In a record turnout, more than 35% of Vienna voters submitted ballots for yesterday’s election to select their next mayor and new councilmembers.

Current Councilmember Linda Colbert beat her two opponents — also both on the Town Council — for the mayor’s seat, according to the unofficial election results in the town’s press release.

Colbert was first elected to the council in 2014 after serving on the Transportation Safety Commission and a variety of other governmental and local councils, according to her town bio.

Her campaign focused on boosting the town’s commercial areas, preserving the neighborhoods and keeping Vienna a “vibrant walkable town protected from the Tysons sprawl.”

As for the other mayoral candidates, Howard Springsteen will stay on the council until his term expires in June 2021, while Pasha Majdi’s term expires at the end of June.

According to the unofficial results, Colbert received 1,545 votes, while Majdi got 1,172 and Springsteen got 869.

Voters chose three out of the seven candidates who vied for councilmember seats.

According to the unofficial election results:

• Ed Somers — 1,545
• Ray Brill, Jr. — 1,472
• Chuck Anderson — 1,420
• Andrea Dahl — 1,336
• Chris Wright — 1,265
• Roy Baldwin — 1,256
• David Patariu — 1,214

Majdi, Dahl, Wright and Patariu ran as a group on a joint platform focused on keeping Vienna’s small town feel and reducing congestion.

Originally set for May 5, Gov. Ralph Northam delayed the town’s election by two weeks due to concerns about spreading the coronavirus.

Voter turnout peaked at 36.5% — recent turnout has usually been between 5% and 23% for the town’s elections — and voters submitted 3,371 absentee ballots, according to Fairfax County’s Office of Elections.

“It was an historic election in Vienna,” the election office tweeted.

The new councilmembers and mayor will start serving July 1.

Colbert photo via Town of Vienna, three photos in collage courtesy Ed Somers, Ray Brill, Jr. and Chuck Anderson

Municipal Finances Spotlighted in Vienna — The Washington Post focused on how Vienna is responding to the financial crisis from the pandemic. [Washington Post]

Tysons Fintech Company Now Under Goldman Sachs — “The acquisition represents the culmination of discussions that started in 2019 and the closing, while subject to regulatory approval, is expected in the third quarter of 2020… The acquisition of Folio by Goldman Sachs brings together two leading financial services firms for the continuing benefit of our clients and business partners.” [Folio Financial]

Virtual Job Fair — “Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS), the largest school system in Virginia, is searching for educators with a strong academic background and a passion to make a difference in the lives of students during the 2020-21 school year. Principals will meet and engage with candidates at the FCPS Virtual Instructional Job Fair on Tuesday, May 26, Wednesday, May 27, and Thursday, May 28.” [FCPS]

ICYMI: Tysons Corner Center is Back Open — “Shoppers can find more than take-out from restaurants at Tysons Corner Center now that the mall is back open.” [Tysons Reporter]

(Updated at 4:25 p.m.) Shoppers can find more than take-out from restaurants at Tysons Corner Center now that the mall is back open.

It is one of 20 malls that operator Macerich announced today (Tuesday) has fully reopened.

Fox 5 reported that shoppers at Forever 21, Kay Jewelers and more confused some people, but noted that Gov. Ralph Northam’s temporary restrictions due to COVID-19 say that non-essential businesses can stay open if they limit customers to 10 people or less.

Shoppers at Tysons Corner Center can expect “enhanced sanitation practices and social distancing protocols in place,” according to Macerich’s announcement.

“Nationwide, our centers create employment for more than 110,000 people, and our portfolio generates approximately $1.1 billion in sales tax revenues and $225 million in property taxes that support essential services at every level,” Thomas O’Hern, Macerich’s CEO, said.

Previously, Macerich has stated that keeping Tysons Corner Center open — while other malls operators closed — helps employees at the mall.

“Local economies depend on us, and our retailers are eager and ready to open for business in a safe, carefully planned, well-executed manner,” O’Hern said in the announcement.

Macerich’s CFO recently said that about 26% of billed rent for Macerich malls were collected in April.

The Town of Vienna’s election is underway, and voters have less than four hours to vote in-person or drop off their ballots.

As masked voters file into the Vienna Community Center or drive to the  Fairfax County Government Center to drop off their ballots in a special box, Tysons Reporter is exploring what civic duty looks like during a pandemic.

Voter turnout has typically fluctuated between 5% and 23% for the town’s elections for the last 20 years. But that may change this year.

“Traditionally, for municipal elections, it’s hard to get a good turnout,” Councilmember Howard Springsteen, who is running for the mayor’s seat, told Tysons Reporter.

Starting in March, Fairfax County officials took to social media to encourage Vienna voters to use the “disability or illness” box when requesting absentee ballots, hoping that mail-in ballots would decrease long lines for in-person voting.

The reminders worked. Vienna voters requested more than 3,200 absentee ballots, according to the town.

There are roughly 11,800 registered voters in the town, according to the state election department. If all of the absentee ballots are completed and submitted, that would put the voter turnout percentage around 27% — not including in-person voting.

“I think voter turnout will be higher than we’ve had in a while,” Mayor Laurie DiRocco told Tysons Reporter.

Signs of the times for voting in the time of a #pandemic. Voters will find these floor markers and signs at the polls in Vienna & Clifton today. Polls close at 7 p.m.#viennava #cliftonva #election2020 #covid_19 #COVID19 #socialdistancing #fairfaxcounty #virginia pic.twitter.com/Cw4wwP2LPr

— Fairfax County Votes (@fairfaxvotes) May 19, 2020

Voters weren’t the only ones urged to do their civic duty by voting from home.

DiRocco, who is retiring when her term ends this June, told Tysons Reporter on Friday that she asked all of the candidates to stay away from the Vienna Community Center today (Tuesday) to reduce the risk of spreading the virus.

In previous years, it has been “very much of a social gathering,” according to DiRocco, who added that people would bring picnics and socialize with one another outside of the 40-foot distance line as people prepared to vote.

“I had reached out to the candidates and recommend we do not show up at the election,” DiRocco said. “All of the candidates agreed to that, which I thought was really good.”

But DiRocco sounded frustrated when she told Tysons Reporter that she received messages from people this morning “who were a little nervous” because they spotted mayoral candidate Pasha Majdi outside the Vienna Community Center.

“I don’t know what else to say at this point,” DiRocco said, stressing that it’s important to respect public health and safety concerns for voters.

Majdi told Tysons Reporter that he was about 300 feet away from the community center — “I could not throw a football from across the street.”

“We thought it would be a nice gesture to thank people for voting by waving from across the street, several hundred feet [away] from the polls,” he said.

The decision of whether or not to stand outside the polling place was never a dilemma before the pandemic, and it is not the only issue that candidates recently faced as Northern Virginia’s coronavirus numbers continue to rise.

Many of the candidates responded to Tysons Reporter’s inquiry about how the pandemic changed their campaign strategy, saying that social media has played a larger role in getting their messages out.

“My team of supporters and I had to change the game plan,” mayoral candidate and current Councilmember Linda Colbert said.

Colbert said that she started her campaign this year with the goal of getting to “every house in Vienna.” Instead, she ended up writing a letter to every resident instead.

Traditional face-to-face methods of interacting with voters — going door-to-door, attending events and handing out campaign literature — are moot while social distancing guidelines and the stay-at-home order are in effect.

“Voters in Vienna appreciate it when candidates knock on their doors and take a few minutes to answer questions before leaving a pamphlet,” Roy Baldwin, a councilmember candidate, said. “Since early March, none of that has been possible — the last thing I would want to do would be to either pick up or unwittingly spread the coronavirus by such close contact.”

Baldwin said that this campaign is “certainly nothing” like the one he ran in 2016.

“I’ve gone to the phone a lot more, and to email, text messages, and Facebook posts, as well as traditional mailers and print ads,” he said, adding that he’s even done Zoom conferences.

Ray Brill Jr., a councilmember candidate who said face-to-face “was to be the cornerstone of my campaign,” said that he pivoted to social media, word-of-mouth, signs and mailings to reach voters.

Brill also said that sharing his message through candidate essays, like he did for Tysons Reporter, “gave voters the opportunity to compare and contrast each candidate’s position on key issues facing the Town of Vienna so they could make an informed decision before they voted.”

Brill isn’t the only candidate missing in-person communication.

“I much prefer face-to-face. I don’t think you have a dialogue with people on social media,” Springsteen, who is running for the mayor’s seat, told Tysons Reporter. “I don’t get a lot of feedback [from voters].”

He said that he’s relied on boosting Facebook posts and sent out two mailings — a letter and a postcard — this year, adding that he’s put out fewer yard signs to reduce in-person contact.

While he said he’s “getting a lot of hits on my website,” he said that posting online can feel like putting a message out into a void.

Limited traditional campaigning tactics have forced some candidates to get creative.

“I have no idea if it will translate into votes, but my daily bike rides with the Choose Chuck velocipede has at least brought smiles to people’s faces,” councilmember candidate Chuck Anderson said.

Anderson noted that he keeps “at least 20 feet” away from people while on his bike rides down the middle of the street.

“With a number of neighbors strolling the streets, I have been able to get my name out, at least, to a large number of voters,” he said.

Colbert, a mayoral candidate, turned to daily videos.

“One day I posted a video expressing my concerns for town residents and businesses,” Colbert said. “After receiving positive feedback, I did it another day until I was doing it every day.”

Some of the biggest COVID-19 challenges have impacted the candidates’ jobs more than their campaigns.

“My day job is dealing with the coronavirus,” councilmember candidate Ed Somers said. “So I’m certainly busier in my day job… I think the challenge is the balance of doing what I need to do for work and doing the outreach I need to do for the campaign.”

Majdi shared a similar sentiment, saying that he shifted his focus away from the campaign more to his duties as a current councilmember.

“Campaigning has taken a back seat to the COVID-19 response,” Majdi said. “The top priority is public health and safety.”

Still, Majdi is talking to voters over the phone, and Somers is relying on his network to vouch for him.

“I’ve found [the campaign] to be a good experience,” Somers said, adding that he thinks online communication has “made us more authentic… [since] we’re going more off our instincts.”

Photo via Fairfax County Votes/Twitter

Ashley Hopko contributed to this story, photo (2) courtesy Chuck Anderson

(Updated 5/20/2020) Before Orange and Silver line stations temporarily close this Saturday (May 23), Fairfax County officials for the Tysons and Vienna areas want to know more about the closures’ impact.

Providence District Supervisor Dalia Palchik and Hunter Mill District Supervisor Walter Alcorn plan to hold a virtual town hall on Thursday (May 21), according to staff from Palchik’s office.

The discussion will include representatives from WMATA and the county’s transportation department.

All Orange and Silver line stations west of the Ballston station will be closed through the fall for platform reconstruction at the four Orange Line stations and work to connect the Silver Line with the upcoming stations running from Reston to Ashburn.

The town hall is set to start at 6:30 p.m. People can register online.

A list started by a woman to “help local businesses in McLean get the word out” quickly became a resource naming roughly 300 businesses and charities in the D.C. area.

The project, created by Lori Boerner, consists of a Google Doc and map, so people either seeking assistance or wanting to help during the pandemic can efficiently find an organization that suits their needs.

Perusing the information provided, people will see a places collecting donations, restaurants offering takeout and delivery, fitness centers offing online classes, retail stores with curbside drop off and even corporate companies that are offering free services.

Part of Boerner’s inspiration for the project came from chatter from local forums and social media. She noticed that people wanted to help those in need but lacked a direct, coordinated list of resources.

“It was initially time-consuming,” she said, adding formatting the information and researching places took a substantial amount of time.

Now that the list is somewhat complete, she told Tysons Reporter that she still spends a few early mornings a week before work to update it with tips sent to her.

For example, the mother of a McLean teenager that works at Sweet Bites Café & Bakery told Boerner to help get the word out that the bakery is still open since its business has slowed substantially.

“A lot of it feeds upon itself — once people see it, they send things in,” Boerner said, especially since the list’s popularity continues to grow.

Since its creation, the list has been promoted by regional organizations such as the McLean Citizens Association, which Boerner is a member of.

Boerner had practice coordinating a similar list after she made one to assist people during the government shutdown in 2019.

“Things are different now and people are helping in any way they can,” Boerner said, adding that not everyone may be able to donate financially, but they can promote resources through social media channels and networks.

Image via Google Maps

(Updated at 10:50 a.m.) While most of Virginia has started the first phase of Gov. Ralph Northam’s reopening plan, Northern Virginia localities won’t be able to start easing restrictions until May 29 at the earliest.

The delay aims to give those localities more time to meet five criteria:

• downward trend of hospitalizations over a period of 14 days
• downward trend of positive test results over a period of 14 days
• increased testing and tracing
• sufficient hospital beds and intensive care capacity
• increasing and sustainable supply of personal protective equipment (PPE)

As of state health data today (Tuesday), the Fairfax Health District, which includes Fairfax County and its towns and cities, has at least 8,111 COVID-19 cases — up by 177 cases from yesterday’s count — and 299 deaths related to the virus.

Tysons Reporter used data for the Fairfax Health District during the month of May to see how the area is faring with the five criteria.

The total number of hospitalizations has continued to increase this month, starting with 650 on May 1 and now past 1,100 today.

The Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association says that roughly 4,200 COVID-19 patients who were hospitalized have been discharged. Meanwhile, 377 of the 1,497 patients with confirmed and suspected COVID-19 cases are in the ICU and 199 are on ventilators.

As for testing, the Fairfax Health District has had more than 34,000 testing encounters and its current 7-day positivity rate for the total number of tests is 19.9% — compared to 13.4% statewide.

Positive test results in the Fairfax Health District have fluctuated day by day so far this month — with dips on both Mondays — but the trendline indicates a downward slope.

Data from the Virginia Department of Health shows that the number of testing encounters from lab reports this month have steadily increased since mid-April, but now appears to be tapering off.

The hospital bed and ICU capacities for Northern Virginia hospitals are unknown at this time.

COVID-19 illustration via CDC/Unsplash, data for graphs via Virginia Department of Health 

Vienna Election Day — Today, voters will pick the new councilmembers and mayor. Here’s our guide to who the candidates are and how to find out more about them. [Tysons Reporter]

Helping Hand — The McLean Little League and the Deevy Group at Compass will deliver food to Inova’s ICU and ER departments today at 6:30 p.m. [Patch]

Some Shoppers Spotted at Tysons Corner Center — “A few stores, such as Kay Jewelers, Forever 21 and Altar’d State, were open. According to Northern Virginia resident Dorothy Gundy, who provided the photos to WTOP, stores were asking shoppers to line up in the concourse and letting a few people in at a time.” [WTOP]

Units on scene of a townhouse fire in the 1600 block of Colonial Hills Drive in the McLean area. First arriving reported smoke showing from rear of home. Fire found on deck. Fire is out. No extension to home. Most units returning to service. #FCFRD pic.twitter.com/qGEmlfoETc

— Fairfax County Fire/Rescue (@ffxfirerescue) May 19, 2020

The polls are open until 7 p.m. tonight for the Clifton and Vienna town elections. Please practice #socialdistancing when you go #vote today to keep yourself, others and our dedicated election officers safe!#GOTV #electionday #COVID19 pic.twitter.com/4A3HPYqPpT

— Fairfax County Votes (@fairfaxvotes) May 19, 2020

Updated 6/1/2020 — Corrects dates for second set of live performances. 

COVID-19 precautions are affecting live performances, but The Alden in McLean has found a way to bring shows to people that is similar to drive-in movies.

“Drive-Thru Drama” is set to run for two weekends in July (July 3-5 and July 10-12) with shows from 6-8 p.m., according to a press release.

The theater, which is a part of the McLean Community Center, plans to hold auditions via Instagram submissions.

“Priority will be given to actors who live, go to school or work in the MCC tax district,” the press release said. “There are no age or gender requirements in the script, but all actors must be 14 years old or older.”

More from the press release:

“Drive-Thru Drama” is the brainchild of The Alden’s Director of Youth Theatre Programs Danielle Van Hook. “Like so many, I was missing live performance and knew there had to be a way to safely produce a non-virtual show,” said Van Hook. “Nothing replaces the feeling of sitting with your neighbors in The Alden, but I hope this helps bring a little respite away from the screens and returns a level of normalcy to people’s lives.”

The show will be the debut performance of “Small Change,” a play written and directed by Andrew Scott Zimmer. Commissioned by The Alden, “Small Change” follows the travels of a $1 bill as it journeys through time and space, interacting with different people’s lives and leaving its mark on the world. Actors will perform one, cohesive story through short monologues at various stations in the center’s parking lot. Audience members will be directed to drive the route from actor to actor…

The Alden is placing several safety precautions into place to adhere to the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions’ COVID-19 guidelines such as requiring the actors to wear personal protective equipment and setting up the route so that actors are positioned six feet away from the cars and passengers.

People should note that performance dates could change based on Gov. Ralph Northam’s orders. A limited number of tickets for the shows will be available online two weeks before the opening.

The Weekly Planner is a roundup of interesting events coming up over the next week in the Tysons area.

We’ve scoured the web for events of note in Tysons, Vienna, Merrifield, McLean and Falls Church. Know of any we’ve missed? Tell us!

Tysons Corner Center is working with community members to help those in need by providing an &pizza meal to healthcare workers. Anyone who wants to sponsor a healthcare worker by providing a meal can text #FEEDTHEM to 200-03, the page said.

Those seeking live entertainment can choose to check out 1st Stage Theatre’s Facebook page, where the arts organization posts videos of its talented cast members posting videos of them performing various songs and acts.

Tuesday (May 19)

• Stuff the Bus — People can drop off non-perishable goods to help community members in need at both the  James Lee Community Center (2855 Annandale Road) Falls Church and the Patrick Henry Library (101 Maple Ave E.) in Vienna from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m.
• Virtual Mystery Fiction Book Group — At 7 p.m. people can join a virtual conversation about “My Sister, the Serial Killer: A Novel.” People must pre-register online to receive the link. This event is hosted by One More Page Books.

Thursday (May 21)

• Virtual Coffee Networking with Professionals — From 7:30-9 a.m. people can join a networking call on the topic of commercial real estate. People may preregister before the event to receive the link.
• Bourbon, Beer and BBQ takeout event — Caboose Brewing is hosting an event featuring beer and barbeque. People can preorder online and then pick up the food from 4-7 p.m. Lost Whiskey will also be offering bottles for sale at the event.
• Remote Working Webinar — From noon to 1 p.m. the Tysons Chamber of Commerce is hosting a remote event to help people think about the future of working from home. This event is free and open to the public. People should register to receive a link.

Saturday (May 23)

• Performers in Quarantine — Starting at 2 p.m. 1st Stage Theatre will hold one of its community conversations via Zoom with performances by actors in the upcoming show “The Nance share.” The actors will share what their creative experiences have been like during the pandemic.

Photo courtesy Caboose Commons