November 23rd Mtg at Jaleo and TechShop - Courtesy of the Crystal City BID

Hope everyone is able to join us this Sunday at Jaleo in Crystal City - we are being treated by the Crystal City BID to brunch at 2 pm and a tour of TechShop at 3 pm!

SAVE THE DATE! Next Meeting Saturday morning, July 19th at 9 AM with Mimosas!

Our next AWE2 meeting will be held on Saturday , July 19th from 9-11 am at CAFE SAZON on Columbia Pike. The café is Bolivian, and owner Adrianna Torres, her sister Claudia and their mother will be providing us with Bolivian breakfast items, as well as coffee, orange juice and champagne (for those who would like a mimosa).

Our topic is transportation planning in Arlington, which will feature a presentation by the Mobility Lab and a presentation of facts about the planned streetcar for Columbia Pike, along with an opportunity for Q&A.

Plan to car pool, if at all possible. There is parking in the front of the café and on the side of the building (near Goodwill).

Sign our letter to the School Board

A few of us have been following the APS Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) fairly closely, and have written a letter to the school board listing a few of our concerns about the process.

We invite you to sign on to this letter, if you agree. We are not proposing a specific site or solution; rather, we are asking the School Board to improve the transparency of the process, and to directly include the impacted neighborhoods in the conversation. We have also requested that there be more detail on the costs, transportation and other impacts of the sites being proposed.

We would like to send the letter prior to the next school board meeting, and will be accepting signatures until JUNE 5th at noon. 

To sign, follow this link: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/arlington-womens-letter-to-arlington-school-board.

Notes from our April 2014 Meeting - Topic: Schools and County Planning Processes

In April, approximately 40 of our members met at Lyon Park to hear how the Schools and County conduct their planning processes. We had two excellent presenters who are deeply involved in the planning process for the County and Schools, respectively.

Inta Malis gave a succinct yet thorough overview of County planning : what it is, why we do it, what we hope to achieve and some recent examples of large community planning processes. Arlington County has a site devoted to current Projects & Planning on the web: http://projects.arlingtonva.us/plans-studies/

Todd McCracken provided the recent history of APS planning, and provided a backdrop for how the current capacity situation has created a need to look at planning a bit differently on the School side. There was a recognized need to move beyond the regular two-year CIP planning cycle to a longer timeline. He explained the genesis of the new Master Planning Process that began this year, and its recent expansion into three groups with broader staff and citizen involvement. Information on the work of these groups can be found here: http://www.apsva.us/Page/25416

After both presenters were done, they fielded questions from the group. During the question  and answer period, the organizers tried to capture the areas of consideration being raised by the group.

As a community, how do we balance the following:

• Educational programs drive use/needs for facilities
• Recognize the link between County planning and demographics
• How big schools should be in Arlington? Parents value small class sizes and schools, but our capacity issues and limited space for schools is at odds with this stated value.
• How do density increases drive/change demographics?
• How does the current CIP impact into the master planning process (CIP decisions being made in June)? Why is the CIP being decided this year prior to the expected report from the Master Planning Committees in September?
• How to develop multi-purpose programs and site when we have limited land/ resources?
• Not all of the County's plans have visibility, though they exist.  How to publicize their existence to the citizenry, and prioritize the goals of each when making planning decisions?
• What about educational links?
• Could schools be considered a community benefit from developers?  Will the development community be asked to house schools in their sites?  Long term leases?
• Discuss vision in tandem with realistic goals.
• Hot button planning happening now:
• update of Rosslyn sector plan
• Courthouse Govt Center and Plaza
• WRAPS (West Rosslyn Area Planning Study)
• Lee Highway
• Affordable Housing Study
• How diverse/ representative are the perspectives on the Master Planning Groups?  Is it transparent?
• With long-term planning, how does the County communicate about vision and plans so that newer Arlingtonians are aware of them, educated on the goals and aren't surprised when some actions to further the plans are taken?  

County and Schools Web Resources

Our April meeting explored key County and School planning processes now underway.  One emergent theme was the need for better County-School joint planning and information sharing.  Collectively, many of us are active on these processes, or at least follow them.  Most have good websites for meeting info and documents:

•  Schools CIP—a ten-year plan to build new schools, renovate existing schools and related-issues like boundary changes. http://www.apsva.us/moreseats
• County CIP—ten year plan for infrastructure, parks and other investments—paid for by general obligation bonds approved by ballot.  Due to be adopted on July 19^th.  The public hearing is June 10, 2014 @ 7pm.  Advanced sign up through the website is possible. http://budget.arlingtonva.us/capital-improvement-program/
• Schools Master Planning Capacity Planning Project—meeting dates announced through June; on a fast track  http://www.apsva.us/Page/25416

“The Master Planning committee was created to ensure that APS assesses all significant and potentially feasible future options for capacity planning for the District. To break down the work into more manageable pieces, three working groups were created to further explore, investigate and analyze particular topic areas. The results of these working groups will then be brought back to the overall committee for synthesis, conflicts, synergies, and scenario development.”

 

Photo: Generations of Powerful Arlington Women

At the last meeting, a picture of some of our mother-daughter members was taken.  In the photo (from left to right) are Kathryn Scruggs, Jane Scruggs, Peg Hogan, Alice Hogan, Anna Nelson and Ginni Nelson.  (Note how the Scruggs and Nelsons are color-coordinated!)

The three daughters - Jane, Alice and Anna - were in the same graduating class (Class of '88) at Washington-Lee High School.

We have a name!

At our meeting last evening (April 26th), the name AWE was overwhelmingly selected by the women in attendance. It stands for Arlington Women Educating and Empowering. 

Because we learned later that another group may be using the acronym AWE, the organizers decided on AWE2 (to be read "AWE squared," so we don't lose the second "E" in the title).

Agenda for the April 26, 2014 Meeting

In response to our issue brainstorming at our last meeting, our program for this meeting is an overview of PLANNING.

We are fortunate to have Inta Malis, planning commissioner and chair of the Columbia Pike Neighborhood Plan speak about the County planning process, and Todd McCracken, chair of the current APS Master Planning Process, speak about the school system's recent efforts to do more long range planning. Being a group of engaged women, we will have additional expertise in the room, so it promises to be a good discussion.
 
From 7-7:30, prior to our program, we will host our informal social with food and drinks. We encourage those of you who work with non profits to bring information to place on our community information tables. No pressure, but many of you have expressed an interest in learning more about local non-profit groups so we wanted to make information available for those who would like it.

We will encourage everyone to vote on our group's name during this meeting.

February 1st - Notes from our first meeting

We started with a half hour informal meet and greet at the top of the meeting. Again, we want women to get to know each other and speak informally, so we will plan to begin all our meetings this way.

The organizers introduced ourselves, and discussed what we envision this group to be and not to be. It is not intended to be partisan, overtly political or a fundraising group, as there are plenty of other terrific groups that do these things.  We do want to educate ourselves on issues and advocate for solutions that our members back. We encourage smaller, issues-oriented groups to form as women make connections and want to discuss items in more depth.

For the record, the organizers are: Ginger Brown, Alice Hogan, Mary Kane, Kathleen McSweeney, Lisa Nisenson, Carmen Romero and Mary Rouleau.

We are an open group and don't have an official membership or dues. We encourage women to bring friends who are interested in the group. The exception is elected officials: women holding office will not be invited to join our group, unless they are invited to address us on a specific topic. Ditto with candidates running for office.

We decided to poll the group for topics of interest, and Lisa led the group in a brainstorming activity. The results are captured in this document. We will identify trends in the comments and issues listed, and will use the information to come up with the program for our next meeting.

We discussed an official name for the group, and brainstormed possibilities at the end of the meeting. We will gather suggestions, and take a vote at the next meeting.

The Formation of an Arlington Women's Group to Strategize/Socialize/educate/Empower/Act

In the fall of 2013, seven Arlington women decided it was time to break down the silos among advocacy groups in Arlington. A few of these women already knew one another, and served on commissions or PTAs together. They met to flesh out an idea. Wouldn't it be great for a group of women who already take an active interest in Arlington, come together to ask strategic questions, educate themselves on issues, come up with ideas and then act on them?

It would also be a great way for women to socialize and network with one another in a fun, informal way. Food and wine would be essential ingredients.

Here is the first email message we sent out to about 100 women we collectively knew in Arlington:

The idea?  100ArlingtonWomen Meet Up   to    Strategize/Socialize/Educate/Empower/Act

We envision “100ArlingtonWomen” [working title]  as a powerful group of motivated women who live/work in Arlington and want to connect both personally and professionally to educate ourselves on crucial and quality of life public concerns in Arlington, from schools to smart growth. Our goal is to empower ourselves to seek solutions and advocate for change. We plan on holding quarterly wine and cheese gatherings and running a moderated listserv. Add your voice, socialize and create new ties - it's our community. Make sure you have a say. 

Please join us for our inaugural meeting on Sat., Feb. 1, from 7-9 p.m. at the Lyon Park Community House, 414 N Fillmore St. between N Pershing Drive and 4th Street.

We know the women to whom we are reaching out are ALREADY busy, but believe that by interconnecting skills and existing networks we can increase personal/collective outcomes with little extra time invested.  We are not tied to a political party.  We want to create an informal gathering of creative thinkers to educate ourselves on issues and propose solutions.

 

We received many positive emails in response, and met with about 45 other women on February 1st at the Lyon Park Community Center.