Look inside for a special Memorial Day pull-out section featuring parade map and lineup, vendor lists, festival schedule and more for this Monday’s 27th annual parade and activities. See Center Section, S-1
Index
CIVIL WAR CHARGE!
A repeat of the fireworks between Falls Church Mayor Robin Gardner and Dr. Steve Rogers, chair of the Falls Church Housing Corporation (FCHC), at Monday’s City Council work session is not likely when the Council meets next Tuesday to consider an ambitious affordable housing project. But you never know. Gardner and Rogers, a former F.C. vice mayor, went toeto-toe Monday over the timing
of Council approval for the plan to build 174 affordable housing apartments in property adjacent to the now-approved $317 million City Center project on S. Maple Avenue. Gardner argued that if the Council gave a preliminary OK to the plan, which would involve a considerable subsidy from City taxpayers, then City boards and commissions, including the public, would need two months to review the matter prior to a vote on final approval. But Rogers said the matter will have to be finalized in
only one month, because that’s the deadline needed to develop the plans in order to apply for and get vitally-needed low state interest rates. “We are now working on a path to go down collectively,” Carol Jackson, executive director of the FCHC told the News-Press yesterday, crediting Assistant City Manager Cindy Mester with refereeing constructive progress toward an amicable resolution. “If we can’t have a final OK
Nationally, Democrats may not have decided who their presidential candidate is going to be yet, but that didn’t stop 500 party activists in Fairfax County from a rousing pep rally Sunday dedicated to turn Virginia “blue” this November. The high-energy partisan event, the annual JeffersonJackson Dinner sold out for the first time in memory, was standing-room-only. It was held on the same day that word was getting out that Republican Presidential Candidate John McCain had opened his Virginia campaign headquarters in Pentagon City. A Democratic presidential candidate has not carried Virginia, long considered solidly in the “red,” or GOP, column, since 1964. But all the numbers point to the fact that this November could break the streak. The numbers also suggest the pivotal shift will be centered in Fairfax County, Virginia’s largest with over a million residents, which has exhibited a dramatic shift toward Democratic majorities in statewide elections since 2000. Eastern Fairfax County, in the areas closest to the City of Falls Church and Arlington, is considered especially key. That area encompasses the 11th Congressional District, where four Democrats are now vying for their party’s nomination in a June 10 primary to replace Rep. Tom Davis in the fall. The district has been named one of the three most likely in the U.S. to shift from Republican to Democratic control this year.
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