The day has finally come for Douglas MacArthur Elementary School.
On Monday, members of the community and Alexandria City Public Schools leadership watched as a demolition crew started tearing down the World War II-era building.
city government
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Like a ship during a storm, Canek Aguirre wants to guide Alexandria to more equitable waters.
The trick, though, is through proper communication.
The June 8 Democratic primary is only 49 days away, and Mayor Justin Wilson has raised the most money of any candidate in the city. Kirk McPike is also leading among City Council candidates.
Below are fundraising totals from the Virginia Public Access Project, as of March 31, 2021.
Four years of development came to a close Tuesday as the Alexandria Redevelopment Housing Authority cut the ribbon on Lineage, a 52-unit affordable apartment complex at the former Ramsey Homes site in Old Town.
“It’s about helping people that need affordable housing, and that’s the passion of mine, given that I’m a product of public housing,” ARHA CEO Keith Pettigrew said, adding that he thought the project would be easy when he started his job four years ago. “I was led to believe that Ramsey was easy, but it was anything but easy, and being in this industry for as long as I have I should have known better, but I didn’t.”
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After months of fine-tuning, the Alexandria City Council unanimously passed a collective bargaining ordinance on Saturday. Its passage was praised by Alexandria’s employee unions as a step forward in employee rights.
“I want to thank you, the members of the City Council, for moving for an ordinance that allows employees voices to be heard,” Josh Turner, president of the Alexandria Fire Fighters Inc. and International Association of Firefighters Local 2141, told Council.
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Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson doesn’t want to hold any other political office. He also wants to be elected at least once more in November, and in less than two months he’ll square off in a Democratic primary rematch against his political rival, former Mayor Allison Silberberg.
Wilson says the June 8 primary really isn’t about he and Silberberg, but more about the direction that the city wants to go. In fact, he never mentioned his opponent by name during a 45-minute conversation with ALXnow. He’s raised $90,000 to Silberberg’s $64,000, hired Henry Watkins (Sen. Adam Ebbin’s Chief of staff) as his campaign manager, and has a goal of knocking on more than 2,000 doors.
The Alexandria School Board has nine members and roughly 16,000 students, and some Board members think the school system could be more efficient if it was smaller.
“We’re actually hurting the efficiency and the goal being achieved within the division of the group this big,” School Board Vice Chair Veronica Nolan said in a Board retreat Tuesday night. “I think we can achieve more for the division by having six (members).”
An update to the Alexandria Mobility Plan could reshape some of the ways the city approaches transit, streets and more.
The city is soliciting public feedback on the new update to the Alexandria Mobility Plan (AMP).
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It was a historic week in Alexandria. Here are some of the highlights.
President Joe Biden visited the Neighborhood Health COVID-19 vaccine site at Virginia Theological Seminary on Tuesday, just before announcing that the date for adults to get access to the vaccine has been moved to April 19.
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In a unanimous decision Thursday night, the Alexandria School Board went against the recommendation of Superintendent Gregory Hutchings, Jr. and changed distancing in schools from six feet to three feet.
School Board members were unhappy that, also on Thursday, Alexandria City Public Schools posted that the school system “is maintaining six feet of physical distancing throughout the remainder of the school year.”
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(Updated at 11 a.m. on April 12) Alexandria Police Department employees have mixed reviews whether they feel valued.
Roughly half of APD staff (153-155 employees) recently participated in an annual citywide employee engagement survey. APD says that Chief Michael L. Brown and other Department heads were encouraged by the city to release the survey results to employees, and that the findings are being included in the APD High Performance Organization Plan.
