and streaming video.” [Arlington Magazine]
Arlington County Police are continuing to investigate a death in Pentagon City last night.
A person’s body was found in the street on the 700 block of 12th Street S., near the Metro station entrance and the Pentagon Centre shopping center and construction site, around 9 p.m. Sunday night, according to ACPD spokeswoman Ashley Savage.
The police department requested the assistance of the Fairfax County Police helicopter in obtaining an aerial view of the scene and investigating how the person died, and the investigation is ongoing as of 4 p.m. Monday, Savage said.
A tipster tells ARLnow.com that they believe the individual fell from the construction crane on the site. A Twitter user reported Sunday night that the helicopter was shining its light on the crane.
Police said on Monday that they could not yet confirm the manner of death.
“This remains an active investigation and next of kin has not yet been notified,” said Savage. “The death is not considered suspicious and there is no threat to the public.”
A woman withdrew money in response to what turned out to be a fake kidnapping claim over the weekend.
According to police, an unknown man called the woman, saying he had kidnapped her daughter and would harm her unless he received a payment. The woman called police, but not before withdrawing money for a potential ransom payment. Officers located the woman’s daughter and confirmed that the kidnapping claim was a scam, stopping any potential payments to the scammer.
More from an Arlington County Police Department crime report:
EXTORTION, 2017-11260099, 5200 block of Lee Highway. At approximately 12:05 p.m. on November 26, police were dispatched to a possible robbery by force. Upon arrival, it was determined that a female victim called the Emergency Communication Center after receiving a threatening phone call from an unknown suspect. The suspect stated that he had kidnapped the victim’s daughter and would harm her unless the victim provided the suspect with money. The arriving officer was able to contact the victim’s daughter and confirm that she was not in danger. The victim had withdrawn money, however, the suspect was unable to provide her with a method for transferring the money as officers had arrived on scene and interrupted the transaction.
Police said the incident followed a pattern seen in similar kidnapping scams that have been reported recently. ACPD offered the following tips for someone who may receive a phone call claiming to be from a kidnapper.
The ACPD wants you to stay safe and be well-informed. To avoid becoming a victim of this extortion scheme, look for the following possible indicators:
Calls do not come from the kidnapped victim’s phone
Callers go to great lengths to keep you on the phone
Callers prevent you from calling or locating the “kidnapped” victim
Ransom money is only accepted via wire transfer service
If you receive a phone call from someone who demands payment of a ransom for a kidnapped victim, contact police immediately.
