Budget season is Christmas for local policy wonks with every week providing insight into where the city is and isn’t investing in its future. But municipal budgets can also be a famously boring topic.
The annual budget can include some insight into the city’s priorities. This year, for instance, the budget finally includes funding for a police body camera program after being proposed as far back as 2015.
The pedestrian zone on the 100 block of King Street has been a hit, so much so that the city is looking to expand the program to the unit block, which prompts the question: what should be the ultimate extent of the pedestrian zone project?
Last year, the City Council voted unanimously to make the closure on the 100 block permanent. The city is also taking a look at ways to make the 100 block’s pedestrian zone “look” more permanent. A new proposal going to the Planning Commission and City Council in April will put a similar pilot project into effect for the end of King Street and The Strand by the waterfront.
This weekend, Alexandria’s City Council unanimously approved an ordinance that allows the city manager to further reduce speed limits. But should he?
The ordinance allows the city manager to “reduce posted speed limits to less than 25 miles per hour, but not less than 15 miles per hour on any city street located in a business or residence district.” The measure was supported by speakers at the City Council meeting and endorsed whole-heartedly by the Council, but the reaction online has been more mixed.
A new art project coming to Waterfront Park later this month is bringing a splash of pink to Old Town.
The project by Miami artists Roberto Behar and Rosario Marquardt was proposed last year and the city announced it will be officially unveiled on Friday, March 25.
President’s Day in Alexandria was marked with the return of an annual parade celebrating George Washington’s birthday.
Parades are something of a fixture in Alexandria, from the (now delayed) St. Patrick’s Day parade to the Scottish Christmas Walk.
Alexandria’s new City Manager James Parajon presented his proposed budget last night to the City Council. While real estate property assessments are still pushing local tax bills up, there’s no tax rate increase proposed in the budget.
The budget is $829.9 million, or a 7% increase from the previous year’s budget. The budget increase is largely funded by the increase in assessments revenue, which comes out to an average $445 increase for the average Alexandria homeowner.
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Putting aside some of the drama of his visit, Gov. Glenn Youngkin spoke in Alexandria last week about a topic that even some local Democrats have expressed support for: eliminating the grocery tax.
Virginia has a 2.5% grocery tax that helps to fund public schools and transportation. One percent of that goes to local governments, while the rest goes to the state. This has created a sort of three-faction divide on the tax that doesn’t break evenly along party lines.
The Landmark redevelopment has a new name: West End Alexandria.
Developer Foulger-Pratt officially unveiled the new name earlier this week, though it was first reported in the Washington Business Journal in late January.
Should Alexandrians have the right to use gas-powered leafblowers to clear away their yards or are they a noisy nuisance that should be blown away?
Well, right now the city can’t ban them even if they wanted to, but the city’s legislative package includes a request for localities to get permission to prohibit the use of gas-powered leafblowers as both an environmental hazard and a nuisance for neighbors.
Alexandria has been bleeding hotels and local economic and tourism experts said if Alexandria wants to fully capitalize on a post-COVID tourism boom, it needs to pitch in on a new hotel.
At a meeting last week, the City Council expressed cautious enthusiasm about a proposal that Alexandria put a little of its tax revenue from the hotel back into the developer’s coffers. The proposal involves offering incentives to help finance the development of a luxury hotel at 699 Prince Street.
