DC Government

ANC Rep Replies to Controversy Surrounding the $242k for Streetscape Improvements

By Prince Of Petworth


Photo by PoPville flickr user ewilfong

As promised in yesterday’s post here is an individual ANC’s perspective on the controversy:

“I’m one of the two ANC commissioners cited by Adam Hoey in his complaint that funds for the Main Street TEG grant might be “diverted by a possible resolution from ANC1D Commissioners Edwards and McKay”. It’s important to note that no such resolution has been offered, and if the ANC simply does nothing, the grant will proceed.

Consider what would be purchased with this $242,000 expenditure. Up-lighting of some trees in Lamont Park. “Festoon lights” hung across the street. Painting the streetlight poles black. A mid-block pedestrian crosswalk (which DDOT won’t do, that being an unsafe crossing location). Bike “sharrows”. Some trees, locations uncertain. Nicer benches (our homeless-shelter folks, who spend their days in this park, will no doubt be pleased). The “park tables” would be nice, and correspond to an ANC resolution calling for such tables, but are not part of the proposal as submitted to DDOT, and have not heretofore been mentioned.

Will any of this make any real difference? Mount Pleasant Street is having a tough time lately, in part because many Mount Pleasant residents prefer to do their shopping and restauranting elsewhere. I could go on at great length about the problems on the Street, and what we might do to reverse the decline of what some residents call “Mount Unpleasant Street”. But what’s clear is that small steps, like the cosmetic changes proposed by Main Street, will accomplish little. Surely that $241,000 of taxpayer money could be better spent. I don’t support wasteful uses of public funds, even if opposing waste causes those funds to go to some other DC neighborhood.

The Main Street effort got off to a bad start, as the ANC in July, 2009, failed (on a 3 to 3 vote) to pass a resolution of support for their proposal, only to have Main Street falsely claim in its proposal to DDOT that it had “received ANC support for moving forward with the application”. No, it hadn’t, as we wanted to see more detail about exactly what was being proposed. As for Historic Mount Pleasant, the president has this to say: “I think a line-by-line discussion of the proposal is essential. . . . If they spend this on second and third priority stuff, then my concern is that our real priorities — like new street lamps — will be pushed even further down the budgetary wait list.”

Mount Pleasant Street needs, and deserves, better than this. DC taxpayers deserve better than this.

I am writing, of course, as a single commissioner, and not for the ANC.

Jack McKay
ANC 1-D, Mount Pleasant, Single Member District 1D03″

Old Bruce Monroe Site Gets $1.5, $7 million for D.C. small businesses hurt by the streetscape projects

By Prince Of Petworth

We last spoke about the old Bruce Monroe site here and we last spoke about providing funds to small business hurt by streetscape projects here.

From a CM Jim Graham Press Release:

“I worked with Chairman Gray to put $1.5 million in to transform the old Bruce-Monroe site into the community use we need. The Mayor’s office said there was only $500,000 in the budget. That was not enough for the basketball courts, night-time lights, fencing, tennis court, programming and other beautification items. The stakeholders challenged me to find more. We did.

There will also be $7 million for D.C. small businesses hurt by the streetscape projects. This money will be placed in a fund for the sole purpose of providing tax relief for our small businesses. Earlier this year, several Col. Heights businesses showed me photos of the obstacles – diggers, brick piles, sand and all manner of debris – stopping their customers at the door. They also shared some of their financial books, all of which spurred me to act. We will be developing the process itself in the next few weeks. But we had to get the budget funding in place.”

WP: Funding restored for D.C. streetcars

By Prince Of Petworth


Photo from PoPville flickr user Mr. T in DC

The Washington Post’s Nikita Stewart is reporting:

“D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray said he has worked with the office of the Chief Financial Officer to come up with money that would allow the city to restore funding for streetcars.

Gray spokeswoman Doxie McCoy said $10 million would be made available immediately to purchase street cars in fiscal 2011. Another $37 million would be place in reserve pending an operations and funding proposal from Mayor Adrian Fenty. The council would then have to approve the proposal.”

Council Chairman Vince Gray Comments on the Budget and Streetcars

By Prince Of Petworth


Photo from PoPville flickr user Mr. T in DC

From a Vince Gray for Mayor press release:

“I strongly support streetcar development, and remain committed to seeing it become a reality here in the District of Columbia. I’ve visited Portland, Oregon, twice in recent years, seen first-hand the positive economic impact and transportation impact on communities, and I am firmly committed to a new streetcar system in the District which brings about similar benefits to our city.

But we owe it to ourselves to have a well thought out planning process. We can’t afford the Mayor’s approach of “build now and plan later,” which only results in poor outcomes and much higher costs in the end. There needs to be proper planning, comprehensive transportation and engineering work, which is why we allocated $5 million to complete the planning process. Streetcars aren’t scheduled for completion until 2030, and over the next year, we’ll do the kind of planning that’s necessary to give us the most efficient use of our dollars.

I have full intention to move forward with streetcars, however, while we do the planning over the next year, we can take some of the dollars for desperately needed and more immediate capital projects, like renovation of middle schools, while our dollars are dwindling. This approach, which passed Council by a vote of 11-2, will allow for better collaboration and cooperation with residents, business owners, and other stakeholders, and result in a much stronger streetcar system in the end.”

GGW Reports: Streetcars Could be Cut

By Prince Of Petworth


Photo by PoPville flickr user Mr. T in DC

Thanks to all who sent links to the below report:

Greater Greater Washington is rallying the troops:

Last night, Council supporters and DDOT officials went to sleep with the understanding that the final budget negotiations had preserved the streetcar.

The line had been approved by the Committee on Public Works and Transportation last week, but the final proposed Budget Support Act removes it and returns funding to some of the Great Streets streetscapes which DDOT said they could backfill with federal funds.

Gray’s office is saying that the program isn’t “cut” because the budget hasn’t been voted on. It’s true that this proposal is a substitute amendment to the budget, which has to be approved by Council, but since Gray is the chairman, it’s essentially the baseline that they’ll be using to modify today, and unless the Council overrides this part to reinstate streetcars, they’re cut.

Horse’s Ass Award (Reader Nomination)

By Prince Of Petworth

A reader wrote in suggesting this property in Eckington be nominated for this week’s horse’s ass award. The work this reader put together is incredible. He compiled all of his research in PDF format here:  329 Rhode Island Ave NE

The reader writes:

“My Eckington neighbors and I have been battling the owner of 329 Rhode Island Ave NE (a 6 story boarded up building that has stood vacant for 12+ years). It’s been on a “watchlist” since 2000 (http://www.dcwatch. com/mayor/ 000314.htm). Last year, it magically caught fire a day after it was placed on the tax sale list, and burned for 3 days since the firecrews couldn’t extinguish the tar roof. You also featured video of the blaze on your website… And now the building owner has collected his insurance money, but the building still languishes and the owner gets even more exemptions from vacant and blighted property taxes.

DCRA has been unwavering in their dedication to giving exemption after exemption to the building owner, since he always says he’s trying to renovate it, or sell it. However no work is ever done on the building, and there certainly isn’t any MLS listing the building as “for sale.”

Continues after the jump. (more…)

Graham Campaign Responds to Dear PoP Letter

By Prince Of Petworth

“Dear PoP,

Yesterday you posted an anonymous letter from someone who observed campaign posters for Jim Graham being hung by employees of the MC Dean company. The letter writer didn’t have all the facts and as a result jumped to conclusions (or had a political agenda he failed to disclose).

First, the campaign contacted several possible vendors who could perform this service. Those vendors referred us to MC Dean. In the past, MC Dean has hung posters for candidates in DC and elsewhere. As a result, the Graham campaign hired MC Dean.

Second, MC Dean invoiced the Graham campaign for all the work performed.

Third, any suggestion that this work agreement is inappropriate is far-fetched. There are no regulations that prohibit a business that does work for the city to also perform work for a campaign. Thousands of businesses have contracts with the city. What if MC Dean was a printer that produced campaign fliers? Many DC campaigns have hired businesses that perform functions for the city. What’s the big deal? This is why we file campaign finance reports: transparency (as the photo posted to PoP demonstrates, MC Dean performed this work in broad daylight. Obviously, the campaign was transparent about the work).

Fourth, we know that individuals with a purely political agenda promoted this smear to several news outlets, and did so by combining misinformation with a selective use of facts. At least two news outlets reviewed the story (and the misinformation supplied to them), and decided not to report the story. The one outlet that did cover the story, the Washington Post, did so only on its blog and updated the story with facts that were not gathered before the story was originally posted.

Campaign season is often referred to as “silly season.” This comes as no surprise to any of us. While the Graham campaign is talking about issues of great concern to the community, this race is being tarnished by parties who have distorted the truth on more than one occasion and offered wild allegations without an iota of fact to support them.

My point: readers beware. If you read a campaign article that supplies but one side of the story you’re probably being spun.

Thank you for the opportunity to respond.

Chuck Thies
Re-Elect Jim Graham 2010″

Dear PoP – Whoa – is this what corruption looks like?

By Prince Of Petworth

“Dear PoP,

We were sitting inside Room 11 last week and looked out to see these MC Dean contractors hanging a Jim Graham campaign sign. I can’t say that I saw them placing the sign, but I did notice them stapling it and placing it just right. I thought at first (trying to give them the benefit of the doubt) they were just adjusting it so they could do real city business on that lamp pole, but nope. After dealing with the sign they just packed up and moved on.

MC Dean is a locally based contractor, but they’re international (a friend works for them, contracted by the US Army in Germany), so it seems like they’d be a bit too expensive for Graham’s campaign coffers to hire just for the sake of hanging his signs.

This just seemed wrong, and all of us sitting at the table were shocked.”

Sorry for the delay in posting but it fell off my radar until I saw this Washington Post article:

“Bill Dean, president and CEO of M.C. Dean, said his crews covered “specific areas” of the ward for Graham, with employees working several nights last week. A portion of the work, he said, is being done as an “in-kind” donation to Graham. Dean said he closely tracks the work to comply with campaign finance laws — which, in D.C. ward races, limit any individual or corporation from donating more than $500 to any one candidate. The Graham campaign would be billed for any overage, he said.”

Dear PoP – Parking Meter FAIL, literally

By Prince Of Petworth


Photo by PoPville flickr user Madame Meow

Ugh, this is frustrating. I know it’s not bike related but perhaps DDOT could take a second to look into this…

“Dear PoP,

Have you fielded any complaints from DC drivers regarding “self-correcting” parking meters? These are meters that may initially accept coins but then display an “out of order” message, and thereafter stop registering the deposit of additional coins. Drivers are left with the choice of finding new parking spaces or calling in the meters as broken. If a driver decides to call in the meter as broken, and leave, even for 10 minutes, the driver faces the risk that the parking meter will “self-correct” during his/her absence. “Self-correcting” means that a parking meter resets itself, showing “00:00”, as if no money had ever been deposited. According to a recent Washington Examiner article, 74 percent of the City’s meters are designed to “self-correct.” Here is the rub. The City’s meter enforcement officials ticket cars at meters that have self-corrected; to them, the cars appear to have been parked at functioning meters and that their drivers have not deposited the any money.

In my particular case, I deposited 75 cents at a meter outside Whole Foods on P St., NW. The meter then displayed out of order. I called the meter in as broken, was given a confirmation number by the City, and was told I could park at the broken meter for up to two hours. Returning to my car 15 minutes later, I found a $25 ticket. I appealed the $25 fine and the City rejected it, on the grounds that the City had checked for “complaints, outages or repairs during the time period the violation occurred” and had found none. In order to appeal that decision, DC regulations required that I pay the $25 fine and a $10 appeal fee. Last night I received a letter stating my payment was an admission of guilt and the City considers the case closed. I guess the City is now $35 closer to closing its several hundred million dollar budget gap…”

Library News, Sales, Bike Rides, and Open Houses

By Prince Of Petworth


Photo from PoPville flickr user hellomarkers!

I thought this was pretty cool from DCPL:

The Library Store, Books Plus

Where Every Purchase Supports Your Library!

The library store offers used books, greeting cards, postcards, posters and small gifts for sale.

Proceeds from the sale of items in Books Plus are used to buy new books and materials for the library.

You can also support the library by buying Books Plus books online through Better World Books or B-Logistics.

Store Design

The distinctive curvilinear design of Books Plus, The Library Store, was conceived and created by the D.C. architecture firm of Arthur Cotton More in 1984.

Store hours: Tuesday-Friday, 11 a.m. – 3 p.m.

Location: Great Hall
Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library
901 G St. N.W.

And in other Library news the Tour de DCPL is this Sat.:

“May 22, 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. Starting @ Martin Luther King Library
Join us Saturday May 22, for the Tour de DCPL, and explore D.C. through your libraries!
The Tour de DCPL is a library-oriented bicycle ride of downtown D.C., stopping at five DC Public Library neighborhood libraries. It is being organized by bicycle-loving library staff as a way to promote environmentally friendly transportation to D.C.’s libraries and show what all the excitement at DC Public Libraries is about! The ride meets at the Martin Luther King Library (901 G St. N.W.) at 9 a.m. and begins shortly after.

The ride will end back at Martin Luther King Library at 12:30 p.m.

Register using this form, and e-mail [email protected] for more information.”

Finally, Also on Sat. “ Mt. Pleasant Interim Library Invites Community to Open House”:

What: Celebrates Opening Mt. Pleasant Interim Library with Open House featuring family-friendly activities.
When: Sat., May 22, 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Where: Mt. Pleasant Interim Library
3162 Mt. Pleasant St. NW

The Mt. Pleasant Interim Library will serve the community until spring 2011, when the renovated Mount Pleasant Neighborhood Library re-opens at its 16th St. location. Family-friendly activities will include children’s story time and craft activities.

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