This week’s update will be short and sweet. Two things: (1) If you haven’t heard by now, the FY19 budget process is done. Whew. The headline says it was a 7-0 vote, but I encourage you to read beyond the headlines. Starting July 1, the real estate tax rate will increase […]
There are a lot of good things to acknowledge about this year’s budget, and I don’t think we take enough stock to recognize how fortunate we are as a community, compared to even our peers in the region, much of Virginia, and the country. I’ve got 5 things I think have been good and 5 […]
Thank you for all of the great feedback on last week’s FAQs post. When these updates get passed around by you and I am reaching more people about “boring city news”, I’ve appreciated hearing that this information is useful and that my efforts are worth it! Please keep sharing. We’re in […]
City Council made several important decisions this week – we voted unanimously 6-0 for the Broad and Washington project and authorized the issuance of $24M worth of bonds for myriad of projects, including the final amount for the Mt. Daniel expansion, architecture and engineering for the library expansion, and tranche 1 […]
I’m taking a brief departure from “all budget, all the time” in this week’s update. While we spent 4 hours in work session this week – mostly on the general government budget – after writing this week’s FCNP commentary and an interview about affordable housing, I’ll leave you with those […]
Happy spring! While half of the Little City is away on spring break, we had some big news in town this week. If you haven’t seen it already, US News and World Report ranked Falls Church as the #1 Healthiest Community, out of 3000 communities in the US. Caveating that health and […]
If you’re heading out of town for spring break, this is a good catch up week for you. Thank you for all of the feedback to my blog post last week – if you missed it, catch up on the main takeaways from the FY19 budget last week and my continued […]
This week, the City Council started our annual 6 week process on budget review and approval. Budget season, more than any other time, brings out *everyone* that we don’t typically hear from throughout the year. Having done this only twice, I will caveat that I am far from an expert. […]
In contrast to the big retail news this week, we had a brief work session as we gear up for the start of the FY19 budget season. This week, we reviewed the first draft of the Council work plan, which includes our top priorities for the next two years. Community […]
You’ll notice that this week’s update is hitting your inboxes and blog readers a day early. Besides today being the day that the West Falls Church RFP hits the streets, today is the first day of Women’s History Month, and I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to plug the […]
We had a really interesting work session this week (ok, not “really interesting” for everyone – but different enough from the topics that consume much of our typical agendas). Read on to see what could be the future of Route 7/Broad Street, learn about Falls Church history, and of course more updates […]
It was a jam-packed week, so a lot to share. First if you’ll allow me a brief departure from typical Falls Church news: if you too are mourning, disheartened, or furious about our country’s gun violence epidemic – one opportunity to channel your thoughts is a town hall on Saturday […]