Observations
Dear Observers:
An important aspect of California’s voter initiative law has been
publicized in two recent California court cases, on same-sex marriage
and medical marijuana. Here’s how the California Second District Court
of Appeals phrased it: “The Legislature nonetheless cannot amend an
initiative, such as the CUA [Compassionate Use Act, legalizing the
medicinal use of marijuana], unless the initiative grants the
Legislature authority to do so. The CUA does not grant the Legislature
the authority to amend it without voter approval.” (Citations omitted,
http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/B195624.pdf.)
In DC, the city council has made a regular practice of overturning voter
initiatives, such as those supporting term limits on elected offices and
limits on campaign contributions. This has discouraged the use of the
initiative process, especially efforts to use it to reform the city
government. In California, unless an initiative specifically authorizes
the legislature to amend or overturn it, the legislature instead has to
pass a bill that would submit any changes it wants to make to an
initiative to the voters. So why don’t DC citizens draft and sponsor
an initiative that amends the DC initiative law based on the California
model, so that the city council can’t overturn or amend voter-passed
legislation on its own authority, but has to submit any changes to the
voters?
Thanks to Marc Borbely for sending a link to EdBizBuzz, a blog by
Marc Dean Millot published by Education Week. Millot has recently
written three items on Washington, DC, schools and Chancellor Michelle
Rhee, and all three are well worth reading: http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/edbizbuzz/2008/05/rheevisiting_the_district_of_c.html#more,
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/edbizbuzz/2008/05/rheevisiting_the_district_of_c_1.html#more,
and http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/edbizbuzz/2008/05/rheevisiting_the_district_of_c_2.html#more.
Millot is the editor of School Improvement Industry Markets Report, so
you would expect him to support Fenty’s and Rhee’s initiatives.
Well. . . . The quote that Borbely highlights comes from the last
paragraph of Millot’s third article: “What this suggests is that the
Chancellor considers herself above the law, above the community, and
above accountability. This may be what’s required to establish a
dictatorship, but it’s no way to turn around a school district, or
create an institution that will survive her departure.”
It’s almost unanimous; nobody (except Jack Evans, Marion Barry, and
Vincent Gray) wants to repeat the baseball stadium mistake so soon with
a soccer stadium. Here’s The Washington Times: “No Stadium
Boondoggle,” http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/may/30/no-stadium-boondoggle/.
Even The Washington Post, a major cheerleader for enriching
sports promoters at the expense of the public and small businesses, has
its editorial doubts, although it leaves itself wiggle room to support
the new giveaway later: “Field of Schemes: Why Are Backers of a DC
Soccer Stadium So Concerned about Public Scrutiny?” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/30/AR2008053002841.html.
Columnist Marc Fisher, who lost his balance to promote major league
charity for poor struggling baseball promoters, has regained his senses
to oppose the same kind of giveaway for soccer: “A Stadium Plan That
Won’t Pay Off,” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/28/AR2008052803101.html.
He even writes, “. . . the city has no business paying for such a
facility or grabbing riverfront parkland to build it.” And Colbert
King, of course, writes the must-not-miss column on the scheme: “Handouts
and Hands Out,” http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/30/AR2008053002522.html.
DC has a bad history of misspending and wasting federal Homeland
Security money. Do you remember the five mountain bikes that the city
bought with Homeland Security funds for Tony Williams and four of his
staffers, so they could escape the city in case of an emergency? (Where
are those bicycles, anyway?) Do you remember the leather jackets the
city bought for police officers as a Homeland Security priority? Do you
remember the embarrassing Sixty Minutes story on our profligacy? Now the
administration is proceeding with its plan to tie together all the spy
cams in the city by using mostly federal Homeland Security funds. Isn’t
this a much bigger waste? Most of those cameras, the great majority, are
in public schools. Now, there may be some weak argument for video
surveillance within a school; if teachers and administrators are too
afraid of the students to monitor the halls themselves, remote video
coverage could tell an assistant principal which hallways the truants
are in, assuming that he spends his time staring at the screens rather
than dealing with students. But what possible excuse is there for
monitoring video feeds of school hallways in a remote, central Homeland
Security office? What good does that do anyone? Is the city government
really arguing to Homeland Security that the biggest terrorist threat to
the city comes from our students, and that it’s worth millions in
federal security funds to find out if students are skipping classes and
walking in school hallways?
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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Now that the dust has settled at Ft. Reno, the opportunity is ripe
for the District to take a good look at this event, how it unfolded, and
what measures will be put in place to ensure there isn’t another false
alarm somewhere else in the city. This is a full disclosure opportunity
for the District Department of the Environment. Its director, George
Hawkins, and staff member, Richard Albright, need to inform the public
of how the “discovery” of high levels of arsenic at Ft. Reno got
released. Who authorized the secret taking of samples at Ft. Reno? Who
authorized the release of the faulty findings? How did Harry Jaffe
obtain an internal DDOE memo? Who is paying for this false alarm? These
are questions of accountability that only DDOE can answer.
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Budget Earmarks Revisited
Dorothy Brizill, dorothy@dcwatch.com
On Friday, the city council will hold a final reading and vote on the
Budget Support Act (BSA) for fiscal year 2009, Bill 17-678. As I noted
in previous postings in themail, this year’s budget process has shown
how out of control the earmarking of funds has become. In recent years,
the city’s elected leadership, both the mayor and the council, have
developed a bad habit of earmarking funds, that is, of circumventing the
normal contracting and review process to direct government funds to
specific groups, businesses, or policy initiative. In most instances,
the earmarked grant language in the BSA is very vague and not even in
complete sentences, simply specifying a stated amount and the name of
the recipient organization, with an address or other means of
identification. The BSA seldom gives details about the use of the funds,
or the specific projects that they are for.
Last week, Eric Goulet, the council’s Budget Director, prepared a
chart listing the one-time earmarked grants contained in the BSA as of
May 14 (http://www.dcwatch.com/council/ob080514.htm).
The chart lists the recipient organizations and the amounts that they
will receive. However, the column detailing the purposes of the grants
is, in most cases, empty.
This year, Mayor Fenty’s initial Budget Support Act, which was
submitted to the council in March, contained $24.6 million in earmarks
to forty-four groups or organizations and $13.5 million in a “designated
appropriation” to the Canal Park Development Association, a
public-private partnership, to construct the three-block Canal Park in
southeast Washington. However, by the time the council had its first
reading and vote on the BSA on may 13, the total amount of earmarks had
grown to $43.9 million, with additional millions of dollars in “designated
allocations” by the council’s Committees on Health, Human Services,
and Economic Development — for example, the $13.5 million for Canal
Park, $1.5 million to the Primary Care Association, $300,000 to KPMG,
and $300,000 to Food and Friends.
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A Huge Mistake
Ed T. Barron, edtb1@macdotcom
It would be sheer folly to build another new stadium with taxpayers
dollars in southeast DC. The District is in much poorer financial
straits today than we were when the council approved taxpayer funding
for the new Nationals Stadium. The idea that this new two hundred
million dollar soccer stadium will produce a flurry of new development
akin to that that is proposed and underway near the Navy Yards is very
wrong. There are many soccer fans in the area and they have demonstrated
the viability of soccer in DC with their attendance at RFK Stadium. It
makes much more sense to invest a lot less money to refurbish and
improve RFK for a good soccer field. Transportation and parking are
already in place and very little infrastructure improvement will be
required. As for who should pay for this refurbishment, let the new
United owners fund the refurbishment in exchange for a share of whatever
profits are realized. The new owners can sell shares in the United Team
to raise the money for refurbishment of RFK.
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The firehouse on Florida Avenue and Orren Streets, NE, closed its
doors on May 27 with no notice to the neighborhood. This is one of the
oldest working firehouses in DC, and I am concerned that the closing was
as quiet as if they had not paid the rent and needed to steal away at
night.
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Harris Teeter Jenkins Road
Bob Levine, rilevine@cpcug.org
The new Harris Teeter Store at Pennsylvania and Potomac Avenues, SE,
has blocked Pennsylvania Avenue, SE, at 6:30 a.m., getting trucks in and
out of the new store for several mornings in a row. I’m trying to get
to work at that hour and have been blocked from using the road for
fifteen or twenty minutes each morning. The major reason for the problem
is that Harris Teeter doesn’t bother to provide any supervision for
their arriving trucks at that hour, feeling that Pennsylvania Avenue is
a great parking lot for its arriving trucks. This is a wonderful way to
promote economic development in our fair city.
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Locking Bicycles on Handicapped Ramps
Annie McCormick-Dixon, mamccredz@msn.com
On Friday, May 30, around 11:15 a.m., my husband and I were walking
down M Street, and there was an elderly woman in a wheelchair with her
five-year-old grandson. She could not enter the ramp into the National
Geographic building because two bicycles were chained on the inside of
each side of the entrance to the ramp. She was sitting there in her
wheelchair on the sidewalk with no way to get into the ramp to get into
the building and no one to assist her. I went inside the building and my
husband stayed with her. I asked a security guard, and someone came out
to help. By that time there was an elderly man with a walker who had
just come up behind her and he couldn’t get through, either.
Surely a world-class and highly respected organization can do better.
Isn’t it illegal to lock bikes anywhere on a handicapped ramp, much
more the inside of the ramp? Those bicycles should have been cut off
their locks immediately and their owners fined on the spot when they
came back for their bikes. National Geographic needs to provide better
for its handicapped patrons.
It was very sad and a bit infuriating to see this lovely lady in a
wheelchair with her young charge and the subsequent gentleman with the
walker in a quandary. I am glad my husband and I were there to ask for
help for them. I’ve written a letter to National Geographic.
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A Teachable Moment
Ralston Cox, Dupont Circle, ralston.cox@verizon.net
I recently drove down to visit family in the piney woods of east
Georgia. We’re talking the really rural, truly deep South folks. I had
to go into the local county seat a couple of times on errands and knew I
wasn’t in my beloved Washington, DC, when I could find parking right
on the square in front of the courthouse two days running! Free! On both
days I ate lunch at a sweet little sandwich shop run by a couple of very
nice young women. On the second day, I happened to park right in front
of their shop and when I stopped by to get lunch, one of the women said
that the license plate on my car had been quite the topic of
conversation while I was in the courthouse. It seems no one could quite
figure out the “Taxation Without Representation” motto.
I rolled up my proverbial sleeves and did my really brief version
(two minutes, tops) of the story of the disenfranchisement of DC voters.
I reached the end of my spiel and said that the motto came from the fact
that we were the only citizens of the United States that paid Federal
taxes but were denied representation in Congress. There was a slight
pause, and one of the women said, “Well, that’s just wrong. Shouldn’t
be like that.” The other one piped up and said that “Somebody ought
to fix it.” I suggested that they let their Senators (Saxby Chambliss
and Johnny Isaakson) and their Representative (Paul Broun) know their
thoughts. All three of them being Republicans, I’m sure they’ll be
interested, right?
It may not be perfect — I always thought it should say “Taxed
Without Representation” — but our license plate motto served to
raise just a little bit of social conscience in east Georgia and gave me
the opportunity to talk to regular people about our situation. It’s
too bad we can’t get it on the quarter.
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The Broken Hand of the DC Government
Jonathan R. Rees, jrrees2006@verizon.net
There are some agencies of the government of the District of Columbia
that have for years performed more poorly than the District of Columbia
Public Schools, but the Fenty Administration has done little or nothing
to address those other underperforming fingers on the hands of
government of the District of Columbia. Why? Is it that the Fenty
Administration is unaware of the poor performing agencies? Is it that
the Fenty Administration does not see the poor performance taking place?
Or is it that the Fenty Administration can’t handle more than it
already has in its basket.
Most people will agree that that are too many broken agencies of the
government of the District of Columbia and little is being done. Fenty
wants to be judged by what he does or does not achieve as far as his
accomplishments concerning his control of the District of Columbia
Public Schools. Voters would be foolish to judge Fenty on one broken
finger and think he is doing a good job while the other broken fingers
have not even been set to heal.
Voters have a bad habit of allowing politicians to blind them with
single issue matters, as it tends to result in voters making blind
decisions. Voters need to start asking the Fenty Administration when it
is going to get on the ball and go after those other underperforming
agencies.
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Dog Fight on Newark Street, NW
Jonetta Rose Barras, Rosebook1@aol.com
The Department of Parks and Recreation kicked off this weekend its
community garden program. But efforts to locate a dog exercise area (DEA)
or dog park at 39th and Newark Streets, NW, could jeopardize one of the
District’s oldest such enterprises, say some members of the Newark
Street Community Garden Association. Other residents in the McLean
Gardens community, where the proposed DEA would be situated, say the
site is “the wrong size and the wrong place.” Still others complain
about the danger to children. Proponents counter that the location is
perfect, and will provide much needed space for nearly five hundred
dogs. They claim to have more than two hundred signatures of support.
If District officials thought getting regulations approved for
so-called dog parks was tough, they haven’t seen anything yet. The
battle on Newark Street likely will be replicated in other parts of the
city as the DPR attempts to force these DEAs in communities where
residents are happy with dogs on leashes and parks for people.
Actually, the struggle at McLean Gardens began more than four years
ago, when some politically connected residents and professional dog
walkers lobbied the DC Council, including Ward 1’s Jim Graham and
then-Ward 3 ‘s Kathy Patterson, to step into the proverbial poop. The
legislature did, mandating the establishment of DEAs. Now, well, it’s
stinky, nasty and loud, and for good reason. Read more at: http://jrbarras.com/artman/publish/article_159.shtml.
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This is in response to your query to themail [themail, May 28]. This
is just a suggestion, perhaps from my recent experience working for the
DC government, as I literally took a leave of absence from my own
commercial real estate company for the first year of the Fenty
administration to help at the Office of Property Management in strategy
and implementation of commercial real estate matters. I was there only a
short time and am back at my own firm now, but hopefully helped make
some real world changes that will benefit “us citizens.” Along the
way I learned a lot about how, as citizens, we can help get things done,
like the matter you have raised. So I am addressing this with ideas for
a long term solution and a short term one. Both require patience and
diligence.
Long term: While writing Councilmember Jack Evans is a good idea, he
is a legislator. So the long term solution would be for the ward
councilmember, that is Jack, and the councilmember who oversees the
Committee on the Environment, that is Mary Cheh, to sponsor legislation
that would outlaw commercial vehicles idling for extended periods of
time. This would presume, of course, that there is not already
legislation on this, and/or there is not a justifiable reason for this,
such as refrigeration or ventilation needing to be warmed up, or
something that we may not know that explains why it is a nationwide
practice at bus stops and truck stops on highways. The benefits seem
obvious. Thought would have to be given to our public employees who do
the same, whether it be for DDOT, MPD, or other agencies. I can assure
you, the city administrator and the mayor would be in favor of anything
that reduces waste and unneeded costs. I have had the opportunity to
work with the city administrator closely, and find that he does not
suffer fools within government who won’t make change happen to save
these needed fuel dollars. Especially at the current price of a gallon.
I can’t imagine any councilmember would not approve legislation on
this point. It just has to have an appropriate sponsor and make it
through its committee first.
In the short term, go to the DC.gov web site and put in a tracked
request for service. If you have never done this, it takes very little
time to learn how it is done. Pick a category, such as “Parking
Enforcement Service Request.” Track the effort taken to resolve the
problem this way. I then suggest that you write a short E-mail to the
directors of the Environment and Motor Vehicles, allowing them time to
investigate the problem and a solution, and fill them in on your
tracking number. This will get their attention. In the event you do not
obtain a satisfactory resolution, it may because, unless there is a law
to the contrary, the city may not control the problem. But the above
folks will look into it and, rest assured (despite Gary’s insistence
that the mayor is almost always in the wrong), this administration will
want follow up to the service request.
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I read your post concerning he idling of tour buses in themail [May
28]. The issue came up recently in the Palisades neighborhood because of
tour buses parking on MacArthur Boulevard. There are regulations
governing idling in the District (and in VA, Title 40 of the Virginia
Clean Air Regulations, 9 VAC 5-40-5670 Par. C and MD, Transportation
Division of the Code of Maryland Regulations, 22-402 (c)(3)).
The District regulations are in Title 20 DCMR, 900.1: “The engine
of a gasoline or diesel powered motor vehicle, including private
passenger vehicles, on public or private space shall not idle for more
than three (3) minutes while the motor vehicle is parked, stopped or
standing, except as follows: a. To operate power takeoff equipment such
as, but not limited to, dumping, cement mixers, refrigeration systems,
content delivery, winches, or shredders; b. To operate for fifteen (15)
minutes air conditioning equipment on buses with an occupancy of twelve
(12) or more persons; and c. To operate heating equipment when the local
temperature is thirty-two (32) degrees Fahrenheit or below.
You can call the mayor’s citizen service line, 311, give them the
location of the idling vehicles, and ask for parking enforcement to
ticket the vehicles. You could also print out the regulations and share
them with people sitting in idling vehicles. Since many drivers are not
aware of the existence of the regulations, it would be great to get this
information out to the public and especially to drivers. Maybe the
Department of Motor Vehicles could post notices.
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CLASSIFIEDS — EVENTS
DC Public Library Events, June 5
George Williams, george.williams2@dc.gov
Thursday, June 5, 12:00 p.m., Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial
Library, Auditorium A-5. Brown Bag Recital Series, Music of Tchaikovsky
and Mozart performed by cellist Vasily Popov and pianist Ralitza
Patcheva.
Thursday, June 5, 2:30 p.m., Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial
Library, Arts and Literature Division, Room 221. Let’s Talk about
Books. Discuss Major Barbara, a play by George Bernard Shaw. Next month’s
selection: “A String of Beads” (short story) by W. Somerset Maugham.
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