The Falls Church League of Women Voters has made an important mistake and done a disservice to its core mission of voter education. The organization should publicly correct its error and take steps to ensure it returns to its tradition of being one of the most informed local organizations in the city.
In a letter to the editor in the November 27, 2008 edition of the Falls Church News-Press, League President Joan Lewis wrote the organization "had learned" developer Atlantic Realty is considering making proposed changes to the city center south project. The reaction of the LOWV to the rather standard request of Atlantic is to demand the previous approval of the project by the city council be disregarded and the entire project go through re-review and re-approval:
"... We understand that in such circumstances the process is reopened and the whole proposal is re-evaluated under the guidance of the Special Exception Ordinance. The new design concept should be considered as carefully as the original design was ..."
As the LOWV knows or should know, requests for changes in projects by developers are routine. Changes which do not materially modify the project go through a public charrette process and must be approved by the Planning Commission during site plan approval. Only significant changes to the project would require a complete scrapping and re-consideration of the project from day one. Atlantic Realty has only had initial discussions about proposed changes, but has not formally asked for any specific changes. The developer is well aware material changes would vitiate its existing agreement with the city and force a complete reconsideration of the project from the very beginning. The approval of the city center south project took eight yeras, so I suspect Atlantic will avoid that scenario at all costs.
But the LOWV has jumped on the minor request and taken it as an opportunity to call for a complete review and re-vote on the whole project. The organization passed a resolution opposed to the project earlier this year. The campaign treasurer and girlfriend of council member Nader Baroukh (an outspoken NIMBY critic of the city center plan) is an officer of the LOWV. The LOWV did not talk with its membership, council members who support the city center plan, or city staff before making its recommendation to scrap the city center project and start again from scratch.
Our League of Women Voters is one of the preeminent organizations in the city. I have been a member for many years and consider many of its officers and members friends and citizens whom I admire greatly.
In this instance, however, the league has made an important error. It is advocating against the extensive public process which led to the passage of critical city center project. It has made a premature radical recommendation without understanding (or explaining) what changes are actually being proposed and how those changes would require the city to void its contract with Atlantic Realty and go through the entire approval process from the very beginning (a process which took eight years). The recommendation from the normally very thoughtful organization is so out of sync from current process, it begs the question of whether the organization has acted in good faith or whether it has become polluted by myopic opposition voices from within.
The LOWV can return to its tradition of thoughtful leadership and innovative strategies in public discourse and voter education. It should begin with a clarification of its ill-concieved recommendation to disregard an eight year public process and scrap the critical city center initiative.
