The Public Pays
Dear Paying Public:
So here’s a simple case. On June 19, Mark Segraves revealed on WTOP-FM
that, “District taxpayers paid more than $50,000 for three members of
Mayor Adrian Fenty’s executive staff, ten police officers, and three
detectives to travel with Fenty as he campaigned across the country for
Senator Barack Obama over the past five months” (http://www.wtop.com/?sid=1424562&nid=695).
It is against District law to spend government money for partisan
political campaigns, and the Fenty administration broke that law. What’s
the right response? “I’m sorry; it was a mistake, an oversight. We’ll
repay the government, and we won’t do it again.”
Why is it so hard for the administration to say that? Instead of
pledging to obey the law, Mayor Fenty responded, “The citizens of the
District of Columbia have my commitment that we will review everything
we’re doing, compare it to what other big city mayors do and compare
with what governors do. And if it is not following what those big city
mayors are doing, then we’ll make an adjustment” (http://www.wtop.com/?nid=25&sid=1425222).
Fenty doesn’t say that he’ll consult the law and follow the law.
Instead, he implies that if he can find other instances where big city
mayors or governors use public funds to subsidize partisan political
campaigns, he’ll continue to do it regardless of what District law
says.
What does Metropolitan Police Chief Cathy Lanier, our chief law
enforcement official, say? On this morning’s “Viewpoint” segment
on WRC-TV, Joe Krebs asked her. She didn’t address the legal problem
with taxpayer financing of partisan political activities; she didn’t
acknowledge that she had a duty to obey the law. Instead, she said that
she would continue to send police officers to guard Fenty on his
political trips at public expense, because in her opinion Fenty is one
of the most important people in the United States today. (Neither the
video nor the transcript of the program is yet posted.)
Fenty is too important, it seems, to have to obey the law, in this
instance as in many others. And why shouldn’t he think that he is? Who
is going to hold him responsible — the city council, the Inspector
General, the Office of Campaign Finance, the Board of Elections and
Ethics? Who is going to issue a finding and enforce it? It’s a simple
case, but who will make it?
The June 16 hearing of the Committee on Public Safety and the
Judiciary, on the administration’s “public safety” initiatives, is
now online at http://octt.dc.gov/services/on_demand_video/channel13/June2008/06_16_08_JUDICI.asx.
The testimony of Acting Attorney General Peter Nickles and MPD Chief
Cathy Lanier begins at the 4:13:40 mark; Councilmember Mary Cheh’s
first ten-minute round of questioning begins at the 4:35:42 mark. One
correction to the introduction to the last issue of themail, brought to
my attention both by Art Spitzer of the ACLU and by Councilmember Cheh’s
office: Cheh is a professor at George Washington University, not
American University; that correction has already been made to the online
version.
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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Klingle Road (Secretly) Open
Taylor Simmons, ttsimmons at aol dot com
Here’s a small victory to report in the chaotic, seemingly Quixotic
quest for restoration of transportation rights that were unexpectedly
lost seventeen years ago. Yesterday I drove all the way up Klingle Road
from Porter Street to 34th Street. Yeah, baby! It was suh-weet! I had
gone biking with my ten-year old daughter on the weekend-closed portion
of Beach Drive north of Broad Branch Road, having parked near Pierce
Mill. (Yes, it would be swell not to need to drive first before biking,
but alas that’s not yet a safe option for her.) So, driving south on
Beach Drive after our ride, with our bikes attached to the bike rack, I
decided as I sometimes do, to “try” Klingle Road, to see how far I
might get.
Until yesterday, that was not very far, as an impenetrable wall of
Jersey barriers a hundred yards from Porter forced us obsessed,
oppressed former Klingle drivers into a U-turn. But when I approached
yesterday, those barriers had all been moved aside, perhaps so
construction vehicles could do their work. In any case, I was able to
proceed along, slowly but surely. The actual pavement may have been
missing in a few spots and a few fallen branches here and there made the
ride a bit bumpy, but I was equally confident and unbothered that my
twenty year-old car could make it. After a few hundred yards, I spotted
our first truly serious obstacle: an elderly gentleman up ahead enjoying
a private evening stroll. I was actually about to put the car into
reverse and begin to back down, not wanting to startle the poor feller,
nor receive a finger-wagging Klingle-berry lecture. But then I
considered that no road-closed signs were posted and that gosh darn it,
I actually had as much right to drive on that road as he did to walk.
He did seem a bit surprised to see me, so I waved and smiled as I
approached, cheerfully commenting “slow but sure!” to which he
replied with similar cheer “dead end!” But as nothing was actually
blocking me yet, I kept going. Around the next bend, I spotted what he
might have been referring to: a massive oak tree, uprooted on one side
spanning the entire valley. So that’s it I guess. Wait a minute, maybe
I can fit under it! Had I been driving an SUV, that tree might well have
proved impassible. But my car’s not that tall. The highest point was
actually the bike on the bike rack which I checked carefully as I
proceeded under the oak. After that, the going got a bit smoother and no
other obstacles were visible. I began to fear that the dead end would be
an impenetrable blockade of Jersey barriers up by Cortland Place and the
back entrance to Tregaron. But one barrier had been moved aside, just
wide enough for my trusty car to get through. I made it. Yeah, baby!
Suh-weet!
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When a Book is More Valuable Than a New Car
Phil Shapiro, pshapiro@his.com
When Oprah Winfrey gave the commencement address at Stanford
University last week, she gave each graduate a gift more valuable than a
new car. She gave them a copy of DC-author Daniel Pink’s book, A
Whole New Mind. This book explains how “right brain thinking”
will be much more in demand in future workers and how we ought to start
preparing our students to better meet the needs of that future
workplace. I heard Daniel Pink speak about his book at the Cleveland
Park library two years ago. (Thanks, Barbara Conn.) I found the book
thoughtful and thought-provoking. Pink’s humility is one of his
greatest strength. Humility is the path to wisdom.
See http://tinyurl.com/44ojfa for further info on this news item. The
DC Public Library has copies of A Whole New Mind. If you’d like
to discuss A Whole New Mind, I’ve started a Facebook group for
that purpose.
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Another Dubious First
Ed T. Barron, edtb1@macdotcom
The June 23 edition of Time Magazine reports that Washington,
DC, is the worst in the US in terms of children’s obesity. Forty
percent of DC’s children are overweight (13 percent of whites, 43
percent of minorities). There are several key factors that result in
overweight children. Children from broken homes seldom get good
nutrition, and there is a lack of efforts to involve our children in
activities that promote better health. The public school system and the
District should establish more opportunities for recreation, more ball
fields, more intramural sports teams, more clubs that involve physical
exercise (hiking, swimming, running). Establishing these recreational
activities will result in better students as well as better health.
I grew up in a diverse community, Brooklyn, NY, that had a wealth of
sports facilities and clubs that involved boys and girls in recreational
activities during the school year and in the Summer months. The Flatbush
Boys Club was my favorite. I don’t remember any fat kids in my schools
or my social circles.
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Everything Fenty and Rhee Have Done to Date Is
Moot
Jonathan R. Rees, jrrees2006@verizon.net
DC Mayor Adrian Fenty on Friday announced what the city plans to do
with seven school buildings that will be closing. Mayor Fenty and
Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee outlined the closure plans earlier this
year. Seventeen school buildings will be shut down by the end of the
month. Some of the schools will be converted for government use or will
house charter schools.
None of what Fenty and Rhee have done to date (closing schools,
firing personnel, etc.) will have any impact upon student performance,
and voters should not allow themselves to be fooled that we are making
progress in improving the educational system in DC for our students.
Similar acts in the New York City school system — closings, firings
and so on — actually had an initial adverse affect on students.
Until student test scores across the city go up, everything that
Fenty and Rhee do is moot. It is all designed to deceive voters that
progress is being made. Fenty and Rhee are dancing around the tough
stuff; namely, coming down with a real plan to improve student
performance. It is time for voters to demand from Fenty and Rhee a
concrete plan in writing to show all they really know what they are
doing. And voters and parents should follow along with the plan until it
comes to fruit.
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More than three weeks have passed since Mayor Fenty and the National
Park Service announced the reopening of Fort Reno following closure due
to a false report of arsenic contamination. Standing with the mayor as
he made his announcement on May 28 were DC Department of Environment
Director George Hawkins and the US Geological Survey’s Michael Gauldin.
Peppered with questions about how the arsenic claim unraveled, Hawkins
and Gauldin promised answers on the cause and peculiar circumstances of
the arsenic finding. Where are the answers and DDOE accountability that
were promised?
A veteran of the Spring Valley cleanup, Alma Gates, posed the right
questions regarding arsenic contamination at Fort Reno and other
locations in Northwest DC (http://www.dcwatch.com/themail/2008/08-06-01.htm).
An article in The Northwest Current (June 18, page 3) added
additional concerns, http://www.currentnewspapers.com/archiveweek.php?n=1&year=2008.
I have an additional question. To prevent a recurrence of this
episode elsewhere in Northwest DC, how will the incorrect imagery that
identified Fort Reno as having arsenic-affected grass be corrected, or
better, be removed from circulation by DDOE and the USGS? Why is this
necessary? The same imagery also shows arsenic-affected areas throughout
Northwest DC (http://www.flickr.com/photos/27335560@N06/).
E. T. Slonecker created the arsenic image in his doctoral dissertation
(George Mason University, 2007) while working for the US Environmental
Protection Agency. He is now employed by the USGS. The larger of the
arsenic-affected areas can be seen at the north and south ends of the
Archibald-Glover Park between Van Ness Street and Massachusetts Avenue;
Nebraska Avenue in the vicinity of NBC offices, the Embassy of Japan,
and Homeland Security; Georgetown Day School and an area near Fort
Bayard. In addition to these areas, numerous single red pixels are
scattered throughout neighborhoods at individual home sites. A single
pixel, or “red spot”, corresponds to an area of 4 meters x 4 meters,
or 172 square feet on the ground.
Knowledge of the arsenic image and the potential for arsenic
contamination in Northwest DC became known in November 2007 at the
Spring Valley Partners Meeting. The minutes are located at: http://www.nab.usace.army.mil/projects/WashingtonDC/springvalley/Minutes/Partnering/2007/pm27Nov07.htm.
According to the minutes of this meeting, “DC Department of the
Environment (J. Sweeney) said there is an equal density of red spots in
the non-Spring Valley portion and the Spring Valley portion of the
District of Columbia.” Wouldn’t that have been reason enough to
confirm, immediately, arsenic levels at other locations within the
image? At the same November 2007 meeting, after DDOE’s Richard
Albright had shared the imagery with local media, Slonecker backpedals
on the usefulness of the imagery, stating that “he did not have
verified data to substantiate the findings.” This is at odds with an
unqualified statement accompanying the arsenic image in his 2007
dissertation — “Red is arsenic-affected grass.” When the image was
shared with the media and picked up across the country, the caption was
omitted.
In April 2008, five months after the Partner’s meeting, USGS’
Slonecker and DDOE’s Albright picked up their imagery project again
and took arsenic “samples” at Fort Reno. Five months. That public
health concerns were not high on their agenda is apparent even to the
small mind. Facts that would provide credibility that the sampling
actually occurred in April 2008 have not been shared with the public.
The very basics are missing — make, type, calibration, model of the
X-ray fluorescence instrument that was allegedly used in April 2008, and
specific date, times and locations of measurements. Other than media
reports, there are no published data, peer-reviewed or otherwise. It
appears that, absent analysis by their management or peers, the
Albright-Slonecker team concluded they had two independent sets of
corroborating data. They got that part right. Unfortunately, both data
sets were bad. The team believed they had confirmed that relatively high
levels of arsenic existed at Fort Reno (up to 1100 parts per million,
ppm). Some weeks later, this revelation was shared with the NPS, which
acted correctly to close Park access immediately on May 14th. For
comparison, naturally occurring arsenic levels are in the range of 3-10
ppm in our area.
Some observations about the use of satellite imagery. Thanks to
Google Earth and other tools, everyone knows how useful imagery can be
to observe physical features in our environment. With much qualification
and ground measurement confirmation, imagery can be used to obtain
chemical signatures of areas under satellite surveillance. Specifically,
contemporaneously-obtained imaging and confirming ground measurements
are needed for meaningful interpretation of chemical presence in imaging
data. The image that Slonecker used was taken in October 2000. Based on
a search of public documents, on-the-ground chemical analyses (arsenic
or other) do not exist in NW DC at any time around that date. At best,
any conclusions about the value of this image are purely speculative.
When DDOE and the USGS are prepared to provide the promised answers,
let’s hope they figure out how to discredit or withdraw from
circulation the arsenic image (“Red is arsenic-affected grass”) that
caused all the fuss. This needs to be solved. The alternative is to
expect future flare-ups as desk-bound cowboys venture into our
neighborhoods for more rogue experiments.
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[In response to Ed Barron’s question about which gas station will
be the first to hit the five-dollar-a-gallon mark, themail, June 22]
Either the Spring Valley Exxon or the Watergate Exxon, at Rock Creek
Parkway and Virginia Avenue, which is also always a price leader. Both
are far from competition.
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This is to advise that the June 2008 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 (the accompanying images can be seen in the archived PDF
version). The complete issue (along with prior issues back to January
2002) also is available in PDF file format directly from our home page
at no charge simply by clicking the link in the Current & Back
Issues Archive. 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 July 11 (the second Friday of the
month, as always). The complete PDF version will be posted by the
preceding night or early that Friday morning at the latest, 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) “Preservation Review Board’s New Members’
Questioning Past Procedures May be the New Normal; Actions Taken
Surprised All”; 2) “Historic Former Apt’s to be Incorporated Into
New Office Project Gets HPRB Nod for Excellent Design”; 3) “Collapsing
Inside Walls of Rundown 16th Street House Forces Tenants Out.”
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CLASSIFIEDS — EVENTS
National Building Museum’s Events, June 24,
30
Jazmine Zick, jzick@nbm.org
Tuesday, June 24, 6:30 p.m.-8:00 p.m. Eero Saarinen’s former
structural engineer Abba Tor, and Martin Moeller, the Museum’s
coordinating curator for the exhibition Eero Saarinen: Shaping the
Future, recount the pre-computer age engineering of JFK Airport’s
iconic TWA Terminal.
Monday, June 30, 6:30-8:00 p.m., Preserving Modernism in a Green
World. Panelists will consider the situations when preservation and
sustainability meet — or don’t meet — in the preservation of
buildings of the modern era. $12 members; $12 students; $20 nonmembers.
Prepaid registration required. Walk-in registration based on
availability. Both events 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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