The Alexandria City Council on Saturday passed an ordinance requiring everyone in the city to wear a face mask in public.
The measure passed 5-2, and a $100 civil penalty for not wearing a mask was removed from the ordinance before passage after it was universally agreed at the meeting by council and city staff that it will not be enforceable. The city manager must now designate city staff to hand out masks and citations to lawbreakers.
Alexandria has experienced its fair share of flooding in recent days, and on Saturday City Council will receive an oral presentation by the Department of Transportation and Environmental Services on $750 million in water improvement projects.
On Thursday, September 10, flooding was reported throughout the city in the latest of a string of summer weather events that have shut down swaths of roadways, flooded alleyways and homes. The city sent out an advisory warning residents of “indoor sewer backups, impassable roads, power outages, and other flood-related issues.”
After Flooding, Councilman Says City Stormwater Management Needs Work — “Councilmember Chapman tells 7 On Your Side Thursday’s flooding means city leaders need to quickly consider wholesale changes in terms of storm management.” [WJLA]
City Extends Deadline on Personal Property Tax Payments — “To provide relief for our residents and businesses during the ongoing pandemic, the City Council voted unanimously on Tuesday evening to extend the deadline for payment of the Personal Property Tax (Car Tax and Business). Payments are now due on December 15th.” [Twitter]
Can’t avoid a crowd in Alexandria? On Saturday, the Alexandria City Council will vote on an ordinance that requires people to wear face masks indoors and outdoors in settings where six feet of physical distancing can’t be followed.
A $100 civil fine would be imposed on lawbreakers, but city staff maintain that the ordinance is geared toward education and not enforcement. Police officers will not issue the civil citations, and the city manager’s office has yet to designate a city agency that would administer them. If approved, the ordinance would go into effect on October 1 and expire when Alexandria’s local emergency declaration ends.
Residents with questions related to coronavirus are welcomed to call Alexandria’s COVID-19 Hotline at 703.746.4988 during the week from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. On the other end of the line will be Debra McGhee or one of the call center’s volunteers to give tips or direct you to city resources.
Now after six months, McGhee is stepping down as the call center supervisor. But don’t worry. She’ll still be volunteering, just not full-time.
The Alexandria City Council on Tuesday night unanimously sent a proposal establishing a community police review board back to the drawing board.
In Tuesday night’s legislative meeting, Councilman Mo Seifeldein said that city staff did not include his desire to give the review board independent investigative authority to look into police misconduct and issue subpoenas. Seifeldein said he was clear with his request to City Manager Mark Jinks when Council unanimously directed the creation of the review board proposal in June.
The Alexandria City Council has pushed a decision to add Virginia Tech’s initials to the Potomac Yard Metro Station.
Virginia Tech’s $1 billion Innovation Campus is promised to bring a massive redevelopment to the area, although no buildings have yet to be constructed and no students are on site. Consequently, some members of council were concerned that the school’s request to add the name to the Metro station would not meet Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority naming guidelines.
Updated 5:40 p.m. — According to Anton Murray, spokesman for Alexandria Libraries:
Due to an incidence of COVID-19 with a staff member at the Beatley Library, the Library has been closed for 1-3 days for deep cleaning. The nature of that staff member’s role in the library requires little to no significant direct contact with the public or other staff. Based on investigation to date (including contact tracing) by the Health Department no quarantine recommendations were needed for other staff or the public.
Despite the odds, Alexandria’s Workforce Development Center’s Youth Employment Services has finished up another year with higher-than-usual participation.
It was a tough summer to run a workforce development program. Alongside the global pandemic, Alexandria faced record-high unemployment and a slow recovery for local businesses. But center Director Daniel Mekibib said the program put together options for in-person employment and virtual participation in job training.
(Updated 10:50 p.m.) When the City of Alexandria builds new schools, a new ordinance change (Item 9) could mean they’re a little larger than they used to be.
A new ordinance proposed for the Tuesday (September 1) Planning Commission meeting would “streamline and modernize the zoning regulations,” according to a staff report.
The city is proposing a series of changes that could cut through the red tape for some local businesses needing to adapt quickly to survive the slow recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.
At the upcoming Planning Commission meeting on Tuesday, September 1, the Department of Planning & Zoning will propose changes to reduce the number of Special Use Permit (SUP) approvals that require public hearings or administrative reviews. The goal is to increase the the number of commercial uses that could in a shorter time frame.
