News-Press Editorial

`Solomonic' is a wonderful adjective that derives directly from a archetypical figure of the Old Testament. We don't know the exact circumstances, but according to Webster's Dictionary, it came into use in 1857. It means, Webster's says, "marked by notable wisdom, reasonableness or discretion especially under trying circumstances."

A similar word, but with hardly the same definition, needs to be introduced into the language in 2004 to describe the action of the Falls Church City Council this Monday night. In this case, it would refer to one of King Solomon's more clever moves to discern the true mother of a child that two women claimed were theirs. The king proposed to solve the dispute by cutting the baby in two, and giving each woman half. Knowing the real mother wouldn't let her child be killed that way, the king discerned the one who suddenly confessed she wasn't the mother, doing so to spare her child's life, to be the true mother.

The Falls Church City Council also proposed to "cut the child in two" Monday night – referring to undeveloped land the Falls Church Housing Corporation was hoping it could use for a affordable senior housing project – but unlike Solomon, it went ahead and used the knife.

This something-less-than-Solomonic solution was aimed at assuaging the concerns of existing residents near the property for retaining the land as "open space," while at the same time acceding to the Housing Corporation's pressing need for a location for its project. The Council resolution insisted that both uses need to be accommodated.

The Council was weakened by not standing foursquare on principle. It needed to say, "We are resolute. Falls Church needs and will have adequate affordable housing. There's a critical need and shortage of options, and if this is the only way it can work, then we'll have to make this tough choice and do it." Instead, what it said was that the pleadings of both sides – those seeking the affordable housing and the neighbors seeking to "preserve open space" – had equal merit, and sought to appease both with a political softness that could well doom the housing project in the next months.

The issue over this 29,000 square feet parcel of undeveloped land is not between "equally important goals of providing affordable housing and preserving open space," as was insisted repeatedly Monday night. The real issue, simply put, is this: Who gets the use of this land?

Will it be the existing neighbors, or will it be 80 to 100 senior citizens who would reside there if the project were built? It's unlikely both can comfortably share it. Therefore, insofar as the Council does not start from the standpoint that the Housing Corporation's future residents shall have the housing they need, then the effort will die, lip service to the contrary notwithstanding. It's a tough choice, but that's what the Council is elected to make.