Countywide

The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday (May 19) took the first step toward considering giving property owners tax rebates in years when the local government shows a significant budget surplus.

In a unanimous vote, supervisors agreed to a request by Springfield District Supervisor Pat Herrity, directing staff to begin looking at the technical and cost implications of such a proposal.


News

The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved plans on Tuesday (May 19) for 304 units of multifamily housing to replace an aging office building at 1950 Old Gallows Road in Tysons.

The development team, county staff and community “have worked together to create what I think is a much better” project than initially proposed, Providence District Supervisor Dalia Palchick said.


Countywide

Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chair Jeff McKay publicly apologized this morning (Tuesday) for calling a school board member a “bimbo” during a heated text-message exchange over budget issues.

His language, directed at Hunter Mill District Representative Melanie Meren, was “unacceptable,” McKay acknowledged during the county board’s May 19 meeting.


News

Seven years ago, Jonathan “Jack” Ham took his newly earned associate’s degree from Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA) and stepped into the next phase of his life.

Then, on Monday morning (May 18), Dr. Ham — just 24 hours removed from having received his medical degree at the University of Virginia — stepped to the stage of EagleBank Arena in Fairfax to inspire NOVA’s Class of 2026.


News

The Northern Virginia Transportation Commission (NVTC) has embarked on a new round of community engagement in its Envision Route 7 effort to upgrade transit options.

NVTC has opened an online feedback form, asking a host of questions about how bus riders in the Route 7 corridor between Seven Corners and Alexandria’s Mark Center/Southern Towers areas currently interact with the system, and what they would like to see in the future.


Countywide

Will the Fairfax County government be able to meet its goal of 10,000 new affordable housing units by 2034? The county’s top housing official is optimistic but hedging his bets.

“We do feel like we’re very much headed in the right direction,” said Thomas Fleetwood, director of the county’s Department of Housing and Community Development.


News

The night before freshman orientation at George Mason University, 17-year-old Saniya Dilip Darediya sat in her room and cried.

Having just arrived in the U.S. from India, she recalled, “I was scared and afraid I might not belong here.”


Countywide

Fairfax County supervisors have reacted tepidly to a staff proposal for imposing what might be termed a “trash tax” on Fairfax’s property owners to support solid waste disposal.

“I don’t think we’re ready. It’s kind of a hard sell,” Board of Supervisors Chairman Jeff McKay said in response to the proposal, floated at the May 12 meeting of the board’s Environment Committee.


Countywide

Fairfax County officials now have a lengthy to-do list in their efforts to increase the community’s housing stock.

The goal is to “ensure we keep the pedal down on this priority,” Ben Aiken, a county staffer who serves as project manager for the Housing Task Force, told the Board of Supervisors at a Land Use Policy Committee meeting on Tuesday (May 12).


Countywide

Despite a relatively stable year-over-year homelessness count in new data, Fairfax County’s level of those experiencing chronic homelessness ticked up more substantially between 2025 and 2026.

A total of 302 people were counted as chronically homeless in Fairfax County and the cities of Fairfax and Falls Church in this year’s Point-in-Time Survey, coordinated by the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG).


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