School Intentions

Here in the ol’ newsletter factory we sure do love a moment when everyone seems to be having the same experience at the same time. They’re gushing over touching moments, posting the same pictures, and hearing the same thing over and over. Shared moments like this bring us together and give us a collective bond, infusing a joy that can only come from knowing that others are appreciating something just as much as you are.

We’re talking of course about KPop Demon Hunters.

Nahhhh… just kidding, we’re actually talking about back to school! We’re at the end of another first week of school (for most, some have been back for a few weeks already) and boy are we feeling Free. The stakes are high on the first day back, you need a Strategy for that front porch photo lest your neighbor’s perfect post on Instagram with the cool chalkboard ends up showing you How It’s Done. And once the kids are gone, you hear that silent house and remember What It Sounds Like for the first time in two months and no one is drinking all of the Soda Pop in the fridge! Anyway, it doesn’t matter if Your Idol is the teacher or the principal—they’ve got your kids now and you’re Golden [Editor’s note: *sigh* so this was about KPop Demon Hunters].

If the start of this school year feels a little more precarious to you than usual, you’re not alone in that sentiment. Our region continues to suffer the effects of a presidential administration hellbent on immiserating residents and employees in and around DC. This is not only affecting individual families, but it’s putting pressure on the region’s entire workforce—including the pool of teachers and administrators we have to hire from. Add to that masked platoons of guys all voted Most Likely to Slam Their Dick in a Car Door in high school carrying out capricious immigration raids on the first day of school, and our classrooms suddenly start carrying a weight of responsibility that goes beyond learning.

ACPS is also faced with the added burden of navigating the ideologically motivated Title IX complaint brought against them and other Northern Virginia school districts by the U.S. Department of Education (new motto: It’s All Kayfabe!). While the substance of this may feel like bullshit, the stakes are quite real—as much as $20 million in funding could hang in the balance. The mechanics of everything are kind of complicated: the current consequence is to put our Title I funding on reimbursement only, and not to mention a lot of this money goes to the state before it comes to us, so really the immediate practical concern might be a *state* budget problem, not a local one. But this is still a situation to take seriously. It’s very much to the credit of the superintendent and the School Board that their messaging and response to this issue has been quite strong so far in defense of trans kids and grounded in our community values—we hope to see that continue.

As if that isn’t enough, we’ve also got the year-long run-up to the implementation of new school boundaries as a result of redistricting; managing the ongoing capacity crisis in West End elementary schools and all the middle schools; continuing to explore a student transportation partnership between DASH bus and ACPS; and our unabated need for at least one if not two more high schools. It’s a lot. Seriously, look at that list—it’s a lot!!

So embrace the joy of this week even as we all remain aware of these challenges and work to stay engaged. It goes without saying, none of us signed up to spend our evenings thinking about federal funding formulas or school boundary maps. Most of us are just trying to get lunches packed, shoes tied, and homework located before the bus comes. But the reality is that all these bigger issues are part of the package, for better or for worse. Fortunately, when this community shows up—parents, teachers, neighbors—we can manage just about anything. (Except getting our kids to stop singing the KPop Demon Hunters soundtrack. That might actually be impossible.)

Things You May Have Missed Because You Have a Life 

• King Street was recently named “53rd best main street in the US to walk” by Assisted Living Magazine, exciting news for both list enthusiasts (like us!) and the geriatric fitness community (also like… wait, no, shut up).
• And speaking of well-earned recognition, Alexandria’s sewer tunnel project received the 2025 Tunnel Achievement Award! Congratulations to the team at AlexRenew for narrowly beating out competitors such as the Tetanus Tunnel between Eisenhower and Duke, the human hamster tubes at Chuck E. Cheese, a picture of a tunnel painted onto the side of a cliff by the Road Runner, and whatever the hell Elon Musk is digging underneath Las Vegas.
• Umiya Sushi has officially opened in the Generous George’s/Yates Pizza Palace space on Duke Street, and just in time—if that space had stayed vacant for just one more month it would have been legally required to convert into a Spirit Halloween.
• Lost Boy Cider announced a new Monday nights speaker series called Lectures on Tap, and you can use this form to indicate your interest in performing stand up educating your neighbors on a topic with which you have expertise. Becky is signing up to give a Ted Talk on water quality and wastewater infrastructure and how much she loves being called the Poop May- [Editor’s note: *murderous glare*] ah, um, that is, a talk on collaborative and respectful creative partnerships.
• This past Tuesday night, African Communities Together hosted author Megan Greenwell to discuss her book Bad Company: Private Equity and the Death of the American Dream which features a resident of Southern Towers in Alexandria as one of the four people she reports on in different industries ravaged by private equity (the other three in the book are a rural hospital administrator, a regional newspaper reporter, and a Toys R Us employee). The panel discussion at Charles Houston included Loren DePina (the resident featured in the book) as well as another resident of Southern Towers. It was a fantastic event, equal parts informative and infuriating, and if you haven’t yet had the chance to read the book we really encourage you to do so (and not just because *two* different Alexandria mayors also get mentioned).

Local Discourse Power Rankings

1. Fascism (Last week: NR). Sometimes we have to take a break from writing “funny” jokes for our “humorous” newsletter [Editor’s note: not sure those scare quotes were really called for, but okay] to talk about something that isn’t amusing at all, and now is one of those times. Honestly, it’s hard to feel anything but rage at the fact that ICE raids have been happening here in our city this week. How does it possibly make our community safer to take away hardworking people from their families, friends, and neighbors? Local leaders, we’re counting on you to push back as much as possible against this. And everyone else can play a role too: support local immigration legal aid organizations, and seek out “know your rights” information for bystanders so you’ll know what to do if you see something like this going down. All Alexandrians, no matter how they got here, deserve to be supported and safe, so let’s keep standing up for each other in any way we can.
2. Justin Wilson’s Alexandria NOVA (Last week: NR). In a game-changing development for people who don’t know what to do with themselves if they can’t blame Justin Wilson for anything, our former mayor is back in a local-ish leadership role! Last week he announced that he’s trading the shining rails of Amtrak for the verdant fields and forests of greater Northern Virginia as the new executive director of NOVA Parks. That’s right folks, our regional park facilities can kiss their integrity goodbye. Winkler Botanical Preserve? Perfect spot for some new luxury condos. Great Waves Waterpark? Overdue for a road waterslide diet. Carlyle House? Surprise, it’s now a duplex! But in all seriousness, congrats to Justin, we wish you all the best in the new gig and hope that your budget request for a fleet of new bulldozers gets swiftly approved.
3. TacOpen Late (Last week: NR). Popular Arlington-based Mexican restaurant Tortas y Tacos La Chiquita recently announced plans to open their fourth location in the space on Route 1 in Del Ray previously occupied by BarkSocial née Haus. Now we’re sure you’re thinking “hell yeah, tacos!” which, same, because tacos are awesome. But what if we told you they wanted to be open 24 hours. Now you’re probably thinking “hell yeah, 1am tacos!” which, same, because 1am tacos are awesome. But what if we told you that there are a lot of houses right next to this business. NOW you’re probably thinking “oh… yeah, they probably don’t want Jesse eating a 1am taco on their stoop” which, same, because that is definitely the sort of thing Jesse would do. Anyway, they ended up settling on some late hours that stop well short of being open all night and we’re finally getting a breakfast burrito place so let’s just call this one a win-win-win.
4. Fear and Loathing on the Campaign TrALX ‘25 (Last week: NR). Congressman Don Beyer has drawn some challengers in the Democratic primary for the 8th District seat and they spent the week making news for interesting(?) reasons. First, former city councilman Mo Seifeldein made his debut appearance in the race by showing up at a protest organized by ARHA residents and confronting the CEO while wearing a polo shirt typically reserved for city officials. That same day the other challenger in the race, Frank Ferreira, accused the sheriff’s office of wrongfully arresting him during an eviction action against him. Gentlemen… pace yourselves. The June primary is a long way off, you’ve got to spread out some of these stunts and headlines or we won’t have anything to write about next year.
5. Missing the Forest for the… (Last week: NR). You may be thinking that you have a handle on the most serious problems facing Alexandria right now. Maybe it’s the aforementioned fascist thugs kidnapping members of our community. Maybe it’s people losing their federal jobs, or being evicted from their office buildings so the director of some other agency can install a helipad and a sauna. Wrong!!! The Alexandria Times would like you to know that none of this is as important as the real issue facing our city in the year 2025: trees. Over the last couple months, our community’s foremost only weekly print publication has published at least four front-page stories and two letters to the editor about the city arborist’s resignation, trees at city schools, trees falling on people, and a complaint filed with the federal government about the city’s foliage trimming practices. All of which has many Alexandrians asking… what?? This seems like a disproportionately high number of articles about this topic given every other thing that’s happening. And like… listen. Do we hate trees? No, they’re freaking awesome. Trees are the longest-living organisms on earth and can communicate with each other through underground networks of mycorrhizal fungi! But is this really the most pressing matter deserving of our attention??? Unless and until a tree makes actual news by falling on [REDACTED], we’re gonna go out on a limb and suggest that the Times try turning over a new leaf.

Alexandria’s Hottest Club Is… Professional Sports

We were treated to some actually fun news this week when it was announced that a record number of former Aces summer league players (seven!) were selected in the MLB draft. But they’re far from the only Alexandrians playing in the major leagues, as our little city is well represented in the upper echelons of sport. And we don’t just mean local sports like endurance parade marching or competitive public hearing commenting—we’re talking actual professional athletics. Sure, we all know about Noah Lyles and Earl Lloyd. But here’s a roundup of some of our favorite ALX pro athletes you might not be familiar with!

Throwing it way back, Alexandria produced a couple of professional baseball players in the 19th and early 20th century. First there was Samuel Yeatman, whose first name might actually have been Bill. The internet is very unclear on this point. But either way, he was born in Alexandria and he played one (1) game for the Washington Nationals in 1872. BaseballReference.com indicates that he went to the plate four times and failed to hit the ball, ending his career with a .000 batting average. You tried, Samuel/Bill. A half-century later, Alexandrian-born Nemo Gaines did a little better when he pitched four games for the Washington Senators in 1921. The Senators lost all four games, but at least he didn’t give up any runs! Following this brief stint in sports, he became a Navy captain, served as an attaché in Peru, and retired to Virginia to open a hardware store and raise Hereford cattle. They simply don’t make guys like this anymore.

Moving on from Alexandria’s athletic failsons of yore, our city actually produced a bona fide star in the mid-20th century. Baseball Hall of Famer Leon Day, one of the best-ever Negro league pitchers, moved to Baltimore as a child, but he was born in ALX and we’re claiming him. This dude had a no wind-up delivery. What??? He holds the Negro league record for most strikeouts in a game (18). The only hit recorded against him during that matchup was a bloop single to left field off the bat of “Pee Wee” Butts. And can we just say… that is the single greatest sentence we have ever had the pleasure of typing for this newsletter. #Blessed.

Alexandrians have also learned how to play other sports, take football for example. Wikipedia lists dozens of pro football players who hail from these parts. Although you have to assume that some of them are from Fake Alexandria, since Wikipedia editors DON’T KNOW THE DIFFERENCE AND HAVE VERY SHODDY BIRTHPLACE VERIFICATION PROCEDURES. Anyway, we’ve got NFL players, UFL players, even a couple of CFL players. But by far our favorite is Scott Norwood, the Buffalo Bills kicker whose missed “wide right” field goal attempt in Super Bowl XXV was the inspiration for Ray Finkle in the 1994 Jim Carrey film Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, a movie we haven’t seen in over twenty years but that we’re guessing probably has not aged well. Wikipedia notes that Scott’s “field goal range was unusually short for a professional kicker,” which is a borderline disrespectful statement. After retirement, Scott moved home to Virginia to become an insurance salesman, presumably because he couldn’t find any Hereford cattle.

Wow, we sure are writing a lot of words about sports [Editor’s note: “we”???] so it’s probably time to start moving things along. Lightning round! Did you know that not one but two Saudi tennis players grew up in and/or currently reside in Alexandria? And did you know that there’s an Alexandrian professional soccer player who’s also Queen Latifah’s cousin? The ALX bike mafia is well represented in professional cycling thanks to Julie Kuliecza and Tina Pic. And don’t forget about the 1980s and 90s Alexandria “hometown hero” of pro wrestling, Cueball Carmichael, whose matches included an outdoor show in the Outer Banks during a hurricane and a title fight in which his opponent knocked him unconscious with an ether-soaked rag.

Finally, let’s give a shoutout to a few other Alexandria professional athletes who didn’t really do anything that interesting but have truly excellent names that must be recognized here: Skeeter Swift. Chase Gasper. Sandor Bustamante. Edwin Hanson Webster “Jigger” Harlan. Hell yes!! Inject it directly into our veins. In conclusion, our deepest thanks to all of these fine people for bringing glory (or something) to our fair municipality. Because of them, the Port City will always be the Sport City in our hearts.

Overheard in ALX

From Mark Eaton’s most recent column:

“A local official told me recently, ‘Alexandrians are generally in favor of progress. However, many of them have problems with change.’ The difficulty, of course, is that progress necessarily requires change.”

We’re not sure what he’s talking about. Alexandrians are totally fine with change!! As long as it doesn’t affect the number of neighbors we have, the speed at which we can drive, the width of the lanes in which we’re driving, the availability of parking, the height of any buildings, the color of any bricks, the material composition of any windows, the density of the tree canopy, the recreational opportunities available to our pets, or the breakfast buffet at the Royal Restaurant.

One Awesome Thing in ALX

We’re not usually in the business of feeling things (our unofficial ALXtra staff motto is “dead inside since 2017”), but one local news story managed to sneak past our emotional defenses last week. Mayor Gaskins held a Back-to-School Salon on August 12 at which about 20 girls living in ARHA housing received free hairstyling, brand-new backpacks, and a catered meal. The ALXnow story about the event described some of the girls crying with joy when they saw themselves in the mirror, which in turn made us leak unfamiliar saline fluids we later confirmed were, in fact, actual human tears.

As if that wasn’t moving enough, ALXnow publisher Ryan Belmore added a personal note to the article sharing how much moments like this meant to him as a kid, causing our hearts to swell faster than the Grinch on Christmas morning doing lines of cocaine despite a recent cardiomegaly diagnosis. All of this is truly the best of Alexandria—local businesses, community members, and elected leaders coming together to help provide our city’s kids with some confidence and joy. Kudos to everyone involved for proving once again that Alexandrians are as good on the inside as these students look on the outside.

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.

ALXtra is a free-to-read newsletter about current events in Alexandria, Virginia. Subscribe to get it delivered directly to your inbox. Paid subscriptions give you access to the comments. Revenue from subscriptions gets used in the following ways: 1) a third goes into a charity fund, and every time that fund hits $500 we’ll make a donation to a local charity in the name of ALXtra’s readers and we’ll feature and write about that organization, like we did here, here, here, and here; 2) another third of the money will go toward investments in the newsletter; and 3) the final third of the money goes toward self-care for your two intrepid authors.