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PAGE 2 |MARCH 31 - APRIL 6, 2022

LOCAL

FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS | FCNP.COM

‘The Adventures of Mr. Toad’ Is Fun for the Whole Family

BY AMANDA SNEAD

FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS

Based on the book “The Wind in the Willows” by Kenneth Grahame, Creative Cauldron’s play “The Adventures of Mr. Toad” is an action-packed adventure put on for kids, by kids and perfect for the whole family.

Put on by Creative Cauldron’s Learning Theater with help from Gus Knapp as a fellow actor and mentor, this production begins with Mr. Toad telling stories of his youth to a group of young mice whom he asks to help transcribe his life story. Toad’s old friends later join him and help fill in the blanks and bring Toad back down to earth from his exaggerated tales.

The play includes an original script by Ellen Selby and P.J. Audenzia as well as incredibly catchy original songs by composer and Musical Director Matt Conner.

The Learning Theater ensemble is composed of both newcomers and veterans from previous Creative Cauldron productions. If you need any sign that the Little City loves the arts, this is the place to be.

This was a fast-paced and engaging show that kept both the youngest and oldest audience members entertained.

“When we first adapted ‘The Wind in the Willows’ for our Learning Theater Ensemble several years ago we focused more on the pastoral and poetic nature of the work, but this time around we have decided to bring you an action-packed adventure,” noted Creative Cauldron’s founder and Producing Director, Laura Connors Hull in the show’s Playbill. “In Ellen Selby and P.J. Audenzia’s fun and frantic script, we get just that. And we also get the wonderful musical creations of Matt Conner and Stephen Gregory Smith.”

As with all Learning Theater productions, the show ended with an audience question and answer segment. Seeing how engaged both the kids in the audience and the actors on stage were was a great thing to see. And maybe we’ll see some of the audience members on stage in future performances!

As usual, this was a great play by Creative Cauldron filled with so many young and talented actors that are sure to go on and do great things with the skills they have learned at Creative Cauldron. Margie Jervis and her team of volunteers did an amazing job with the costumes, masks and set

MR. TOAD is pictured here as he tells stories of his youth to a group of young mice. (P����: W������

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designs.

The play closes this Sunday so be sure to take your little ones out to see it before it ends!

Performances of “The Adventures of Mr. Toad” take place Friday, April 1 at 7:30 p.m., Saturday, April 2 at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, April 2 at 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. Tickets can be purchased online at creativecauldron. org/toad.html. Tickets are $20 for adults and $18 for students. Creative Cauldron is located at 410 South Maple Avenue #116 in Falls Church.

Falls Church Little League Returns for the Season

BY ALEX RUSSELL

FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS

This past Saturday, Mar. 26, saw the return of the Falls Church Kiwanis Little League (FCKLL) Opening Day parade. In attendance were F.C. Mayor David Tarter and Delegate Marcus Simon — both taking part in the ceremonial first pitch — as well as surprise guests the (Racing) Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Roosevelt. Bag piper Austin Middleton led the procession, with the festivities culminating in a series of first pitches from local High School seniors — all of whom “graduated” from F.C. Little League.

The celebration itself marks the comeback of regularly scheduled, in-person baseball in the Little City. The Opening Day parade is typically an annual endeavor, but as with most things, Covid-19 forced Little League organizers to cancel the event in 2020 and replace the parade with an Opening Day video last year.

Little League President Kirsten Fatzinger and Communications & PR Lead Erika Toman explained how Covid “created numerous operational and logistical challenges,” but following their hiatus in spring of 2020, the League’s been “fully operational.”

Fatzinger and Toman underscored that “safety is always the League’s number one priority, with or without a pandemic.” But since pandemic-related conditions have been gradually improving in recent months, this season “players and spectators” will not be “required to wear masks or socially distance,” and “umpires are back in position calling balls and strikes behind the plate.”

The 2022 Spring Season will feature 48 teams, totaling almost 600 boys and girls between the ages of 4 — 13, playing games across 10 fields in the Falls Church area — this includes the Challengers, “an adaptive baseball program for individuals with physical or intellectual challenges.”

Speaking about its operational logistics, Fatzinger explained that the City’s Little League “is 100 percent volunteer, not-for-profit.” The volunteers “coach, coordinate events, and maintain fields each season. All coaches and volunteers are local and unpaid, and some stay with the League even after their players graduate from the program because of their love for the game and the community.” She added that “a Board of Directors oversees all activities. Everyone who comes out for Little League makes a team. There are no ‘cuts.’ Falls Church Little League is for everyone who lives or goes to school within the League’s boundary.”

Fatzinger touched upon how sponsors are a major source of revenue for the FCKLL, adding that “Little League International permits one fundraiser throughout the year” that relies on participation from the players themselves, and historically this has been the two-day-long Player Hit-A-Thon. (The Hit-AThon returns this year in May, with the Adult Hit-A-Thon and Home Run Derby scheduled for May 14 at Westgate Field at 7500 Magarity Rd, Falls Church.)

This year’s Opening Day parade exemplified the ties that the Kiwanis Little League has to its local community. In addition to the Washington Nationals, who are a “multi-year partner” with the FCKLL — the Nats provided team jerseys and hats and have donated prizes to kids who raise the most money or hit the farthest ball during a Hit-A-Thon — the League has numerous sponsors right here in the area, including the Falls Church News-Press. (This season, the Triple-A team, consisting mostly of players ages 9 — 11, is coached by David Izawa and is the official News-Press Little League team.)

The Falls Church Kiwanis Little League is the oldest Little League organization in the state, having been founded in 1948. Later, in the ‘50s, “the then-local Kiwanis Club became patrons of the League.” Even after the hardships brought on by the pandemic, the FCKLL is still going strong.

Looking ahead, Toman shared that “a working group is already planning a 75th anniversary celebration” set for 2023, and that “League leaders are looking for photos and stories from ‘the good old days.’” She adds that “anyone with vintage materials or stories to tell is invited” to email her directly at erika@fckll. org and add to the nostalgic collection.

To find out more about F.C. Little League, located at 2400 Hurst St, Falls Church, VA, visit fckll.org or email playeragent@fckll.org.

LITTLE LEAGUE is back in the Little City. The season will feature almost 50 teams and hundreds of kids, many seen here celebrating Opening Day. (Photo: F��� K���)

FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS | FCNP.COM

LOCAL

MARCH 31 - APRIL 6, 2022 | PAGE 3

City Manager Proposes 8.5¢ Tax Rate Cut for New Budget

Continued from Page 1

a six percent ($2,451,107) increase in general government operating expenditures and a 6.3 percent ($2,750,000) increase in local funding for public schools, as requested by the School Board.

Shields was joined by School Board Chair Laura Downs and Superintendent Peter Noonan in the budget presentation.

Reducing the real estate tax rate by 8.5 cents to $1.235 per $100 of assessed value (down from $1.32) comes in the context of assessed values increasing by 11.4 percent overall, as reported recently.

“This budget proposal is intended to strengthen the core government and education services at the high level residents expect, while at the same time ensure that we manage well the transformative capital projects and new development currently underway,” said Shields Monday

Key investments contained in the budget he said are the City public schools, core government services, the City’s work force, public safety, improved walkable neighborhoods and traffic calming, and flood mitigation.

“The tension between basic services and transformative things like all the new development coming in represent a tension,” Shields said Monday, calling this “our most dynamic budget environment ever, including coming out of the pandemic, the impact of the war overseas, the actions of the Virginia general assembly in Richmond, and cost inflation.”

With overall real estate assessments up by a whopping 12.1 percent, as reported earlier this month, the proposed 8.5 cent tax rate reduction proposed by Shields does not cover all the added cost to homeowners the assessment increase will represent.

To propose a tax rate reduction equal to the assessment growth would require lowering the rate all the way down to $1.19, he noted. Some on the Council have suggested in this context that lowering the rate below Shields’ proposed $1.23 level will be open for Council consideration.

The proposed budget includes an additional $2.2 million of new investment in City employee compensation, as the City struggles to recover from manpower shortages that led to an overall 15 percent vacancy rate, and 25 percent as of last September for the police department. The department is now back to 100 percent, Shields reported.

The City’s tax rate reduction contrasts to what Shields reported was no rate reduction for the City’s two large neighbors, Fairfax and Arlington counties.

In Shields’ proposed budget, debt service will decrease by $1.3 million or 9 percent due to the cancellation of planned debt issuance in FY2021 and the refunding of prior bonds from 2013 and 2011 at lower interest rates.

The proposed budget includes the use of $4.03 million in capital reserves towards debt service, which is part of the long-term plan of finance for the new high school that was presented to voters during the bond referendum in 2017. Offsetting the use of capital reserves is the third payment of the ground lease ($4.5 million) for the impending 10-acre mixed use West Falls project.

The budget proposal includes an appropriation of $3,789,331 of federal pandemic relief in the form of American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds: almost $1.4 million for assistance to small businesses, households, and schools, and $2.4 million in the Capital Improvements Program for sidewalks and HVAC replacement at the Community Center.

Last year, the City Council approved $7 million in ARPA funds to be used for the six major flood mitigation projects recommended by the Stormwater Task Force.

The budget proposes a new Commercial and Industrial (C and I) Tax of five cents per $100 of assessed value on commercial properties, which by law must be used exclusively to fund transportation improvements. It was emphasized Monday that this tax will be levied solely against commercial property owners.

According to a statement from City Hall, while most counties and cities in Northern Virginia adopted a C and I tax of 12.5 cents in recent years to help pay for transit and road expansions, the City proposes to use the revenue to pay for its share of WMATA capital costs, bike share program, and other transportation needs.

Shields submitted the proposed operating budget to the City Council Monday along with a six-year Capital Improvements Program (CIP) that will be detailed in a Council work session this coming Monday.

The School portion of the overall budget proposal has come within Council’s budget guidance for the third straight year, below the 8.4 percent expected annual growth in overall revenues.

As the lion’s share of the school system budget goes each year to personnel, this year it includes adding $1.6 million for a “step” salary increase and $890,000 for a 2.5 percent cost-ofliving (COL). This is set against neighboring Arlington County’s planned four-step, or 11 percent, increase to make up for the constraints of the pandemic era.

Still, since the new high school construction actually came in under budget, the schools are returning $100,000 to the City coffers.

Three major components of the schools’ funding involve the ongoing infusion of K-12 International Baccalaureate curricula, a “caring culture,” and equity considerations, Dr. Noonan said.

The Council is expected to adopt a final budget on May 2. The 2023 fiscal year runs from July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2023. A virtual town hall is slated for today (March 31) at noon, and another Thursday, April 7, at 7 p.m. and City Council meetings every Monday night until the final budget is adopted May 2 is open to the public.

PAGE 4 | MARCH 31 - APRIL 6, 2022

LOCAL

FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS | FCNP.COM

Final OK Given by City Council For Founders Row 2 Development

Continued from Page 1

ease of Monday’s vote.

The project will include 280 residential units, a height limit that ranges from 85 feet on the W. Broad frontage to 35 feet on the Ellison Street side, 22,278 square feet of ground floor retail, including 10,000 square feet for a restaurant, 409 parking spaces underneath, residential occupancy contingencies based on leases of retail spaces, and 12 percent of the residential spaces being dedicated for affordable housing, half of which will be available to those at the lowest end of the income scale.

The deal calls for 75 percent of the retail space to be under lease within six months of the first residential certificate of occupancy, along with some other technicalities. There will also be 5,000 square feet of “co-working space.”

All the appliances in the residential units will be electrical (though gas will be needed for a ground floor restaurant, Mill Creek’s Joe Muffler insisted). The project can generally be expected to complement Mill Creek’s Founders Row 1 that is already well along in construction across the W. Broad at West Street intersection. Numerous residents have already moved in over there, and the big issue is whether or not the promised multiscreen movie theater is actually going to come to pass at that site.

On that one, it was Mayor Tarter who put up the strongest resistance to going ahead with Founders Row 2 with no lease yet signed for the movie complex across the street.

But while Mill Creek has a “letter of intent” from a movie theater company, it is considered of little value without an actual lease. Mill Creek had such a lease until the pandemic knocked the movie-going industry for a loop and the company filed bankruptcy. It remains to be seen how fully that industry will rebound postpandemic.

New deals to increase Mill Creek’s take from ticket sales at the theater have been agreed to by the City in an effort to boost its commitment, but a lot of the commercial revenues anticipated from restaurants, in particular, are considered contingent on getting the movie screens in there.

A motion by Snyder to hold the Founders Row 2 approval con-

tingent on a signed lease for the movie complex failed, 5-2, however, with Tarter joining Snyder was the only “yes” votes.

AT MONDAY’S CITY COUNCIL meeting, five members of the community took oaths of Office for City Board and Commission positions. Pictured here (l. to r.) are Alison Miller, Urban Forestry Commission; Allen Greenberg, Historic Architectural Review Board; Tatiana Eaves, Environmental Sustainability Council; Stuart Whitaker, Citizens Advisory Committee on Transportation and Kristine Ward, Board of Zoning Appeals. Not pictured: Debra Z. Roth, Human Services Advisory Council. (P����: N���-P����)

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FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS | FCNP.COM

Commentary

F.C. EDA Works Hard to Improve the Little City

by Bob Young

Falls Church’s Economic Development Authority (EDA) has for many years been responsible for working with City Council, City staff, the business community, the Falls Church Chamber of Commerce and many of our Boards and Commissions to maximize responsible economic development in the city. The most significant goal has been to greatly increase the commercial proportion of the tax base. The City Council, the EDA, and other boards have worked together over the last decade to make great progress in this endeavor.

In addition to growing our commercial tax base, recent and ongoing EDA projects are several in number. The EDA’s Wayfinding project is currently being completed and consists of 45 new signs around the city.

The goal of this project is to improve a situation which was at best confusing for visitors and instead create a coherent “wayfinding” signage design that would help visitors find their way around town to specific destinations. The majority of the signs are designed to guide people driving vehicles. This project also includes two specially designed Tinner Hill pedestrian walking signs that include a map and QR code.

Using funds from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) national grant program, the EDA is in the process of providing up to $450,000 in small business grants to local businesses to help in their recovery from the Covid pandemic as well as a new Parklet program to support the creation of new outdoor dining and activity areas in the city. One of the new Parklet locations is likely to be adjacent to the already very popular Mr. Brown’s Park where some additional outdoor dining area could be created in our downtown area and which is adjacent to public parking.

Another major ARPA initiative for the continued Covid recovery of City businesses we will undertake this summer will be to engage a professional marketing firm/consultant to help us better market the city restaurants, local businesses, and historic landmarks. The EDA has been aware for some time that the marketing of the city, particularly from an economic development perspective, could be improved with adequate resources and effort. With assistance from our marketing consultants, we hope to identify how best to cost effectively spend our ARPA funds to assist in Covid business recovery.

In addition, via both ARPA and City funds, we have also just on boarded a new staff member who will focus on marketing, including efforts such as increasing customer interest in the City via social media posting, updates to the choosefallschurch.org website, creating and updating a landing page with listings for city attractions on the Virginia Tourism Commission’s web site and many other new initiatives. The EDA/EDO (Economic Development Office) team has worked hard in an effort to assist in both preserving and retaining affordable housing in the city. This work included the acquisition and preservation of affordable units in Virginia Village on South Maple Street, 1940’s vintage brick “quadplexes”, as well as through encouraging developer voluntary concessions to provide new affordable units in perpetuity. Eventually, we hope redevelopment of the Virginia Village’s approximately five-acre site will occur and will include new affordable housing units, market rate units and new public use areas.

We also currently are finishing work on an update of the city’s fiscal model which is used to assess the net value to the city of proposed new economic development projects.

The EDA also actively and regularly participates in reviews of new City development projects; the EDA then provides their recommendations and suggestions on those projects to the City Council. The recently approved Founders Row 2 project was reviewed twice in the last year by the EDA and we likewise anticipate continuing reviews of One City Center project as well. In the upcoming month we will also continue to work with city staff to complete the land transfer/lease of the 9.7 acres in the proposed new West End redevelopment project next to the new Meridian High School. This extremely exciting 1.5 million SF project includes new senior housing units, market rate apartments, condominium units, office space, civic/ public space, hotel rooms and over 100,000 SF of retail.

Suffice it to say that the EDA had a very busy and successful 2021 and looks forward to continuing to be involved in numerous important City initiatives in 2022!

LOCAL

MARCH 31 - APRIL 6, 2022 | PAGE 5

Our struggling Metro this March announced a post-pandemic plan to recover its needed ridership.

The coming new marketing push on social media, to which Arlington contributed $10,000, will stress the value of public transit at a time of rising gasoline prices.

Details, however, were scarce. So I extracted some hints from Metro General Manager Paul Wiedefeld in an exclusive interview.

Metro, it seems, was impressed with a recent blogpost by SunGazette managing editor Scott McCaffrey. This friendly competitor of mine attacked the Arlington school board’s sartorial shortcomings. “Going commando, either without a jacket, without a tie, or without both,” read his description of the elected officials at a recent meeting. This “sloppiness reflects badly on the school board, the school system and the community.”

This got Metro to thinking: Perhaps the way to lure back the rush-hour standing-roomonly subway crowds is to class the transit system up a bit. That means implementing a dress code. Planners believe that requiring sharper wardrobes would make a trip on Metro more of a special event. And it would create a certain solidarity of purpose for an incipient community of wellgroomed riders.

I asked skeptical questions.

Our Man in Arlington Would this be fair to those who freBy Charlie Clark quent the subway in Crocs, blue jeans purposefully tattered, or T-Shirts that shout ill-informed slogans? Certainly Metro officials wouldn’t go so far as to require formal wear? Black tie, besides being unaffordable to many (unless they’re willing to rent), would be asking too much, the Metro chief acknowledged. (I personally have ridden the subway downtown wearing a tux, and it made me very self-conscious.) I can report that the new Metro dress code will be a compromise: business casual. How would the code be enforced? Do the kiosk guards— who don’t do much currently about passengers not wearing covid masks—possess sartorial tastes discerning enough to make snap judgments? Could they be trained? I was assured that the station managers in tough cases would use their walkie-talkies to pool their thoughts. And they promise to rule quickly enough so that passengers with border-line outfits wouldn’t unnecessarily miss their trains. Some kinks are still being worked out, I was told. What if one of the slobs who gets rejected at the turnstile is a long-distance commuter who parked a car at Metro before entering? Does getting sent home to change entitle them to a parking refund? Metro’s only condition for granting my interview: that I wait to publish until April Fool’s Day. ***

Two key advisory bodies have implored the county board to preserve the Joyce Motors building facade now endangered by the pending Clarendon Sector Plan. Built in 1949 and marked as historic in 2011, the now-empty building in N. 10th St. is the only remaining example of “porcelain-enameled, boxlike service stations” remaining in Arlington by the late-twentieth century, wrote the Historical Affairs and Landmark Review Board. It backed a recommendation by the Planning Commission that the frontage be preserved.

But the owner, eyeing a larger area re-development, sees the onetime Texaco station as run-down and its parking lot a hazardous waste site. The county prefers commercial buildings closer to the street. Board decision coming in April.

***

I was moved on March 19 while attending the two-years, pandemic-postponed classical concert by the 56-year-old Arlington Chorale.

The theme heard in the packed pews at Westover Baptist Church was “Through Troubled Times,” made all more urgent by the crisis in Ukraine.

Artistic director Ingrid Lestrud took the orchestra, choir and four soloists through Ola Gjeilo’s “Song of the Universal” and Haydn’s “Lord Nelson Mass.” The finale was Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus” conducted by a fund-raising auction winner—13-year-old Ava Yi, a student at H.B Woodlawn.