To deliver an unambiguous message back in the day, kings (and queens) would dangle the decapitated heads of their vanquished foes from high atop castle walls. It was, to borrow a line from Sheriff Buford T. Justice, designed to be “an attention-getter” to others considering making waves.
And while the (figurative) decapitation of members of the Arlington Human Rights Commission by the Arlington County Board last week grabbed the headlines, it was the other part of the County Board’s unusual August special meeting that could have much longer-lasting ramifications in the community.
Board members contended that, aw shucks, there were no substantive changes being made to the three dozen or so pages of the county’s human-rights ordinance. “This is housekeeping,” board member Takis Karantonis said of the raft of wording changes being dropped into the ordinance during a meeting designed, it seemed, to attract as little public attention as possible.
Maybe Karantonis is right. But cynics are left to wonder why, when Arlington leaders are willing to spend exorbitant lengths of time on a host of master plans, development plans – any kind of plans, really – these changes had to be rushed through in the heat of summer. And they have reason to be wary. Little is ever done by accident or left to chance when it comes to the Kabuki theater that is Arlington governance, after all.
From the dais, County Board member Susan Cunningham asked that the whole matter be deferred a few weeks. While she opined that the changes to the ordinance were indeed minor in scope, “I don’t think that’s how it’s been received in our community,” Cunnningham said.
And yet all four of her colleagues, who typically profess fealty to open governance every chance they get, were having none of it. Cunningham couldn’t get a second to her motion.
Those cynical government-watchers mentioned above already are spinning scenarios where seemingly benign wording changes in the ordinance can be used to impose major changes on the community, perhaps against residents’ collective will. We’ll all need to keep a watchful eye.
