19 minute read
Crime Report
PAGE 12 | APRIL 8 – 14, 2021
COMMENT
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A Penny for Your Thoughts
News of Greater Falls Church
By Supervisor Penny Gross
March Madness 2021 may be relegated to those who keep statistics and sports trivia for roll-out at future tourneys, but perhaps the most important result of this year’s NCAA tournament is a renewed focus on women’s basketball and, in turn, women’s sports overall. The glaring inequities about the women’s weight and training area in San Antonio may have been the catalyst for a lot of discussion and NCAA apologies last month, but apologies and lip service don’t cut it. Expeditious change is needed, now.
The first NCAA men’s basketball tournament was held in Evanston, Illinois, in March 1939. The tournament was won by the Webfoots, now known as the Ducks, of the University of Oregon, who defeated Ohio State, 46 to 33. (In the spirit of full disclosure, my parents met that same year at Oregon, and I am a second generation “Duck.”) More than 30 years after that first men’s tournament, the Education Amendments of 1972 added Title IX, which protects people from discrimination, based on sex, in education programs or athletics in any educational institution that receives federal financial assistance. Title IX initiated a sea change for women’s programs, but it took another decade — 10 years! — for the NCAA to institute a women’s basketball tournament, in 1982.
Women’s sports have come a long way since I was in school, when girls could play volleyball (using “girls” rules) field hockey, and tennis, but few other team sports were recognized and supported by their educational institutions (both high school and college). Title IX opened the floodgates for female athletes to pursue their chosen sports, but many barriers still exist, as exemplified by the weight and training inequities publicized by Sedona Prince, also an Oregon Duck, as she sought to work out in preparation for the Lady Ducks’ appearance in the Sweet 16. Covid-19 often is used as an excuse/reason for not doing something, but the NCAA explanation fell flat. It shouldn’t matter whether a team is one of dozens in the preliminary rounds, or in the Final Four. An athlete is an athlete, regardless of gender; opportunities for training should be the same whether you are at the top or somewhere further down, and with similar, well-stocked facilities available to all competitors. If the NCAA truly values the athletes, rather than just the financial proceeds that accrue to the organization, it will work during the coming year to address the inequities that Ms. Prince and others pointed out so deftly. The women’s tournament showcased many talented women’s teams from across the country, and the championship game, between Stanford and Arizona (like my alma mater, Oregon, both are PAC-12 schools) was simply superb, with a one-point win by Stanford at the buzzer.
The Covid-19 pandemic created unprecedented challenges for both amateur and professional team sports, and their many fans. Many of those challenges have been met, and overcome, by the athletes and their coaching staffs. In the spirit of never letting a crisis go to waste, they devised new approaches to training, practice, and the social interaction that is special to team sports. As the pandemic, hopefully, wanes, the NCAA and other sports organizations should take the lessons of the women’s basketball tournament to heart, and start recognizing women athletes as the first-class players they are. It shouldn’t take another 40 years.
Penny Gross is the Mason District Supervisor, in the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors. She may be emailed at mason@fairfaxcounty.gov.
C��� �� F���� C����� CRIME REPORT
Week of March 29 – April 4, 2021
Identity Theft, 300 blk Grove Ave, March 30, 2:41 PM, an incident of Identity Theft was reported.
Destruction of Property, 1100 blk W Broad St, March 30, 6:22 PM, a window of a business was broken but no entrance was gained.
Fraud/False Pretense, 1000 blk W Broad St, April 1, 12:52 PM, an incident of Fraud was reported.
Shoplifting, 500 blk S Washington St, April 1, 1:43 PM, items of value were taken from a business. A male, 26, and a male, 26, both of District Heights, MD, were arrested for shoplifting,
Indecent Exposure, 100 blk E Annandale Rd, April 4, 12:41 PM, a male, 39, of Arlington, VA, was arrested for indecent exposure.
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FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS | FCNP.COM
From the Front Row: Delegate Kaye Kory’s
Richmond Report
Since the death of my longtime friend Ben — a rescued dog that I was fortunate enough to be able to invite into my family — I have thought deeply about the roles animals play in our lives and the roles we play in their lives.
The humane treatment of animals has always been important to me as a legislator, community activist, parent, neighbor and sister. Advancing this value is complex and multitiered. I have sometimes been successful with my support of animal protection legislation. Animal welfare should never be a partisan issue, but frequently the General Assembly votes have broken along party lines. However, as the majority has moved into Democratic hands, we have had the opportunity to pass legislation that will protect and support animals in Virginia. I am proud that I successfully patronned the Humane Cosmetics Act in this session, making Virginia one of four states in the nation to protect animals from cruel cosmetics testing. My bill, HB2250, mandates that the sale of any personal products containing ingredients tested on animals in Virginia will be unlawful as of July 1, 2022. I have been working on this ban since I first introduced the bill in 2016.
I have fought for legislation allowing a police person to break into a car to rescue a pet in danger of dying from heat or cold. I also worked to prohibit towing a car with a pet inside it after a constituent brought me her story:
Her dog was inside her car when it was towed. She spent many hours trying to find her pet and car. When she finally located them, she was not allowed to free her dog until she had waited in a long line, filled out numerous forms and paid a fine. I worked with local governments and towing companies to prevent this from ever happening again.
I have patronned legislation mandating the adoption of animals used in testing facilities against the fierce lobbying of universities performing that testing; mandating shelters to notify the public when planning to euthanize any animals due to lack of space so that the animal may be adopted or moved to another shelter before euthanizing.
I have supported expanding the legal definition of “service dog;” the decriminalization of catch and release of feral cats; the creation of the Registry of Adoptable & Transferable Companion Animals. I have worked legislatively and with community activists to ban puppy mills and puppy sales in pet shops. I have voted to ban tethering dogs outside in very cold or hot weather, and failing that outcome, to restrict the conditions in which that tethering may occur.
Over my years in the House of Delegates, I have been proud to receive awards from the Humane Society, PETA, accolades from the Dog Army and from Humane Domain for my actions to protect animals. I intend to continue my battle for animal rights as a legislator, a community activist and rescued pet owner.
I grew up with rescued dogs and cats.
My mother taught us that it is irresponsible to purchase a pet when so many are in shelters without a forever home. Currently I live with two rescued cats and just lost my rescued dog (after 9 great years) to a neuropathy disorder. I support local rescue organizations and encourage others to do so at every opportunity.
I founded the Legislative Animal Welfare Caucus in 2018. I have continued to Chair and staff this Caucus thus bringing diverse experiences and voices to the table in our search to make Virginia an animal-friendly and humane state. I actively support all animal rights legislation brought before the General Assembly. I am very concerned about the lack of enforcement of animal protection laws and will do all I can to increase funding for the Animal Law Unit in the Attorney General’s office. I will work to make our companion animal laws more inclusive.
I pledge to Ben that I will explore all legislative and community-consensus avenues to end animal cruelty wherever it is found in our Commonwealth.
FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS | FCNP.COM Who Is ‘Q?”
Could It Be Putin?
America’s modern Day of Infamy, this most recent January 6, cannot be recalled without recalling the haunting question: Who was really behind it? Trump, himself? The Proud Boys? The Oath Keepers? QAnon?
Surely, QAnon, whatever it is, seems to rise to the forefront as scenarios are rehashed again and again about the principle motivators for the huge assault on the nation’s Capitol that day. Most reviews of the many videos documenting the event reveal it was considerably bigger than many first thought, a massive physical assault and sacking of the nation’s Nicholas F. most important seat and symbol of its democracy. Benton Had a few things turned out differently, it truly could have interrupted the FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS certification of the Electoral College vote that day and could have resulted in a much higher loss of life, including of members of Congress and very possibly the vice president.
For all its seemingly ubiquitous presence in the course of the 2020 presidential campaign and at the January 6 riot, Q and QAnon with all its symbols and pervasive followers amidst the fray, have remained mysterious, with most ordinary citizens baffled by the strength of its following. How can otherwise seemingly rational people believe the certifiably crazy belief system of this cult, even to the point of risking their lives and those of others to act on it?
Its fundamental belief is that a Satan-worshipping cabal of elites who practice pedophilia is running the world from behind the scenes, and that Donald Trump is some kind of divine warrior sent to destroy it. Q him or herself, the belief goes, is some kind of deeply embedded but highlyplaced anonymous intelligence operative who sends cryptic messages out through the Internet to swelling numbers of followers.
Two attempts to get at the root of this cult have been made in the past week, including the concluding sixth hour-long segment of a documentary series that aired on HBO last Sunday night, filmmaker Cullen Hoback’s “Q: Into the Storm,” where the identity of this Q figure is ostensibly revealed as one Ron Watkins, who until this point had only been seen as an operative of the mysterious Q’s efforts at posting online messages.
The other was an essay published in Sunday’s Washington Post Magazine by Marisa Meltzer entitled, “The New Age Roots of Q: Masculinity, Spirituality and the Strange Convergence of Counterculture and Hate.”
The former, Hoback’s documentary series that included many scenes of the sacking and tied together events leading up to it that surely linked Trump and key right wing allies like Gen. Flynn, Roger Stone, Alex Jones and Steve Bannon to it, failed for its unwillingness to deviate from its perceived primary goal of identifying who this ostensibly singular person, this anonymous character of Q, actually was, or is.
Meltzer’s work does a much better job at identifying the problem represented by QAnon, which is to scan its core psychological elements and how they turned otherwise ordinary citizens, or so it would seem, into devotees of a completely crackpot belief system.
Over time, it is this pursuit that is most important to our national security and national well being going forward.
Meltzer uses her own involvement in the cults of the counterculture from an earlier period to help her readers grasp how someone could become a true believer in the QAnon world view. She defines one QAnon devotee as a “freedom fighter for Donald Trump...zeitgeist-y, sensitive New Age-guy version of masculinity and something more nefarious... of unlikely connections and strange bedfellows, of mixed martial arts fighters and poets, evangelical Christians and yoga teachers...a hybrid of conspiracy theory beliefs and New Age culture.”
It goes back to the original so-called “men’s liberation” movement rooted in Robert Bly’s 1990 book, “Iron John” that spawned the current heavily bearded aesthetic among some males. She traces its beliefs back to ideas of Gnosticism from the era of early Christian sects.
But the flaw is that it ends there. Myself once swept into a counterculture cult in the 1970s that provided key insights into their workings, the evidence points to a sophisticated psychological profiling cult operation whose roots go right back to the Soviet KGB and Vladimir Putin.
Nicholas Benton may be emailed at nfbenton@fcnp.com.
COMMENT
APRIL 8 – 14, 2021 | PAGE 13
Our Man in Arlington Diversity.” It delivers scene photos: By Charlie Clark diners inside restaurants, crowded sidewalks, cos-
The multi-hued palette of com- tumed festivals, storefronts, a volplexion and clothing that populates unteer fireman, and a mariachi Columbia Pike was captured in band. Published by Wolf’s friends crisp photography, ready for the at the Columbia Pike Revitalization rollout exhibit of 50 images, in Organization, it’s distributed by March 2020. University of Virginia Press.
Then came the pandemic. So Wolf is a 1970 graduate of Lloyd Wolf, the photography teach- Fairfax’s J.E.B. Stuart High School, er and talented lensman for hire who which was renamed Justice High has been shooting on the Pike for in 2018, and whose father worked four decades, had to bide his time as in early computing — Dad was in “business fell off a cliff.” on the Arlington-based Advanced
We met last month at his favor- Research Projects Agency projite Pike haunt, Café Sazon, after ect that helped spawn the Internet. I reviewed three volumes of pho- During his nine years teaching at tography he has shepherded with the H-B Woodlawn program, Wolf help from longtime collaborator began his Pike work in 1979 to proPaula Endo. Their latest paperback, duce “The Arlington Photographic “Transitions: The Columbia Pike Documentary Project” with Endo Documentary Project,” showcases under a grant from National stunning portraits and interviews Endowment for the Arts. by Wolf and Sushmita Mazumdar Their work has received worldof personalities of all walks from wide coverage, including by the 2015-2019. You can see more at Voice of America. cpdpcolumbiapike.blogspot.com. One frustration is that Arlington
The folks profiled include county has too few galleries, Wolf comboard member Katie Cristol; long- plained. His team’s work has been time Pike developer BM Smith’s shown at Walter Reed Community president David Peete; civil rights Center, the George Mason campioneer Joan Mulholland of the pus, and the Columbia Pike Library, Barcroft neighborhood and recently where the librarian was “a wonderarrived Ethiopian immigrant Rozina ful fellow, but not a curator.” He Nigussie, a Washington-Liberty likes displays at Central Library. High School student who hopes to A Glencarlyn resident, Wolf become a doctor. The ongoing proj- thinks plenty about Arlington’s ect is funded by a Virginia humani- North-South divide. Though he ties grant. declined to take a position on the
The “soul” and diversity of the ill-fated Pike streetcar, he said the four-mile stretch called the Pike was idea that “the north supposedly has captured by a team of photographers more wealth and less diversity is not in the smaller hardback “Living entirely true.” The Buckingham and Westover apartments, for example, are in the north, while the affluence on Arlington Ridge Rd. is in the south. “But in general, south of Route 50 is less well off, is more affordable, so it attracted a lot of immigrants.” And there’s less of the “attitude” of snobbery, he agreed, though “some resentment of North Arlington,” whose residents may come to the Pike only occasionally for a meal.
But Wolf is worried by change. With the arrival of Amazon, older structures are threatened to make way for higher-income housing. The Westmont Shopping Center on the Pike at S. Glebe Rd. is coming down to be replaced by market-rate apartments. “The Pike is less diverse than 10 years ago,” Wolf said. “You can tell by walking around.” ***
The Postal Service’s troubles persist, as confirmed by friends’ tales of mail weeks late.
But here’s a sympathetic word. I was recently hoisted on my own petard in an attempted gag. My brother and I have long corresponded using real addresses, but with fake identities for the recipient. So I mailed him a book addressed to “Long Snapper” Clark, an in-joke reference to his high school football days as center on the punting team.
The book in transit got separated from the envelope. Weeks went by before I received a bureaucratic form apologizing, with a USPS invitation to file for an investigation.
I filled it out (the probe is ongoing). And felt deservedly sheepish for tasking the federal bureaucrats with chasing down a stray item belonging to “Long Snapper.”
FALLS CHURCH NEWS-PRESS | FCNP.COM
LOCAL
APRIL 8 – 14, 2021 | PAGE 14
Preservation Biscuit Co.’s Southern Cooking Fills Bellies in F.C.
by Patricia Leslie
Falls Church News-Press
Customers often line up through the doorway at the new Preservation Biscuit Company at the Southgate Village Shoppes on East Fairfax Street, which has been a regular feature of the restaurant since it opened on March 16.
“It’s been crazy!” owner Tricia Barba exclaimed about her new restaurant. “We are very grateful [for the business] and still can’t believe it.”
Waiting for those customers on the inside are Preservation’s warm and toasty biscuits, filled with strawberries and whipped cream or fried chicken or any of the other varieties available.
That is, if they’re lucky enough to get them. Sellouts before the store closes at 3 p.m. are common, motivating Barba to hire more staff, including an additional biscuit maker.
The carryout is managed by Jonathan Coombs, who prides himself on biscuit making. Weekend sales of 500 biscuits sold daily are almost double what Coombs and Barba predicted which is “taking more prep time than we thought,” Barba said. Chef Jon is “very particular on rolling the dough and how many times you have to fold it to get it the perfect height.”
The best-seller by far is the fried chicken sandwich ($12.50) which she and Coombs created together. The duo have tinkered with ingredients several times, but now they think they’ve attained their unmatchable signature dish.
The sandwich stands several inches high and its “secret sauce” (“I’m not giving away our sauce!” Barba joked when asked) mixes deliciously with a hint of Thousand Island dressing, bacon, hot honey, napa cabbage, gouda, pimento cheese and dijon mustard.
On the tops are dabbles of what seems like orange paint applied by an impressionist.
In addition to biscuits, there are breakfast meats ($2), pork and chicken embellishments, plain homemade jams ($1) and guacamole, egg, bacon, lemon aioli ($10) and more.
Would you like prime rib with that biscuit? Coming right up with Swiss cheese, caramelized onions and roasted bell peppercoulis ($13). A kid’s menu is available, too ($6).
Being a girl of the South, I know a thing or two about barbecue, especially when it comes to north of the Memphis, Tennessee line. So I can say that Preservation’s got some of the finest pork tasted in these parts, piled high ($3) on top of a tasty mountain of mac and cheese ($5) with a hidden crumbled biscuit sprinkled somewhere.
I like my barbecue smothered in coleslaw, and Preservations’s slaw is crunchy and delicious, lacking gooey mayonnaise “expanders” to soak it all up, but $3 for about a fourth of a cup is a bit too steep for my wallet, even for slaw.
On the sweet side, the “strawberry shortie” ($6.50) is a teaser, so big I saved my second half for “later” — which became “now” once I started eating.
It has a mostly biscuit taste rather than a shortcake one, with a middle moisturized by oozing fruit and whipped cream. (The restaurant may add a “peach shortie” later.)
Not everything is high calorie at Prevation Biscuit. There’s a Caesar salad ($8) and Barba plans to add some vegan selections, especially for Chef Jon’s palate.
Southern roots seem to make biscuits better, and no one knows that more than Coombs who spent five years in the Army at Ft. Benning, Georgia where he developed a fondness for Southern cuisine. That experience helped spark his passion for cooking, leading to chefdom at area eateries after military life. (He served three tours of duty in Iraq and earned a Purple Heart.)
Barba and Coombs met at the Matchbox at Woodbridge where Coombs was executive chef and Barba was the brand marketing director. After coronavirus shut down that Matchbox, Barba, who likes “comfort foods, especially biscuits” started thinking about “one of my favorite things. With the hardship everyone has been going through and the whole pandemic, what does everyone need? Ultra comforting food.”
She contacted Coombs: “What do you think about biscuits?” Together they chose “flour, butter, love” which is Preservation’s mantra.
Barba was born and raised in Washington, D.C., but “I just thought this concept would work well here. A lot of my friends live in Falls Church which has that ‘small town’ feel.” Barba looked at spaces in D.C., Vienna, and other Virginia spots. Falls Church beat them all.
“It may seem crazy to some, opening [a restaurant] right now, but it was a good opportunity to get some space on good terms,” Babra said.
Just before opening day, last minute tech problems created major headaches, but in true Falls Church fashion, the owners of Thompson Italian and Spin Pollo came to the rescue to help launch their new neighbors’ restaurant.
Barba is donating $1 from the sale of one biscuit every week to local charities, like Homestretch, Inc., Falls Church Educational Foundation and Columbia Baptist Food Pantry.
The restaurant is open Wednesday through Sunday with plans to open on Tuesday. Order from 8 a.m. – 3 p.m. at 102 East Fairfax Street, Falls Church 22046, 571-378-1757 or for assured orders, visit preservationbiscuit.com.
Don’t forget the sausage gravy ($3)! Or just plain ole biscuits are available, too ($3).
