January 21 - 27, 2016
Fa lls Chur c h, V i r g i ni a • ww w. fc np. c om • Fr ee
Fou n d ed 1991 • Vol. XXV No. 48
Falls Church • Tysons Corner • Merrifield • McLean • North Arlington • Bailey’s Crossroads
Inside This Week F.C. Braces for Mega-Storm
With forecasters now predicting an epic winter snow storm and blizzard to hit the Washngton, D.C. region this weekend, the City of Falls Church has sent out information on emergency snow routes that will need to remain free of parking or stopping for first responders, public safety officials and road crews at all times. See News Briefs, page 8
3 Shot By Assailant Outside State Theatre Suffer Non-Lethal Injuries
Police Seek Public Info on Early Monday Fight & Shooting
by Nicholas F. Benton
Falls Church News-Press
Planners OK New Business Parking Rules
The Falls Church Planning Commission rejected its chair’s call for a deferral and voted 4-3 to recommend to the City Council that it give final approval to an ordinance that would update current commercial parking regulations based on evidence that current numbers are too high. See News Briefs, page 8
David Brooks: Time for a Conspiracy!
Members of the Republican governing class are like cowering freshmen at halftime of a high school football game. See page 12
Press Pass with Grant-Lee Phillips
Grant-Lee Phillips has traversed tough waters at least a couple times since he released his last album Walking in the Green Corn in 2012. See page 18
Index
Editorial..................6 Letters....................6 News & Notes.10-11 Comment......... 12-15 Calendar.........16-17 Food & Dining......19
Sports..................22 Classified Ads .....24 Comics, Sudoku & Crossword...........25 Business News....26 Critter Corner.......26
WITH THE CONVENING of the Virginia General Assembly last week, lawmakers spread out all over the commonwealth last weekend to update and listen to constituents, and in the City of Falls Church the meeting was held at the Community Center hosted by State Sen. Dick Saslaw (left) and State Del. Marcus Simon (right). (Photo: News-Press)
With Pro & Con Advocates Both There, Guns Dominate Town Hall
by Nicholas F. Benton
Falls Church News-Press
Guns became the major issue of debate at Saturday’s state legislative town hall meeting at the Falls Church Community Center, despite the fact that State Sen. Dick Saslaw and State Del. Marcus Simon, both Democrats, agreed that such toxic issues in the Richmond legislature will get nowhere, as usual, and they’ve chosen to focus on bills that might actually win bipartisan support and pass. The annual Richmond legislative session
kicked off last week. Single representatives of both pro-gun and anti-gun groups showed up to speak, neither of whom were from Falls Church. As much as both Saslaw and Simon prefaced their remarks with “we don’t want to take away your guns,” but spoke to the need for universal background checks, their comments nonetheless came under fire, so to speak, from the pro-gun spokesman on grounds of a variety of “what-if” hypotheticals. This is despite the fact that 82 percent of members of the National Rifle Association
favor universal background checks. Sen. Saslaw noted that in the case of Florida, with whom Virginia has a “reciprocity agreement” on guns, 1,400 licenses were issued in the recent period to persons with criminal records, including 218 with outstanding warrants for their arrest, 14 of those for murder. Although plenty have been submitted by almost all Democrats in Richmond this session, no measure to put any
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City of Falls Church Police Chief Mary Gavin told the NewsPress in an interview Wednesday that the City’s State Theatre live music venue, always eager, she said, to cooperate with police, had “robust” security, including a magnetometer to detect guns at the entrance for its “go-go” concert Sunday night, and it was supplemented by five uniformed Falls Church police officers in marked police cars. However, that did not prevent a “brazen person” from taking a fight, which broke out inside the theater early Monday, to the parking lot outside at the end of the concert, and firing a gun that struck three patrons with non-life threatening wounds. It is not known for certain that the assailant was a single person, although, Chief Gavin said, the ammunition residue was consistent with that. Some bullet fragments were found in the wall of the adjacent restaurant, Clare and Don’s Beach Shack. Chief Gavin said, “This was a brazen act by one individual outside the theater. The incident was not as much about security as it was about the specific person who brought a weapon outside and fired it into the crowd. Five uniformed police officers and eight security personnel did not deter this incident and no other security measures would have probably deterred this shooting.” Gavin offered few new details of the incident in her phone interview with the News-Press, beyond the update report that the City of Falls Church released Tuesday. All
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