November 19 - 25, 2015
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. 39
Falls Church • Tysons Corner • Merrifield • McLean • North Arlington • Bailey’s Crossroads
Inside This Week Eating In & Out on Thanksgiving in F.C.
From locally-raised birds and pre-made sides to gluten-free pies and turkey-and-stuffing-filled pop tarts, Falls Church has plenty of options when it comes to eating well during Thanksgiving next week.
F.C. Gets 2 Bids to Execute New ‘Campus Redevelopment Project’
Both Want to Build New High School & Creative Retail Draw
by Nicholas F. Benton
Falls Church News-Press
her reason for not delaying the vote when she said that “the major change (if a deferral were OK’d– ed.) will be a change in the makeup of the City Council, and that’s what this is all about.” In other words, Rodgers acknowledged that the outcome of the will of the citizenry in the Nov.
The Office of the City Manager of the City of Falls Church released Friday extensive non-confidential components of the two responses the City received to its request for proposal for the development of the 36-acre Upper West End property. The two bidding entities are Edgemoor Infrastructure of Bethesda, Maryland, including its leading contractor Clark Construction, and an entity going by Mason Greens Joint Venture, with the Republic Properties Corp. of Washington, D.C. as the major component. The Falls Church City Council and School Board, partners in deciding the destiny of the land that was ceded to the City from Fairfax County last year, held a three-and-a-half hour session behind closed doors Monday night to discuss the next steps now that the proposals have been received. According to News-Press sources, the meeting was confined to the two elected bodies and their teams of consultants and attorneys, and no outsiders, including no members of the bidding entities, were present. The long meeting took place in the Dogwood conference room at City Hall without a single break, while one floor above them, the Planning Commission was struggling with the Mason Row proposal (see story, this page). The one takeaway for public consumption of the closed session was the announcement of two public forums that will be held in early December to explain the process over the coming year that will, once a primary contract is awarded
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David Brooks: Finding Peace Within The Holy Texts
It’s easy to think that ISIS is some sort of evil, medieval cancer that somehow has resurfaced in the modern world. The rest of us are pursuing happiness, and here comes this fundamentalist anachronism, spreading death. See page 14
Press Pass with Sinkane
A desire to express himself musically, an exploration of his musical roots and a visit to his family in Sudan led Ahmed Gallab to create Sinkane and root the identity of the musical project in his own Sudanese background. See page 25
THE 36 ACRES that were transferred from Fairfax County into the City of Falls Church last year (outlined in green) now have two developers who have formally submitted bids to redevelop the land, including the construction of a new high school and a renovationexpansion of the middle school, with 10 acres designated for economic development in the form of mixed use and commercial projects. The Falls Church City Council and School Board met for over three hours in a closed session Monday night to mull their next moves in what they’ve coined a “Campus Redevelopment Project.” (Photo: City of Falls Church)
Planning Commissioner Calls to Nullify November Election Vote by Nicholas F. Benton
Falls Church News-Press
Index
Editorial..................6 Letters....................6 Business News....10 News & Notes.12-13 Comment......... 14-17 Sports..................18
Calendar.........20-21 Food & Dining......23 Classified Ads .....28 Comics, Sudoku & Crossword...........29 Critter Corner.......30
To at least one member of the Falls Church Planning Commission, the vote to reject the Mason Row project despite the absence of a key member Monday night was explicitly to override the will of the people as reflected in the November 3 election.
Repeated pleas by the Spectrum Group developers to seek a delay in the vote until January based on the need to evaluate new changes, pleas that began with e-mail exchanges with commission chair Rob Meeks the Friday before, went unheeded Monday night. Veteran commissioner and former chair Ruth Rodgers let the proverbial “cat out of the bag” on