Money
Dear Money Managers:
Money spoke in yesterday’s ward council elections. Both the
campaign funding reports and the election vote totals are incomplete,
but the current numbers are that Muriel Bowser’s campaign raised
$371,000, and that Bowser got 4,886 votes. This was far from a majority
of the 12,061 votes cast, but it was a sufficient plurality to give her
a win in the special election for Ward 4 councilmember. The Fenty
administration, starting with the mayor himself, put relentless pressure
on contractors, developers, and others who do business with the city
government to contribute to Fenty’s chosen candidate. The result was a
record amount of money raised for a ward council campaign, and an
obscene amount of money per vote. Bowser raised $75.93 in campaign funds
for every vote she got. In Ward 7, Council Chairman Vincent Gray was
largely responsible for the success of Yvette Alexander’s campaign
fundraising. Her campaign raised $180,000, or $74.29 for every vote she
got. She won her race with only 2,423 votes, just 34.1 percent of the
7,101 votes cast.
If elections can be bought, and if the cost of an election in DC is
currently between $74 and $76 per vote, only candidates who are backed
by the biggest money interests can win, and only candidates who back
big-money interests against the residents should bother to run. Unless,
of course, more citizens make the effort to turn out to vote, and only
if they vote for candidates who will represent their interests. Only
13.53 percent of registered voters came to the polls yesterday, and the
low turnout is why elections can be bought easily, if expensively.
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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Fire Leads to Spending Spree
P. Walters, konetidy@gmail.com
According to the web site of the Architect of the Capitol, the new
visitors’ center is a 580,000 square foot structure. The current cost
is pegged at $554 million, which is enormously over its budget. That
works out to $955 per square foot for a completely new, highly secure
facility. According to the Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/01/AR2007050101878.html)
Lars Etzkorn, the Director of Property Management, puts the Eastern
Market restoration cost at $30 million or more. Eastern Market is 16,500
square feet (area cited by the Project for Public Spaces). That works
out to $1,800 per square foot. How can anyone expect to spend nearly
twice as much per square foot to restore an existing facility than has
been committed to build the visitors center just a few blocks away? The
fire was sad, no doubt about it, but it looks like the Fenty
administration is queuing up to make the aftermath a champagne bath for
its favorite developers. Open your pockets, boys, here comes the money
train.
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Eastern Market, Adieu
Paul Wilson, dcmcrider at gmail dot com
As if by some inexplicable planetary alignment, Gary Imhoff’s
lament on the subject of privatization of neglected and under used city
properties [themail, April 29] came out on the same night that the South
Hall of Eastern Market was nearly destroyed (the Post politely
says “gutted”) by a multiple-alarm fire. Eastern Market was anything
but under used, but it was certainly subject to a decades-long pattern
of official neglect. A neighborhood landmark is gone and, even if
rebuilt “as was,” it won’t be the same place.
Sadly the dilapidated condition of Eastern Market is all too common
for city-owned properties. Take a look at our schools and libraries, for
instance. Or the old naval hospital, which is a perpetual eyesore and
stands as another towering monument to civic neglect. Renovation plans
at Eastern Market have been in the works for five years, but were going
nowhere fast, as they were bogged down in endless community group
hand-wringing, compounded by dithering and delays on the part of
officialdom. Delays in this case have proved fatal. The very thing
people feared, radical change, has descended upon Eastern Market, in
spades. Lack of automatic sprinklers -- sprinklers would surely be part
of any renovation scheme -- played a major role in this catastrophe.
You have to ask if the market had been owned by a private nonprofit
organization, or God forbid a private for-profit owner, would they have
allowed it to decay to such an extent? Would they have been charging
rent from merchants for years, while plowing none of it into the
physical plant? As opposed to the government, private entities tend to
take greater care of their physical assets. The physical plant
represents their only revenue source after all. And, they generally can’t
go to the city council and beg for a handout, unless they own a sports
team.
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Temporary Eastern Market
Ed T. Barron, edtb1@macdotcom
I go away for two weeks to Eastern Europe and come back to find two
old landmarks have gone up in flames. While the Eastern Market is being
rebuilt the city should cough up one of its empty schools near Capitol
Hill and refurbish it for temporary occupancy by the Eastern market
vendors and those who set up around the Eastern market on weekends. This
would allow those who shop and hang out at the Eastern Market to enjoy
their delights while the vendors continue to earn a tough living. The
city would collect rent from those using the temporary facility to cover
the costs of temporary refurbishment of the school building. It’s a
win-win for the citizens and the business people. Perhaps there’s an
empty school facility in Georgetown where the same arrangement can be
made to provide temporary library services while the Georgetown library
is rebuilt.
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Sale of Eastern and Jelleff Branches of Boys
and Girls Club
Melinda Roth, mroth@worldbank.org
While two historic landmarks were ravaged by fire this week in the
Georgetown and Capitol Hill neighborhoods, two other community assets
are also on the verge of destruction. This form of destruction is
avoidable, however, as we have been warned by the Boys and Girls Clubs
of Greater Washington that they have opted to sell both the Eastern
branch, located in East Capitol Hill, and Jelleff, located in
Georgetown. Eastern is set to close during the summer, while Jelleff’s
future is uncertain. Unlike Eastern Market or the Georgetown Public
Library, the community has the chance to stop such a disaster.
The decisions to sell these clubs — without requiring a club to be
maintained or redeveloped — is all about the money. Those in power at
the parent organization have run into financial problems. They have
hired expensive consultants with little to show for it, continued to
mismanage the assets, cut staff (and even stopped funding the pensions
of already underpaid staff), and now believe they have little other
choice. These two older and dated clubs require renovation and, rather
than step up and help, they are turning their backs and running to the
suburbs. The spin is that the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Washington
now will serve those children in greatest need. However that need was
determined by using income level and geographic proximity to the clubs.
The methodology of the study was flawed, and the entire process has been
cloaked in secrecy without any community consultations, and also against
the very mission of the organization.
All children are supposed to be welcome in any Boys and Girls Club
— no one should be checking income levels to see if a child qualifies
to participate. In fact, both Eastern and Jelleff branches represent the
real world: neighborhoods change but all children remain at risk for the
same issues. We cannot simply forget about certain parts of DC and stop
serving kids simply because real estate has appreciated. There are
thousands of children affected by these decisions, and we urge you to
help them keep their clubs open. Please see http://www.savejelleff.blogspot.com.
###############
In the District, as in any civilized society, the key function of
government is to provide for the public safety. Two incidents this week
— one widely publicized and the other personal to me — raise serious
concerns about the District’s ability to protect the public with
regards to fire and police services.
As has been widely reported (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/01/AR2007050102089.html),
the DC Fire Department’s efforts to fight Monday’s fire at the
Georgetown library was hampered because the two nearest fire hydrants
were broken. Responding firemen had to spend precious time searching for
working fire hydrants, several blocks away, that had adequate water
pressure. In the aftermath of the fire, we have learned that: 1) the
District’s Water and Sewer Authority is responsible for maintaining
the city’s 9,300 fire hydrants; 2) WASA has only two crews to inspect
and repair those 9,300 hydrants; 3) WASA, under the direction of General
Manager Jerry Johnson (remember his lame response to the
lead-in-the-drinking-water problem several years ago), doesn’t have a
clue as to the total number and location of other problem hydrants in
the city; and 4) the fire department and WASA are not communicating with
each other, and they maintain separate and distinct lists of inoperable
fire hydrants.
In January, Mayor Fenty held a press conference with Police Chief
Lanier to announce that the Metropolitan Police Department would
recommit itself to community policing and that the commanders of each of
the seven police districts would be developing a “customized policing
plan.” In the Third District, where I live, 3D Commander McCoy devised
a program he labeled “adopt a block,” which is intended to focus
police manpower and resources on neighborhoods’ problem areas. It was
against this background that last week I was quite pleased to see a
patrol car parked during the evening hours at the corner of 14th and
Girard Streets, NW, across the street from a small pocket park that has
been a hotbed for drugs and criminal activity in Columbia Heights for
the past twenty years. In short order, however, I soon realized that my
hope that MPD would finally address this neighborhood problem was
ill-founded. Last week I realized that the officers never left their
parked car and that they kept their car windows rolled up and seldom
even glanced over to observe what was happening in the park. On two
successive evenings, I watched the officers reading novels and magazines
in the car. My neighbors told me that they had seen the officers
sleeping in the car. When I ran into Chief Lanier in the Wilson Building
last week, I gave her the details, including the times and car numbers.
She assured me that my concerns would be addressed. This evening, at
9:00 p.m., Gary and I passed the patrol car parked across the street
from the park, and I was glad to see that the officers were neither
sleeping nor reading. Instead, they were watching a Disney Aladdin
cartoon on the car’s dashboard computer.
###############
Cap Payday Loan Interest Rates
Jillian Aldebron, Center for Responsible Lending, jillian.aldebron@responsiblelending.org
In March, Councilmember Cheh introduced a bill that would protect
District residents — especially low-income households — from abusive
payday lenders. Payday loans are small value, short-term, high-interest
loans based on a personal check as collateral. Payday lenders target
low-income communities of color. They make it extraordinarily easy to
borrow money because they don’t do a credit check — in fact, the
harder it is for a borrower to pay back the loan, the more money the
payday lender makes. Payday lenders charge interest rates of up to 391
percent. The loans are so expensive that rather than helping people
bridge a short-term need for cash, they actually create debt and
dependency. It can take months for a borrower to make enough money to
pay back a payday loan: the average borrower pays $708 to pay back a
loan of $325.
The sad part is that payday loans are legal. DC law caps interest
rate for all other consumer loans at 24 percent. But in 1998, payday
industry lobbyists fought for and won an exemption from the District’s
usury cap. What this amounts to is that middle-income and more affluent
households are protected by the 24 percent interest rate ceiling, but
low-income households are left without any protection. Councilmember
Cheh’s bill would oblige payday lenders to follow the same rules that
every other lender in the District has to follow.
We are hoping that residents will contact their councilmembers to
urge their support for this bill. Please contact me for more information
on this issue and how you can help stop payday lenders from preying on
hardworking families.
###############
Need a Caterpillar to Move All These
Caterpillars
Paul Penniman, paul@mathteachingtoday.com
So what’s the deal? Where did they come from, and how do we get rid
of them? Is this like the seventeen-year cicada cycle?
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Saturdays Are Crane Days in DC
Ron Leve, Dupont, theron@comcast.net
While I’m not fond of the fact that Saturdays in my neighborhood of
Dupont and West End seem to be the days that we locals get stuck with
the weekend construction jobs that commuters get to avoid, the least
that could be done is to have DDOT use some common sense in planning
this work.
This past Saturday there was a huge crane located on the complete set
of lanes heading west on K Street under Washington Circle. Also, 23rd
Street, an alternate to getting onto “surface” K Street, was closed
for construction (I believe it was for work being done at the One
Washington Circle Hotel). So there was a huge line of traffic leading
around Washington Circle to “surface” K Street and backing up onto
Pennsylvania Avenue. And why did the line take so long to move? Because
the traffic signal at the point at K and 25th Street, where one can join
the traffic coming from under Washington Circle heading west towards
Georgetown, was still working even though no traffic was there because
the road was closed by the aforementioned crane.
###############
DC Vote Bill Introduced in Senate
Ken Kiger, kkiger@dcvote.org
On May 1, Senators Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT)
introduced a bill in the Senate that would give DC citizens their
first-ever voting member of Congress. A similar bill, the DC Voting
Rights Act, passed the House of Representatives on April 19. This
nonpartisan, vote-neutral legislation pairs one seat for heavily
Democratic DC with a fourth seat for Republican-leaning Utah. Unlike the
House version, the Senate bill does not have an at-large seat for Utah.
Instead, Utah will adopt a four-seat map such as the one approved in
December. Also, the newly created DC and Utah positions would be elected
during the 2008 election. These changes were necessary to secure
bipartisan cosponsorship of the bill.
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Ending Home Fool
Michael Bindner, mikeybdc at yahoo dot com
There is more than one way to skin a cat. With voting rights closer
to passage, giving the Delegate full status, I would propose the
following: repeal the Home Rule Act and replace it with a
council-manager form of government. Limit candidacy for the council to
members of the House and Senate who reside within the District. Allow
these individuals to run in four classes: Majority House, Minority
House, Majority Senate, and Minority Senate. These should be designated
using the usual formula for a joint committee of Congress. The actual
selection will be made by District of Columbia voters (which leaves
staffers out of the voting pool). There should be no primary, so that
all voters will be able to select the Republican members, not just the
local Republican Party. The election would obviously occur in February
or March after the seating the new Congress, with declaration of
candidacy required forty-five days before the election.
The locally elected council would also function as the Joint
Committee on the District of Columbia and would serve as both the
authorizing and appropriations committee. Include in the rules of each
house that the District’s budget will be considered under a closed
rule in the House with a point of order against any amendments in the
Senate requiring sixty votes to suspend it or to amend the rule. To make
sure that this becomes a powerful committee, place jurisdiction over all
of the monuments and the Architect of the Capitol under this committee,
as well as the Capitol Police. Also, give the Chair of the Committee the
title of mayor, with appointment power over all boards and commissions.
This proposal would only become law if ratified by District voters.
Any amendment to it must also be so ratified. The act should also
contain a bill of rights, etc. It should also contain initiative and
recall provisions. Not every act would be an Act of Congress. It would
pass DC Laws as the city council, not as a congressional committee. This
is, of course, a thought experiment, put out to you for comment. The
experiment would only work if someone wanted the job. The size of the
committee would be set based on the number of members and Senators
actually living within the District. Likely the number of matters
handled by the committee would be smaller, especially in contracting. Of
course, there would be no bring home the bacon factor. However, if your
voters kicked you out and you had a good DC rep, you could always run
here, giving the post of DC Representative a bit of competition. What
say you all?
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A common factor in virtually every issue that comes before the
District council (including the issues concerning disposition of public
land or assets to real-estate interests with a material and very
profitable concern for a variety of situations and circumstances) is the
peculiar practice of discussion and action under emergency legislation.
Now, I think I have some grasp of the meaning of “emergency” in
common parlance, but I have the impression that it is used in this
context in a very peculiar way. It by-passes inconvenient regular ways
of doing so, either in timetable or in scope, especially when this would
mean taking more time to consider complicated questions. It implies
that, unless we act soon, we will be unable to act effectively. It
allows the introduction of measures too close to the event to allow time
to read and consider them, as with the so-called “sell-off” of the
youth clubs, or the apparent silence over the future of the office-holder(s)
of the schools’ Superintendent
Surely we can do better than this? As a minimum, we might return to
the approximately normal use of the word “emergency.” Under a
changed usage, we might ask of the council and the mayor that they
remain under the control of normal provisions for procedures,
timetables, and notification, and avoid the implication of a rush to
judgment in many areas of our official public life. It might be that we
could become more aware of how much of our public property is at risk if
we permit short-term “emergencies” to truncate our consideration of
all the various opportunities for “development” as an excuse for
costly-mistakes that might easily be avoided if we took more time than
is permitted by the single word “emergency.”
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Papers All Over Are Freaking Out
Star Lawrence, jkellaw@aol.com
Re Phil Shapiro’s note on changes at the WashPost [themail,
April 29], I can report from the West that the Arizona Republic
(Gannett) is also trying to remake itself. Monday is now a pamphlet, all
sections glommed together because we are “so busy” on Monday. I call
it Mindless Monday. The two-page op-ed section has lost half a page,
with stories often jumped onto it. A lot of the paper is going online,
like we want to make reading the paper a day-long, multimedia event. I
tried to find that story online about the bee virus, could not, asked
the editor, and he said, “I found it with the video about bees.” I
don’t know where this is heading, but some of us love to read a
newspaper. I have some severe vision issues at the moment, but still
pick through three papers a day. I know a magazine has come out with a
cell phone issue . . . so we are not done yet!
###############
Ms. Lorn [themail, April 25], you may want to check with reporter
Jonetta Rose Barras. I heard her express similar sentiments on air
recently. She could probably direct you to a group watching the dog park
development issue, although there are quite a few kid-friendly and
community garden-friendly groups out there who seem to be quite vocal in
their opposition. Your E-mail gave me a chuckle. What was even funnier
was the "rabid" response from Bob Levine [themail, April 29].
Yo Bob, heel boy! There’s a way to disagree without foaming at the
mouth.
###############
More on Postal Service Erosion
Ted Gest, tgest@sas.upenn.edu
Bryce Suderow wrote recently on this list [themail, April 18] about
his poor experience at the Eastern Market post office. I also have a
couple of tales. My office is in Chinatown. For years I’ve been using
a mailbox at 7th and H Streets, in the shadow of the Arch. Recently I
had to get some mail out that day. When I went to the box, it was gone.
I hightailed it to the nearest post office, which claimed no knowledge
of the removal. I was given card with a toll-free number to call. Two
calls over a two-week period produced no answer about why a mailbox
would be removed from one of DC’s busiest intersections.
Last week, after a meeting near Union Station I dropped into the main
Post Office at North Capitol Street and Massachusetts Avenue with the
idea of buying a periodic supply of commemorative stamps. No such luck.
After waiting in line, I was told by a clerk, “We don’t have any. Go
to the Postal Museum” (next door). One has to do an airport-style
security check to get in there, after which I discovered a long line of
people making esoteric requests. I left. Yeah, I know, I should buy
stamps by mail.
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CLASSIFIEDS — EVENTS
DC Public Library Events, May 3, 5-6
Randi Blank, randi.blank@dc.gov
Thursday, May 3, 10:00 a.m., Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial
Library, 901 G Street, NW, Enhanced Business Information Center (e-BIC),
A-level, e-BIC Conference Center. The Business Planning Process. Learn
the steps you need to take to start a business in D.C. This class is
free and cosponsored by DC’s Small Business Development Center. For
more information, call 727-2241.
Thursday, May 3, 12:00 p.m., Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial
Library, 901 G Street, NW, Room A-5. Brown Bag Recital Series. Cellist
Vassily Popov, pianist Ralitza Patcheva, and guest artist Serhii Morozov,
a prize-winning Ukranian pianist, will perform music by Rachmaninov.
Call 727-1245 for more information.
Thursday, May 3, 1:30 p.m., Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial
Library, 901 G Street, NW, Enhanced Business Information Center (e-BIC),
1st Floor. Local, Small, Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (LSDBE)
Office Hours. Are you eligible for LSDBE certification? Come to the
Library during LSDBE office hours if you are a small business owner in
the District, plan to become one, or currently sell to the District
Government. Please call 727-2241 to sign up for this session.
Thursday, May 3, 2:30 p.m., Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial
Library, 901 G Street, NW, Room 221. Let’s Talk About Books. We will
discuss Summer by Edith Wharton. Call 727-1264 for more information.
Thursday, May 3, 3:30 p.m., Northeast Neighborhood Library, 330 7th
Street, NE. Young Adult Book Discussion - Their Eyes Were Watching God.
For more information, call 698-3320.
Saturday, May 5, 1:00 p.m., Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial
Library, 901 G Street, NW, Room 215. Technology Training Session.
Demonstrations of new assistive technologies and group training for
people of all ages who use assistive technology for the blind and
visually impaired. For more information, call 727-2142.
Sunday, May 6, 2:00 p.m., Petworth Neighborhood Library, 4200 Kansas
Avenue, NW. The Literary Friends will host dramatic readings from Their
Eyes Were Watching God. For more information, call 541-6300.
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Zora Neale Hurston in Cleveland Park, May 5
Beth Meyer, lmeyer8090@aol.com
Deborah Macanic, exhibit developer and project manager at Smithsonian
Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, will give a PowerPoint
presentation on “Zora Neale Hurston in Context” on Saturday, May 5,
at 3 p.m. in the first floor auditorium of the Cleveland Park Branch of
the DC Public Library, Connecticut and Macomb Streets, NW. This program
is part of the Big Read, a major initiative from the National Endowment
of the Arts. DC’s Big Read will consist of activities for a “city
read” of Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God
from April 19- May 19. Also included in the program will be a brief talk
by a library staff person about how to form a book club. Refreshments
will be provided courtesy of Friends of the Cleveland Park Library.
Ms. Macanic will talk about Zora Neale Hurston and the events around
her in the Twenties and Thirties. She will review Hurston’s writing in
the context of the Harlem Renaissance and the American South. Ms.
Macanic has had more than thirty years of arts and museum experience.
She has managed the following exhibitions: Beyond Category: The Musical
Genius Of Duke Ellington, Latin Jazz, and The Jazz Age in Paris. The
Cleveland Park Branch of the DC Public Library is located near the
Cleveland Park Metrorail Station. All District of Columbia Public
Library activities are open to the public free of charge. For further
information, please call the Cleveland Park Library at 282-3080.
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National Building Museum Events, May 7
Lauren Searl, lsearl@nbm.org
Monday, May 7, 6:30-8:00 p.m. Spotlight on Design: Reinventing Los
Angeles: Reinvention without Amnesia. Founded in 1980, the Los
Angeles-based architecture firm Levin & Associates has received
worldwide attention for its preservation work on some of the city’s
beloved landmarks. With the restoration of the Los Angeles City Hall,
the Bradbury Building, the Griffith Observatory, and other projects, the
firm has played a large part in revitalizing the metropolis. Founding
principal Brenda Levin, FAIA, will discuss her firm’s role in this
complex urban center and demonstrate the importance of preserving the
built past. Following the program, she will sign copies of her book Levin
and Associates Architects: Selected and Current Works. This program
is presented in celebration of National Historic Preservation Month. $12
Museum members, National Trust for Historic Preservation members, and
students; $20 nonmembers. Prepaid registration required. Walk-in
registration based on availability. At the National Building Museum, 401
F Street, NW, Judiciary Square stop, Metro Red Line. Register for events
at http://www.nbm.org.
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Join us in our fight to stop all domestic violence. The Ward Four
Education Council presents its second forum on domestic violence on
Thursday, May 31, 6:30 p.m.–8:30 p.m., at Calvin Coolidge Senior High
School, 6315 5th Street, NW. Moderators, EZ Street and Jeannie Jones,
93.9 KYS radio personalities. Keynote speakers: Chief of Police Cathy
Lanier, DC Metropolitan Police Department, on how the police department
will handle domestic violence in our communities? And Mildred Muhammad,
ex-wife of DC Sniper John Muhammad Come hear her story: The terror of
living in fear at the hands of a domestic violence perpetrator and
survival in the aftermath of such a horrible life experience. Other
special guest speakers: Karen Cunningham, executive director, Women
Empowerment Against Violence (WEAVE). Help is available for victims and
their families: DC has the highest teen DV rate in the country. LaVika
Bhagat Singh, chief operating officer, Children Network International.
What impact does domestic violence have on children who have parents
that are victims of domestic abuse? Sponsors: DC Women Commission for
Women, Safeway Food Store. Contact info, 487-5926
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CLASSIFIEDS — VOLUNTEER SERVICES
Learn Skype Videoconferencing
Phil Shapiro, pshapiro@his.com
I was recently hired for a part-time job teaching English to teens in
Korea, using Skype videoconferencing, a free Internet service. The
person who hired me gave me some excellent practice sessions using Skype.
I feel compelled to pass along that goodwill and know-how to anyone here
in the DC area who would like a short Skype orientation. I provide these
short trainings using the Skype videoconferencing service itself. One
thing I like a lot about Skype is that it works very well between Mac
and Windows computers (as well as between Mac/Mac and Windows/Windows.)
Send me an E-mail if you’d like an orientation session to Skype.
Windows users can do videoconferencing on a fairly wide range of recent
computers using something as inexpensive as a $30 webcam and a headset
with microphone. Purchasers of recent Macs can use Skype
videoconferencing with the built-in iSight camera in their MacBooks,
MacBook Pro’s and iMacs. I’m pretty sure I can offer the orientation
training to you even if you don’t have a camera on your side. (That
would be a video to audio Skype call.) Videoconferencing is also one of
those technologies that can help us keep more cars off the roads, a
worthy goal in itself.
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