This article was written by Marian Marquez, Director of Business Investment for Arlington Economic Development.
It’s the time of the year when our favorite outlets are releasing their “year in review” and… what a year it has been!
I know I’m not alone when I say it’s been a year like no other for our Business Investment Group (BIG) at Arlington Economic Development. Like many others, we quickly learned to do business not as usual. Our “normal” work is to support economic growth through job creation and business expansion in Arlington County, and that all changed in mid-March of this year.
December 29, 2020 at 2:45pm
Longtime Arlington residents who founded a Rosslyn-based online university are donating $50,000 to help local small businesses.
In 1998, Yanping Chen and J. Davidson Frame established the University of Management and Technology, a fully online school enrolling national and international students, located at 1901 Fort Myer Drive. Their $50,000 donation comes from the Chen Frame Foundation, which they started to support educational causes across the world.
But now, they are thinking closer to home.
“COVID-19 brought to mind that we’re not focused enough on our own backyard,” Frame said.
Arlington Economic Development will use the money to help pay for new initiatives, such as educational programming and online services, to help small businesses through the pandemic.
This column is sponsored by Arlington Arts/Arlington Cultural Affairs, a division of Arlington Economic Development.
For holiday shoppers in the know, the annual Lee Arts Center Holiday Show and Sale has been a cherished Arlington tradition that allows you to #shoplocal for the holidays finding unique ceramics, prints and other handmade crafts. This year, Arlington Arts invites you to visit Lee Arts Center Artists on the Web, where in addition to shopping from the socially distanced comfort of your home, you can also explore the artists’ talents more deeply.
Located in a charming former 1920s schoolhouse, the Lee Arts Center is a fully equipped professional studio for artists working in ceramics and printmaking. The Center houses a mini-gallery with rotating exhibitions of visiting and resident artists. Master workshops are offered throughout the year. Of course, that’s what goes on usually… For the safety of the public and the artists alike, the center has been closed duri
December 14, 2020 at 5:00pm
(Updated at 5:15 p.m.) Few office and retail spaces were approved or completed in the first three quarters of 2020, but Arlington officials say it is too early to attribute the drop to the pandemic or consider it a trend at all.
The 2020 third quarter report on retail, office, hotel and residential development appears to show that the rates at which projects are approved, buildings are demolished, and construction starts and ends have dropped off in 2020. Meanwhile, the demolition and redevelopment of single-family detached homes appears to remain consistent.
No hotel rooms have been approved or built so far in 2020 (though a former hotel was demolished in spectacular fashion on Sunday). About 120,000 square feet of retail has been completed this year, and 40,000 square feet approved, but rates exceeded both those sums in 2019. About 17,000 square feet of office space was approved this year, compared to 2 million last year thanks to Amazon’s HQ2.