Bet on ALX

Among the many ways you could try and summarize the prevailing theme of recent times, the Era of Risk would be far from the worst moniker to land on. Across nearly every sphere of domestic society we’ve seen a shift toward behavior and choices that accommodate or even seek out higher levels of risk. We’ve seen this in our economy (stock market volume), public health (vaccine avoidance), cognition (letting AI think for you), and leisure time (sports betting apps and prediction markets). Neither of us are psychologists or social scientists so we’re not going to try and unpack why this has been happening (though surely it’s a combination of the nihilistic response to a global pandemic and the ease with which we have allowed everyone to walk around with gamified dopamine release in their pockets) but it’s hard to look around and not notice how much of modern life is built to valorize and celebrate risk-taking behaviors.

This is bad first and foremost because of the catastrophic downsides of some of these gambles (you know, for example, betting most of the world economy on a guy whose sartorial inspiration is “the Fonz but somehow hornier”). But it’s also bad because it negatively polarizes responsible people against the concept of risk, generally. When you see all of the worst people imaginable behaving in a certain way it’s entirely understandable that you’d want to course correct in the opposite direction, to ensure that nothing you’re doing could be lumped in with the people that routinely do things like roll the dice on “what if we made a belligerent human thumb the White House Press Secretary” and “letting people bet on the death tolls of natural disasters is fun and good.” Yet sometimes a calculated risk is exactly what’s needed, and it’s important to be able to frame that as a prudent bet on a projectable outcome and not just another hedonistic sign of the times.

Last week’s election results were hugely consequential for more than just the trajectory of the republic, the resilience of our democracy, and our personal mental health (more on that in the discourse section below). They were also a really big deal for the near-term prospects of Alexandria and the rest of the DC metro region. All of us here have suffered mightily under these two years of dimwitted imperial rule, most especially through the double-barrelled economic blow of our residents losing jobs as the federal bureaucracy has been hollowed out, and visitors not being quite as excited to come enjoy the occupied-capital-of-a-conquered-province-but-with-more-shiny-horse-ass-statues energy we’ve been giving these days.

That all changed after the midterm elections. We are about to see a major influx of talent and energy as young staffers move here to work for the legion of new Democrats elected to Congress or at organizations and industries that will have fresh momentum. We are (hopefully) about to see a reversal of the “Maryland, My Maryland” lyrics-ass governance policies that have cast a pall over life in our region which will be good for restaurants and nightlife and the visitor economy. The upshot of all this is a high likelihood that we see more people moving to Alexandria, visiting Alexandria, and spending money in Alexandria.

This matters because if you’ve been paying any sort of attention to local news you’re likely aware that the city is skint. We’re facing budget pressure across key service areas like schools, public transit, and public housing (each agency having recently publicly reported to council their expectation of higher FY28 needs) as we simultaneously experience slowing revenues because of the aforementioned pressures the DMV has experienced since the onset of Trump 2: The Corruptioning. We’re fortunate to have a Council and a city staff that are clear-eyed about the scale of this challenge, and the formal kickoff of the FY28 budget process last week showed that they’re taking this work seriously and asking many of the right questions. And hopefully one of those questions can be about revising our stance toward fiscal risk.

Alexandria—much to its credit, to be clear—has long had a pretty small-c conservative posture toward the amount of debt we can take on and the percentage of debt service we’ll tolerate in our annual budget. It’s what’s driven our excellent reputation with the bond rating agencies and continued receipt of a AAA rating. Alexandria has been, and remains, a great bet. But a sterling bond rating does us no good unless we use it, and given the mounting sources of budgetary pressure we face, this is the ideal time to use our borrowing power to accelerate investments in the kinds of projects that will structurally improve our revenue base by making it easier to live in Alexandria, be educated in Alexandria, get around Alexandria, and visit Alexandria. Were we planning to write this essay before the city announced on Tuesday a plan to borrow money to do exactly this? We sure were (and more on that announcement below) but we hope this is the first sign of a concerted change in strategy. Is it risky? Sure, a little. But it’s also a bet on the near-and-long term future of a successful, thriving, and growing Alexandria. And that’s a bet we’d take every time.

Things You May Have Missed Because You Have a Life 

• Careful observers will have noticed a slight tilt in the earth’s gravity last week as the balance of bookstore power in Alexandria shifted west with the opening of a new Barnes & Noble at Foxchase. This is a great development, but if we want to achieve true geographical bookstore parity we’re going to need some specialty shops over there as well. Let’s get a mystery bookshop in Landmark, foreign language novels in Van Dorn, hell why not get really niche and open up a gay antiquarian cookbook store in Cameron Station! If any city can support all of this it’s us, LET’S GOOOO!!!
• Unfortunately as the book gods giveth, so they taketh away. Duncan Library in Del Ray unexpectedly had to close and postpone its book sale due to a leaky roof. Don’t worry though, the sale has been rescheduled to December 3 and the books will only be a tiny bit wet. 
• A nonprofit is trying to raise money to repair the old train car in front of Mt. Vernon Recreation Center and not since Becky taught everybody what “perreo” means have so many Alexandrians thought about cabooses.
• The lineup for this weekend’s Alexandria film festival includes a mockumentary short about bollards?? Say less, we’re there.
• The city is in the process of studying whether we should continue operating our detention center, and if so, how it should be funded and managed. The report is due at the end of the year, and a public comment period is currently open until Nov. 20. Among the many factors being considered we hope the city weighs the likelihood that an abandoned jail might eventually be infiltrated by Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage seeking to stop the well intentioned but misguided efforts of Ed Harris. Carla was the prom queen indeed.
• On a much more somber note, this week we learned of the tragic death of Roberto Gomez, founder of Cornerstone Craftsman and tireless advocate for Alexandria’s youth. We got to know Roberto through the numerous ways he was involved in worthy local causes, and wrote about him and Cornerstone last year. He will be deeply missed, and our thoughts are with all who loved him.

Local Discourse Power Rankings

1. Sports! (Last week: NR). In what could easily be described as the biggest and most interesting announcement the city has made in several years (sorry, 2023’s “ Quaintest Christmas Villages Across the US” third place award) we learned on Tuesday night about the ambitious plans to convert the Cameron Run site into a multi-use sports and events complex. The proposed 210,000 square foot facility would provide much needed indoor court space for sports like basketball, volleyball, and futsal in addition to attracting major tournaments and events throughout the year. The effort would be run by a new nonprofit called ALX Sports, which is being set up by Alexandria Soccer Association in their role as a partner on the venture. It’s only been a few days since the project has been announced and many details are yet to be shared or finalized (there is an extensive public engagement effort planned in the coming weeks)... but when has not having all the details ever stopped us Alexandrians from having takes on something! On balance it seems like many of the initial reactions have been excitement, because we really do need more indoor sports capacity and because we really do need new visitor economy assets like this. There have also been some justified questions about cost (oh yeah we didn’t mention that part yet, the city would borrow $107m through the Industrial Development Authority to fund construction) and the specifics of the nonprofit partnership (much of which is still TBD as an agreement would need to be fully developed and signed). Some people want to know why not a school here (can’t put one on this site), why can’t we just keep the waterpark (you skipped the opening essay about needing more money, didn’t you) and a god-tier comment on The Zebra article asking what will happen to the waterfowl that like to cross the road at this location (the geese will be fine). It’ll be 2031 at the earliest before any of us are watching a college basketball tournament or a dog show at this facility, but don’t worry we’re sure there will be lots more to say on this between now and then.
2. Bluenami (Last week: NR). Can you feel it? The pulsating shimmer of a vibe shift in the air? Alexandrians have spent the past two years slogging through a seemingly endless barrage of depressing and demoralizing actions by the federal government to the point where we forgot what optimism felt like… until last Tuesday. The last week and a half has felt like an entire community letting out a massive sigh of relief. Not necessarily because the barrage is going to stop overnight, but because the sensation of hope is starting to trickle back into the shriveled husk of whatever body part our emotions used to live in. It’s all feeling very Obama-era so bust out your peplum tops and crank up the Hamilton soundtrack, we’re bringing cringey positivity back!! It all started with a fun election day—turnout was massive (two-thirds of active registered voters, that’s a lot for midterms) and poll workers managed everything impressively (we love this Alexandria Brief shoutout to their hard work). All three state constitutional amendments passed, with local support outpacing statewide margins. Alexandrians Don Beyer and Mark Warner had a good night, capping it off with a celebration at the Mark Center Hilton, and former Alexandrian JD Vance’s sweaty posts about why everyone except him was to blame for the results dosed us with dangerously potent quantities of schadenfreude. Just unprecedented levels of libbing out from top to bottom. And why did all of this happen? There were obviously many factors but we’d like to credit the Bad Bunny Super Bowl halftime show the Alexandria Dems and other volunteers who put in truly impressive amounts of organizing. The people who do political work at the local level are actual superheroes and make real change happen—everybody’s talking about Blexas, Blansas, and Blississippi but thanks to them we’ve been Blalexandria, Blirginia [Editor’s note: rein it in please] since before it was cool. Ultimately we’re still wrapping our heads around what these results mean for our city as a practical matter, but in the meantime if you need us we’ll be over here listening to stomp-clap music and celebrating the fact that the DC area is about to feel at least 10 percent less hellscapey.
3. You Idiots Are Doing This Road Wrong (Previous rank: 5). The vote on the Russell Road Safe Routes to School project is tomorrow and while some Rosemont residents are calling for more deliberation, please for the love of god just let Council pick between Revised Option 1 and Modified Alternative C before staff moves on to Amended Choice Ψ or Updated Selection 𓅃. The impending vote has caused much wailing and gnashing of teeth at the Rosemont Citizens Association, which adopted a resolution opposing the city’s recommended design for the schoolchildren safety project at a meeting they scheduled during schoolchildren’s bedtime, ensuring no inconvenient participation by the “I just don’t want my kid to get T-boned by a Wagoneer” contingent. It did however leave them ample opportunity to describe supporters of the more protective option, who again were not able to be in the room, as a large group of people “who don’t live in Rosemont.” Listen guys, labeling your opponents “outside agitators” wasn’t cool when southern governors did it in 1965 and it isn’t cool now. These shenanigans then inspired a 5,000-word Alexandria Brief investigative piece that mercilessly applied the Columbo “just one more thing…” interview style to civic association parliamentary procedure. Keep in mind, this entire debate is about the net loss of a total of 2 to 7 parking spaces across four blocks on a stretch of road that is less than half full at the busiest time of day. At this rate Rosemont is never beating the allegations. Which allegations? Oh, you know the ones.
4. Is Our Children Learning (Last week: 1): It’s been a busy couple of weeks for ACPS, starting with the release of their new $370m 10-year capital improvement plan which was initially described as a scant modest robust eye-popping $186m above the expected guidance from the city. Now despite the shock value of the initial headline (Double! You’re over by double!) ACPS and the city subsequently clarified that they were actually staying within the expected budget planning levels because of reserve funds that get applied to these projects. Either way—it’s a lot of money, and a stark reminder of how much additional investment the system still needs to catch up and keep up. Speaking of money, maybe they’ll be saving some in the future by buying fewer Chromebooks—a new advocacy effort called School Beyond Screens Alexandria shared an open letter and petition with School Board asking for a reexamination of how technology is used in the classroom. This is important because it’s long past time we put an end to the parasocial relationships that young learners are forming with the cheerful cartoon avatars teaching them to read and make them learn to read the way the rest of us did—being traumatized by a dog getting rabies and then getting shot or a kid dying after falling off a rope swing in the rain and drowning in a river. Bet your Zootle for Reading app or whatever the hell it’s called can’t make you cry yourself to sleep, can it?? For real though, how did any of us grow up to love books? Dear god. At least everything turned out fine for those wonderful rats from NIMH. Anyway, before we wrap up ACPS also updated the school closure designations so that instead of being excited about a snow day closure we will now feel like Lt. Kaffee is screaming at Col. Jessup about ethics in duty reporting. Who ordered the Code Red? Did Matthew Cappucci order the Code Red?? (Kidding, it was clearly Fairfax County.) And not to get all art critic on them here, but the order of colors makes no sense! Green, fine—you’re open. But then Code Yellow for a late opening, but Code Orange for an early dismissal—why is the second one worse than the first one? It’s the same amount of missed time. And how is a Virtual Learning Day not Code Black and at the bottom of the list! These are supposed to progress in the order of how much they scare us! For real though do we have to memorize all this? Is this going to be on the test? We knew we shouldn’t have deleted Zootle off our Chromebook so soon.

Alexandria’s Hottest Club is… Chimney Watch

Longtime* (*since last December) readers of this publication know that we’ve been following the unfolding saga of Chimneygate Chimneyghazi Chimneypot Dome with a zeal bordering on unhealthy. Remember that time we wrote about it in iambic pentameter? Haha, that was weird! But can you blame us for enjoying ourselves a little here? City council’s decision to overrule BAR’s recommendation and get rid of the non-functional decorative chimneys on City Hall as part of the renovation process is exactly the kind of low-stakes drama we live for. It lacks the serious consequences of the actually important issues our community is facing, like ICE raids, policing debates, and budget pressures, yet still stokes the fires of our passions and produces tremendous quotes and headlines such as these:

But we aren’t the only ones doing a Mary Poppins and singing “Chim Chim Cher-ee” [Editor’s note: is that really the name of that song? What the fuck?] every time we pass Market Square. Other interested residents have been meticulously documenting the progress of Chimneypocalypse over the past few months:

The cries of despair rang so disconsolately through Old Town last week that the city’s official social media accounts had to issue a statement reminding everyone that this particular chimney was worthless garbage that didn’t deserve to survive:

This announcement immediately entered the Alexandria Public Relations Hall of Fame and inspired many glorious reactions, such as this suggestion for new city merch from friend of the newsletter Alex G.:

As of today, we are officially down to zero (0) smokestacks. For better or worse, an era has ended. The age of City Hall chimneys is over; the time of the flat roof has come. 

Overheard in ALX

From an article about the Alexandria Police Department’s response to concerns that their Flock cameras are still flashing at passing cars: 

The cameras are solar-powered and have motion sensors, police spokesperson Tracy Walker said Friday, but they are “no longer recording, capturing, or collecting data.”

Hmm, interesting how this statement doesn’t deny that the cameras are flashing at people to erase their short-term memory like the flashy things in “Men in Black.” We’re onto you, APD. You can try to hide it but the people know the truth!!!

One Awesome Thing in ALX

Last weekend the Stabler-Leadbeater Apothecary Museum in Old Town hosted a special open house to celebrate its 20th anniversary as a city-owned museum. It’s easy to forget that it hasn’t actually been a publicly owned space for that long considering that it’s one of the oldest pharmacies in the country and served many historic personalities including—🚨GEORGE WASHINGTON ALERT🚨—some of the founding fathers. The apothecary operated from 1792 to 1933, became a private museum for several decades, and was then donated to the city in 2006 with the continuing support of a volunteer fundraising group delightfully called the Mortar and Pestle Society. Back when the apothecary was a working pharmacy, a doctor’s prescription wasn’t required for drugs, you could just walk in and ask for whatever you wanted. As a result they’ve got some real crazy shit in there… jars of stuff called dragon’s blood, unicorn root, “meat juice” and of course opium out the wazoo. They really knew how to party in the 18th century.

The open house last weekend provided an opportunity to view some extra special rare materials and view the museum’s current exhibition which focuses on “three diseases with deadly outbreaks in Alexandria and what the government and medical professionals, including this apothecary shop, did to prevent the spread and alleviate symptoms.” We can’t prove that this is an RFK Jr. subtweet but we know in our hearts that it is.

We haven’t written much about our local museums, but aside from thinking about them as a draw for our growing visitor economy, it’s also worth remembering they’re not just here for tourists, we can visit them any time we want! Earlier this year local survey respondents said that visiting our museums improved their sense of civic identity, community belonging, and quality of life. So the next time you’re in Old Town with some extra time on your hands, pop in and take a tour. Just keep your hands off the meat juice. 

You can follow Becky @beckyhammer.bsky.social and Jesse @oconnell.bsky.social on Bluesky, or you can e-mail us anytime at alxtranewsletter@gmail.com.

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