A party store just got bigger by the Greensboro Metro station in Tysons.

Party Mania at 8353 Leesburg Pike is undergoing an expansion to double the size of the store.

An employee said that the store has remained open — and will continue to — as the expansion takes place.

Signs on doors outside the store ask customers to “Pardon the mess during expansion” and also are advertising new associate positions that the store is hiring for.

In addition to the store’s growth, the employee said that customers will soon be able to buy more Halloween goodies, with costumes arriving soon.

(Updated at 11:45 a.m.) The Vienna Town Council is considering raising its fee for bad checks.

While the proposed change would increase the fee from its current $20 to an amount up to $50, the town is currently planning to charge a fee of $25, a spokesperson for the town told Tysons Reporter.

The town’s current fee is on the lower end in comparison to nearby jurisdictions, according to the Town of Vienna:

• Fairfax Water: $20
• Fairfax City: $25
• City of Alexandria: $35
• Loudoun County: $40
• Arlington and Fairfax counties, Falls Church, Herndon and Leesburg: $50
• Prince William County: $50 for the first offense and $75 for the second offense within two weeks

The town’s Director of Finance Marion Serfass told the councilmembers at a meeting last Monday (Aug. 19) that a public hearing will need to be held about the proposed change because it affects taxes.

A public hearing on the proposal is set for Monday, Sept. 16.

“We don’t have a lot of bad checks,” Serfass said.

The community center in the City of Falls Church is getting cleaned from top to bottom.

“They do that every year just to give the floors a good scrub and get all the supplies recognized,” Susan Finarelli, a spokesperson for the City of Falls Church, said.

The center will be temporarily closed for deep cleaning from Saturday, Aug. 24, through Monday, Sept. 2.

It will reopen for public use on Tuesday, Sept. 3, with normal hours, which are 8 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 8 a.m.-11 p.m. Friday, 8:30 a.m.-11 p.m. Saturday and noon-6 p.m. Sunday.

The community center provides community members access to gyms, multi-purpose rooms, a kitchen and a preschool. It also houses the senior and teen centers.

Community members looking for activities can still visit the Mary Riley Styles Public Library or visit one of the city’s public parks.

FYI: the Community Center will be closed Aug. 24 – Sept. 2 for their annual deep clean. It's good timing, since the building has an eau de sweaty camper essence right now. pic.twitter.com/SugbJDEtZh

— City of Falls Church (@FallsChurchGov) August 19, 2019

Photo via City of Falls Church Community Center/Facebook

Tysons company Urgent.ly has sparked national attention after its recent partnerships with Uber, Volvo and Amazon.

Its partnerships with Uber, Volvo and Amazon were all formed within the last year, but the company is still focused on outward expansion Chris Spanos, the co-founder and CEO, told Tysons Reporter.

“I think it’s important for people to know we have the largest digitally connected network in the U.S.,” Spanos said.

Urgent.ly is a roadside assistance app that works on-demand with standardized pricing — no subscription needed.

Uber’s and Volvo’s partnerships allow their companies to receive rewards for roadside assistance including discounts, while growing Urgent.ly’s userbase and aligning them with well-known brands, according to the company’s website.

With Amazon, users can order Urgent.ly roadside assistance through Alexa.

The company was co-founded in 2013 by Spanos and five other colleagues. They used to gather at the McLean coffee shop Star Nut Gourmet for brainstorming sessions until they moved onto a permanent office, Spanos said.

Since Urgent.ly’s founding, the company has hired 250 employees, opened several offices throughout the U.S. and also began offering roadside service internationally. The company’s recent growth nabbed it the #12 spot on the 2019 Inc. 5000 national rankings as one of the fastest-growing private companies in the U.S.

“Our international strategy so far is to license our technology to players in those markets who operate a service directly,” Spanos said.

Though no subscription is needed to use the app, the company is offering a discounted $50 yearly membership that gives users access to discounts and free services like jumpstarts or lockout services.

Looking to the future, Spanos said he will watch for upcoming technology and may eventually offer roadside service for technology beyond traditional vehicles. “It’s fascinating to have a look into the future and how we may be receiving our packages.”

He said that he thinks drones and robots delivering packages may be a reality in the near future and that a company — like Urgent.ly — will need to fix them when they break on the job.

Though he couldn’t give specifics about future partnerships, he said that the company is looking to build alliances with early-stage companies exploring new technologies, like drone and robot deliveries.

“That’s where we see the next five years,” said Spanos.

Image courtesy Urgent.ly 

(Updated at 11:45 a.m.) The Town of Vienna is mulling over three preliminary designs concepts for Patrick Henry Library’s upcoming renovation.

Opened in 1971, Patrick Henry Library (101 E. Maple Avenue) is set to be rebuilt as part of a $91 million bond referendum to upgrade Fairfax County’s aging libraries. The town is looking to partner with the county so that the town can have public parking spots at the new library site.

Grimm and Parker presented three design concepts that incorporate public parking to the councilmembers last Monday (Aug. 19)

The first design concept (Option A) would build a stand-alone, two-story building and have surface parking for 90 cars. The design has a modern design, according to the presentation:

The building orientation allows for a large expanse of glass to the north along Maple Avenue. This northern glass will provide ample natural light for the library users and provide views into the library from Maple Avenue. The rest of the building is clad in a variegated grey metal panel. The glass and metal cladding create a modern identity and gives the library a strong presence on the corner.

The last two concepts share the same idea of having a single-level library with an integrated parking garage, both with 125 spots for the library.

Option B1 would have 84 spaces for the town, while Option B2 would have 188 spaces for the town and require a height variance for the extra level of parking.

The last two options have a storefront-esque design. According to Grimm and Parker:

In this option the Maple Avenue facade is designed to resemble a traditional urban main street with glass display windows and canopies… The varied facade expressions help to reduce the scale of the building. A variegated metal cladding is used on the stair and elevator towers to distinguish them from the brick of the library and to draw attention to the public access to the parking garage. Canopies along Maple Avenue create an identity for the library and provide a human scale to the building.

The designs concepts are not set in stone and could change between now and when the county makes the final decision about the library design, a spokesperson for the town told Tysons Reporter.

Tysons Reporter wants to know what you about the design concepts.

Images via Town of Vienna

A body sculpting service plans to open in a building by Tysons Corner Center.

A building permit indicates that Elite Body Sculpture is moving into 1919 Gallows Road.

Elite Body Sculpture provides personalized body contouring — “No area is off limits; if you can pinch it, we can take it,” the website says.

Currently, Elite Body Sculpture lists locations in Beverly Hills, Sacramento, Dallas, Houston, Chicago, Atlanta, New York City and Nashville.

Image via Google Maps

Fairfax County police are investigating a burglary at the Koons Tysons Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge, Ram dealership in Tysons.

The incident occurred around 9:30 p.m. on Thursday (Aug. 22) at 2050 Chain Bridge Road.

“A suspect broke into the business and stole cash,” police said.

Image via Google Maps

Community leaders and city officials celebrated the start of an infrastructure project located in the heart of an upcoming mixed-use development in the City of Falls Church.

During a keynote address for the groundbreaking today (Monday) ceremony at George Mason High School, Councilmember David Snyder said that this $15.7 million dollar project will create a safer and more economically successful community around the West Falls Church Metro.

The new improvements, according to the City of Falls Church, include:

• synchronization of four new traffic signals
• a high-intensity, pedestrian-activated crosswalk on Haycock Road
• pedestrian access improvements, such as widening sidewalks
• bus stop enhancements
• bicycle access improvements, including near the newly installed Capital Bikeshare stations near the high school campus
• utility undergrounding and relocation

The money for the project was acquired through the Northern Virginia Department of Transporation.

Infrastructure issues that have been building up over many decades will finally be addressed with this project, Snyder said.

“Twenty years ago this project would not have occurred,” Snyder said. “This is a classic example of the system working.”

The project is still in the “beginning stages,” according to the City of Falls Church website, adding:

The timing of project design and construction will be coordinated with the new High School construction and future Little City Commons development. City staff expects that design, engineering, and environmental work would begin in Fiscal Year 2021, with construction beginning in Fiscal Year 2022.

Lindy Hockenberry, who taught at George Mason High School for 30 years, served for eight years on the Falls Church City Council and spent another 11 years on the city’s Planning Commission before retiring, attended the groundbreaking to show support for the project.

“Its been my life dream to replace George Mason,” she said adding that the school has serious infrastructure problems, like leaky ceilings.

The new high school campus is already under construction and is slated to be completed by early 2021.

Until then, the students will remain in the same building, which will eventually be demolished for a new commercial center, similar to the Mosaic District, Hockenberry said.

“This will be truly multi-modal,” Snyder said, adding that this these updates will allow people easier access to the Metro.

A Vienna family said they’ve been waiting months to get their money back from unwanted credit card charges by a local music school.

Family members, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to Tysons Reporter, said that Jeffrey Levin, the president of District Music Academy, gave their son music lessons for about four months this spring.

When the family told Levin about billing on their credit card statements, they said he blamed the incorrect amount on an invoice issue involving the billing companies, before offering to write a check to cover the overcharged amount, which the family declined to provide.

The family claims that they never got a check.

The family waited for a few weeks before reaching out to their credit card company to prevent future charges from District Music Academy. As of last week, the family told Tysons Reporter that they are waiting to hear back from their credit card company before considering taking the matter to small claims court.

District Music Academy offers private in-home lessons, after school programs, entertainment for retirement communities in the D.C. area and other services, according to its website.

The Breakdown

Two Reston residents had a similar experience with unwanted charges from District Music Academy and took Levin’s company to small claims court earlier this year.

Michele Chesser told Tysons Reporter that she noticed the company was double-billing her credit card for her daughter’s piano lessons, charging her at the beginning and end of the month. In total, according to court documents, District Music Academy overcharged her $1,260.

Chesser said she contacted her credit card company, which was able to credit her two out of the five months of double billing. She decided to try to recover the rest of the money in court.

The judge heard the case in May and ordered Levin to pay the full amount. But as of today (Aug. 26), Chesser said she hasn’t gotten the money back.

“I don’t think I’ll ever see my money again,” she said.

Another Reston resident, Anjia Nicolaidis, told Tysons Reporter that her daughter started ukulele and voice lessons once a month in February 2018 and the family scheduled lessons through August.

For a family with two full-time working parents, she said that District Music Academy seemed like a convenient solution, adding there are “not a lot of companies offering that in-home instruction in the immediate area.”

But by July of that year, Nicolaidis noticed double charges and “random charges.” When she reached out to Levin, “first there was some delay in getting him to acknowledge that our records and the teacher’s record were consistent,” she said.

“We asked for that reimbursement and gave him a number of opportunities to give it to us,” Nicolaidis told Tysons Reporter, adding that Levin at first offered to make up the amount with credits to future lessons. After she declined the offer, the discussion over repayment broke down.

According to court records, Nicolaidis emailed Levin back on Sept. 10, writing:

As of this morning, September 10, 2018 you have not refunded the money you owe us. It has been a week since we received your email indicating you would process the refund. We have been corresponding about this issue for nearly two months…

We feel victimized and are in contact with other families that have had the same experience with District Music Academy.

Levin responded via email the same day, saying, “We have resolved all issues with our credit card system, but the process to refund the money is taking longer than expected. If it is acceptable to you, I can mail you a check today for the money due so that you can receive the fund more quickly.”

Nicolaidis said Levin never sent the check and she hasn’t heard from him since.

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