Our colleagues at the online ArlNow news site reported on our chief’s presentation to the Falls Church City Council last week where he offered our paper’s services in a fight to counteract the devastating impact of the Trump administration’s federal workforce firings and contract cancellations. The article noted the response seemed “lukewarm” despite Mayor Letty Hardi’s comment following the presentation at the meeting by commenting, “We certainly appreciate all the contributions of the News-Press to this community, and how special it is we have a community paper.”

We can report more directly that “lukewarm” is hardly an understatement, our chief having met with the Mayor and Vice Mayor for an hour and a half discussing the subject late last week. Our Nicholas Benton proposed that with an increased City investment in the News-Press, the paper’s circulation readily be doubled or more to reach wider audiences in Arlington and Fairfax with steady news aimed at attracting people here thereby mitigating the precipitous decline in revenues at our local restaurants and entertainment venues as frightened and cautious federal employees and their families await the full impact of Trump’s policies in the coming months.

Many layoffs have already occurred in a region where federal jobs are a vital component of the economy, Falls Church having the highest percentage of its workforce in government jobs of all jurisdictions in the region, and almost all restaurateurs here have reported sharp dropoffs in their business. Fear of ICE raids has also exacerbated the problem.

Let us be clear, this problem is one that will hit all City residents directly in their pocketbooks as lower sales, meals and other tax revenue yields will add to a burden that residents will have to make up for in the coming period. The only way to offset these cuts is to attract more outside dollars and the News-Press is uniquely positioned to do this by reaching beyond the City borders to a wider audience.

Falls Church, Benton said, with the opening of the Paragon Movie Theaters at Founder’s Row, is now ready to market itself as a bonafide regional destination with four nodes of dining and entertainment along a Route 7 strip through its 2.2 square miles. The Hoffman Company’s West End development, the Founders Row with its world class restaurants and the Paragon theater complex, the City center where the new flagship Whole Foods has also just opened, and the “Little Saigon” nexus at the Eden Center represent a totally unique attraction to the five million people in the greater Washington D.C. “DMV” area. This is a “Restaurant Row” of truly massive potential.

So, expanding the News-Press’ distribution into a wider market can capitalize on this. Beyond simply an immediate return on investment, the benefit to everyone in Falls Church would be incalculable. And, It would take only four votes out of seven on the Falls Church City Council, and the internal fortitude to get them, to make it happen.