If DC's system is the result, no thanks.

by Bob on Mar 25, 2010 12:52 pm  

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Arlington is really small. Do wethey really need a R-B ward member fighting with the Pentagon City member about whose transit system is better, while the ward member from North Arlington just opposes any funding for transit because his ward doesn't have metro and the ward member from Bailey's crossroads is just envious of R-B and Pentagon City?

by Jasper on Mar 25, 2010 1:33 pm  

There might be another slew of unintended consequences if this were to change, all in the way Virginia legislates.

Because Virginia is a "Dillon Rule" state, localities can only make ordinances on issues they're explicitly allowed to cover by the state General Assembly.

Arlington has many many many single-locality exceptions in the Virginia code, won over decades, to enable the County to do things locally that other counties and cities are not permitted to do.

However, singling out Arlington by name would invite a Constitutional challenge, so the General Assembly often targets an Arlington-only exception by stating the rule applies to "localities with a County Manager form of government."

Changing out of a "County Manager form of government" could cause Arlington to lose all its hard-won self-governing liberties.

by Joey on Mar 25, 2010 1:40 pm  

This reminds me of the old debate as to whether or not Arlington should just go ahead and become City of Arlington. It's the smallest county in the country and is obviously densely populated enough. However, given Virginia's strict Dillon Rule status I can see how they would be loathe to sacrifice any hard won jurisdictional freedoms.

by Mike on Mar 25, 2010 1:49 pm  

Sounds like a Republican scheme to get one of their own on the board to me.

by Sarah Palin on Mar 25, 2010 2:09 pm  

Nevermind Arlington County, it's Virginia's byzantine government that needs a good overhaul. Hell, if you look closely enough at the books, slavery is probably still legal in the Commonwealth.

by Ron on Mar 25, 2010 2:33 pm  

Oh, this again.

Rumors about this have been floating around since last year. There was some scuttlebutt that petitions would get pushed during the primary election in June (never happened) and Democratic poll workers were told not to take a position on it and not to pull double duty.

From what I've heard, this idea is getting pushed by the Police and Fire unions because they feel the former County Manager reneged on agreements with them. I don't know if that's true but this seems like a massive over-reaction. It also conflates two issues that could be dealt with separately - 1) County Manager vs. County Board and 2) All At-Large vs. Districts

Arlington politics can seem pretty clubby and insular at times, although not more so than what goes on anywhere else. It's local politics, and it takes relatively more work to follow than big national stuff, so only people who really care do. Would districts help that? That seems unlikely, particularly if the size of the board doesn't expand. Right now I get to vote for every member of the Board. How would I benefit if I only get to vote for one or two?

I'm really not sure what the argument here is. The website seem relatively scattershot and doesn't have a well focused message. Also, because I'm horribly pedantic, I'm docking points for their 'Districts' page using the term Board even when not applicable. Either use the right name (Board, Council, etc) or use "Legislature".

by Distantantennas on Mar 25, 2010 2:36 pm  

Since there would still be no executive I do not see how this would help. Alexandria on the other hand desperately needs a ward system. Only one member of the city council lives in a walkable area, and predictably only he responds to constituent mail about pedestrian issues.

by S.B. on Mar 25, 2010 2:41 pm  

Some north arlington people were talking about this. Foolish. And politically won't happen.

Although it would be a good chance to slap down the police here and teach them a lesson or two. Getting rid of patrol cars and making them bike could be a good first step. Forcing them to open up more public information would also ben nice. Time to remember who they work for.

by charlie on Mar 25, 2010 2:51 pm  

The Change Arlington web site is very cagey about who is behind it. There are no names of people that support it, no link to a page that shows who is funding it, no street address or phone number. The only clue is the e-mail address goes to the Arlington Professional Firefighters and Paramedics Association (an affiliate of the International Association of Firefighters, IAFF). Why are they so secretive about who they are? Do they think if people know who they are they will lose?

It seems from their web site the thing that is "broken" that needs to be fixed is that the IAFF isn't getting the money it wants from the Arlington board. The solution is to reshape the board to make it easier for the union to win. Providing more money for firefighter can come from only two places: higher taxes and cuts to other parts of county government. It will not come from changing the form of government.

For the record, here is how other local governments are structured:

Alexandria: Mayor + 6 at large
Arlington: 5 at large
Fairfax: 9 districts + 1 at large
Montgomery: 5 districts + 4 at large
Prince Georges: 9 districts
Washington: 8 districts + 5 at large

by Stanton Park on Mar 25, 2010 2:52 pm  

Yes, yes, YES, absolutely, it needs to change.

For the record, I live in Arlington and have no connection of any kind to the police or firefighters. And like many on the Board, I'm a liberal Democrat.

But the County Board has no accountability in its at-large makeup. No matter where you live, you have no one person who is responsible for addressing your concerns. You can e-mail the county manager; good luck with that.

This is one reason that jurisdications like Dallas (formerly at large) have been sued for district representation.

Moreover, Arlington County is, despite its constant PR efforts tooting its own horn, very poorly run. When you look past its constant self-promotion, there are a number major failures on its part:

* The Bromptons complex on Lee Highway, which still sits there unfinished, several years after the County failed to ensure proper construction methods;

*Streets whose residents have, year after year, requested sidewalks, only to be told the money isn't there--and yet a few blocks away there are less pressing and equally expensive street improvements;

*For all its talk of walkability, a complete failure to keep sidewalks along major streets (e.g., Washington Boulevard, Glebe Road) clear--or to require homeowners and businesses to do so;

* The debacle in Clarendon regarding new condo units atop a church, flouting the spirit and the letter of zoning laws and dangerously mixing church and state;

* All manner of waste and bad management--e.g., plowing closed library parking lots before anything else during the big blizzard; failure to balance economic development with historic character and affordability in places like Clarendon in the way that Old Town Alexandria has done well--so that now we have massive, eight-story buildings of overpriced, shoddily constructed units sitting there half-empty; a wildly inconsistent pattern of real estate assessments, where nearly identical homes are accorded hugely different valuations; crazy school districting--e.g., (according to the County government's map) kids in Rosslyn go to Yorktown HS, even though Washington-Lee is closer.

So yeah, I can't wait to have a person representing some smaller segment of the County that will include where I live, whom I can hold responsible for serving the needs of me and my neighbors.

by JB on Mar 25, 2010 4:11 pm  

JB, it's arguments from people like you that tend to keep me supporting the current system.

If Arlington had someone in place whose job was primarily representing wealthy single-family homeowners living in, say, Lyon Village, without having to balance that against the interests of those in the rest of the county (of lesser means, transportation options, etc.), I think planning would become disjointed, NIMBYfied, and geared to support solely the wealthiest anti-development interests.

You argue against the affordable housing project in conjunction with the church, and yet also complain that Clarendon is too expensive and/or too dense (quirky and inconsistent complaints to make at the same time, I'll add). If your real problem with the church/housing project is the density and height (as it seems to be from most who are opposed), that's exactly the type of NIMBY argument I'd most want tempered by someone accountable to the entire county.

Moreover, the Brompton's issue was the result of a negligent contractor and an economic collapse that occurred in the middle of construction -- hardly something to blame the County over. Having a district system wouldn't have changed that one bit.

by Joey on Mar 25, 2010 5:13 pm  

I agree with Joey. Why politically Balkanize Arlington? Especially since the county is already well-run. Developers we will have always with us, in local politics, but at least Arlington has a record of planned development and a present care for affordable housing.

by SKEller on Mar 25, 2010 5:51 pm  

Joey: You didn't exactly say it outright, but for the record, I'm not wealthy (I promise) and I don't live in Lyon Village. (I wish.)

When you say that planning would become "NIMBYfied," what you're saying is that you don't think local residents should have a say in planning. I disagree.

As to the church: Don't you think those people who live nearby *should* have more of a say than those elsewhere? You can't deny that they have the most to lose. If the issue were putting a waste dump in a poor black community, I hope you would see that that community would rightfully object--so is that "NIMBYism"? That term is just name-calling when someone has the nerve to object to something that will affect their quality of life.

That doesn't mean I think that only people like me should be represented; I don't. But the way it is now, many neighborhoods of Arlington are not represented at all. That's not a democracy.

I took a look at the Change Arlington site just today, and it's made me realize I may actually be wrong in my assumption that the Board has all the power. It sounds like they have very little and that the county manager (who is not elected) is the one who makes the decisions. That's terrible.

SKEller: I disagree that Arlington has done much at all to promote affordable housing. In fact, most of the units near the Metro are now less affordable than ever--and I have it on good authority that County employees often get first crack at the designated low-rent units.

And to say that single-member districts would Balkanize Arlington I think is a bit far-fetched. There might be some acrimony, but I think there's too little real debate on anything the way it is now. Oh, they'll have a public hearing with a few crackpots blathering for their 3 minutes--but real debate among people with any power doesn't seem to happen much.

But the larger issue is that the function of the the County government (or any government) is to serve its current residents--not future residents.

by JB on Mar 25, 2010 8:01 pm  

Let's put this a different way: can we honestly say that the orange line in Arlington would have gotten built the way it is today if there had been districts in Arlington? Would the district representing Columbia Pike or Arlington Blvd not have complained that they are paying for something that won't benefit them directly? The county is small enough as it is. No need to break it up into districts that will each barely be 2 or 3 miles square.

by Teo on Mar 25, 2010 10:55 pm  

I sort of made this point up above but will reiterate it. The presence of a County Manager is a separate question from the composition of the County Board. One could make a change that removes the County Manager but keeps at-large districts, or conversely create a districted board while keeping the County Manager. The website is advocating both changes but they don't have to come together.

by Distantantennas on Mar 25, 2010 11:34 pm  

I had a conversation a couple years ago with a high level DDOT official about the development of the complementary zoning and station planning activities associated with the development of the WMATA system.

We were comparing what happened in DC vs. Arlington (s/he commented that s/he discovered that DC did do station plans for the stations, just that they didn't get executed).

The belief in the trade is that the reason that Arlington was able to make the leap and change its development procedure (PUDs technically, not a upzoning, the existing underlying zoning remains) to intensify and complement the subway service is because the County Council members were "at large" in their representation, not ward-based. That had they been elected via individual districts that they never would have done it. (It'd be an interesting history article.)

As someone who lives in DC and pays attention to the processes and structures and vicissitudes of municipal government somewhat closely, from the standpoint of being concerned about issues of "city-wide" import, I think that the ward structure becomes hyper-parochial and encourages a discarding of broader considerations.

At the same time, having 4 Councilmembers elected citywide doesn't do much either. They end up not being supra-accountable, and for the most part, they won't step into ward-based issues that might require a broader viewpoint, out of "Council courtesy" where for the most part councilmembers defer to the Ward Councilmember on matters in their district.

I don't believe in running roughshod over citizens. OTOH, for the most part citizens demonstrate that they aren't very much interested in a long term perspective. How do we ensure that a long term perspective is included along with a focus on the immediate term? I think it's best done by having at-large members. They still end up focusing on the short term, because of the nature of government, and because of the power of citizens as voters, as residents, and as advocates. But if they have vision, they can still deal with broader concerns without losing office.

OTOH/2, in an at large system minority interests tend to be underrepresented (that's why at large systems were created, to reduce the power of ethnic voting). That's a problem. I don't think there is a way to deal with this issue very well in an at large system.

Still, I would hate to wish upon Arlington DC's parochialism.

by Richard Layman on Mar 26, 2010 7:56 am  

Yes, god yes.
As a lifelong Arlington resident (1-12 though our school system) it would be nice to at least have the chance of something other than 5 Democrats sitting on the board.

Combine that with a County Manager who often goes off and does what he wants, obligates the County and then when asked to explain or explore other options says he has already committed to that course of action?

A little change would be good.

by Daniel on Mar 26, 2010 9:57 am  

Cook doesn't compute Partisan Voting Indexes for counties, however the 8th congressional district, which includes all of Arlington, is D+16. In short, Arlington is heavily Democratic, and that's why the board is all Democratic. Changing the form of county government wouldn't necesarially change that. You'd have to either 1) gerrymander the districts to create some winnable non-democratic districts or 2) put a requirement that no more than X seats can be held by one party. I don't think either of those are desirable.

by Distantantennas on Mar 26, 2010 10:06 am  

I fully support the effort. The problem with all at-large members is that you can never get any of the board members to address your concerns. Instead, you end up talking to some aid who may or may not get back to you. When I lived in the District, I had a great relationship with the councilmember from my Ward and he would address many of my issues (which included things like trash being thrown on the ground by CVS or opposing tax increases, etc.). Also, most of the board members hail from other parts of Arlington, so I feel like I have no representation. It really is just a bunch of rich people, who don't understand that right now in the middle of a recession I CANNOT afford to pay 10% more in property taxes. Anyway, I am supporting this effort 100%.

by Pentagon City resident on Mar 26, 2010 10:24 am  

A. It's not gonna happen.
B. It shouldn't. Arlington is far too small to have districts make any sense. The notion that people in part of the county aren't effected by developments, etc in other parts of the county is just absurd. Unless you're a shut-in, you will be visiting all parts of the county at various times during your routine. With the possible exception of very small scale neighborhoody things like installing sidewalks, pocket parks, etc. And these things ARE already very much influenced by the neighborhood associations. I wonder if JB has attended any of these meetings in his neighborhood. As a former president of my neighborhood association, I can tell you that things do or don't get done based on the participation of local residents - the county explicitly told us that they wanted to build a sidewalk along a street where none existed but wouldn't if the neighborhood association didn't endorse it. I personally thought it was insane not to endorse it without reservation but hey - that's democracy in action. The noisy ones won out because no one else showed up. On the other hand, the county chose to move one of their offices into our neighborhood without notifying us ahead of time. Again, this seemed OK to me since the location of county services is a decision that needs to take into account the needs of ALL county residents, not just those living nearby.
All this is to say that I WANT county board members to keep the needs of the entire county in mind, rather than just a small sub-set, who may have their own parochial reasons for opposing something that might benefit us all. Not to mention benefitting residents throughout the region, who pass through, visit, shop, dine, etc. in the county.
I tend to find the services provided in Arlington to be amazing. Especially in comparison to other jurisdictions. I suppose there is always room to complain and want things to be better, but perspective is also a useful thing to have.
I think one of the best measures of the value to be had in living in a particular place is the price of housing. Because so many people want to live here, prices remain strong. If the place was truly badly run, this wouldn't be so.

by Josh S on Mar 29, 2010 10:16 am  

I'm in the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" camp. Nothing's perfect - but the only reason I continue to live in VA is that I love Arlington. Last week, there was an issue at the Saturday Farmer's Market - Willow was prohibited from giving out its delicious free tastes. I emailed the board, spoke to Chris Zimmerman's aide and Willow will be back on Saturday!. If you take the time to connect with the board members it usually works. There are issues that aren't that easy, and some that haven't been handled as well. I know. But we have great services, (yes there are unmet needs), and great human rights policies and practices, given the politics of the Commonwealth.

by Rhonda on Jun 17, 2010 12:41 pm