Speaking of Lake Anne Development

Please do not misunderstand.  I can tell the difference between a press release and a Shakespearean sonnet.   I have completely different expectations of each of these.  Furthermore, I understand and respect the aims of the writers of both forms of poetry, but I do not welcome the arrival of either in my email inbox.

It is also true that I receive far more of the former than I do the latter.  Iambic pentameter is not a growth industry, but acronym-filled blocks of jargon seem to thrive in the current business environment. 

So, I could either guide you through Sonnet 116 ("...love is not love/ Which alters when it alteration finds...") or the most recent announcement about Lake Anne Plaza.  What's it going to be?  Are you sure?

Here's the Press Release as annotated by me for your edification:

"Hunter Mill District Supervisor , and the Office of Community Revitalization and Reinvestment (OCRR) invite you to attend a Public Presentation of the Lake Anne Village Center (LAVC) Commercial Reinvestment Plan (CRP) by Alvarez and Marsal Real Estate Advisory Services, LLC (A&M), and The Eisen Group (TEG)."  

This is the sentence in which all the acronyms are introduced.  Notice that one of these (A&M) already had an acronym in the full name which they elected to drop in the final version.  So, the two human beings in this sentence (Catherine M. Hudgins and you) do not receive acronyms.  This is because the correspondence will never refer to either again.

"Working with and on behalf of the owners and operators of LAVC’s non-residential uses, the OCRR contracted with A&M, who augmented its wide ranging real estate knowledge with that of TEG, which specializes in retail and mixed-use real estate, to develop a CRP for the LAVC."

Notice the artistry of using all five of the newly-introduced acronyms in a single sentence to clearly describe exactly what is happening.  Dear Reader, you want a CRP for the LAVC, do you not?  Well, the augmented knowledge of A&M and TEG will provide that for the OCRR.  In essence, the business owners at Lake Anne have paid people a lot of money to come up with a plan for them to make a lot of money.

"The CRP includes an assessment of the current conditions affecting the non-residential uses in the LAVC, and provides recommendations, informed by baseline data, public input and best practices, to stabilize and sustain current establishments and to attract viable and complementary new nonresidential establishments to the LAVC."

What is this plan?  Well, it assesses and recommends and informs and stabilizes and sustains and attracts without using the active form of any of these verbs.  The CRP "includes" and it "provides."  These are the muscular actions it promises.   Apparently, the plan may or may not "include" the fact that Lake Anne's historical integrity and commitment to keeping non-local, non-franchise commercial enterprises out of the plaza has always made it difficult for emerging businesses to establish and maintain a foothold. 

The plan may or may not "provide" information on how small businesses can get the capital they need in the current lending environment where risk appetite is next to nothing.

The plan may or may not "provide" a concise outline of how the residential properties and commercial ones will co-exist harmoniously despite the conflicts that have arisen over the past 45 years. 

However, if the plan were to "include" these specifics, then it would be the Commercial Reinvestment Actual Plan and they were smart enough to foresee that the resulting acronym might have caused them problems.

If you want to attend the event or learn more about it, Oh, and I forgot to mention, it's ALAOM4 (at Lake Anne on May 4).