Tell me more about the School Board election process

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone announced that they are running against Anderson, Meren, or Frisch yet? Either as a Democrat trying to get the D endorsement (seems unlikely without a primary) or as a R or I.

They all have opponents:

https://www.vpap.org/localities/fairfax-county-va/elections/

Thank you! Also how in God’s green earth has Karl Frisch raised nearly $200k?? WHO likes this guy that much??!?

His funds come from out of state.

Mostly west coast/California.

He also gets financial support from nqtional donors.

He has very lottle support from fcps parents and local families.

No one cares what I think but I feel like you should only be able to fundraise from your own constituency. I feel like people who live out of state don’t know about our local issues by not sharing our lived experience here & I really don’t think their funding should be able to influence our election.

I don't care who donates to them as long as they're responsive, and Karl Frisch always has been.

So, you wanted the dog park instead of a school. Got it.

Honestly yes. My kids went to Shrevewood and it was so overcrowded - this new school in Dunn Loring will finally ease overcrowding in the nearby schools as Tysons and West Falls Church develop. I don't care about the dog park, but I like this new school site better than Oakton.

Key Word - "WAS" overcrowded - it no longer is overcrowded and neither are the schools that are around it. This project is a $60 Million waste of money that Karl Frisch is fully responsible for. Elected officials should be good stewards of tay payer money. I wonder if any school board member in history has wasted more money than Karl.

Think of the addition that McLean High or Chantilly high could have had with this money.

The issue was that the money was originally earmarked in a bond for a "Fairfax/Oakton elementary school." I'm sure Frisch had John Foster jump through some hoops to make the case that an elementary school in Dunn Loring was still a "Fairfax" elementary school.

In comparing, while re-allocating the money to McLean and Chantilly (assuming there is no need to build another ES in Fairfax/Oakton, though Mosaic sure is awfully big for an ES) would have made far more sense, it probably would have required more work on the part of county staff to justify. And they'd rather throw $60M in taxpayer money at a school that isn't needed at that site than actually work through how to adjust their plans and build more sensibly.

This is primarily on Frisch, but every other Board member who went along with his nonsense deserves to be voted out as well. These people are total nitwits and anything but good stewards of county resources.

Yes, this. And all of you just glossing over where the *new* site was chosen... there were PLENTY of families in Fairfax who are displeased because the school was NOT built on the "dog park." My child attends Mosaic and it's huge. Way too huge for an elementary school. It's not just about the physical building, which they are renovating (although, interestingly, not increasing the capacity, just making better use of space). It's about having a school so huge -- and the challenges that creates in terms of creating a sense of community, in terms of logistics for things. Every school wide event is an enormous challenge, with no parking, so many families that they need security, no elbow room, etc. Most Elementaries don't have that, so they end up with a LOT more PTA Bingo nights, ice cream nights, fun family nights, etc. But Karl wouldn't know or care about that since he isn't a parent and apparently cares more about dogs and / or their loudmouth nimby owners than our children.

Meh, Mosaic is on the bigger side, but it's not some huge outlier, there's 115 FCPS ES with a smaller design capacity, but there's also 26 with a larger design capacity. The average FCPS ES has a design capacity of ~900, Mosaic at 1,038 is ~15% bigger than your average ES. *shrug*

The average ES does not have a design capacity of 900 and many of the schools with large design capacities have considerably smaller program capacities, Mosaic not being one of them.

In any case, FCPS had long planned to build another ES in Fairfax and Frisch just killed it because he and his childless friends valued a dog park over reasonably sized elementary schools. And the Dunn Loring school isn't needed there at all. It is such an obvious waste of taxpayer money that Frisch should have been subject to a formal investigation for misuse of public funds. He is a complete moron who is only kept around because he rakes in money for Democrats from LBGTQ donors in NYC and California. It does into Frisch's account and then gets reallocated to other campaigns.

[Anonymous]

Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone announced that they are running against Anderson, Meren, or Frisch yet? Either as a Democrat trying to get the D endorsement (seems unlikely without a primary) or as a R or I.

They all have opponents:

https://www.vpap.org/localities/fairfax-county-va/elections/

Thank you! Also how in God’s green earth has Karl Frisch raised nearly $200k?? WHO likes this guy that much??!?

His funds come from out of state.

Mostly west coast/California.

He also gets financial support from nqtional donors.

He has very lottle support from fcps parents and local families.

No one cares what I think but I feel like you should only be able to fundraise from your own constituency. I feel like people who live out of state don’t know about our local issues by not sharing our lived experience here & I really don’t think their funding should be able to influence our election.

I don't care who donates to them as long as they're responsive, and Karl Frisch always has been.

So, you wanted the dog park instead of a school. Got it.

Honestly yes. My kids went to Shrevewood and it was so overcrowded - this new school in Dunn Loring will finally ease overcrowding in the nearby schools as Tysons and West Falls Church develop. I don't care about the dog park, but I like this new school site better than Oakton.

Key Word - "WAS" overcrowded - it no longer is overcrowded and neither are the schools that are around it. This project is a $60 Million waste of money that Karl Frisch is fully responsible for. Elected officials should be good stewards of tay payer money. I wonder if any school board member in history has wasted more money than Karl.

Think of the addition that McLean High or Chantilly high could have had with this money.

The issue was that the money was originally earmarked in a bond for a "Fairfax/Oakton elementary school." I'm sure Frisch had John Foster jump through some hoops to make the case that an elementary school in Dunn Loring was still a "Fairfax" elementary school.

In comparing, while re-allocating the money to McLean and Chantilly (assuming there is no need to build another ES in Fairfax/Oakton, though Mosaic sure is awfully big for an ES) would have made far more sense, it probably would have required more work on the part of county staff to justify. And they'd rather throw $60M in taxpayer money at a school that isn't needed at that site than actually work through how to adjust their plans and build more sensibly.

This is primarily on Frisch, but every other Board member who went along with his nonsense deserves to be voted out as well. These people are total nitwits and anything but good stewards of county resources.

Yes, this. And all of you just glossing over where the *new* site was chosen... there were PLENTY of families in Fairfax who are displeased because the school was NOT built on the "dog park." My child attends Mosaic and it's huge. Way too huge for an elementary school. It's not just about the physical building, which they are renovating (although, interestingly, not increasing the capacity, just making better use of space). It's about having a school so huge -- and the challenges that creates in terms of creating a sense of community, in terms of logistics for things. Every school wide event is an enormous challenge, with no parking, so many families that they need security, no elbow room, etc. Most Elementaries don't have that, so they end up with a LOT more PTA Bingo nights, ice cream nights, fun family nights, etc. But Karl wouldn't know or care about that since he isn't a parent and apparently cares more about dogs and / or their loudmouth nimby owners than our children.

Meh, Mosaic is on the bigger side, but it's not some huge outlier, there's 115 FCPS ES with a smaller design capacity, but there's also 26 with a larger design capacity. The average FCPS ES has a design capacity of ~900, Mosaic at 1,038 is ~15% bigger than your average ES. *shrug*

The average ES does not have a design capacity of 900 and many of the schools with large design capacities have considerably smaller program capacities, Mosaic not being one of them.

In any case, FCPS had long planned to build another ES in Fairfax and Frisch just killed it because he and his childless friends valued a dog park over reasonably sized elementary schools. And the Dunn Loring school isn't needed there at all. It is such an obvious waste of taxpayer money that Frisch should have been subject to a formal investigation for misuse of public funds. He is a complete moron who is only kept around because he rakes in money for Democrats from LBGTQ donors in NYC and California. It does into Frisch's account and then gets reallocated to other campaigns.

Fine, I was rounding... the mean average design capacity of all 142 FCPS ES is "894.15". Pedant. But this brings to mind that medians are usually better in cases like this so that outliers have less impact, in which case 909 is the median design capacity of FCPS ES.

The median program/design capacity ratio is 84.5%. Mosaic's rate is higher (94.9%), so there is not much room to expand the program capacity at that site. There are 17 ES with even higher rates, so it's certainly up there, but it's also not completely exceptional in this regard.

Prior to the pandemic, the long-term capacity issues at the schools in/around Tysons were projected to be much higher and more urgent than in the Fairfax area, so that shift to the Dunn-Loring site was more appropriate (page 59 of https://www.fcps.edu/sites/default/files/media/pdf/amended-FY2020-24-CIP.pdf). Near-term to help address Shrevewood and Pine Spring capacity, longer-term to help with Tysons' area growth (beyond the 5-year projections shown in the CIP, which would be shared with Westbriar, Freedom Hill, Westgate, Spring Hill, primarily in this case by offloading some of Freedom Hill to Dunn-Loring to allow FH to take on more of the Tysons load).

So I don't second-guess the original plan as much as many seem to re: Dunn-Loring, but it does seem like that decision should have been revisited and likely deprioritized if possible once the situation changed in unforeseeable ways.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

Ugh, me either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

Ugh. Hard pass.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone announced that they are running against Anderson, Meren, or Frisch yet? Either as a Democrat trying to get the D endorsement (seems unlikely without a primary) or as a R or I.

They all have opponents:

https://www.vpap.org/localities/fairfax-county-va/elections/

Thank you! Also how in God’s green earth has Karl Frisch raised nearly $200k?? WHO likes this guy that much??!?

His funds come from out of state.

Mostly west coast/California.

He also gets financial support from nqtional donors.

He has very lottle support from fcps parents and local families.

No one cares what I think but I feel like you should only be able to fundraise from your own constituency. I feel like people who live out of state don’t know about our local issues by not sharing our lived experience here & I really don’t think their funding should be able to influence our election.

I don't care who donates to them as long as they're responsive, and Karl Frisch always has been.

So, you wanted the dog park instead of a school. Got it.

Honestly yes. My kids went to Shrevewood and it was so overcrowded - this new school in Dunn Loring will finally ease overcrowding in the nearby schools as Tysons and West Falls Church develop. I don't care about the dog park, but I like this new school site better than Oakton.

Key Word - "WAS" overcrowded - it no longer is overcrowded and neither are the schools that are around it. This project is a $60 Million waste of money that Karl Frisch is fully responsible for. Elected officials should be good stewards of tay payer money. I wonder if any school board member in history has wasted more money than Karl.

Think of the addition that McLean High or Chantilly high could have had with this money.

The issue was that the money was originally earmarked in a bond for a "Fairfax/Oakton elementary school." I'm sure Frisch had John Foster jump through some hoops to make the case that an elementary school in Dunn Loring was still a "Fairfax" elementary school.

In comparing, while re-allocating the money to McLean and Chantilly (assuming there is no need to build another ES in Fairfax/Oakton, though Mosaic sure is awfully big for an ES) would have made far more sense, it probably would have required more work on the part of county staff to justify. And they'd rather throw $60M in taxpayer money at a school that isn't needed at that site than actually work through how to adjust their plans and build more sensibly.

This is primarily on Frisch, but every other Board member who went along with his nonsense deserves to be voted out as well. These people are total nitwits and anything but good stewards of county resources.

Yes, this. And all of you just glossing over where the *new* site was chosen... there were PLENTY of families in Fairfax who are displeased because the school was NOT built on the "dog park." My child attends Mosaic and it's huge. Way too huge for an elementary school. It's not just about the physical building, which they are renovating (although, interestingly, not increasing the capacity, just making better use of space). It's about having a school so huge -- and the challenges that creates in terms of creating a sense of community, in terms of logistics for things. Every school wide event is an enormous challenge, with no parking, so many families that they need security, no elbow room, etc. Most Elementaries don't have that, so they end up with a LOT more PTA Bingo nights, ice cream nights, fun family nights, etc. But Karl wouldn't know or care about that since he isn't a parent and apparently cares more about dogs and / or their loudmouth nimby owners than our children.

Meh, Mosaic is on the bigger side, but it's not some huge outlier, there's 115 FCPS ES with a smaller design capacity, but there's also 26 with a larger design capacity. The average FCPS ES has a design capacity of ~900, Mosaic at 1,038 is ~15% bigger than your average ES. *shrug*

The average ES does not have a design capacity of 900 and many of the schools with large design capacities have considerably smaller program capacities, Mosaic not being one of them.

In any case, FCPS had long planned to build another ES in Fairfax and Frisch just killed it because he and his childless friends valued a dog park over reasonably sized elementary schools. And the Dunn Loring school isn't needed there at all. It is such an obvious waste of taxpayer money that Frisch should have been subject to a formal investigation for misuse of public funds. He is a complete moron who is only kept around because he rakes in money for Democrats from LBGTQ donors in NYC and California. It does into Frisch's account and then gets reallocated to other campaigns.

Fine, I was rounding... the mean average design capacity of all 142 FCPS ES is "894.15". Pedant. But this brings to mind that medians are usually better in cases like this so that outliers have less impact, in which case 909 is the median design capacity of FCPS ES.

The median program/design capacity ratio is 84.5%. Mosaic's rate is higher (94.9%), so there is not much room to expand the program capacity at that site. There are 17 ES with even higher rates, so it's certainly up there, but it's also not completely exceptional in this regard.

Prior to the pandemic, the long-term capacity issues at the schools in/around Tysons were projected to be much higher and more urgent than in the Fairfax area, so that shift to the Dunn-Loring site was more appropriate (page 59 of https://www.fcps.edu/sites/default/files/media/pdf/amended-FY2020-24-CIP.pdf). Near-term to help address Shrevewood and Pine Spring capacity, longer-term to help with Tysons' area growth (beyond the 5-year projections shown in the CIP, which would be shared with Westbriar, Freedom Hill, Westgate, Spring Hill, primarily in this case by offloading some of Freedom Hill to Dunn-Loring to allow FH to take on more of the Tysons load).

So I don't second-guess the original plan as much as many seem to re: Dunn-Loring, but it does seem like that decision should have been revisited and likely deprioritized if possible once the situation changed in unforeseeable ways.

Dunn Loring ES has been a mistake from the time Frisch came up with his half-assed idea to reallocate the Fairfax/Oakton funds there.

It has been and will continue to be surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

When it opens, part of Shrevewood will move to Stenwood, and a large part of Stenwood will get moved to Dunn Loring. Stenwood will immediately become a low-enrollment, relatively high FARMS (for the Tysons area) school.

As you say part of Freedom Hill will also get moved to Dunn Loring - certainly everything now zoned to Freedom Hill that is inside the Beltway and perhaps more.

And then, because Freedom Hill will be even more severely under-enrolled, much of the Tysons area zoned to Westbriar will get moved to Freedom Hill. Which, in turn, will complicate what is really needed - which is a new elementary school in Tysons near the growth areas, not a new school in Dunn Loring surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

The only thing that was ever appealing about Dunn Loring was the possibility of renovating the attractive older school building and restoring it to use as a school. Instead it will just get torn down.

There isn't a single Board member who supported this nonsense who should ever hold public office again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone announced that they are running against Anderson, Meren, or Frisch yet? Either as a Democrat trying to get the D endorsement (seems unlikely without a primary) or as a R or I.

They all have opponents:

https://www.vpap.org/localities/fairfax-county-va/elections/

Thank you! Also how in God’s green earth has Karl Frisch raised nearly $200k?? WHO likes this guy that much??!?

His funds come from out of state.

Mostly west coast/California.

He also gets financial support from nqtional donors.

He has very lottle support from fcps parents and local families.

No one cares what I think but I feel like you should only be able to fundraise from your own constituency. I feel like people who live out of state don’t know about our local issues by not sharing our lived experience here & I really don’t think their funding should be able to influence our election.

I don't care who donates to them as long as they're responsive, and Karl Frisch always has been.

So, you wanted the dog park instead of a school. Got it.

Honestly yes. My kids went to Shrevewood and it was so overcrowded - this new school in Dunn Loring will finally ease overcrowding in the nearby schools as Tysons and West Falls Church develop. I don't care about the dog park, but I like this new school site better than Oakton.

Key Word - "WAS" overcrowded - it no longer is overcrowded and neither are the schools that are around it. This project is a $60 Million waste of money that Karl Frisch is fully responsible for. Elected officials should be good stewards of tay payer money. I wonder if any school board member in history has wasted more money than Karl.

Think of the addition that McLean High or Chantilly high could have had with this money.

The issue was that the money was originally earmarked in a bond for a "Fairfax/Oakton elementary school." I'm sure Frisch had John Foster jump through some hoops to make the case that an elementary school in Dunn Loring was still a "Fairfax" elementary school.

In comparing, while re-allocating the money to McLean and Chantilly (assuming there is no need to build another ES in Fairfax/Oakton, though Mosaic sure is awfully big for an ES) would have made far more sense, it probably would have required more work on the part of county staff to justify. And they'd rather throw $60M in taxpayer money at a school that isn't needed at that site than actually work through how to adjust their plans and build more sensibly.

This is primarily on Frisch, but every other Board member who went along with his nonsense deserves to be voted out as well. These people are total nitwits and anything but good stewards of county resources.

Yes, this. And all of you just glossing over where the *new* site was chosen... there were PLENTY of families in Fairfax who are displeased because the school was NOT built on the "dog park." My child attends Mosaic and it's huge. Way too huge for an elementary school. It's not just about the physical building, which they are renovating (although, interestingly, not increasing the capacity, just making better use of space). It's about having a school so huge -- and the challenges that creates in terms of creating a sense of community, in terms of logistics for things. Every school wide event is an enormous challenge, with no parking, so many families that they need security, no elbow room, etc. Most Elementaries don't have that, so they end up with a LOT more PTA Bingo nights, ice cream nights, fun family nights, etc. But Karl wouldn't know or care about that since he isn't a parent and apparently cares more about dogs and / or their loudmouth nimby owners than our children.

Meh, Mosaic is on the bigger side, but it's not some huge outlier, there's 115 FCPS ES with a smaller design capacity, but there's also 26 with a larger design capacity. The average FCPS ES has a design capacity of ~900, Mosaic at 1,038 is ~15% bigger than your average ES. *shrug*

The average ES does not have a design capacity of 900 and many of the schools with large design capacities have considerably smaller program capacities, Mosaic not being one of them.

In any case, FCPS had long planned to build another ES in Fairfax and Frisch just killed it because he and his childless friends valued a dog park over reasonably sized elementary schools. And the Dunn Loring school isn't needed there at all. It is such an obvious waste of taxpayer money that Frisch should have been subject to a formal investigation for misuse of public funds. He is a complete moron who is only kept around because he rakes in money for Democrats from LBGTQ donors in NYC and California. It does into Frisch's account and then gets reallocated to other campaigns.

Fine, I was rounding... the mean average design capacity of all 142 FCPS ES is "894.15". Pedant. But this brings to mind that medians are usually better in cases like this so that outliers have less impact, in which case 909 is the median design capacity of FCPS ES.

The median program/design capacity ratio is 84.5%. Mosaic's rate is higher (94.9%), so there is not much room to expand the program capacity at that site. There are 17 ES with even higher rates, so it's certainly up there, but it's also not completely exceptional in this regard.

Prior to the pandemic, the long-term capacity issues at the schools in/around Tysons were projected to be much higher and more urgent than in the Fairfax area, so that shift to the Dunn-Loring site was more appropriate (page 59 of https://www.fcps.edu/sites/default/files/media/pdf/amended-FY2020-24-CIP.pdf). Near-term to help address Shrevewood and Pine Spring capacity, longer-term to help with Tysons' area growth (beyond the 5-year projections shown in the CIP, which would be shared with Westbriar, Freedom Hill, Westgate, Spring Hill, primarily in this case by offloading some of Freedom Hill to Dunn-Loring to allow FH to take on more of the Tysons load).

So I don't second-guess the original plan as much as many seem to re: Dunn-Loring, but it does seem like that decision should have been revisited and likely deprioritized if possible once the situation changed in unforeseeable ways.

Dunn Loring ES has been a mistake from the time Frisch came up with his half-assed idea to reallocate the Fairfax/Oakton funds there.

It has been and will continue to be surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

When it opens, part of Shrevewood will move to Stenwood, and a large part of Stenwood will get moved to Dunn Loring. Stenwood will immediately become a low-enrollment, relatively high FARMS (for the Tysons area) school.

As you say part of Freedom Hill will also get moved to Dunn Loring - certainly everything now zoned to Freedom Hill that is inside the Beltway and perhaps more.

And then, because Freedom Hill will be even more severely under-enrolled, much of the Tysons area zoned to Westbriar will get moved to Freedom Hill. Which, in turn, will complicate what is really needed - which is a new elementary school in Tysons near the growth areas, not a new school in Dunn Loring surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

The only thing that was ever appealing about Dunn Loring was the possibility of renovating the attractive older school building and restoring it to use as a school. Instead it will just get torn down.

There isn't a single Board member who supported this nonsense who should ever hold public office again.

FH parent here and I agree. Tyson’s has an issue (that will get worse) with overcrowding at the HS level. That needs to be addressed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

Ugh. Hard pass.

I was expecting something better than a copy of Asra Nomani's talking points.

Bartkowski could win if he toned down the MAGA "parental rights" stuff and focused on facilities issues, especially in the McLean and Marshall pyramids.

But judging from this he's going to get beaten badly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Has anyone announced that they are running against Anderson, Meren, or Frisch yet? Either as a Democrat trying to get the D endorsement (seems unlikely without a primary) or as a R or I.

They all have opponents:

https://www.vpap.org/localities/fairfax-county-va/elections/

Thank you! Also how in God’s green earth has Karl Frisch raised nearly $200k?? WHO likes this guy that much??!?

His funds come from out of state.

Mostly west coast/California.

He also gets financial support from nqtional donors.

He has very lottle support from fcps parents and local families.

No one cares what I think but I feel like you should only be able to fundraise from your own constituency. I feel like people who live out of state don’t know about our local issues by not sharing our lived experience here & I really don’t think their funding should be able to influence our election.

I don't care who donates to them as long as they're responsive, and Karl Frisch always has been.

So, you wanted the dog park instead of a school. Got it.

Honestly yes. My kids went to Shrevewood and it was so overcrowded - this new school in Dunn Loring will finally ease overcrowding in the nearby schools as Tysons and West Falls Church develop. I don't care about the dog park, but I like this new school site better than Oakton.

Key Word - "WAS" overcrowded - it no longer is overcrowded and neither are the schools that are around it. This project is a $60 Million waste of money that Karl Frisch is fully responsible for. Elected officials should be good stewards of tay payer money. I wonder if any school board member in history has wasted more money than Karl.

Think of the addition that McLean High or Chantilly high could have had with this money.

The issue was that the money was originally earmarked in a bond for a "Fairfax/Oakton elementary school." I'm sure Frisch had John Foster jump through some hoops to make the case that an elementary school in Dunn Loring was still a "Fairfax" elementary school.

In comparing, while re-allocating the money to McLean and Chantilly (assuming there is no need to build another ES in Fairfax/Oakton, though Mosaic sure is awfully big for an ES) would have made far more sense, it probably would have required more work on the part of county staff to justify. And they'd rather throw $60M in taxpayer money at a school that isn't needed at that site than actually work through how to adjust their plans and build more sensibly.

This is primarily on Frisch, but every other Board member who went along with his nonsense deserves to be voted out as well. These people are total nitwits and anything but good stewards of county resources.

Yes, this. And all of you just glossing over where the *new* site was chosen... there were PLENTY of families in Fairfax who are displeased because the school was NOT built on the "dog park." My child attends Mosaic and it's huge. Way too huge for an elementary school. It's not just about the physical building, which they are renovating (although, interestingly, not increasing the capacity, just making better use of space). It's about having a school so huge -- and the challenges that creates in terms of creating a sense of community, in terms of logistics for things. Every school wide event is an enormous challenge, with no parking, so many families that they need security, no elbow room, etc. Most Elementaries don't have that, so they end up with a LOT more PTA Bingo nights, ice cream nights, fun family nights, etc. But Karl wouldn't know or care about that since he isn't a parent and apparently cares more about dogs and / or their loudmouth nimby owners than our children.

Meh, Mosaic is on the bigger side, but it's not some huge outlier, there's 115 FCPS ES with a smaller design capacity, but there's also 26 with a larger design capacity. The average FCPS ES has a design capacity of ~900, Mosaic at 1,038 is ~15% bigger than your average ES. *shrug*

The average ES does not have a design capacity of 900 and many of the schools with large design capacities have considerably smaller program capacities, Mosaic not being one of them.

In any case, FCPS had long planned to build another ES in Fairfax and Frisch just killed it because he and his childless friends valued a dog park over reasonably sized elementary schools. And the Dunn Loring school isn't needed there at all. It is such an obvious waste of taxpayer money that Frisch should have been subject to a formal investigation for misuse of public funds. He is a complete moron who is only kept around because he rakes in money for Democrats from LBGTQ donors in NYC and California. It does into Frisch's account and then gets reallocated to other campaigns.

Fine, I was rounding... the mean average design capacity of all 142 FCPS ES is "894.15". Pedant. But this brings to mind that medians are usually better in cases like this so that outliers have less impact, in which case 909 is the median design capacity of FCPS ES.

The median program/design capacity ratio is 84.5%. Mosaic's rate is higher (94.9%), so there is not much room to expand the program capacity at that site. There are 17 ES with even higher rates, so it's certainly up there, but it's also not completely exceptional in this regard.

Prior to the pandemic, the long-term capacity issues at the schools in/around Tysons were projected to be much higher and more urgent than in the Fairfax area, so that shift to the Dunn-Loring site was more appropriate (page 59 of https://www.fcps.edu/sites/default/files/media/pdf/amended-FY2020-24-CIP.pdf). Near-term to help address Shrevewood and Pine Spring capacity, longer-term to help with Tysons' area growth (beyond the 5-year projections shown in the CIP, which would be shared with Westbriar, Freedom Hill, Westgate, Spring Hill, primarily in this case by offloading some of Freedom Hill to Dunn-Loring to allow FH to take on more of the Tysons load).

So I don't second-guess the original plan as much as many seem to re: Dunn-Loring, but it does seem like that decision should have been revisited and likely deprioritized if possible once the situation changed in unforeseeable ways.

Dunn Loring ES has been a mistake from the time Frisch came up with his half-assed idea to reallocate the Fairfax/Oakton funds there.

It has been and will continue to be surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

When it opens, part of Shrevewood will move to Stenwood, and a large part of Stenwood will get moved to Dunn Loring. Stenwood will immediately become a low-enrollment, relatively high FARMS (for the Tysons area) school.

As you say part of Freedom Hill will also get moved to Dunn Loring - certainly everything now zoned to Freedom Hill that is inside the Beltway and perhaps more.

And then, because Freedom Hill will be even more severely under-enrolled, much of the Tysons area zoned to Westbriar will get moved to Freedom Hill. Which, in turn, will complicate what is really needed - which is a new elementary school in Tysons near the growth areas, not a new school in Dunn Loring surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

The only thing that was ever appealing about Dunn Loring was the possibility of renovating the attractive older school building and restoring it to use as a school. Instead it will just get torn down.

There isn't a single Board member who supported this nonsense who should ever hold public office again.

Thank you for explaining the unintended consequences of this terrible mistake. I agree on all points. I wish the board could pause Dunn Loring and then reconsider, but the project is probably already out to bid.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Has anyone announced that they are running against Anderson, Meren, or Frisch yet? Either as a Democrat trying to get the D endorsement (seems unlikely without a primary) or as a R or I.

They all have opponents:

https://www.vpap.org/localities/fairfax-county-va/elections/

Thank you! Also how in God’s green earth has Karl Frisch raised nearly $200k?? WHO likes this guy that much??!?

His funds come from out of state.

Mostly west coast/California.

He also gets financial support from nqtional donors.

He has very lottle support from fcps parents and local families.

No one cares what I think but I feel like you should only be able to fundraise from your own constituency. I feel like people who live out of state don’t know about our local issues by not sharing our lived experience here & I really don’t think their funding should be able to influence our election.

I don't care who donates to them as long as they're responsive, and Karl Frisch always has been.

So, you wanted the dog park instead of a school. Got it.

Honestly yes. My kids went to Shrevewood and it was so overcrowded - this new school in Dunn Loring will finally ease overcrowding in the nearby schools as Tysons and West Falls Church develop. I don't care about the dog park, but I like this new school site better than Oakton.

Key Word - "WAS" overcrowded - it no longer is overcrowded and neither are the schools that are around it. This project is a $60 Million waste of money that Karl Frisch is fully responsible for. Elected officials should be good stewards of tay payer money. I wonder if any school board member in history has wasted more money than Karl.

Think of the addition that McLean High or Chantilly high could have had with this money.

The issue was that the money was originally earmarked in a bond for a "Fairfax/Oakton elementary school." I'm sure Frisch had John Foster jump through some hoops to make the case that an elementary school in Dunn Loring was still a "Fairfax" elementary school.

In comparing, while re-allocating the money to McLean and Chantilly (assuming there is no need to build another ES in Fairfax/Oakton, though Mosaic sure is awfully big for an ES) would have made far more sense, it probably would have required more work on the part of county staff to justify. And they'd rather throw $60M in taxpayer money at a school that isn't needed at that site than actually work through how to adjust their plans and build more sensibly.

This is primarily on Frisch, but every other Board member who went along with his nonsense deserves to be voted out as well. These people are total nitwits and anything but good stewards of county resources.

Yes, this. And all of you just glossing over where the *new* site was chosen... there were PLENTY of families in Fairfax who are displeased because the school was NOT built on the "dog park." My child attends Mosaic and it's huge. Way too huge for an elementary school. It's not just about the physical building, which they are renovating (although, interestingly, not increasing the capacity, just making better use of space). It's about having a school so huge -- and the challenges that creates in terms of creating a sense of community, in terms of logistics for things. Every school wide event is an enormous challenge, with no parking, so many families that they need security, no elbow room, etc. Most Elementaries don't have that, so they end up with a LOT more PTA Bingo nights, ice cream nights, fun family nights, etc. But Karl wouldn't know or care about that since he isn't a parent and apparently cares more about dogs and / or their loudmouth nimby owners than our children.

Meh, Mosaic is on the bigger side, but it's not some huge outlier, there's 115 FCPS ES with a smaller design capacity, but there's also 26 with a larger design capacity. The average FCPS ES has a design capacity of ~900, Mosaic at 1,038 is ~15% bigger than your average ES. *shrug*

The average ES does not have a design capacity of 900 and many of the schools with large design capacities have considerably smaller program capacities, Mosaic not being one of them.

In any case, FCPS had long planned to build another ES in Fairfax and Frisch just killed it because he and his childless friends valued a dog park over reasonably sized elementary schools. And the Dunn Loring school isn't needed there at all. It is such an obvious waste of taxpayer money that Frisch should have been subject to a formal investigation for misuse of public funds. He is a complete moron who is only kept around because he rakes in money for Democrats from LBGTQ donors in NYC and California. It does into Frisch's account and then gets reallocated to other campaigns.

Fine, I was rounding... the mean average design capacity of all 142 FCPS ES is "894.15". Pedant. But this brings to mind that medians are usually better in cases like this so that outliers have less impact, in which case 909 is the median design capacity of FCPS ES.

The median program/design capacity ratio is 84.5%. Mosaic's rate is higher (94.9%), so there is not much room to expand the program capacity at that site. There are 17 ES with even higher rates, so it's certainly up there, but it's also not completely exceptional in this regard.

Prior to the pandemic, the long-term capacity issues at the schools in/around Tysons were projected to be much higher and more urgent than in the Fairfax area, so that shift to the Dunn-Loring site was more appropriate (page 59 of https://www.fcps.edu/sites/default/files/media/pdf/amended-FY2020-24-CIP.pdf). Near-term to help address Shrevewood and Pine Spring capacity, longer-term to help with Tysons' area growth (beyond the 5-year projections shown in the CIP, which would be shared with Westbriar, Freedom Hill, Westgate, Spring Hill, primarily in this case by offloading some of Freedom Hill to Dunn-Loring to allow FH to take on more of the Tysons load).

So I don't second-guess the original plan as much as many seem to re: Dunn-Loring, but it does seem like that decision should have been revisited and likely deprioritized if possible once the situation changed in unforeseeable ways.

Dunn Loring ES has been a mistake from the time Frisch came up with his half-assed idea to reallocate the Fairfax/Oakton funds there.

It has been and will continue to be surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

When it opens, part of Shrevewood will move to Stenwood, and a large part of Stenwood will get moved to Dunn Loring. Stenwood will immediately become a low-enrollment, relatively high FARMS (for the Tysons area) school.

As you say part of Freedom Hill will also get moved to Dunn Loring - certainly everything now zoned to Freedom Hill that is inside the Beltway and perhaps more.

And then, because Freedom Hill will be even more severely under-enrolled, much of the Tysons area zoned to Westbriar will get moved to Freedom Hill. Which, in turn, will complicate what is really needed - which is a new elementary school in Tysons near the growth areas, not a new school in Dunn Loring surrounded by under-enrolled schools.

The only thing that was ever appealing about Dunn Loring was the possibility of renovating the attractive older school building and restoring it to use as a school. Instead it will just get torn down.

There isn't a single Board member who supported this nonsense who should ever hold public office again.

Thank you for explaining the unintended consequences of this terrible mistake. I agree on all points. I wish the board could pause Dunn Loring and then reconsider, but the project is probably already out to bid.

There is certainly money being wasted now on architects to come up with plans. As far as I'm aware the main construction contract hasn't been put out to bid yet. If the next School Board, which will be composed primarily of new members, has any sense they will put this project on hold indefinitely and say it was a hasty decision made by the prior School Board prior to Covid.

Note that FCPS lies about Dunn Loring to hide Frisch's idiocy. On the "Building Our Future: Capital Projects" page, FCPS claims that Dunn Loring and all the other projects on the page are "underway (sic) based on their order in the Renovation Queue Status." That is a lie - Dunn Loring was never in the renovation queue; rather, the Capital Improvement Program was amended at Frisch's request two years ago to the reallocate money earmarked for a new school in Fairfax/Oakton to Dunn Loring instead. It was never in the "Renovation Queue." The other School Board members should have shut Frisch down then, but were too lazy and blinded by party loyalty to do so.

https://www.fcps.edu/building-our-future-capital-project-status

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

Looks like a solid, common sense platform.

Of course the dcum childless trolls hate it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

Looks like a solid, common sense platform.

Of course the dcum childless trolls hate it.

I'm not childless, thanks, but it's not a winning platform. If this stays a two-way race, he's looking at 40% of the votes at most unless he comes up with something better. Believe me, it doesn't make me happy to say that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

Ugh. Hard pass.

I was expecting something better than a copy of Asra Nomani's talking points.

Bartkowski could win if he toned down the MAGA "parental rights" stuff and focused on facilities issues, especially in the McLean and Marshall pyramids.

But judging from this he's going to get beaten badly.

Yeah, agree... would love a moderate alternative to Lady who focused on facilities, expanding mental health resources, and then as it pertains to equity, emphasize raising the floor in a way that doesn't simultaneously lower the ceiling. Doesn't look like either party is really capable of delivering that candidate right now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

Ugh. Hard pass.

I was expecting something better than a copy of Asra Nomani's talking points.

Bartkowski could win if he toned down the MAGA "parental rights" stuff and focused on facilities issues, especially in the McLean and Marshall pyramids.

But judging from this he's going to get beaten badly.

Yeah, agree... would love a moderate alternative to Lady who focused on facilities, expanding mental health resources, and then as it pertains to equity, emphasize raising the floor in a way that doesn't simultaneously lower the ceiling. Doesn't look like either party is really capable of delivering that candidate right now.

+1. It's sad that neither candidate seems to have a clue about what matters to most families in Dranesville. But if it's going to be a contest between generic Democrat and generic Republican, there's not much question as to which one will prevail in Fairfax.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Paul Bartkowski, who is running in Dranesville, has his web site up. Maybe this is a first stab but I'm not impressed.

https://paulforfcsb.com/

He's going to put instruction first, but he's a lawyer with no educational background and has not one coherent thing to say about instruction and curriculum. He's running on a straight MAGA platform. Yuck.