Rockville Town Square ice rink under construction (Photos)

Temperatures below 50 degrees over the weekend may have visitors to Rockville Town Square in the mindset for winter. The square's ice rink is under construction now, coincidentally. Where's a Zamboni when you need one?

Rockville construction update: Aldi (Photos)

As the future of groceries implodes at Rockville Town Square, Rockville's newest grocery store - Aldi - continues to be constructed at Congressional North on Rockville Pike. This used to be Circuit City years ago. Hard to imagine this store will open by year's end as promised, but stay tuned.

New poll shows Wolf only 6 points behind Frosh in Maryland Attorney General race

A new Gonzales poll out yesterday showed Republican Craig Wolf surging in the Maryland Attorney General race, only 6 percentage points behind incumbent Democrat Brian Frosh. The narrowing gap brought new attention to the race Wednesday, with Wolf using the poll in a new fundraising pitch.

Frosh was in position to win handily just a few weeks ago, although Larry Hogan has proven it is still possible for a Republican to win statewide in Democratic-controlled Maryland. Some attributed Frosh's 23-point collapse to the public perception that he has been entirely focused on Donald Trump and Washington since 2017, instead of Maryland issues. At the same time, Frosh's Trump obsession was thought to be a winning move with Democratic voters statewide.

Hammer & Stain coming to Rockville Town Square

Hammer & Stain is coming to Rockville Town Square, but despite the name, it's not the hardware store people have been demanding. Instead, it is a "Wood, Paint & Sip Studio." Similar to the painting/pottery + adult beverages fad, guests will construct a woodworking project they can take home at the end of the night.

Materials and all necessary tools are provided by the shop for the DIY workshops. Friends, officeworkers, and kids are among the target audiences for the workshops, where you might find yourself constructing planks, wood signs or rustic benches. Hammer & Stain will be located at 107-B Gibbs Street.

Apollo Restaurant to close in Rockville

The Apollo Restaurant will close at the end of this month, according to the owner, who made the bombshell announcement at a meeting about the future of Rockville Town Square. He cited high rent at Courthouse Center as the reason for the closure. Courthouse Center, like RTS, is owned by Federal Realty.

What the Apollo lacked in Michelin stars and fancy decor, it more than made up for in 4 Yelp stars, and hearty Greek/American food for three decades. A regular stop for City officials, the restaurant has a large and loyal following in the community. The Apollo is just the kind of restaurant that is increasingly facing extinction in Montgomery County - longtime, mom-and-pop operations squeezed by high rents and the high cost of doing business under an anti-business County Council.

Explosive Rockville Town Square public meeting - it's even worse then we thought

"I was crying like

hell when we 

received the letters

that they were going

to evict us"

A public meeting on the future of Rockville Town Square exceeded the fire code-allowed capacity of the Buchanan Room at VisArts last night, forcing overflow attendees to listen from out in the hallway. Emotiional testimonies by business owners were only topped by bombshell announcements of additional business closures at the Square, and another Federal Realty property in Town Center.

Takeaways from the night include two clear problems - the widely-despised parking policies at RTS, and that "the rent is too damn high" at that property and nearby Courthouse Center. Last night we learned the latter is about to lose one of its most-popular and beloved tenants, when the owner of the Apollo Restaurant announced it will close at the end of this month, citing an inability to pay the high rent Federal Realty is asking for.

Mayor Bridget Donnell Newton
addresses the crowd

A member of the family that owns Samovar, a restaurant that has been closed for almost two months after water leaked in from the apartments above it, detailed her struggles with brokers and Federal Realty from the beginning. She said a property manager at RTS repeatedly stalled in giving her a key to their leased space, leaving owners and contractors unable to immediately access the restaurant as they began construction.

"I was crying, asking and begging them," she recalled. "Please, we need to start." Her architect charged them overtime as a result, she added. "He was standing there, next to the door," as she had no key or passcode to let him in. She said her father had opened and operated a successful restaurant in New York City with seating for one-thousand people, one in Denver, and another in Portland, Oregon, and assumed he would find similar success in Rockville.

But, "we cannot survive here," she said. "I was crying like hell...when we received the letters that they were going to evict us," she recounted. She segued into one of the banes of RTS tenants - parking. "Nobody wants to come here because of the parking," She noted correctly that two hours of validated parking is not enough for many people. Samovar hosts entertainment and events at which people may stay for more than two hours. She said Samovar wants to continue, but "I don't know," receiving a round of applause at the end of her remarks from the crowd.

Attendees file into the Buchanan Room,
which eventually reached fire code capacity

A tearful owner of Pandora Seafood House and Bar said Federal Realty is evicting her restaurant later this month, after only one year (it was still operating last night). She said she was fooled about the full cost of renting the space by her agent, who she is now suing, and about what she would have to pay during the construction phase - which lasted quite a while, if you remember.

One retail tenant at the Square pointed to the larger business climate beyond Rockville as a cause of her trouble."I can no longer afford to do business in Montgomery County, or the state of Maryland," she said, announcing that she currently does not plan to renew her lease when it ends. "I'm telling you, Rockville, you are losing the heart of your city. Please do not make the mistake of letting all of your small, independent businesses go."

Former Rockville Mayor Larry Giammo, widely credited for his leadership in delivering the city's redeveloped Town Center, was clearly concerned about the fate of one of his legacy projects. Giammo honed in on the question of high rents. "What are the lease rates that Federal Realty is charging tenants here, and how do those compare" with competing developments, he asked to an eruption of applause. "It's obviously the key to understanding what's going on here."

Giammo said he was "heartbroken" to find out that Dawson's Market will be closing this month. "My family and I shop there a good three, four, five times a week. It's really a part of our lives now." He noted that the number of cars filling the reserved Dawson's Market spaces in the N. Washington Street surface lot at RTS often exceed the number of customers actually shopping inside the store. Despite repeated pleas from Dawson's to Federal Realty and parking contractor Colonial Parking, "neither has ever done anything" to assist the store. "So my question is, 'Why not?' If Federal Realty wanted it to succeed, why did they ignore such obvious issues?" Giammo concluded to applause.

Another former elected official, City Councilman Tom Moore, called the decision to cut the planned height of the development's residential buildings in half a "fatal flaw." He said the reduced density deprived Town Center business owners of many more potential customers.

Resident Joe Jordan recommended that Federal Realty and the city conduct a form of exit interview with businesses that close, to determine if the cause was rent, their business model, or another issue.

Other suggestions made by attendees included more investment in arts and entertainment, turning Dawson's into a co-op market, adding a dog park, making a better connection to the Metro station, allowing up to 5 hours of free parking, and operating a shuttle bus.

There was no shortage of complaints and concerns, but one element missing from the meeting was hearing from businesses that are doing well at Rockville Town Square. What are they doing right, what is drawing traffic to them, and how might those insights assist tenants who are struggling, or Federal Realty in better targeting local demographics? There was also frustration at the lack of feedback from City officials and Federal Realty representatives. One attendee said that he had expected more of a dialogue.

Officials said they wanted to allow the maximum time for the public and business owners to speak, rather than have a back-and-forth conversation. Mayor Bridget Donnell Newton, who called for the meeting, said the goal was to hear from all of the stakeholders involved to determine how the development can be succcessful. Rockville Chamber of Commerce CEO Marji Graf said all of those stakeholders do share one goal. "We all want the same thing - a thriving Rockville."

Los Primos Tex-Mex Grill to open in Rockville

A new Tex-Mex restaurant is coming to the Twinbrook area of Rockville. Los Primos Tex-Mex Grill will be located at 12303 Twinbrook Parkway. One of the owners is also affiliated with the popular Al Carbon in Rockville, and Azul Bar & Grill in Gaithersburg. The restaurant is scheduled to open this fall.

Rockville to consider redeveloping RedGate golf course

City will also 

examine if it can

terminate contract

with Billy Casper Golf

The controversial issue of whether to retain Rockville's public RedGate golf course, or redevelop the site, has come to the surface again. A discussion of the topic initiated by Councilmember Mark Pierzchala late Monday night ended with the Council voting 4-1 to direct City Manager Rob DiSpirito to assess the golf course property's potential for redevelopment, and conduct a fiscal impact study of the different options. Mayor Bridget Donnell Newton cast the lone vote of opposition.

Pierzchala also made a motion to have the City examine its contract with course operator Billy Casper Golf, to see if it can be terminated, citing inadequate maintenance as a potential legal justification to do so. Mayor Newton said she has observed substandard maintenance of the property while playing golf at the course in recent years, and joined in the unanimous vote approving Pierzchala's motion.

In bringing up the matter of RedGate, Pierzchala said he was approached by an unnamed developer, who asked if the golf course was for sale. Pierzchala said he replied that it was not, but that the developer was clearly eager to build residential housing on the land.

Pierzchala initially proposed studying a plan that would redevelop RedGate as City-operated athletic fields (soccer fields in particular), and residential housing consisting of townhomes and single-family homes. An unspecified portion of the parcel would be "returned to nature." After Newton and Councilmember Beryl Feinberg questioned why the study would only look at that specific mix of land-use options, Councilmember Virginia Onley proposed a successful amendment - adding the phrase "including, but not limited to," to Pierzchala's initial language. Newton supported that wording, but still voted against the study.

While - again - the developer was not identified, the "win-win"-style PR talking points, land acquisition choice, and housing types certainly sound like EYA. That developer has just recently offered a similar plan for the Montgomery Women's Cooperative Farm Market in downtown Bethesda, and successfully received approval of a comparable non-Metro-oriented development with the same housing types near Tower Oaks. Of course, EYA is not the only townhome developer in the region, so we'll have to wait and see. But the Spider-Sense is tingling.

The National Golf Foundation is expected to release a report on RedGate in January, which will tell city officials what it will take financially to bring the course up to standards. But Pierzchala said he didn't want that to end up being the sole discussion, and would prefer to have parallel discussion of other uses of the site, as well as Billy Casper's alleged default on its contract with the City.

Feinberg pressed for hard numbers on what the expense and potential revenues of every option would be. Pierzchala said he didn't need completely accurate numbers to move forward, and that ballpark estimates by staff would be sufficient for the decisions that need to be made.

"We will do our best," DiSpirito told the Mayor and Council. He estimated that an in-house analysis, without hiring outside consultants, could be completed by early January. That would be in time for the NGF report on RedGate, which is located at 14500 Avery Road, off of Norbeck Road.

Rockville's interim City Clerk to be the new City Clerk

Former Deputy City Clerk - and current acting City Clerk - Sara Taylor-Farrell has been chosen as the replacement for Kathleen Conway, who left the position last month after a closed session of the Mayor and Council. Taylor-Farrell will formally be designated as "Resident Agent for the Mayor and Council of Rockville" at tonight's Mayor & Council meeting. Municipalities are required to designate a Resident Agent, and in Rockville, it has been standard practice to have the City Clerk fill that legal role.

Rockville mayor schedules public meeting on future of Rockville Town Square

Rockville City Hall is in crisis mode after the announcement that Rockville Town Square retail anchor Dawson's Market will close at the end of this month. The bad news followed the exit of another major restaurant tenant, Mellow Mushroom, the previous week. Dawson's failure has given at least the public perception that the property is taking on water in a big way at this point - fair or not. Mayor Bridget Donnell Newton has now scheduled a public meeting on the future of the Federal Realty development, which was the keystone of the city's revitalized town center when it opened a decade ago.

In her announcement of the meeting, Newton said Dawson's Market was "an incredible community partner, and I am very sad to see them close. It came as a shock to me as well.” The meeting will be held next Tuesday, October 9, 2018 at 7:00 PM in the Buchanan Room at VisArts at Rockville Town Square.

The city has had many discussions over the years about the high turnover of tenants at the property, and a parking system that has infuriated patrons and tenants alike. With many high profile closures, including original tenant Toy Kingdom last year, action may finally have to be taken to stop the bleeding.

King Farm man arrested in Rockville rape

Montgomery County police have arrested and charged the suspect in a Rockville rape. An adult female victim was grabbed while walking just after midnight along Route 355 on October 3, and was pulled into the woods along West Gude Drive, where she was sexually assaulted. She managed to break free and run to a nearby office building,, where a security guard called police.

Detectives from the Special Victims Investigations Division determined Dustin Thomas Rogers, 25, was the suspect. Officers went to his home on Gaither Road in King Farm around 6:00 PM last night, and arrested him without incident.

Rogers has been charged with 1st degree rape and 1st degree assault.  He was also charged with a separate count of 1st degree assault via a warrant stemming from an unrelated event. Rogers is being held without bond and will have bond review today at 1:00 p.m. in Rockville District Court.

Incidents of rape in Montgomery County are up 53% this year.

Dawson's Market to close at Rockville Town Square

The bad news at Rockville Town Square continues to pile up. Now anchor retail tenant Dawson's Market says it will close on October 27, 2018. Despite more special events and tastings than any chain grocery store, the organic, hipster-oriented grocery store never took off. "Unfortunately, the store did not generate enough business to be financially viable," owner Rick Hood said Tuesday.

While the immediate focus has been the closure announcement, much of the context for just how big of a blow this is to the Square has been absent. Remember, the grocery space was one of the biggest design failures of RTS from the beginning. The demolition of Magruder's to make way for the new town center was originally meant to be made up for with a new grocery store in the new development.

But the anchor grocery space was hidden in the back corner of the development off N. Washington Street. Major grocery chains passed on the opportunity, leaving landlord Federal Realty without the prize retail anchor they needed for maximum traffic. In fact, Dawson's extracted concessions from Federal before agreeing to the lease, including over-the-top signage the market argued was necessary just for potential patrons to locate their hidden spot.

Apparently, the major grocery chains know their stuff. Dawson's never had anything close to the traffic you would find at any Giant, Safeway or even Trader Joe's or MOM's Organic Market. The too-few complimentary reserved parking spaces for Dawson's were often full at prime times, leaving grocery shoppers in the grip of a paid/validation parking scheme that has enraged drivers and business owners alike.

Failure is not an option here. While there have been sentiments that RTS is another Rockville Mall, it's not going anywhere after the investments made by all the stakeholders, including the City of Rockville. There may be no assurance of attracting another grocer unless major changes are made to the parking arrangement.

Perhaps if Federal Realty could attract either a Lidl store or an Asian grocery store, and provide enough reserved parking, the grocery space could work. Many have argued that more residences are needed within walking distance to provide more foot traffic for all businesses in the Town Square. Two large apartment towers are coming within one block of the development, but they won't be delivered for several more years. 

Unfortunately, the new developments have also provided more dining competition. Gordon Biersch had the craft beer market cornered until World of Beer came along in the Upton/Cambria Suites development, for example. A longer and stronger roster of restaurants at rival developments like Pike & Rose, Washingtonian Center/Rio and Downtown Crown - and their lure of free parking - has cost Rockville Town Square much traffic. A new Wegman's down the Pike in a couple of years won't help matters.

Bill to ban smoking in all outdoor dining areas to be introduced today by Montgomery County Council

Smoking and vaping on outdoor patios at Montgomery County restaurants could soon be a thing of the past, if Montgomery County Council Bill 35-18 passes. Scheduled to be introduced by Councilmember Sidney Katz (D - District 3) today, the bill would ban smoking and vaping in all outdoor dining areas, including partially-enclosed spaces.

A public hearing on the bill is currently scheduled for October 23, 2018 at 1:30 PM. The Council will also have to sit as the Board of Health, and pass an accompanying regulation as that board, to legally enact the smoking ban.

The legislation is very similar to that passed by the Rockville Mayor & Council last year. Adam Zimmerman, an activist who spearheaded the Rockville effort, is also advocating for the County to pass Bill 35-18. He says the ban will improve health, while increasing business at venues non-smokers currently avoid.

Rockville's ban was opposed by some restaurant owners, such as Danny Trahan of Mellow Mushroom. Trahan closed his restaurant permanently last month - though the smoking ban wasn't the primary reason. He viewed the ban as the last straw in Montgomery County's costly and unwelcoming business climate. It will be interesting to see what restaurateurs have to say about the proposed County ban.

Residents who testified before the Mayor & Council last shared Zimmerman's view that business would improve, citing their reluctance to dine at two Rockville Town Square restaurants that allowed outdoor smoking before the ban. Because many restaurants now open their doors and windows, patrons have also complained that smoke now drifts inside from patios.

Goodyear tire shop posts "coming soon" signage at Rockville Town Square

The new tire retail concept from Goodyear is hinting at its imminent arrival on Gibbs Street at Rockville Town Square. But it's still not giving us the name of the concept, which has been referred to as "Roll by Goodyear" in trademark filings.

MoCo school board approves new redistricting criteria that would force busing of students from "W school" clusters

Move to disconnect

home address from 

coveted school districts 

would reduce home values

Your vote in November's election will now literally determine the future value of your home. The Montgomery County Board of Education this week approved new criteria for redistricting of public schools that would force the busing of students from affluent school clusters in Bethesda, Potomac and Rockville. In their comments prior to the 5-3 vote, some board members specifically cited students in the "W school" clusters in the southwest part of the county as having to be bused to other schools around the county. Because the new criteria puts the heaviest weight on diversity, the policy as written could only be achieved by busing students out of their currently-assigned Walt Whitman, Walter Johnson, Winston Churchill and Thomas S. Wootton clusters (the districts to which the term "W school" are most commonly applied).

Montgomery County Council President Hans Riemer
has made no secret of his desire to change who gets
to attend the most coveted schools in areas like
Bethesda, Rockville and Potomac

Montgomery County Councilmembers Hans Riemer and Craig Rice have openly endorsed the idea of detaching homeownership or residency from school cluster assignment in the affluent southwest of the County for several years. But the BOE move this week is the first formal codification of this desire in County regulations. Rice mocked Whitman parents from the Council dais in 2016, declaring in an entitled-sounding voice, "I moved to the Whitman cluster, and therefore I must go to Whitman High School! People lose sight that somehow you attending Whitman is better than attending Gaithersburg or Northwest. That should not be the case," Rice said. "It should not be about what your zip code is."

On Monday night, BOE members took aim at those same parents. Jill Ortman-Fouse, who ran unsuccessfully for the Council and doesn't face reelection for the Board, also criticized the idea that "when you buy a house, you buy a school. And [parents] even said that in their emails. They said 'I bought my house for that school.'" Chiding those parents, she said, "all of those schools are owned by all of the taxpayers. They aren't owned by certain neighborhoods." She denounced the belief that "only certain kids get to go to those schools." Jeannette Dixon added that "an easy commute to school" should not be a criteria for school assignment.

Board member Judith Docca explicitly called out the "W school" clusters, and said that busing of students must include those students from more affluent families. Of those who spoke during the public comment period prior to the vote, Docca noted, "only one speaker mentioned a W school. And that's where some of the students are that need to interact with some of our other students. That is not happening. When we talk about all students, we mean those students as well. I know that it's not going to be easy to do."

That could be the understatement of the decade. If there's any doubt this move is coordinated between the BOE and councilmembers like Riemer and Rice, note their similar talking points. In 2016, Rice declared that "boundary changes used to be a third rail." Monday night, Ortman-Fouse called redistricting "the third rail."

BOE members acknowledged the new criteria, which would certainly reduce home values in the "W schools" communities, will be a hard sell. Ortman-Fouse referred to parents hitting the "panic button." "There will be unintended outcomes," MCPS Superintendent Jack Smith - who declined to take a position for or against the new criteria - warned, "and we will all live with them."

Smith is usually dead wrong on most topics, having failed to keep students safe or reduce the achievement gap during his term, but he made one of the best points during the discussion. In regards to what most determines student achievement, "the secret is what happens in that classroom," he said.

The superintendent is correct. Busing did not lead to equal education. Instead, we have an achievement gap that persists to this day in America. You can bus a child to another school, but they still come from the same income-level family as they would have in their neighborhood school. If diversity of race or socioeconomic background were the top factor in academic success for a school, Whitman or any number of elite private schools in the area would be among the worst-performing. They are not.

Some proponents of the new criteria are predictably quick to call opponents "racist." In reality, the new criteria is what is racist. This is a dodge by MCPS to avoid the actual challenging work of improving the worst-performing schools in the County. The Council has wasted yet another term, failing to reduce the achievement gap and geographic educational inequities in areas like East County and the Upcounty. 

Dropping final exams has already led to MCPS gaining an "Easy A" reputation across the country, according to the Washington Post. This will hurt Montgomery County public school students in the college admissions process over time, if not reversed. Now MCPS is dropping the PARCC tests, for the same harebrained reason that the kids can't pass the tests. Can't pass the test? Get rid of the tests, our County "leaders" say. Can't improve failing schools? Bus kids around to try to artificially-but-slightly boost test scores, even if it causes scores at the top schools to drop.

This is the definition of "the soft bigotry of low-expectations."

As Jaime Escalante proved three decades ago, student groups of any racial or economic background can perform at the highest levels. It's the teacher and the curriculum that make the difference. Contrary to Riemer's claim that there must be rich, white students in a classroom for black and Latino students to excel, Escalante's students achieved high scores without "Richie Rich" sitting at the next desk.

How do we know "the secret is what happens in that classroom," as Smith said? After Escalante left Garfield High School in East Los Angeles, student math performance tanked. Kind of like Algebra test scores in Montgomery County in recent years.

Redistricting and busing could be a post-election surprise for many parents, especially with no accurate media coverage of Monday night's change. Several schools are already due for new or changed assignments before the end of this year, such as those impacted by a new high school opening for Downtown Crown in Gaithersburg. The clusters affected in that redistricting will be Wootton, Richard Montgomery, Quince Orchard, Northwest and Gaithersburg. Clarksburg Village #2, another new school, will also be districted this fall. Development pressures in Bethesda and Silver Spring make boundary changes inevitable in those areas, especially with elected officials showing a new boldness to touch that "third rail."

According to board veteran Patricia O'Neill, who voted for the new criteria, boundary changes will be "happening pretty darn soon." Docca referred to the implementation of the new criteria as "the operation."

Impacts of the changes are clear: reduced home values when a particular address no longer guarantees entry to coveted schools, perpetuation of failure at failing schools countywide, longer bus commutes for already-tired students, and a continuing achievement gap. 

Can "the operation" be stopped? Yes. By electing Council candidates who oppose this dodge of the County's fundamental responsibility to provide good schools in every neighborhood. If elected, I would use the ultimate power to force the BOE to drop the new criteria. It is the County Council that funds MCPS. The BOE would have a hard time operating with no funding.

If you currently live in an area with coveted schools, your vote on Tuesday, November 6 will literally determine the future value of your home, and the futures of children countywide. We need leaders who won't sidestep the major challenges we face for another four years, including failing schools and an unacceptable achievement gap. The failed solutions of the past won't move us forward into the future.