Filene's Basement at the Mazza Gallerie in Friendship Heights jumped the gun on Black Friday deals last week with its going-out-of-business sale. The store is slated to close in early 2012.

Many Chevy Chase businesses participated in yesterday's Small Business Saturday, Marty Chase reported.

Pepco has bought the former Chevy Chase Buick site at 5220 Wisconsin Ave., NW, Washington, DC, by purchasing several small parcels for $14.5 million. The utility company has plans to build a sub-station there.

Each month, the three pre-kindergarten classes at the Chevy Chase United Methodist Church Preschool assemble bag lunches for the homeless. Patch visited with one of the classes earlier this month, as they made 100 bag lunches to be donated to Shepherd's Table in Silver Spring.

The collaborative efforts and donations of the communities of Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School and the Town of Chevy Chase provided Thanksgiving dinner baskets to 117 families in Silver Spring last Sunday through Linkages to Learning, a nonprofit program that provides accessible services to at-risk children and their families.

Chevy Chase's Congressional representative, Rep. Christopher Van Hollen (D-Kensington), expressed disappointment that the bi-partisan committee tasked with slashing the federal deficit—the so-called "supercommittee" of which he has been a member—was not able reach an agreement by its deadline last Wednesday.

With the supercommittee failing to come up with a plan to cut the deficit, Maryland could face as much as $150 million in cuts to its 2014 budget.

Following the failure of a move to restrict panhandling in the state legislature earlier this year, Delegate Anne Kaiser (D-Montgomery), Delegate Aruna Miller (D-Montgomery) and Sen. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Montgomery) plan to file bills during next year's session to crack down on panhandling in Montgomery County.

More than 20,000 Native Americans living in Maryland have been bereft of the economic and cultural benefits afforded to other Native American tribes that have obtained recognition.

Montgomery County Public Schools Superintendent Joshua Starr will host his first book club event on Nov. 29, when he'll discuss Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck. The discussion starts at 7 p.m. at the Carver Educational Services Center, and it will be broadcast on MCPS TV.

The Intercounty Connector opened on Tuesday. Drivers will be able to use the road for free through midnight on Dec. 4.

Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission crews are gearing up to keep more than 5,500 miles of pipes buried beneath Montgomery and Prince George's counties in working condition through the winter, the season when most leaks, breaks and bursts in water mains occur.

Operation Turkey Chase, an initiative to deter underage drinkers and impaired drivers, stopped 265 vehicles last Wednesday night, issuing traffic citations to 157 drivers and arresting 19 for DUI.

Several burglaries have been reported in Chevy Chase during the past week and a half.

Voters will decide bargaining rights for Montgomery County Police, political blog Maryland Juice reported.

County Executive Isiah Leggett will pitch Montgomery County as the place for biotechnology as he accompanies a Maryland delegation to India on a six-day trade mission that began on Saturday, Nov. 26.

And, Maryland’s unemployment rate showed improvement in October, falling from 7.4 percent to 7.2 percent, the state’s top labor official announced this past week.