Attacks on School's Teachings Drown Out Traffic Concerns (Saudi school)

Washington Post ^ | March 23, 2009 | Sandhya Somashekhar

[La Lydia]

A controversial private school for Muslim children is seeking to expand a campus in Fairfax County, a proposal that has made reluctant partners of neighbors concerned with the impact on traffic and water quality and critics who oppose what they say is the school's radical agenda. The Islamic Saudi Academy has asked the county for permission to build a state-of-the-art building on one of its two campuses, a 34-acre property near Fairfax City. The increased capacity could draw as many as 200 additional students to the 750-student campus each day, which has sparked concern among neighbors....

"The hearing started off on the wrong foot," said Sherry Keramidas, president of the Beech Ridge Civic Association. "It took away from the sense that the community around the school was approaching this because of the environmental concerns and the traffic."

... the school has been the subject of intense scrutiny, in part because of unfounded anti-Arab suspicions but also because of course material that troubled some elected leaders....

[La Lydia]

Unfounded anti-Arab suspicions? Uh huh. Never mind the terrorism record of its graduates. And never mind that where they want to build this huge new MOSQUE is on land that is in a watershed that has had all kinds of environmental protections attached to is and is subject to stringent occupancy limits. The watershed pertains to the Occoquan River, provides drinking water to a large swathe of northern Virginia and finally feeds into the Potomac -- another rigorously protected watershed, and eventually Chesapeake Bay, the subject of a huge and ongoing environmental restoration effort. The Audubon Society has spent a lot of time and effort and made a lot of noise wringing its hands over this watershed, but nary a bird-lover was to be found at this meeting. The Fairfax County government has protected the Occoquan watershed with 5-acre lot zoning restrictions that make it difficult to build houses there. Where are the enviros when we need them? The meeting occurred last Wednesday, and the Post reports it inside the local section five days later. Uh huh.

[Oldpuppymax]

Environmentalists are first and foremost America haters and proponents of Marxist rule. They are unlikely to take aim at fellow haters of the US. Don’t plan on their assistance in this.

[Frantzie]

Saudis own Washington DC now.

[Brian C. Ledbetter]

I was at this meeting (reported on it here and here), and can state 1000% that the County Planning Commission had absolutely no interest in hearing any opposition to the school's expansion. In fact, it seems that they've already made up their minds, even though this meeting was intended to give them introductory information about how the neighbors felt about the plans.

Even residents of the area who brought valid safety and environmental complaints to the board were completely brushed off with lines of questioning that were intended to undermine the entirety of the complaint.

This is stacked, and it stinks to high heaven. I've got a request in with Fairfax County for an archived copy of the proceedings, so you can see it for yourself. Will post it here when I get it.

Regards,
Brian L.

Exit Question: The land they're proposing to build a 111,000 sqft building on is zoned residential conservation. If you tried to build something significant on your "conserved" property, what do you think the County would say?

[Seeing More Clearly Now]

Like the so-called “environmentalists,” the so-called “women’s movement” is AWOL of the topic of the Islam, because the followers of these two movements have been lulled into not thinking at all any more. These movements, it turns out, had no core values relative to what their leaders said they stood for and if they did, they’ve long since been forgotten. The environmentalists and the women’s movement are called upon to get excited only when it’s useful to the chess game being plahyed by Maxist movement. They don’t care about the environment nor women. Raw power is their goal.

[Condor51]

Well ... from Google Maps, Satellite View, the area appears to be open space. And though a 100,000 SF school sounds 'big', it really isn't, that''s only 316' x 316'. That's pretty small compared to school construction today. And 200 extra students doesn't seem it would create any great impact on the roads, traffic or 'environment'. This is again what I see from the Satellite View of the area.

So I'd have to assume this protest is based solely on the Religion of the school and students. And that just ain't right. All Muslims aren't terrorists.

And for arguments sake, what if this was a Jewish school, property and they were proposing a new school building and Synagogue? Would there be the same outrage? ... NO. Because in a heart beat the ADL would label all these folks anti-Semites. But since they're Muslims they're fair game and the torches and pitchforks are out.

[Brian C. Ledbetter]

Condor,

There have been no classes held on this campus for a year, since ISA pulled the students out to their Alexandria (leased) building in anticipation of starting construction quickly. So the actual net change in students you're discussing is somewhere between 500 and 900 kids.

On a road that's notorious for traffic fatalities.

Would a responsible zoning board allow this in any other locality?

This expansion is something that people who live in the immediate vicinity oppose, and it's entirely for safety and development issues. The protest is not related only to the religion of the school.

(Though, as the Post points out, the school has been surrounded by controversy, since the GRADE SCHOOL textbooks they use contained fairly hefty amounts of "hateful" material.)

Regards,
Brian L.

[La Lydia]

Well, what you can’t see from the satellite view is the runoff problem in that watershed (and its impact on the domestic water supply there). I don’t buy into the entire argument, but the point is that any other entity or private individual wanting to construct anything larger than a picnic table gets very short shrift from the Fairfax powers that be. So in a weird way, you are right: this situation is based solely on the religion of the school and the students, that is, if it were any other religion, were it any other school, there is would be no way in hell Fairfax County would agree to grant an exception to the occupation density and water runoff rules that it has used to restrict land use there, beginning in the 1970s. The school has a track record linking it to terrorism and the teaching thereof going back quite a few years that even the Associated Press has been unable to ignore. It isn’t paranoia — nor is it xenophobia — when they really do want to kill you. And to answer your other question, Christian schools have been turned down cold when they wanted to locate in Fairfax County, or to expand. Someone told me, and I can’t vouch for this, that the reason the school was sold to the Saudis in the first place was that it was unable to expand. The fix is in with the Fairfax County board of supervisors because they have been bought and paid for by political donations from Muslims. And one of the major beneficiaries of this buying of local government with Saudi money is the former supervisor who is a now a member of Congress.

[Brian C. Ledbetter]

La Lydia,

Speaking as a long-time citizen of Fairfax County (off and on for 20 years now): If you ask any church or private school how their experience with the County's various zoning and planning boards is, you will hear horror story after horror story about how hard it is to get any changes in at all.

Immanuel Bible Church, for instance, has had parking and traffic overflow problems for at least 12 years now. It took them something like 5 years just to get a minor expansion to their parking lot approved. They're just now starting to enter the process to expand their building yet again—but I haven't heard how that's been going for a while.

Fairfax Christian School, who used to own the buildings that ISA is seeking to expand, moved out in 1985, and then was immediately denied permission to build their school on the land they purchased to move to. (They fought with the County for the next 5 years, and were finally allowed to move into their new building, which is a fraction of the capacity of the Pope's Head location, in the mid 90's.)

This county has continually closed its doors to religious entities—Except for one particular religion. Which is given sweetheart (and endless) lease deals, freedom from being held under the same criminal standards as everyone else, and now, apparently, completely unlimited permission for expansions.

Wonder why that is?

Regards,
Brian

[La Lydia]

Yeah, I wonder. May Gerry Connolly has some insight into this question.