Concerned about crime, flooding or taxes in Alexandria? There’s a public meeting this Saturday that could answer some of your most burning questions.
The Alexandria City Council will answer public questions in a town hall meeting on Saturday morning at Charles Houston Recreation Center (901 Wythe Street). The meeting is the second of its kind, after kicking off in September.
(Updated at 4 p.m. on Oct. 18) For at least five weeks, Loren DePina and her family will be forced live in a one-bedroom apartment until flooding damage in her three-bedroom Southern Towers apartment is fixed.
DePina’s and 13 other apartments at Southern Towers’ Sherwood building (5001 Seminary Road) were significantly damaged early Sunday morning by a water leak that worked its way from the eighth floor of the 15-story building all the way to the first floor. Video of the damage showed residents wading through inches of water in apartments and hallways and flooded elevators.
Nearly 500 signatures have been collected in an effort to name the new and yet-to-be-built athletic fields at Alexandria City High School’s Minnie Howard campus after former Mayor Kerry Donley.
A steering committee of civic leaders, colleagues and friends submitted the petition with 486 signatures yesterday to the Alexandria School Board. In their letter, the steering committee wrote that the name is fitting, as Donley’s contributions were through public governance, education and community service.
After more than a dozen complaints of outdoor grills sending smoke into neighboring Del Ray homes, City Council on Saturday unanimously approved a modified plan to allow Hi/Fi Tex-Mex BBQ to operate behind Evening Star Cafe.
The approval expands the concept’s hours of operation from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. (previously 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.), more outdoor seating (from 50 seats to 124 seats), live outdoor music Wednesday to Saturday, as well as permission to cook food from two outdoor smoker grills and selling the food from a temporary food trailer.
Alexandria’s City Council is taking its anti-panhandling ordinance off the books, but city leaders said at a meeting last night the actual impact of the change should be minimal.
City Attorney Joanna Anderson noted that the panhandling change is part of an update to bring obsolete sections of the city code in line with evolving case law.
Asking for spare change could soon no longer be a crime in Alexandria.
City staff contend that restrictions against panhandling are unconstitutional, violating the freedom of expression of those begging for money or help.
With Alexandria’s consumption tax revenues hitting an all-time high in fiscal year 2023, Mayor Justin Wilson says that the city has emerged from the economic spiral created by the 2020 coronavirus pandemic.
The city’s consumption tax revenues (sales, meals and transient lodging) peaked at $81 million in fiscal year 2023, a 7% increase over the $76 million collected in FY 2022 and 23% more than the $66 million in FY 2019, according to figures presented at Visit Alexandria‘s annual meeting on Tuesday night.
Is the Alexandria School Board too big? Should their elections be staggered and three-year terms increased?
The entire structure of the Alexandria School Board could soon be upended, as these and a number of other big questions are up for discussion Thursday night.
(Updated at 5:15 p.m.) With emergency medical incidents taking up nearly 75% of calls for service, the Alexandria Fire Department (AFD) is planning to redeploy some of its resources, Fire Chief Corey Smedley tells ALXnow.
Smedley’s AFD Forward plan is still being ironed out, but the gist is that by the first quarter of 2024 the department’s fire engines will get reduced from nine to seven and increasing smaller Emergency Medical transport units staffed by firefighters/emergency medical technicians (EMTs).
Hundreds solemnly gathered outside Police Headquarters this morning to dedicate the Alexandria Police Department Suicide Memorial.
The names of officers Jason Kline, who died in 2004, and his best friend, Steven Pagach IV, who died in 2011, are etched in the memorial.
Alexandria planning staff are recommending that City Council reverse a ruling by the Board of Architectural Review and allow a hair salon to keep an after-the-fact paint job on its exterior.
In May, the city was notified that the Glynn Jones Salon at 720 King Street painted a large portion of its exterior the color gray. On July 6, the Board of Architectural Review unanimously voted to deny the salon a certificate of appropriateness for the work.
