Representation
Dear Representatives:
Gregg Easterbrook is a liberal political commentator and columnist
for The New Republic, who has his own blog on the magazine's web
site, http://www.tnr.com/easterbrook.mhtml.
In his current column, he heaps scorn on last week's decision by the
International Commission on Human Rights of the Organization of American
States that the US violates international law by not giving DC citizens
full representation in Congress. I'll just quote three of his most
provocative positions, and let you discuss among yourselves.
“DC residents ought to have a full vote for the House and Senate,
but the idea that they are suffering some form of human-rights violation
is the sort of absurdity that could only be given hearing in an
institution divorced from reality. If anything, DC residents are
over-represented in the United States Congress. The federal government
spends far more per capita on DC than in any state; about five times
more per capita than on the highest-ranked state, Alaska. . . . Many
members of the House, Senate, and cabinet live in the District and are
keenly aware of its needs. The president himself lives in the District
of Columbia. It was fear that the capital's concerns would be
over-represented in the US national legislature that caused the framers
to create a special federal district. The framers generally liked the
idea of voter influence on government, but thought there should be an
exception when it came to the capital district, to prevent that district
from excessively favoring its own concerns. It can be argued that, even
without DC having direct voting power in Congress, Washington already
excessively favors its own concerns. . . .
“A single city with two members of the United States Senate would
be worse over-representation than sparsely populated states such as
South Dakota having two members of the Senate, since South Dakota and a
few other states would have no voice at all without Senate seats,
whereas the United States capital city has many strong ways of
expressing itself. A single city with two members of the Senate would
pretty much make a mockery of the entire concept of representation --
half a million people all living close together having the same power in
the Senate as California's 37 million people living under highly
disparate circumstances.
“Of course, the lobby that wants DC to be treated like a state for
purposes of the Senate is entirely political, assuming this would add
two automatic Democratic seats. Republicans who oppose DC statehood
treatment do so partly out of fear of two automatic Democratic seats,
but at least opponents of DC senators have sensible political philosophy
on their side. For Democrats who want two senators from DC, there's no
philosophy, just a Senate-packing scheme.”
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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How the Other Half Lives: A Tale of Two
Wilsons
Ed Dixon, Georgetown Reservoir, jedxn@erols.com
Frequently the Mayor and the Council refer to how much money they are
throwing at the schools and then they shake the gross expenditure per
student figure in everyone's face and the room is hushed. But the fact
that they talk like this while 30 percent of the budget goes directly to
servicing kids in private placements and not to all 65,000 students
should reveal one of two things about the city's leaders: they are ill
prepared to lead or they are hiding something. Case in point is the cost
to maintain the recently renovated John Wilson Building, where the
Mayor, the well-paid Council, the CFO and their staffs work, and the
battered Woodrow Wilson Senior High School in Tenleytown, where almost
1500 students learn and over 130 city employees work.
The Office of Contracting and Procurement let a contract for
"Facilities Management Services for the Wilson Building" on
the first of December 2003 running through the end of July 2004. The
building has 165,000 square feet of space. The single source contract to
international property manager CB Richard Ellis was priced at
$751,895.36 (http://ocp.dc.gov/information/awards/detail.asp?award_id=2017).
Wilson High is a considerably larger building, has grounds that need to
be maintained and has not been recently renovated. The 271,300 sq. ft.
building is tended by 1 custodial foreman and 6 custodians that cost the
city $217,134 in FY 2003. The custodial supplies budget as requested by
the local school restructuring team (LSRT) was $30,000 in FY 2003. The
expenditure for the year was $247,134. If the Ellis contract were
prorated to a year it would be about a million dollars, which may be why
it wasn't written for a year. Million-dollar city contracts, especially
single source contracts, have to go through more public scrutiny. That
aside, the city is spending four times more on the Wilson Building than
Wilson High. Similar disparities in facilities maintenance costs appear
at Banneker SHS in Columbia Heights and Anacostia SHS. Anacostia Senior
High is a 247,000 square foot building, has about 700 students and about
90 employees. The seven-person custodial team costs the city $206,346.
An additional $28,800 in custodial supplies puts the total for FY2003 at
$235,146 or about a fourth of that spent at the Wilson Building.
Banneker Senior High is a building much closer in size to the Wilson
Building at 180,000 square feet. One custodian paid under $30,000 with
$4,000 in custodial supplies cleaned up after 390 students and 39 city
employees in FY2003; a thirtieth of the cost to clean the Wilson
Building.
Frequently overworked custodians get help on things like cutting the
grass or component replacement from DCPS. But even if the overarching
DCPS Facilities Maintenance Division's budget for FY2003 were divided
equally between all the schools in the city it would still not bring
Wilson, Banneker, or Anacostia up to par with the cleaning costs at 1350
Pennsylvania Avenue. If the city closed half of the school buildings and
evenly distributed the facilities maintenance budget for FY 2003,
Wilson, Anacostia and Banneker would still not be getting what the
Mayor, the Council, and the CFO are at the John Wilson Building.
###############
What Gets Measured Gets Done
Richard Layman, rlaymandc@yahoo.com
In the classic business book In Search of Excellence, the authors
coined the famous phrase "what gets measured gets done" to
refer to companies that outperform their peers because of a greater
focus on what matters. Of course, being sure that organizations focus on
what matters is always a problem, as is a focus on accountability.
Today's Austin American-Statesman talks about how the City of Austin
updates 4,000 different performance measures weekly, from library
circulation statistics to how the city is meeting its goals, and it
posts this data to the city website. This is an expansion of their
public communication of such data, which since the mid-1990s had been
published quarterly. (See http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/budget/eperf/index.cfm
for the website.)
Similarly, the Citistat program in Baltimore is a finalist in
Harvard's Ash Institute annual program highlighting governmental
innovation. The program is written about by syndicated columnist Neal
Peirce at http://www.postwritersgroup.com/archives/peir0112.htm.
Citistat marries data tracking and analysis with accountability for
improvement, comparable to the CompStat program initiated by Jack Maple
and William Bratton in NYC, a program which led to big change in
policing strategies and tactics, and a concomitant reduction in crime.
Peirce quotes Mayor O'Malley stating that “success comes only with
constant and intense executive pressure, plus relentless follow-up with
departments.”
I looked at the government services section of http://www.dc.gov,
but
I haven't been able to locate similar data sets. We need them.
###############
DC Triples the Size of Proposed SE Hospital
Warren Gorlick, wgorlick@cftc.gov
No doubt I will be castigated by others for my politically incorrect
remarks, but I find it interesting that no one has picked up on the tiny
article that appeared in the Washington Post three weeks ago
[January 25, 2004, page C04], indicating that DC has now decided to
nearly triple the size of the hospital it previously decided to build in
Southeast. The hospital will now be 290 beds, not 110 beds. This is
going to be a huge hospital, and one can only wonder why it is that the
DC government has now decided that such a large hospital should be built
and paid for by city funds, though apparently the public will not have a
role to play in its management, which is being contracted out to Howard
University. This is sure to be a huge budget buster for the District,
but I suspect Mayor Williams does not care too much; he knows he will be
out of office by the time the bills come due.
Story follows: “Howard University and DC government negotiators
agree that a new hospital slated for the site of DC General Hospital in
Southeast Washington should have 200 to 300 beds — a much larger
facility than had been initially projected in the fall. A memorandum of
understanding drafted by the city and university negotiators also states
that the hospital should be a Level 1 trauma facility, which means it
would be equipped to handle all emergency cases. The memorandum was
forwarded last week to the DC Council, where it awaits a vote.”
###############
In doing some research on the history of Home Rule, I ran across this
little tidbit. When folks refer to the “city” government, or the
“city” council, they use a colloquialism that has had no existence
in fact for more than 130 years. To put it plainly, there is no such
thing as the City of Washington. Washington, DC, is a convention used by
the post office. (Once upon a time, letters could sent to Georgetown, DC
or Alexandria, DC.) The City as a governmental entity, with its Mayor
and Aldermen, was abolished by Congress in 1871 and replaced by a
district government. Congress provided the District government with an
appointed governor and elected legislative assembly along the lines of
the structures used for the western territories. When the three
localities within the District (City of Washington, City of Georgetown,
and the County of Washington) were consolidated into the new territorial
government, the municipal charters of the two cities within the
boundaries of DC were repealed. A short time later, in 1878, Congress
abolished the territorial government after the downfall of “Boss”
Shepherd. The structure once again changed, this time to a board of
three commissioners, who ran DC until the advent of Home Rule.
So, here’s my modest proposal. Let’s bring back an official City
of Washington, instill some civic pride and relegate the much-maligned
“DC,” as a moniker for the federal enclave and the central federal
apparatus at large, to the dustbin of history. Let’s focus on building
a great city, not a rump state-let, or half-baked federal territory.
###############
DC Democratic Party and Caucuses
Janet W. Brown, janetwbrown@igc.org
Have you noticed how many states have moved up their primaries this
year, so the candidates would pay attention to their state and give them
a genuine role in choosing the candidate? Oklahoma, New Mexico,
Tennessee, and Virginia. I am jealous of Virginia. For the last several
days the national media have covered Virginia — what the issues are in
the state, what the candidates are saying there, how the voters are more
energized than ever before, etc. DC tried to do that. The Council voted
unanimously to have our presidential primary in January rather than May
— primarily to draw attention to our lack of representation. Our
response was terrific — 16 percent of the voters turned out; that's
twice the participation in Iowa two weeks later. Our choice wouldn't
have had serious impact on the ultimate choice of candidate, of course,
but it would have put the nation's denial of democracy to half a million
citizens on the front page across the country.
But the local and national Democratic Party did us in. Local party
leaders, heavily pressured by the Democratic National Committee, decided
that our primary would be only an expression of opinion, that it would
not choose delegates, and that candidates didn't have to run here if
they chose not to. Then, mysteriously, as if coordinated by the DNC,
four of the leading candidates withdrew from the process all on the same
day. Wouldn't it have been nice if our local party had stood up for our
basic democratic rights, and had us choose our candidates and send
delegates to the convention!? Had they not been seated, as “our”
national party threatened, there could have been a challenge and the
story of our disenfranchisement would have had maximum national
coverage.
The Democratic Party needs to be told how we feel about this. I'm not
suggesting that you desert the party in the November anyone-but-Bush
election, but I hope you'll use the presidential campaign in every way
you can. Every time you attend a reception or rally for the candidate
(especially those who chose not to run in DC in January — Kerry,
Edwards, Clark), ask them why they declined to run here when it could
have been so important to us. Every time you write a check for any
candidate this year, tell them on the enclosed form — I just use a
magic marker — that you want to know what they have done for DC's
voting rights and what they'll do when elected. And send the check not
to the address on the envelope (at those P.O. Box numbers they only
count the money and keep the records) but to the Congressional Office of
the solicitor (Nancy Pelossi, for instance has been sending out appeals
on behalf of House candidates), the PAC, or whoever sent you the appeal.
If the request is from the DNC, send your check and note directly to
Terry McAuliffe, marked "personal," at the Democratic National
Committee, 430 South Capitol St. SE, Washington, DC 20003.
###############
Getting little more than a passing mention in the Washington Post is
that scandals about lead pipes are nothing new in the District. A search
through the Post's own archives reveals multiple stories
stretching back over fifteen years.
January 1987: “A large number of the nearly 1,000 District
households whose water was tested recently have excessive lead
contamination . . . the growing problem . . . may affect up to 56,000
houses.” February 1987: “The District of Columbia has launched a
public health effort to alert residents to the dangers of lead leaching
from old plumbing pipes into the drinking water . . .” December 1987:
“Tests have found excessive levels of lead in water from drinking
fountains at 10 District public schools . . . School board member Linda
Cropp . . . said her committee has asked administrators to develop plans
to correct the lead problem.” June 1991: “Tests of drinking water in
the vice presidential mansion, which showed high levels of lead in water
from two faucets have focused the attention of many Washingtonians on
the possibility of contamination in their own houses . . .” July 1991:
“A survey at 12 congressional buildings showed that water from 21
percent of the coolers and taps tested contained levels of lead higher
than the Environmental Protection Agency considers safe for drinking.”
December 1993: “Notices are going out in the District . . . to use
only cold water for drinking or cooking. This was prompted by the city's
most recent round of testing, which found high levels of lead in 25
percent of 128 DC homes . . .” April 1996: “Efforts to reduce levels
of lead in the District's drinking water have been stalled for nearly
two years, despite evidence that hundreds of city homes could have
unsafe amounts of the contaminant in their tap water. . . some
homeowners whose water was tested said they never were notified of the
results.”
Surveys, notices, alerts, plans. Sound familiar? I wonder how long
will it take for city officials to forget about it this time?
###############
WASA Tinkering with Water Treatment
Jay Vinton, vintonj@nih.gov
This past week I have noticed a change in the smell of our tap water.
It smells more musty and less chlorine-ish. I would be interested to
know what a reporter or council member could find out from WASA as to
whether they have made any changes to the chemical treatment of our
water since the lead problem has been publicized.
If they have made changes, it may have been to bring about a true
permanent reduction in lead levels, or on the other hand, it may simply
be a temporary change in order to achieve lower lead level results in
the many lead tests being made by many households at this time, or it
could be for some other unrelated reason.
In any event, it would be interesting to know if any changes have
been recently made, and if so, what changes, for what reason, with what
expected or actual results.
###############
While lead in drinking water is a concern, it need not be a big
concern for everyone. If you are an adult (actually, I think the age is
about 15 or so, post adolescence), you do not absorb much of the lead
that you take in, say maybe 0.1 to 0.5% or so. However, the young'uns
absorb about 40 percent of the lead they take in, which isn't a good
thing, since the lead goes after brain cells and such. Granted that no
lead is ideal, it might not be necessary to spend thousands of dollars
to refit house piping for a marginal safety increase if you don't often
have children in the house.
As a side note: the reason that kids eat lead paint chips isn't
necessarily because they just like to eat everything on the floor, but
that the lead paint chips are actually fairly sweet to the taste
(personal experience).
###############
Who Broke That Story?
Kathy Sinzinger, The Common Denominator, newsdc@aol.com
If I may be so bold as to correct a factual error in Mark David
Richards' posting about the OAS Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights' ruling regarding DC's lack of real participation in Congress [themail,
February 11], the New York Times did not break this story. The
Common Denominator broke this story on Tuesday, Feb. 10th, in its
"daily" (Monday through Friday) online local news updates at http://www.thecommondenominator.com
and also gave our readers a link to read the entire ruling on the OAS/IACHR's
web site. Google News confirms that The Common Denominator broke
this story one hour ahead of the New York Times.
We would simply like to set the record straight.
###############
The submission by Mark Richards on February 11, noting that the
Organization of American States has ruled that the United States is
violating international law by refusing to give residents of the
District the right to elect members of Congress, is not the first such
action by an international body. In the early 1980s the International
Labor Organization ruled that the United States Congress was violating
international labor law by refusing to give Senate restaurant employees
the right to vote on whether to unionize. Senate restaurant employees at
the time were employees of the Architect of the Capitol. As a result of
the ILO ruling, the Senate Rules Committee agreed to allow Senate
restaurant employees a vote on unionization. As it turned out, the
employees voted not to form a union, but the ILO action did result in
Congressional action. Perhaps the OAS ruling will also lead to
Congressional action in this case.
###############
This is to advise that the February 2004 on-line edition has been
uploaded and may be accessed at http://www.intowner.com.
Included are the lead stories, community news items and crime reports,
editorials (including prior months' archived), restaurant reviews (prior
months' also archived), and the text from the ever-popular “Scenes
from the Past” feature. Also included are all current classified ads.
The complete issue (along with prior issues back to March 2002) also is
available in PDF file format by direct access from our home page at no
charge simply by clicking the link provided. Here you will be able to
view the entire issue as it appears in print, including all photos and
advertisements. The next issue will publish on March 12. The complete
PDF version will be posted by early that Friday morning, following which
the text of the lead stories, community news, and selected features will
be uploaded shortly thereafter.
To read this month's lead stories, simply click the link on the home
page to the following headlines: 1) “From Logan to Petworth: New
Projects Promise Residential and Retail Energy”; 2) “Mayor's Office
Reaches Out to Neighborhood to Make Case for Project Garage Funding”;
3) “City's Planning Office Seeks to Hear Convention Center Neighbors'
Concerns”; 4) “Neighbors Act to Ensure Ancient Elm Preserved When
Alleyway is Rebuilt.”
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CLASSIFIEDS — EVENTS
Neighborhood History in DC Workshop, February
24
Matthew Gilmore, dc-edit@mail.h-net.msu.edu
Matthew Gilmore, coeditor of H-DC, the Washington DC History E-list
and web site, will be offering a workshop for doing neighborhood history
on February 24, offering research techniques and describing the sources.
The workshop will take place in the Washingtoniana Division of the DC
Public Library, 901 G Street, NW, Room 307, from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.
A tour of the division will follow and participants will have a chance
to work with some of the sources discussed.
Mr. Gilmore, formerly a staff member of the Washingtoniana Division,
will highlight the variety of tools and sources (maps, microfilm, books)
available for documenting neighborhoods in Washington, DC -- both in the
Washingtoniana Division itself and at a number of other institutions
throughout the city. The workshop is intended to complement programs and
workshops at the new City Museum which deal in depth with sources in
that collection. Mr. Gilmore has been offering workshops since 1997. For
a peek at some of the sources discussed, check out: http://www.h-net.org/~dclist/neighNew4.pdf.
This is the first in an ongoing series of workshops that will also
cover with building and family history. The workshop is free but
registration is requested, so that enough handouts can be prepared. For
more information and to register, please E-mail dc-edit@mail.h-net.msu.edu
or call 352-4378. The Martin Luther King Library is at 901 G Street, NW
and the Washingtoniana Division on the third floor in room 307. The
phone number for the Division is 727-1213.
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DC Public Library Events, February 23-24
Debra Truhart, debra.truhart@dc.gov
Audism: What Is It? What Can We Do About It? Monday, February 23,
12:00 p.m., Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library, 901 G Street, NW.
Dirksen Bauman, associate professor of American Sign Language and Deaf
Studies at Gallaudet University, will discuss “audism.” This new
term is used to describe discrimination against persons based on hearing
status. The room is equipped with an assistive listening system. Sign
language and voice interpreters will be available. Public contact:
727-2145 (TTY and voice).
Black Excellence Through Words and Song. Tuesday, February 24, 4:00
p.m., Juanita E. Thornton/Shepherd Park Neighborhood Library, 7420
Georgia Avenue, NW. Sopranos Lee-Folia Brunt and Valerie Harris-Gregory
perform for Black History Month. Public contact: 541-6100.
Anime Films and Discussions, Tuesday, February 24, 3:45 p.m., Takoma
Park Neighborhood Library, 416 Cedar Street, NW. Riding Bean will
be shown and discussed. Public contact: 576-7252.
###############
The Howard University Cancer Center provides prostate cancer
screening for men forty and older the third Wednesday of every month at
Howard University Cancer Center, 2041 Georgia Avenue, NW. To learn more,
call 806-9259.
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