In This Edition

A year and a half ago, the City Council made the decision to proceed with the Eisenhower West Small Area Planning process. The plan area is bounded by I-395 on the north, the City borders on the west and the south, and Holmes Run on the east. 

The City's small area planning efforts are nothing new. Over the past decade, collaboration between the community and its policymakers has lead to the adoption of new small area plans in nearly every corner of the City. 

However, Eisenhower West is unique for other reasons. In many ways it was a "greenfield" from the planning perspective. It can be argued that there were less constraints, less preconceived notions, and less timing pressures on the plan adoption than the others that preceded it. 

Since this summer, there have been a series of community meetings to shape the future vision of the plan area. Those exercises have now lead to four different high level visions for the area, each of which include site for a potential new school:

Option A (New Neighborhoods): This option focuses on the creation of new neighborhoods, and new retail.

Option B (Recreation and Natural Resources): This option includes new mixed-use development while creating new park land and open space.

Option C (Great Street): This option develops Eisenhower Avenue as a boulevard with mixed-use throughout. This also creates a new stormwater handling feature.

Option D (Incubator/Employment Center): This option attempts to preserve many of the industrial and warehouse uses in the plan area today, while focusing on the creation of new job centers.

Until January 18th, the City is actively soliciting your opinion on the different options. Review the details of each option and offer your feedback using the AlexEngage system. 

The Steering Committee meets on Monday, January 26th at the Cameron Station Clubhouse (200 Cameron Station Blvd) at 7 PM. 

The next community meeting is Monday, February 9th at Beatley Central Library (5005 Duke Street) at 7 PM. 

In November I wrote about the City's efforts to improve the reporting and availability of street lights. 

We were successful in working with Dominion Virginia Power to create a new web form to allow residents to report street light outages without waiting on the phone. 

Additionally, in the adoption of the current year budget, the City Council chose to set aside money to perform two assessments of outages. These are to facilitate reporting to Dominion Virginia Power. 

The City recently completed the first of those assessments and found 433 non-functioning streetlights around the City. Those outages have now been reported to Dominion Virginia Power for restoration. 

As years of constrained budgets have taken their toll, the City has been forced to look at areas of public safety for spending reductions. 

Last year, one of the more controversial proposals in the City Manager's proposed budget related to the shifting of staffing from one fire engine on the east end of the City to a newly opening one on the west end. While that proposal was not accepted by the Council, it is clear the City's revenue reality compels closer scrutiny of all areas of spending, including public safety. 

In October, following the arrival of our new Fire Chief, the he and the City Manager came to the Council to present a package of reforms. These were designed to both improve the City's fire suppression and emergency medical services, as well as provide these services with greater efficiency. 

The end result of this reconfiguration provides for a department that will have an additional staffed fire engine (giving us 9 total) and employ a minimum staffing of 4 firefighters for each fire engine and ladder truck. Our current staffing is three per apparatus, which is below the regional standard. 

These changes are important as they will provide improved service to Alexandria's residents in need. For patients, their first contact with a medical provider will occur in less time.  

The key component in implementing this vision is cross-training the City's 73 existing emergency medical providers to be firefighters as well. At the conclusion of the 2-3 year implementation process, the City will have a corps of dual role firefighter/medic providers that can staff fire apparatus or medic units throughout Alexandria. 

While these changes have focused on the personnel side of how we provide fire suppression and emergency medical service, we have additional pressures on the infrastructure side of those services. The City's approved Capital Improvement Program includes $47 million to repair and rebuild four of our fire stations.

Additionally, the City has $11 million in required developer contributions coming over the next several years to build the new Fire Station 211 on the west end. 

Last year's budget process showed the need for obtaining reliable and consistent data around emergency response. With that in mind, the City will be kicking off a new station location study, led by the City's Office of Performance Accountability. 

This study, along with other reform efforts will improve the delivery of these life-saving services in an efficient manner. 

In June, City Council approved the Phase I Landscape and Flood Mitigation Plan for our Old Town waterfront. The Olin Group concept, inspired by the approved Waterfront Plan and improved by the input of many residents, brings to life the vision of a more active and sustainable waterfront. 

In approving the concept, the Council asked our staff to return with an implementation schedule and funding plan. 

Last month a public meeting was held to present the implementation schedule and funding options to the community and the City's Waterfront and Parks and Recreation Commissions. 

These are not insignificant expenses and will take many years to achieve, but if implemented, will provide our residents and visitors with the type of accessible, sustainable, and active waterfront that has inspired the planning process from the beginning. 

The schedule and funding options will go to both commissions formally this month and come to the Council at our second legislative meeting. 

Let me know your thoughts! 

The City Council is on the verge of making some of the most significant decisions of this Council term. 

In November the City's AAA/Aaa bond rating was reaffirmed by both Moody's and Standard & Poor's. The City has held these ratings for 22 years, and it might be easy to dismiss this as business as usual. 

As our neighbors in Fairfax County may teeter on the edge of a downgrade, we should never take for granted the fiscal stewardship required to maintain these ratings. These high ratings allow the City to borrow at rates lower than most jurisdictions in the country. Last month, the City did just that, issuing $36 million of new General Obligation bonds at one of the lowest rates in modern history. This saves millions for the taxpayers of tomorrow in the cost to service that debt. 

Last year, the Council adopted our 10 year Capital Improvement Program, covering fiscal years 2015 - 2024. Over the 10 year period, the program calls for $1.459 billion in capital investment throughout the City. Fully 60% of those funds go to new investments in transportation and education infrastructure. 

Our capital budget is funded primarily through a mix of debt and current year funding, also known as "cash capital." If you think of your home mortgage, the cash capital is the down payment. We also pay interest each year on the debt that was issued in previous years. 

Alexandria is very conservative with our use of debt. 

That brings us to the important decision that is now before us. The combination of the interest we pay on the debt and the cash capital contribution to our capital budget is increasing. It is crowding out spending in our operating budget. This year 12.6% of our tax dollars went to this combination. It will rise to nearly 14% over the next 5 years. 

We are already facing a gap in next year's budget due to stagnant revenue growth. The City staff has proposed capping the impact of our capital budget on our operating budget at 12%. In other words, they have proposed allowing debt to increase slightly (but remaining under our existing self-imposed constraints) to free up money for our operating budget. 

This proposal was presented last month and the Council had a significant discussion on this proposal that you can watch online.

In the end, as I stated that evening, I have discomfort at increasing our debt level, despite our capacity to pay. If we were to do so, I would want to see the City make a commitment to a minimum annual cash contribution to our capital budget.

I continue to believe our City under invests in our basic infrastructure. Whether we fund it with debt or cash, I will continue to push to increase that commitment to our infrastructure, not decrease it. If we are to increase our debt, I would like to see a portion of that debt increase go instead toward paring down our list of deferred capital projects. 

I will always believe that to be a better investment for the City in the long run.