Leap Year Day
Dear Leapers:
The 21st Century School Fund has published Michael Siegel’s and
Mary Filardo’s “Review of the Illinois Facility Fund’s Analysis of
School Location and Performance in Washington, DC,” http://21csf.org/csf-home/Documents/IFFreview_21CSF_Siegel.pdf.
(The IFF Analysis is posted at http://www.dcpswatch.com/mayor/120123.pdf.)
Siegel and Filardo conclude that, “In the final analysis, there is no
valid evidence to justify the outcomes of IFF rankings and
recommendations. There only predictable results would be the disruption
of the lives of thousands of students and families; the imposition of an
arbitrary process to select schools for disinvestment, investment,
demolition and closure; the transfer of control of school facilities to
a publicly unaccountable appointed DC Public Charter School Board; and
the attendant loss of public trust that would result.”
#####
Chief Cathy Lanier’s article disputing the Post’s reporting
on homicide rate reporting was published on Sunday, February 26, and has
now been posted at http://tinyurl.com/7kwccfx.
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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New York Tries to Mimic DC, Hysterical Protest
Results
Gabe Goldberg, gabe at gabegold dot com
Pretty funny — over-the-top hysterical — article. And its
comments note that DC’s Metro’s no-food/drink consumption helps keep
the system clean and relatively rat free.
“Eating in Public: Pleasure or Peril?” “https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/29/opinion/eating-in-public-pleasure-or-peril.html?ref=opinion
“Bill Perkins, a Democratic state senator who represents Harlem,
has introduced legislation that would ban eating in the New York City
subway system and fine first-time violators $250 (twice that for repeat
offenders). Mr. Perkins and his allies — including the local transit
workers’ union — argue, not unreasonably, that eating on the subway
breeds rats.
“It’s far from clear that the proposed ban would be enforceable,
or would do enough to overcome cutbacks in cleaning stations and tracks.
Worse, the claim that noshing leads to litter and filth harks back to
racial and class stereotypes from the Victorian era. In those days,
social reformers tried to crack down on working-class public eaters and
food vendors — many of whom were immigrants — by linking them to
squalor, disease, and shame.”
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On February 20, I tried to withdraw money from an ATM owned by
ATMWorld. The location was the BP gas station situated at 14th Street
and Florida Avenue, NE. The machine took money from my bank account but
didn’t dispense any money. That certainly got my attention. Another
attention-getter was the fact that the machine charges $3.45 for each
transaction. I reported my problem to the police and they told me there
was no crime involved since I was robbed by a machine, not a person. I
called ATMWorld and they told me to contact my bank.
I learned from CitiBank that ATMWorld is located at gas stations and
Laundromats around the city and that their ATMs frequently don’t
dispense the money people request. Then the people come to their banks
and report the fraud. I spoke to a woman who lives in the area near the
BP Gas Station and she told me there had been no money in the machine
since the first of the month, that everyone using the machine had money
taken from their banks, but that the money was not dispensed to those
people, and that one woman lost $200.
This is a lucrative scam. My warning to readers of themail is avoid
using ATMWorld machines.
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Monthly HHW/E-Cycling/Document Shredding
Kevin Twine, kevin.twine@dc.gov
The Department of Public Works will hold its monthly Household
Hazardous Waste/E-Cycling/Personal Document Shredding drop-off on
Saturday, March 3, between 8:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. at the Ft. Totten
Transfer Station. District residents may bring toxic items such as
pesticides, batteries, and cleaning fluids to Ft. Totten, along with
computers, televisions, and other unwanted electronic equipment.
Personal document shredding also is available and residents may bring up
to five boxes of materials to be shredded. No business or commercial
material will be accepted.
To accommodate residents whose religious beliefs prohibit them from
using the Saturday drop-off, DPW will accept household hazardous waste
and e-cyclables the Thursday before the first Saturday of the month
(March 1, from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.). While DPW normally offers
personal document shredding on the first Saturday, they cannot accept
items for shredding on Thursdays because these documents cannot be
protected until the shredding contractor arrives the first Saturday. For
a list of all household hazardous waste and e-cyclables accepted by DPW,
please click on the HHW link at http://www.dpw.dc.gov.
Directions to Ft. Totten: Travel east on Irving Street, NW, turn left
on Michigan Avenue, turn left on John F. McCormack Road, NE, and
continue to the end of the street.
###############
I agree with the spirit and sense of Brian Robertson’s post about
the District of Columbia council (themail, February 26). I would,
however, recommend a much more fundamental “root and branch”
approach to reforming the council. Institute instant run-off voting (IRV,
sometimes called single transferable or alternate ballot voting). With
IRV we would not cast a single unitary vote for one candidate. Instead,
we would rank all the candidates for, in this case, each council seat.
If no candidate got a majority of the votes cast. the candidate with the
fewest “first preference” votes would be dropped and his or her “second
preference” votes would be allocated to the remaining candidates, and
so on, until one candidate gets a majority of the votes cast for that
council seat.
Amend the Home Rule Charter to require a candidate to get a majority
of votes cast for election to the council. Right now, a candidate is
elected if he or she gets a plurality, more votes than any other
candidate for that seat. In tandem with instituting IRV, we should
change the charter to require all candidates to get a majority of the
votes cast, and not just more than the next guy. This is a basic Civics
101, good government reform we should have instituted a long time ago.
Amend the Home Rule Charter to include a Self-Denying Ordinance. All
incumbents should be required to first resign their current elected
positions before they can stand for some other elective office,
especially council chair and mayor. A number of councilmembers have
rather notoriously run for council seats that are in the presidential
electoral cycle (2008, 2012, 2016) because it then leaves them free to
run for council chair or mayor in the mayor-chair cycle (2010, 2014,
2018) without being in danger of losing their incumbency. This has also
contributed to the lack of turnover on the council, since council chair
and mayoral rejects get to remain on the council even after being
repudiated by us voters when they seek other, higher office. Of course,
this ordinance requires each incumbent to resign far enough in advance
of the next regularly scheduled election (I would recommend at least
180-210 calendar days in advance) to allow other citizens time to
organize a viable campaign for the elective office that is being
vacated. By the way, this requirement should also be extended to members
of the Board of Education to help end that body’s role as a Class-AAA
‘farm team’ for the council instead of a policymaking body made up
(at least partly) of elected citizens who genuinely care about the
quality and future of public education in this city. Perhaps it should
also extend to ANCs. They are, after all, elected officials and applying
this requirement to ANCs would further promote turnover and infusion of
new elected blood at this most basic level of elective citizenship in
the city.
Reform party affiliation registration rules for candidates. Brian
Robertson’s core point about the need for more turnover and fresher
faces on the council seemed, to me anyway, to concern whether or not we
have truly independent (that is, nonparty affiliated) councilmembers or,
to be blunt, Democrats in independent’s clothing. The answer is
obvious in a city where registered Democrats outnumber registrants in
all other parties combined by something like thirteen to one. The
solution is (also) simple: independent candidates for District of
Columbia council must have been so registered with the DC Board of
Elections and Ethics for at least three consecutive calendar years
before the date on which they stand for election. And, before any of you
ask: if the person in question is already in elective office as a
registered Democrat, Republican or Statehood-Green or any other
officially recognized political party in this town, then the three year
‘independent’ clock starts to run after he or she leaves that
office. Also before you ask: I recommend an odd number of years for this
requirement to make it just that much more difficult for someone to game
the electoral process here, which is currently divided into two- and
four-year electoral cycles, depending on which electoral game you are
playing.
Streamline and simplify the recall process. We would, well should,
have a much more responsive and less tin-eared council if the members
knew that they can be fired by the people who elected them, and that
that option was more readily available to and more easily employed by
the electorate. There should be a credible bar for recall petitions, to
prevent interest groups from organizing to dismiss a councilmember
simply because they disagree with his or her policies or with a vote he
or she cast that was unpopular but the right thing to do. That said,
however, the recall process could and arguably ought to be a lot more
voter-friendly, accessible and easy to bring to closure and a vote than
it is now. A recall vote for a ward representative should be permitted
if 7.5 percent of all registered voters in that ward sign a recall
petition. For at-large councilmembers, a recall should be placed on the
ballot if 7.5 percent of all registered voters in the city sign the
petition. This is a slight decrease from the 10 percent requirement
currently in District law but it still maintains a high enough bar to
deter frivolous or “pay back” recall efforts. And, anyway, the
petition does not recall the official: it just places that choice on the
next regularly scheduled ballot for the voters to consider.
Long-term, we perhaps ought to consider some form of
semi-parliamentary reconstitution of the entire District government
whereby the entire council can be recalled if, say, 35 percent to 45
percent of all registered voters in the city signed a petition for new
city council elections across the board.
###############
Concerning the MPD’s advertised homicide closure rate of 94
percent, indeed, both parties are correct: 1) the statistic is
calculated in a legitimate manner; and 2) it is, or can be, very
misleading. It’s legitimate, because if the annual rates of homicides
and of homicide clearances were constant, then the number of clearances
of past-year homicides would balance the number of current-year
homicides that would be expected to be closed in coming years. Because
one cannot know how many of this year’s homicides will be closed in
future years, this is the only way to do it, and the result is sensible
— unless there’s an unusual count of previous-year closures.
That’s the case this year: an exceptionally high count of
previous-year homicide closures, forty, whereas the normal count is half
that. That’s the reason for the extraordinary 94 percent closure rate
claimed for 2011, though the actual, long-term-average closure rate is
much lower, perhaps 75 percent (the MPD’s target homicide closure
rate).
I think Chief Lanier is making a mistake in boasting about this 94
percent rate, as she does in her Washington Post column: “and
by the way, in 2011 we closed 103 homicides, for a UCR closure rate of
95 percent”. That’s almost certain to be a one-time-only outcome,
because the MPD is not likely again to have so many previous-years
homicide closures to add to the total. So, if the homicide closure rate
for 2012 drops to the “normal” value of 75 percent, or even less
than that, as the MPD has fewer previous-years homicides amenable to
closure, what will Chief Lanier say then? Better to admit now that a
realistic closure rate is 75 percent, and the annual rate may be higher
or lower than that, depending on how many previous-years closures happen
to boost or reduce this year’s accounting.
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CLASSIFIEDS — EVENTS
Woman’s National Democratic Club Luncheon,
March 7
Patricia Bitondo, pbitondo@aol.com
Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD) has served in Congress since 1987 and was
elected to the Senate in 2006. He’s been a national leader on
initiatives helping small businesses and creating jobs, expanding health
care, restoring the Chesapeake Bay, defending civil rights/civil
liberties, protecting the environment, and much more.
He currently serves on the Finance, Budget, Foreign Relations,
Environment and Public Works, and Small Business committees. Some of his
recent accomplishments include securing a guaranteed dental benefit in
the Children’s Health Insurance Program, a provision to provide
first-time home buyers with an $8,000 tax credit, and elevation of the
new National Institute for Minority Health and Health Disparities. The Washington
Post has said Senator Cardin has a “command of issues, proven
integrity, formidable intellect and an unstinting work ethic.” He
believes it is possible to work across the aisle to get things done
without sacrificing Democratic values. At the Woman’s National
Democratic Club, 1526 New Hampshire Avenue, NW. Bar opens at 11:30 a.m.;
lunch 12:15 p.m.; lecture, presentation, Q&A: 1:00-2:00 p.m. Members
$25, nonmembers $30; lecture only $10. Register at https://salsa.wiredforchange.com/o/5880/p/salsa/event/common/public/?event_KEY=34058
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National Building Museum Events, March 6, 8
Stacy Adamson, sadamson@nbm.org
Tuesday, March 6, Readings at 10:30 and 11:30 a.m. Book of the Month:
Riki’s Birdhouse. $3 per person, includes admission to the
Building Zone. Drop-in program. Recommended for ages three to five.
Spring is coming and Riki can’t wait to build a birdhouse! Learn about
animal homes in this interactive reading and make your own.
Thursday, March 8, 6:30-8:00 p.m. Women of Architecture: Architecture
and the Great Recession. $12 members, $12 students, $20 nonmembers.
Prepaid registration required. It is difficult to exaggerate the
chilling effect of the economic slowdown on architecture. A panel of
female developers, architects, and design experts examines how the
building industry is responding to profound challenges created by the
current recession. This program is presented in March in recognition of
National Women’s History Month. Both events at the National Building
Museum, 401 F Street, NW, Judiciary Square Metro station. Register for
events at http://www.nbm.org.
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