Susan Metcalfe and her husband live next to a quiet patch of open land in New Alexandria. Quiet, that is, except for when young drivers joyride through that open patch of land doing doughnuts and tearing up the grass.
The joyriding has been going on since last year, but nobody has been able to identify a driver or get a tag number for the car. The most recent incident was a little different. This time, the driver left behind a calling card; Harrison Ordonez abandoned his truck after it got stuck in the mud early Thursday morning. To make matters even worse, the tow truck called to remove the abandoned truck also got stuck. This required the towing company to bring in another truck and caused more damage.
Mount Vernon District Supervisor Gerry Hyland said that the boy returned later that day with this father, Oscar Ordonez. The son apologized to the community members who were there and Ordonez promised to pay for the repairs. In a follow-up phone call, Ordonez said that he has already arranged for a landscaping company to repair the damage — there are ruts caused by the truck tracks throughout the communal property. He doesn’t think that his son will do anything like this again. Hyland doesn’t think he will either, but was concerned when he heard that Ordonez may have damaged other properties in the past.
MPO Greg Kottemann, Crime Prevention Officer, wasn’t aware of any prior charges, and said that in this incident, Ordonez was charged with two counts of destruction to property, one to private property and one to county property.
Metcalfe said Oscar made a statement that he was going to send his son back to Spain to punish him, but she would rather see him stay here and help repair the damage.
“I think we should make him accountable for his behavior. This is not the first time this has happened and other people are involved,” she said. “He was dropping off a friend and if we can determine who that was, we can see if they know something.”
THE PATCH OF LAND involved is located between H Street and Old Towne Road. It serves as a stormwater easement for the county, as well as communal property for the 14 houses that border the land.
Members of the New Alexandria board and community members have been meeting to determine what should be done. Deb Sell-Pugh, president of the New Alexandria civic association, said, “I spoke to the kid’s father last Thursday and he has offered to repair the mess. This will be up to the individual homeowners and Fairfax County (the easement which the county owns was also heavily damaged). The tow trucks that came to get the boy’s truck did as much damage when they got stuck trying to get to him. This has been an ongoing problem since last March. We have never before been able to get a tag number but have had plenty of witnesses describe a big black truck on several previous occasions. Generally this has happened between 3 a.m. to 6 a.m.”
Once the repairs have been made, community members have to decide how to prevent future incidents. Hyland believes that they need to put up some sort of concrete barrier or chain, but said that’s really up to the community.
“This has happened on several occasions, but this kid got caught. It’s never been this bad. We discussed putting up a fence, but it’s up to the homeowners and the civic association,” said Lenore Bloch, secretary of the association.
“I think as a community we want to prevent this from happening. We have to somehow restrict people from driving on it,” Sell-Pugh said.