Tejada, Violand-Sanchez Reportedly Agree for Arlington to Accept 'Several Thousand' Unaccompanied Minors from Central America

Hey, Yupette,

Latest news about the influx of 'unaccompanied minors' from Central America is that County Board member Walter Tejada and School Board member Emma Violand-Sanchez have negotiated with several Central American governments, including Guatemala, about Arlington accepting several thousand 'unaccompanied minors' and an unknown, but substantial number, of their family members.

This comes at the time when the School Board just finalized APS's 10 year CIP and Arlington County is about to finalize the County's 10 year CIP. County Manager is going to announce her plans for streetcar financing this week.

Unfortunately, it's 2014, not 1984.There is little affordable housing left in the County for anyone who earns $30,000 to $40,000 per year.Arlington's school system is already strained, as is Arlington's food assistance network.

Appears that about 50,000 unaccompanied minors have already crossed into the United States from Central America and 60,000 to 100,000 more will be entering the United States within a year.

It's unknown to what extent the County Board and School Board approved Tejada's and Violand-Sanchez's communications with Central American governments.

Pike Rider 22204

San Antonio Residents Fight Streetcar Plans, Collect Signatures for Referendum

Hello, Yupette,

I was in San Antonio on business last month. The Arlington Yupette blog should be aware that almost the same battle is being waged there against a downtown streetcar line (at a projected cost of $280 million). Same entrenched Democratic machine committed to 'New Urbanism'. Same entrenched transportation bureaucracy. Same group of chamber of commerce and development-for-the-sake-of-development boosters. Same 'economic analysis' paid for by the City of San Antonio that 'proves' a streetcar line will generate $1.3 billion in economic benefits from development and redevelopment.

Difference between Arlington and San Antonio is that San Antonio residents are much more vocal and are collecting petition signatures to put a streetcar referendum question on the ballot in November. Same concerns about streetcar safety, traffic jams, and various costs to residents. So check it out on the Web.

Jason, 22204

Poor and Minority Moped Owners Furious About Mandatory Registration

Hello,

I am a struggling African American who works in a fast food restaurant on the Pike. Don't have much left over from my pay check for paying rent, which is why I can't afford to live in Arlington.

About 9 months every year I can commute the 8 miles from my actually affordable apartment (location I won't disclose so some yuptard developer won't make an offer the owner can't refuse) to the Pike restaurant where I work. I use an inexpensive Moped with a 50 cc engine to commute from home to work.

So, guess what our local General Assembly Democrats decided? Poor minority group members (like me) have to have our Mopeds registered and titled and display license plates by tomorrow, July 1st.

Don't want to do that? The Arlington Transportation Elite suggests we rent Bikeshare bicycles instead (per the Post article yesterday). Cost? Maybe $1,000 per year for someone like me.

NO WAY I will vote for any local PlutoCrat who calls himself or herself a 'Democrat'. They are ALL selfish and greedy. Anything they might do that benefits poor minority group working class people is purely a coincidence.

J.D.

ACDC Insiders: Del. Brink to Retire, Hynes to Replace Brink, Raphael to Replace Hynes

Hi Yupette,

Just heard from a neighbor who's an ACDC insider. Bob Brink is retiring from the House of Delegates. Mary Hynes has had enough of the County Board. Abby Raphael is tired of the School Board.

So decision was made by ACDC insiders to have Bob Brink retire from the House of Delegates and replace Bob with Mary (who would be running for re-election to the County Board next year). ACDC insiders also decided to replace Mary with Abby (who would be running for re-election to the School Board next year).

Since several strong candidates emerged during the last Democratic caucus for School Board, ACDC isn't worried about finding a strong candidate to replace Abby.

Selection of Mary continues the trend over the past decade for Democrats on the School Board  to move to the County Board and County Board Democrats to move on to the General Assembly.

Thanks for your blog.

Margaret 22207

Time to Test Bus Rapid Transit Vehicles on the Pike

Hi Yupette,

Just returned from vacationing in Europe. Visited Las Vegas last Winter.

Bus Rapid Transit vehicles have no difficulty operating on city streets in traffic and in dedicated bus lanes. In fact, that's how they usually operate.

So can we please save federal, state, and local taxpayers about $525 million and have a few test BRT vehicles operate on the Pike for a few weeks. Including a double-articulated BRTs (like the Van Hool AGG 300 which operates in Arlington's Sister City, Aachen, Germany).

I am tired of the streetcar fanatics, who are backed by the mega-infill developers, lying like cheap carpets about Bus Rapid Transit.

Check out this YouTube video about the double-articulated buses in Aachen:

 www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MMGtz3NH8U

Thanks for this blog.

Dennis 22204

Donnellan Promises Streetcar Financing Plan to County Board by Mid-July

Hey, Yupette,

Another County Board-County Manager 2015-2024 CIP Work Session this afternoon. More from County Staff about VERY expensive infrastructure expenditures in the works: For Environment, Water, Wastewater, IT, Public Service.

As usual, Barbara Donnellan wasn't fazed at all. Told the County Board to have their CIP markups prepared by mid-July and she'd have her Streetcar financing plan in place the same time.

How Arlington taxpayers are going to afford a streetcar system and pay for new schools and expensive public infrastructure is something that had several County Government insiders in the County Board Room wondering. But I guess we'll find out in about 3 weeks.

2100 too

County Planning Staff, Community Leaders Meet Secretly to Plan Ethnic Cleansing in Fairlington

Hello,

Based on documents a Fairlington resident pried out of Arlington County Government via a contentious Virginia Freedom of Information Act request, it's apparent that County Planning Staff has secretly worked with Fairlington's 'Community Leaders' for months to permanently remove minority residents from the redeveloped Park Shirlington apartments on South 31st Street.

According to the final submitted site plan, the redeveloped Park Shirlington Apartments will greatly increase in size from 294 to 750 units and the number of parking spaces will triple to 904. The site plans request a rezoning from a maximum of 380 townhouse units. One hundred of the new apartment units would be 'affordable'. The applicant, Home Properties, Inc, has owned the current site for years. The site plans depict an apartment complex that would attract high income yupster tenants, like those who live in Shirlington Village and Clarendon.

However, a number of Fairlington's Community Leaders have a longstanding antipathy towards the largely-Latino minority residents of Park Shirlington, and want them all removed. A number of increasingly upscale Abingdon School parents believe the presence of Latino children, who live with their families in Park Shirlington, degrades the performance of all Abingdon School students.

Consequently a 'Park Shirlington Redevelopment Advisory Committee' was formed by the Fairlington civic association and a number of the aforementioned Community Leaders have been meeting secretly for more than six months. Attendance is by invitation only. If you're not invited you may be arrested if you try to attend. To its credit, Parks and Rec won't allow them to meet in the South Fairlington Community Center so they meet in North Fairlington.

Officially, the Planning Commission's Site Plan Review Committee met for the first time last month and did a walk through and review of the site plans for Park Shirlington and was uniformly negative.

So, the Community Leaders and their secret committee and County Planning Staff will meet tonight, June 24th, in North Fairlington and reveal the secret deal or deals they've been concocting.

Sorry it took so long to get this news out but it was a struggle to obtain FOIA information from the County Manager's office.

Cindy