Posts
D.C. gets $58M Medicaid bill, refuses to pay - Washington Business Journal
Gift to D.C. Historical Society questioned - Washington Post
Nickles insists, 'I am not a hatchet man' - Examiner
Tommy Wells, advocates push for tax increase - D.C. Wire (Washington Post blog)
D.C. mulls anti-bullying law - Washington Times
Big crowd celebrates Kwame Brown's birthday - D.C. Wire (Washington Post blog)
Not a one-party town - Washington Post
GOP hitching ride on Fenty's coattails into four council races - Washington Post
DMV Daily: Gay Republican Says GOP "Has Some Work To Do" - NBC-4
Smith's ads bring culture wars to D.C. - Washington Post
D.C.'s social conservatives deserve a voice - The Washington Times
Rhee assertive right to the end - Washington Post
Hopkins gets D.C. OK to add Sibley - Washington Business Journal
GW development passes on a needed second Metro entrance - Examiner
D.C.'s budget mess
Washington Business Journal - by Michael Neibauer
Date: Thursday, October 28, 2010, 2:49pm EDT
The District, already facing a $200 million-plus shortfall this year and $400 million the next, may have to scrounge up millions of dollars more to reimburse the federal government for bad Medicaid claims.
It's not supposed to happen this way. The District generally bills Medicaid, not the other way around.
But the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, in an Oct. 18 letter, called for D.C. to pay back $58.75 million it received from Medicaid in fiscal years 2004 and 2005 -- for charges the city cannot support. The District's Department of Health Care Finance, which oversees Medicaid and Medicare, responded days later that it rejects the bill, disagrees with the charges and plans to appeal.
DHCF "disagrees with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' findings," Julie Hudman, DHCF director, wrote Oct. 22 to Ted Gallagher, CMS associate regional administrator in Philadelphia.
"Additionally, because we disagree with your findings, when we receive the official disallowance letter, we will be appealing the disallowance to the Department of Health and Human Services, Department Grant Appeals Board," Hudman wrote.
LaShon Beamon, DHCF spokeswoman, said the rejection letter was a "formality" to get the matter to the next step -- an administrative hearing, where Medicaid may offer some relief.
"Maybe we'll pay half," she said. "Maybe none."
Blame for the billing blunders falls mainly at the feet of the Child and Family Services Agency, which has a history of improperly submitting and poorly documenting its Medicaid claims (as does, to a lesser extent, the D.C. Public Schools). The problem was so pervasive -- threatening the city's financial reputation on Wall Street -- that D.C. stopped requesting Medicaid reimbursement for CFSA-related targeted case management and rehabilitation charges as of Jan. 1, 2009.
The city wrote off nearly $100 million in anticipated Medicaid revenue in fiscal 2009 and 2010. Doing so limited the risk of overbilling in the future, but CMS still wants payback for mistaken claims of the past.
"CMS has proposed a repayment schedule, which the District has rejected," Lorraine Ryan, spokeswoman for CMS Region 3, said in an e-mail. "As a result, CMS will initiate a disallowance in order to resolve the overpayments. The District has the option of appealing the disallowance."
But there is no denying that the overbilling happened. The issues were revealed by internal audits conducted on behalf of the District's Medicaid program.
Health Care Finance will not restart CFSA-related Medicaid charges for targeted case management until its private sector Medicaid manager -- what's called an Administrative Services Organization -- is on line. That won't happen until the spring, Beamon said.
By Nikita Stewart
Washington Post Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/28/AR2010102806947.html
Washington Post Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/28/AR2010102806947.html
Thursday, October 28, 2010; 9:52 PM
As Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray were cracking down on earmarking city funds last year, council member Harry Thomas Jr. (D-Ward 5) worked to push through a large transfer to the struggling Historical Society of Washington, D.C., for exhibits at its downtown building.
Thomas won council approval of a $1 million grant to the financially strapped nonprofit group, using money that was transferred from the Department of Parks and Recreation to the D.C. Public Library and on to the historical society. And council member Marion Barry (D-Ward 8) acknowledged in an interview that he contacted the chief financial officer's office when the group's last payment of $250,000 was delayed.
The $1 million transfer came to light last week after the District sued the historical society for failing to repay an additional $250,000 the city officials said was accidentally deposited into the group's bank account in June. Since then, Barry has been trying to get the CFO's office to clear up the debt.
Thomas said the expenditure was not an earmark but a transfer of capital funds to the city-owned Carnegie Library. The society holds a 99-year lease to the library at 8th and K streets NW across from Walter E. Washington Convention Center. "That's a piece of history," Thomas said.
Thomas said he and Barry did not speak about the grant, which went into effect Oct. 1, 2009. But several government and historical society sources said Bellamy complained to city officials, including Barry, that the D.C. Public Library was slow in making the money available to the society.
In an interview, Barry acknowledged he called the chief financial officer's office in June about the final payment. "I sure did. What's wrong with that?" said Barry, who added that he has made similar calls on behalf of other groups.
However, he would not address allegations by government sources that he and the society's executive director, Sandy Bellamy, are romantically involved. He would only say that he and Bellamy, who accompanied him to a gala for the D.C. Chamber of Commerce on Saturday, are friends. Bellamy declined to comment on their relationship.
Thomas, who currently faces questions about the Team Thomas nonprofit group he operates, is now facing accusations of hypocrisy for the society's grant. Since October 2009, he has headed an ongoing council probe into how the Fenty administration funneled millions of dollars through the D.C. Housing Authority, which awarded contracts to firms with ties to the mayor to build parks and recreation centers.
The Fenty administration transferred the money without council approval - an action that officials later called illegal. Thomas's transfer does not appear to have broken laws but raised a red flag when the funding arrived at the D.C. Library board of trustees.
"The fact of the matter is, I have no idea why the money was coming to the library board," said John W. Hill, who heads the D.C. Public Library's trustee board.
Thomas said the library could manage the capital funds because it has procurement authority that other agencies, including parks and recreation, do not. Invoices show the society used some of the grant to pay employee salaries, including that of Bellamy, who makes about $112,800 according to the most recent available tax documents from 2008, and project management of the exhibits. Other funds were used to pay vendors for design and fabrication of the exhibits.
Hill said the library was slow to issue payouts because of questions over society invoices that appeared to be reimbursements for work that predated the grant. Library records show several invoices were rejected.
But Bellamy said in a statement that she suspected Hill retaliated because of a dispute between the society and the Federal City Council, which Hill also heads.: "It has been excruciating dealing with Hill and his obvious conflicts of interest over the past three years.''
In July, the society sued the Federal City Council and its National Music Center and Museum Foundation for backing out of a sublease at the Carnegie Library in 2008. The society claims move left it in dire financial straits because the center had booked and collected payments for future events. The two groups are scheduled to meet in mediation Nov. 16.
Bellamy also said Hill burdened the society with the debt in a plot to move the Martin Luther King Jr. Library to the Carnegie Library property. She said reports of such potential transactions made it difficult for the society to raise private dollars among donors worried that it would fold.
Hill countered that the library board had considered the Carnegie building but found refurbishing it would be too costly. Instead, the board decided to focus on renovating and building neighborhood libraries.
Bellamy called Attorney General Peter Nickles's decision to sue the Historical Society "a slap suit" on behalf of Hill.
"It's an interesting conspiracy theory, but it has nothing to do with the extra check for $250,000," Hill said, adding that he never spoke to the offices of the chief financial officer or Nickles about the payment. "It amazes me to think that she believes I would have the power to have the city sue the Historical Society."
Nickles said he sued the society after a recent breakfast with Chief Financial Officer Natwar M. Gandhi, who fretted about the accidental wire payment and the society's failure to give the city the $250,000 back. Nickles's office and the society are in negotiations, but he said, "If we don't get a resolution or clarity this week, we will turn this over to criminal authorities."
Government and society sources have explained the society had outstanding debt through Industrial Bank, which automatically used the bulk of the extra $250,000 payment to cover the debt. The city wired the funds, but an employee charged with canceling a check being processed for the society failed to do so, leading to the additional payment. That staffer is no longer employed by the city, according to a source in the chief financial officer's office who spoke on the condition of anonymity because personnel actions are confidential.
Meanwhile, Barry has continued to call the chief financial officer's office to clear up the inadvertent payment, according to two government sources.
"If I call five times, 10 times, so what, if I'm trying to get the job done?" asked Barry, who said he calls District agencies on behalf of organizations and individuals when the city is late on payments.
A contract that Barry awarded to an ex-girlfriend through his council office prompted an independent investigation. The probe concluded earlier this year that he violated conflict-of-interest rules and impeded the investigation. The council censured him and removed him as chairman of the Committee on Housing and Workforce Development and as a member of the Committee on Finance and Revenue.
By: HARRY JAFFE
Examiner Columnist
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/Nickles-insists_-_I-am-not-a-hatchet-man_-1367424-106149928.html#ixzz13jn1BZWk
Examiner Columnist
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/Nickles-insists_-_I-am-not-a-hatchet-man_-1367424-106149928.html#ixzz13jn1BZWk
October 28, 2010
Who knew Attorney General Peter Nickles was so well-schooled in classic literature?
His letter sent yesterday to the D.C. Council was meant to belittle and defang the lawmakers' attempt to block a settlement payment to one of Mayor Adrian Fenty's buddies. He began with a literary allusion:
"Sir Francis Bacon ended his essay 'Of Seditions and Troubles' with the now well-known words of caution that 'the remedy [may be] worse than the disease.'"
Nickles then ties the phrase to the council's bill that seeks to restrain the executive from cutting settlement deals -- in particular the one with Fenty's friends, which he calls the settlement agreement.
"To the extent that the legislation represents a remedy at all," Nickles wrote, "which I would certainly dispute, it is a bitter pill dosed to combat an imaginary disease."
What provoked all these highfalutin' metaphors?
Nickles had two reasons to write. First, he wanted to explain in detail why the council bill violates certain laws, and the Constitution. He makes a good case, too. But he had another motive:
"My second purpose, then, is to debunk any notion that the Settlement Agreement represents some backroom deal and that, in reaching it, I acted as a political hatchet man."
That, of course, has the ring of Richard Nixon's line: "I am not a crook." But I digress.
The Fenty administration's $82 million contract with Banneker Associates to build and manage construction of recreation centers and parks contributed to Fenty's downfall. Banneker is run by Fenty's friend, Omar Karim; Sinclair Skinner, another running buddy, benefited from the deals.
"The whole thing from the beginning to end is corrupt," Ward 3 Councilwoman Mary Cheh said in an August hearing.
Cheh, though a lawyer by training, is dead wrong. Sorry -- no corruption here. Shoddy contracting perhaps. Failure to consult the council. But no kickbacks, no bribes, no underhanded deals. Facts are Banneker was never slated to get the entire $82 million. It profited from being a manager, to the tune of a few million, at most. That's called capitalism.
When the council, in a fit of pique, stopped the contracts, Banneker said the city owed it money for work it had done. The firm asked for $2.25 million. Nickles got them down to $550,000, which seems fair.
The council's most recent fit of pique seeks to stop the city from forking over the $550,000. If that happens, Banneker will sue and get more, Nickles says. The bill is pending.
And so is the council's vaunted "investigation" of the Banneker deals. Last May the lawmakers got big-time lawyer Robert Trout to dig into the alleged "corruption" in the Banneker deals. Trout's probe was expected to last two months.
"It is now almost November," Nickles writes, "and there is no end in sight."
In fact, Nickles says Trout has botched the investigation. To bend Bacon's famous phrase, Trout may not even have a remedy, and there may be no disease.
By Tim Craig | October 28, 2010; 11:07 AM ET
D.C. Wire (Washington Post blog)
D.C. Council member Tommy Wells (D-Ward 6) said Wednesday night that he will not accept any cuts to the city's social services budget unless it is accompanied by a tax increase, perhaps even on wage-earners who make less than $100,000 a year.
Wells, chairman of the Human Services Committee, made his remarks at a news conference where almost 70 organizations announced that they will push to set a new tax rate for residents who earn more than $200,000 a year.
"I will not accept any budget cut to the human services cluster without raising revenue, taxes," Wells said. When a reporter asked him if he'd support a tax increase on middle-class residents, Wells responded, "I don't believe anything should be off the table."
"I will look at all income levels and I am not starting off with one proposal," said Wells, who faces Republican Jim DeMartino in the Nov. 2 general election.
The Fair Budget Coalition, made up of 67 local nonprofit and advocacy groups, released a proposal to set a new income tax rate for residents who make more than $200,000. Currently, all District residents who earn $40,000 or more pay an 8.5 percent local income tax.
But with the city facing a budget shortfall of at least $175 million, advocates are pressing city leaders to raise additional revenue instead of closing the gap through spending cuts alone.
"Another round of deep cuts puts at risk the gains we've made in education, public safety, health care and human services," said Judith Sandalow, executive director of the Children's Law Center. "The potential impact on schools, libraries and other vital programs jeopardize the District's ability to recover and to invest in a prosperous future."
In addition to a tax hike on the wealthy, the coalition is also pushing to end the tax exemption for interest paid on out-of-state bonds.
Dwight R. Bowman, national vice president of the American Federation of Government Employees, said organized labor was also backing a tax increase to close the budget shortfall. But when asked if AFGE would accept a deal in which a tax increase was coupled with layoffs or furloughs of city employees, Bowman suggested that that would hurt the local economy.
"It is my position we want to save jobs," Bowman said. "You have to realize our people just don't work in the District of Columbia, they live in the District of Columbia."
The battle over taxes and budget cuts will probably land before council Chairman Vincent C. Gray (D), the presumptive mayor, before the end of the year.
A tax increase could further erode Gray's standing among wealthy residents in Upper Northwest, who overwhelmingly sided with Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) in the Sept. 14 Democratic primary. But Gray is also under pressure from organized labor and social advocates, who were among his biggest backers during the campaign, to avoid major budget cuts to human service programs.
So far, Gray is avoiding taking a firm stance. At his final town hall meeting Wednesday night, Gray said he and the council would compile a list of potential budget cuts and then seek public input about whether taxes should be raised instead.
"I don't mind paying more, I'm okay with that," Gray said. "But I don't think everyone else is."
D.C. mulls anti-bullying law
Gays included in protection
The Washington Times
8:40 p.m., Thursday, October 28, 2010
Missouri lawmakers recently adopted a gender-neutral anti-bullying law, while the D.C. Council is considering legislation that adopts recommendations proposed by a gay rights group.
Meanwhile, New Jersey lawmakers earlier this week introduced an "anti-bullying bill of rights" that an advocate said would be the toughest state law of its kind in the nation. And, school officials in Alameda, Calif., are implementing anti-bullying policies by adopting new textbooks and curricula that teach grade-school children about different types of families, including reading a book about two male penguins raising a baby penguin.
States have had anti-bullying laws since 1999, but some versions are being urged by civil rights groups such as the Anti-Defamation League and gay organizations such as the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) to spell out special protections for the gay community.
Now some anti-bullying proponents question whether the overemphasis on gender will give short shrift to the very real problem of violence by and against youths.
"Teasing and bullying arent an issue in our community. Youths killing and maiming other youths is," said Ron Moten, co-founder of the anti-youth-violence group Peaceoholics. "The new movement is not about children. Its about politics."
Besides, Mr. Moten said, schools cant "police everything a kid says."
The D.C. bill titled the "Harassment and Intimidation and Prevention Act of 2010" would hold school, library and recreation officials responsible for developing anti-bullying policies.
In 1999, Georgia became the first state to adopt an anti-bullying law. The District would join Georgia, Missouri, California and 42 other states, but the one under consideration in the District reaches far beyond the newly adopted measure in Missouri, which excludes gender, race and other political characterizations.
The Missouri measure states: "Each district's antibullying policy shall be founded on the assumption that all students need a safe learning environment. Policies shall treat students equally and shall not contain specific lists of protected classes of students who are to receive special treatment. Policies may include age-appropriate differences for schools based on the grade levels at the school. Each such policy shall contain a statement of the consequences of bullying."
In New Jersey, the proposal would require anti-bullying programs in public K-12 schools and language in college codes of conduct to address bullying. The original law, passed eight years ago, only encouraged anti-bullying programs and wasn't doing enough, state Sen. Barbara Buono, a Democrat from Metuchen, told the Associated Press.
Both the Missouri and D.C. measures include cyberbullying, e-mails as acts of bullying, intimidation and harassment.
But the D.C. measure also proposes faculty training programs and places special emphasis on gender-related characteristics, including gender, sexual orientation, gender expressions and gender identity — enumerations cited in GLSENs "Four Steps Schools Can Take to Address Anti-LGBT Bullying and Harassment" plan.
"Enumeration is crucial to ensure anti-bullying policies are effective for all students," GLSEN says on its website.
It also urges faculty training "to enable school staff to identify and address anti-LGBT name-calling, bullying and harassment effectively and in a timely manner."
Further, it proposes establishing "age-appropriate, inclusive curricula to help students understand and respect difference within the school community and society as a whole."
And therein lies the conundrum in Alameda County.
Parents there staged a legal fight last year after the school board decided to add "LGBT Lesson #9" to its anti-bullying curriculum for grade-school students. Opponents complained when they learned first-graders would be taught about same-sex families.
Parents wanted to be able to opt out their children from the instruction, but the school board said no. They then sought legal relief, but a judge denied their request.
The board adopted more than 20 books for the reading list, including "Heather Has Two Mommies" and "And Tango Makes Three," the book about the penguins.
Mr. Moten and Candi Cushman, an education and social policy analyst with Denver-based Focus on the Family, said the gender emphasis is misplaced.
"Bullying is a serious problem in the nation and it has serious outcomes, but we think emphasis should be put not on characterizations of the victims but on the actions of the bullies. Bullies are always going to have a reason," she said. "You dont want to give them credence."
Mr. Moten agreed, adding that "we need to eliminate the excuses for youths behavior and hold them accountable."
Some D.C. lawmakers dont expect to hold a hearing on the bill before January, when the new mayor is sworn in, and D.C. Council member Michael Brown said there may be loopholes that will need to be closed.
For example, Mr. Brown said he and his colleagues dont want students or teachers to fall victim to such open-ended terms as "any" real or perceived verbal offensive, which could innocently occur during a dramatic historical presentation or if a teacher uses a derogatory term in instructing a student about words that are off-limits.
D.C. Public Schools officials support the council bill.
"DCPS is fully committed to developing a culture where bullying, of any kind, is not tolerated," said schools spokeswoman Safiya Simmons. "In fact, we have already captured many of the elements of this act through our revisions of Chapter 25 in the D.C. Regulations. We look forward to working with the Council as this bill moves forward."
By Nikita Stewart | October 28, 2010; 7:35 AM E
D.C. Wire (Washington Post blog)
Council member Kwame R. Brown (D-At large), who is expected to coast to a win Tuesday in the race for council chairman, took over one of the city's newest hot spots Wednesday night to celebrate his 40th birthday.
Supporters, council members and a handful of officials from the administration of outgoing Mayor Adrian M. Fenty packed Cuba Libre for music and mojitos.
Council member Yvette M. Alexander (D-Ward 7) purred "Happy Birthday," giving her best impression of Marilyn Monroe. "Happy birthday, Mr. Council Chairman," she sang to laughter and applause.
Council member David A. Catania (I-At large), who is seeking re-election Tuesday, gave Brown a gift of a pair of boxing gloves to prepare him for the fight ahead. Catania told the crowd that he also gave Brown a card containing a famous quote from President Theodore Roosevelt's speech at the Sorbonne, in Paris, on April 23, 1910:
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.
After being introduced by his children, Brown offered emotional thank-yous to his colleagues, friends and family. As the Democratic nominee in an overwhelmingly Democratic city, the youthful-looking council member is poised to capture the second-most powerful post in the city--just six years after winning his first election. His only opponent Tuesday is D.C. Statehood/Green Party candidate Ann C. Wilcox.
Brown told the crowd to "vote Democrats and David Catania."
Other council members in attendance were: Phil Mendelson (D-At Large), Jim Graham (D-Ward 1) and Harry Thomas Jr. (D-Ward 5). Presumptive Mayor Vincent C. Gray, the current council chairman, was expected to show up after a Town Hall in Ward 6 but did not arrive while the D.C. Wire was there.
Well-wishers also included Gabe Klein, director of the Department of Transportation; Linda Argo, director of the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs; and Chip Richardson, Fenty's general counsel.
Former Council member Vincent Orange, who lost to Brown in the Democratic primary, also showed up. Orange has continued to draw attention to an investigation into Brown's campaign funds that is being conducted by the Office of Campaign Finance. Orange is also pursuing a special Democratic appointment to the at-large seat Brown is vacating.
Not a one-party town
Editorial
Washington Post
Friday, October 29, 2010; A22
THE FACT that four Republican candidates are running credible campaigns for the D.C. Council must be unsettling the city's Democratic establishment. How else to explain the recent screed by a District labor leader that Republicans and independents are welcome to live and pay their taxes here but should forget about being able to govern? No good has ever come out of long-term rule by one party, so D.C. residents should welcome the availability of new voices and perspectives.
Aside from whether a maverick write-in campaign for Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) gets any traction, most of the interest in Tuesday's general election centers on the races for four ward council seats. The local Republican Party decided to sit out the citywide races, instead fielding district candidates - Marc Morgan in Ward 1, David Hedgepeth in Ward 3, Timothy Day in Ward 5 and Jim DeMartino in Ward 6 - against Democratic incumbents. We endorsed Mr. Hedgepeth and Mr. Day because we saw them as better choices over the current officeholders. A further advantage, to our mind, is that their election would be a welcome break from the Democrats' domination of local government.
Of the two at-large seats on the 13-member council set aside under the home rule charter for minority-party representation, only one, held by council member David A. Catania, can truly be seen as an independent; council member Michael A. Brown was a Democrat who dropped his party affiliation only to get elected. Part of Mr. Catania's contribution to the council has been his ability to look at issues through a different prism; he has helped to enrich debate and deepen public policy. The strength of his service serves as a rebuke to the view of Joslyn Williams, president of the Metropolitan Washington Central Labor Council, that there is no place for non-Democrats in D.C. government.
The Republicans standing for office are - contrary to the caricature painted by Democratic activists - a thoughtful group with conservative views on fiscal issues but progressive stances on social issues. That they are politically disadvantaged in this overwhelming Democratic city makes their decision to run all the more laudable.
GOP hitching ride on Fenty's coattails into four council races
By Tim Craig
Washington Post Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/28/AR2010102807240.html
Washington Post Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/28/AR2010102807240.html
Thursday, October 28, 2010; 9:06 PM
If voters in Upper Northwest peer closely at David Hedgepeth's chest, they can sometimes tell he's a Republican.
Were it not for the elephant pin on his jacket, most Ward 3 residents would not know the Bronx native is hoping to ride the nationwide GOP tide into office in the heavily Democratic district.
One of four Republicans running for the council on Nov. 2, which party leaders say may be a record, Hedgepeth rarely mentions his party affiliation in his race against freshman Mary M. Cheh (D). Instead, the 42-year-old has attached himself to one of city's most prominent Democrats, Mayor Adrian M. Fenty.
Hedgepeth, a lawyer who lives in North Cleveland Park, hands out fliers featuring photographs of him standing next to Fenty signs. And his fliers are green and white - the same colors Fenty used in his unsuccessful reelection bid against D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray (D).
"Like Mayor Fenty, Dave supports what matters to you," reads the flier, which also stresses his support for outgoing Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee. "Cheh claims she supports Chancellor Rhee, but how can she say that when she endorsed Vince Gray for Mayor?"
Hedgepeth has seized on Cheh's endorsement of Gray in the Sept. 14 Democratic primary. She has reputation as an effective legislator and for attentive constituent service, but her support for Gray in a ward where eight out of 10 voters supported Fenty has left an opening for Hedgepeth.
"There are people here who do want to send her a message," said Thomas Smith, the chairman of the Ward 3 Democratic Committee. "I think Mary will still win big, but we could have a very competitive race in Ward 3 . . . and if Democrats sit home, it could be a surprise."
Although they are not running a candidate for mayor, the local GOP is fielding a candidate in four ward contests for the first time in decades, according to party leaders.
In Ward 1, which includes Adams Morgan and Columbia Heights, professional fundraiser Marc Morgan is challenging Democrat Jim Graham, who is seeking a fourth term. In Ward 5, which includes much of Northeast, accountant Timothy Day is running against freshman Harry Thomas Jr.; and military consultant Jim DeMartino is hoping to best Democrat Tommy Wells in Ward 6, which centers around Capitol Hill.
While the national debate is dominated by the tea party and conservatives influence on Republican politics, District party leaders are stressing that the local candidates are different than their national peers. Hedgepeth, Morgan and Day are black. Morgan and Day are also gay, and all four say they support the city's new same-sex marriage law.
"They are urban candidates running on an urban Republican platform," said Paul Craney, executive director of the D.C. Republican Committee. "These are not stereotypical Republicans."
In a city where about eight out of 10 registered voters are Democrats, no Republican has been elected to the council in a ward race since home rule. Three Republicans have been elected at-large, but the council consists of 11 Democrats and two independents who often align with Democrats.
The four Republicans argue it's time for fresh ideas, saying the council should focus on improving schools and controlling taxes and spending. But District Democrats are fighting back, seeking to make the contests a referendum on a national Republican Party they say is out of touch with the concerns of District residents.
"It is very important to keep in mind, these individuals represent a party that is not for progress, that is not for people, and we have to fight them across the United States, and we have to fight them in the District of Columbia," Graham said at a get-out-the-vote rally two weeks ago.
Party insiders acknowledge that the Day and Morgan races have little chance in overwhelmingly Democratic Wards 1 and 5. But with sizeable pockets of Republicans and independents in Upper Northwest and Capitol Hill, leaders hope DeMartino and Hedgepeth can have a respectable showing for a party seeking relevancy in local government.
Cheh, who ran unopposed in the Democratic primary and was expected to cruise to reelection, appears to face the toughest race, even though Democrats in her ward hold a 3-to-1 registration edge. A constitutional law professor at George Washington University, Cheh is responsible for some of the most sweeping legislation to clear the council, including her initiatives to require schools to serve healthier meals and a law in 2007 limiting interest rates on payday loans.
"I work extraordinarily hard, both in the ward in terms of constituent service and getting projects going," Cheh said. "And my legislative record, I think, is fairly well recognized to be, if not the best on the council, certainly up there with the best in terms of consumer protection and environmental stuff."
Though Cheh said she refuses to go negative against Hedgepeth, he started facing greater scrutiny after The Washington Post editorial board endorsed him last week, perhaps giving him a boost in an area where newspaper readership remains high.
On Monday, The Post's Mike DeBonis reported that the IRS filed a tax lien against Hedgepeth and his wife last year for $13,000 in back taxes. The same day, Washington City Paper reported that Hedgepeth's Facebook page showed he "liked" both former Republican Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and Christine O'Donnell, the controversial GOP Senate candidate in Delaware. And in an interview this week, Hedgepeth was unable to point to any community groups that he's been active in since he moved to Washington in 1997.
"People are like, who is this guy? What has he done?" said Nelson Jacobson, a former political strategist and blogger who focuses on issues in Ward 3.
Hedgepeth's chief argument is that Cheh turned her back on Ward 3 parents by endorsing Gray over Fenty. "I think most folks in Ward 3 understand this mayor's race was about education and keeping Rhee," said Hedgepeth, who endorsed Fenty a few weeks before the primary. "Can I say she didn't support school reform? No. But when it came to backing the chancellor in the most important way, she didn't do that."
Hedgepeth's pro-Fenty message appears to be having some effect. While canvassing in Tenleytown two weeks ago, he knocked on the door of Dennis Hall, a Democrat with two children attending Janney Elementary School.
"I think what she did was pathetic," Hall told Hedgepeth. "I find her speaking out of both sides of her mouth."
Cheh defends her Gray endorsement, saying most of her constituents are ready to move beyond the divisive mayoral primary. Several observers of Ward 3 politics said the frustration some Ward 3 voters felt toward Cheh is fading, because Fenty has endorsed Gray, and Rhee is leaving.
In Ward 6, DeMartino, is campaigning on his support for charter schools and a greater focus on spending and boosting local small businesses. He's also taking aim at Wells's record, noting he has oversight over the troubled Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services.
"Everyone realizes, with the budget the way it is, there's got to be a better approach," DeMartino said. "There is a bureaucracy that has to be reviewed, analyzed and stream-lined."
Although DeMartino is optimistic about his chances, Wells remains popular in parts of Ward 6. He won 75 percent of the vote in his primary match-up against Kelvin Robinson, who had been chief of staff to Williams.
A defining issue in the Ward 6 race is the debate over the proposed streetcar line on H Street Northeast, the first leg in a planned 37-mile network. Wells is a chief proponent of the plan, but DeMartino criticizes the streetcars as a "black hole of money."
Wells said DeMartino's opposition is proof he's not a liberal Republican.
"The national Republican line is that government should not be paying for investing in infrastructure like this," Wells said.
But DeMartino counters that he sees little evidence that party affiliation is a major hinderance to his campaign. He said only two doors have been slammed in his face since he started canvassing this spring, which he takes as a sign that District voters are becoming "more open to at least listening" to his "approach."
"That, in of itself, is important," he said.
DMV Daily: Gay Republican Says GOP "Has Some Work To Do"
Ward 1 candidate says party can improve
By P.J. ORVETTI
Updated 7:30 AM EDT, Thu, Oct 28, 2010
Ward 1 D.C. Council candidate Marc Morgan, a Republican, says the GOP “has some work to do” on issues impacting gays and blacks like himself.
“Looking back through history, the Republican Party was always the party that supported freedom, prosperity, and community,” he told me. “As the party changed, so did its focus on these issues when it came to the African-American community. … I’m confident the message of equality and supporting projects around HIV/AIDS prevention will begin to gain greater traction with local and state parties, which in turn will help the message unfold at the national level.”
He says the D.C. GOP “is very progressive on LGBT issues, supported gay marriage in the District, and been very involved with LGBT organizations.” He hopes to work with the national Republican Party “to help develop a stronger platform that supports diversity, by promoting a responsive party” that is diverse and accepting. “I feel that we are to change the hearts and minds of some Republicans that do not accept homosexuality, we need people like me to remind them, daily, that we can all have positive, productive lives, while still supporting core values like fiscal reasonability.”
Though his rival, Democratic incumbent Jim Graham, is also openly gay, Morgan says he has received a lot of support from LGBT groups during his campaign. While he is an underdog, Morgan thinks he has a shot at victory.
“In a midterm election in D.C., voter turnout is normally very low,” he said. Based on the turnout of about 12,000 voters four years ago, Morgan says his “game plan all along has been to move about 6,000 votes. We are well on our way to achieving that goal.”
Read P.J. Orvetti's news analysis here: http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/politics/DMV-Daily-Gay-Republican-Says-GOP-Has-Some-Work-To-Do-105991448.html
MIKE DeBONIS
Washington Post
Friday, October 29, 2010; B2
Missy Reilly Smith agrees with the rest of the world: Her political commercials are revolting.
"You think I like 'em?" asked the 67-year-old District Republican, a candidate for congressional delegate. "You know, is it something where I wake up in the morning and put out on my table while I'm eating?"
One of her 30-second ads includes the image of a bloodied late-term fetus, followed by a picture of two more fetuses, blackened and scarred by a saline abortion. Another ad begins with the stuff of "miracle of life" public-TV documentaries - before resolving into a photo of President Obama followed by a pair of dismembered fetal limbs, set next to a dime to highlight their proportions.
Not what anyone likes to have with their Wheaties. "Vile," Smith calls it. "Absolutely vile."
Yet Smith, with the help of money raised by a national network of antiabortion activists, is bombarding TV viewers in the city and suburbs with the disturbing images. The ads have run for about two weeks on broadcast stations in the D.C. market, during programs such as "Seinfeld," "Saturday Night Live" and "Everybody Hates Chris." Thanks to a recent buy on Northern Virginia cable stations, Smith estimates that her commercials will have run more than 500 times before polls close Tuesday, accompanied in almost all cases by disclaimers making it clear that the stations had no choice.
Even among the insular world of hard-core antiabortion activists, Smith describes herself as a member of a band apart. She is a close ally of Randall Terry, the founder of Operation Rescue and one of the movement's most militant and controversial leaders.
It was Terry, Smith said, who knew of a bulletproof provision in federal law: Holders of broadcast licenses are required to air federal candidates' advertisements unedited in whatever time slots they can afford. He suggested to several members of his "Insurrecta Nex" network that they run for office, using the accompanying legal protections to air the graphic ads. "I was the only one who picked up the ball and ran with it," Smith said.
Using e-mail lists compiled by Terry and others, Smith has appealed to like-minded activists across the country. In her appeals, Smith plays up that the ads will run "in the belly of the beast" - in the city where Roe v. Wade was decided. "This is where it started, and this is where it's going to end," she said.
Her candidacy, she said, has been boosted by more than $50,000 in donations, and she expects as much as $100,000 to come in by Election Day. (Reports filed with the Federal Election Commission show about $17,000 in receipts, but Smith is not required to report donations under $1,000 apiece.)
In a city where the local Republican apparatus focuses attention on pocketbook concerns and good government while taking a libertarian tilt toward social concerns, Smith is an unapologetic culture warrior. This year, the party organization didn't endorse candidates in citywide races, focusing instead on D.C. Council seats, which left an opening for an outsider.
Paul Craney, the D.C. GOP's executive director, said Smith approached him months ago about her run for Congress. "I asked her not to run," Craney said. "It wasn't really a campaign. It's just ads about abortion. . . . Her tactics seem to be out of sync with the city."
Smith wasn't surprised by the brush-off. "They're homosexual. Why do you think they would support me?" she said, noting accurately that the local party's chairman is active in the Log Cabin Republicans, a national group of gay GOPers.
The idea is by any measure ingenious. The federally protected ads are one thing; the barrage of media coverage Smith has gotten as a result - what the campaign pros call "earned media" - is another. She appeared on CNN's "Situation Room" and on radio shows across the country. And, yes, in The Washington Post.
Smith has no chance of ousting Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Democrat who is seeking her 11th term as delegate. Abortion is rarely an issue in any political race in the overwhelmingly Democratic and liberal metropolitan area, let alone in the District. Her boast of being a "tea party activist who hates big government, high taxation, socialism and government bailouts" is, as Craney says, "out of sync," to say the least.
But give Smith and Terry credit for one thing: In an election cycle dominated by economic issues, Smith has found a way to rekindle the most divisive of cultural issues. And, once again, D.C. residents pay an odd price for living in the national capital.
Smith's campaign could become a biennial tradition. If she doesn't oust a member of Democrats who support abortion rights - or, as she refers to it, the "party of death" - she'll be back in two years with the same ads. And two years after that.
"All I can see in my mind are these little babies that have been murdered," she said.
And now, apparently, so do we.
The Washington Times
8:41 p.m., Thursday, October 28, 2010
Missy Reilly Smith knew going into the race for a congressional seat that she faced several uphill challenges.
First of all, she's taking on Eleanor Holmes Norton, a beloved D.C. liberal of Republicans, Democrats and independents. Second, Mrs. Smith is a Republican running in a city whose voters think GOP stands for Grand Old Patriarchs. And then there's her uncompromising pro-life stance.
Liberals and some Republicans relish in calling such people anti-abortionists, not that Mrs. Smith cares. She calls them baby killers and RINOs (Republicans in name only).
Mrs. Smith is running because she wants to exorcise the lethargy from the city's electorate and push it to think before it votes.
Indeed, that is Mrs. Smith's biggest challenge since D.C. Republicans are morphing into Democrats.
Unlike her female counterparts, whether that be Maxine Waters or Connie Morella, Michele Bachmann or Donna Edwards, Mrs. Smith does not have the backing of her party.
Her battle for the ballot is as much a culture war as it is a gender war.
Men, who control the D.C. Republican Party, do not have abortions, and men often walk out of their children's lives after a woman chooses life.
For their part, D.C. Republicans are urging their party cohorts to write in a Democrat in the mayor's race.
Go figure.
Blessedly, Mrs. Smith won the primary, garnering 1,919 votes, or 87 percent of the Republican ballots cast on Sept. 14.
Yet, leading up to the primary, there were more than 29,700 registered Republicans, but only 2,645 of them, or 8.9 percent, bothered to even show up at the polls.
Despite the D.C. Republican Party's rejection of her and her traditional-values platform out of hand, Mrs. Smith and her supporters will continue courting voters — and they are especially beholden to residents East of the Anacostia River.
Many of you are familiar with that geographical term, which is often used as the cultural divide to distinguish the haves from the have-nots.
East of the river also is a largely black traditional-values stronghold, where same-sex marriage doesn't play well, and where teens and young women are choosing life instead of abortion.
Mrs. Smith said she is outraged that the D.C. GOP is not on her side, and, well, she should be.
The lack of vocal opposition to policies and programs that are sustaining vicious cycles of poverty, government largesse and lawlessness speaks volumes, and more so since conservatives and Republicans lost control of the House and Senate.
D.C. Democrats have overwhelmingly outnumbered Republicans since President Nixon signed off on the city's home-rule law in 1973. But whatever happened to moral consciousness?
Doling out dollars for social services can in no political form replace the urgent need for a moral compass.
Sure, we can fall into the trap that faith and religion have no place in politics. But that's the wimp's way out of any moral argument.
The city's congressional seat has become nothing more than a hierarchical accomplice to the anti-social conservatism that is holding D.C. residents hostage.
D.C. conservatives and Republicans deserve a voice in Congress. Unfortunately, that voice is resonated by lawmakers and policymakers who don't even live in the nation's capital. To be sure, members of Congress reside here part time because they work in the U.S. Capitol. But they do live here.
That's why D.C. folks get so riled when federal legislation regarding abortion, gun rights, marriage, medical marijuana, needle-exchange programs and the like are on voters' radar screens.
RINOs and liberals want Congress to hear, see or speak no evils against the District.
Mrs. Smith says we should face Washington's wicked ways eyeball to eyeball. After all, politicians who don't stand for something will fall for anything.
Vote on Nov. 2.
By Bill Turque
Washington Post
Washington Post
Friday, October 29, 2010; B1
She is D.C. schools chancellor for just one more day, but that didn't stop Michelle A. Rhee from issuing one last warning Thursday, this one to ineffective teachers and the undergraduate education programs that granted them degrees.
"Now we have a new teacher evaluation system where we know who's ineffective, minimally effective and highly effective," she told a hotel ballroom filled with educators attending a College Board forum. "We're going to back-map where they came from, which schools produced these people. And if you are producing ineffective or minimally effective teachers, we're going to send them back to you."
Rhee is exiting the District much as she entered it more than three years ago: outspoken, impatient, apparently indifferent to the kind of tension and pushback that most in her line of work labor to avoid. What she did here, and how she did it, will be debated for years. But her signature contribution, many supporters and detractors say, was a change in the conversation.
Rhee added a new urgency and righteous anger to the school reform movement, one that she will now take to a national platform. She asked how the District could compile an abysmal academic record and yet rate most of their teachers as meeting or exceeding expectations. She decreed that poverty was no longer a reason for expecting less of a child in Anacostia than one in Tenleytown.
"Whether her way of getting there was the best or only way is an open question. That expectations have changed is not," said Matthew Frumin, father of a ninth-grader at Woodrow Wilson High School. "In that sense, with all the controversy, the city gained and learned from Michelle Rhee. And, one would think that Michelle Rhee learned from the city."
Although many of her achievements come with asterisks and caveats, by any standard Rhee improved a school system that was among the nation's worst.
District and national standardized test scores improved. Enrollment stabilized and began to edge upward for the first time in nearly four decades. A detailed new framework of guidelines gave teachers and principals across the system a common language with which to discuss effective classroom practices. A rigorous new evaluation system began to hold some teachers accountable for student test scores.
Rhee. meanwhile, shrank the system from 150 schools to 123, closing ones with low enrollment. She winnowed a top-heavy central office staff from 900 to fewer than 600, pushing some of the savings down into the classrooms. She overhauled the system's school leadership, filling 91 principals' openings created by firings, resignations and retirements, according to a Washington Post analysis. She revamped a teaching corps that she said had too many ineffective practitioners, terminating or laying off nearly 700, at least 120 for poor performance.
Along the way, Rhee attempted to re-create the instructional staff at least partly in her image, turning over more than half of the city's 4,200 teaching jobs. She filled many of them with young educators who share her core belief that good teaching can help children prevail over poverty and other barriers beyond the classroom. Many of the 2,600 new educators hired on her watch (an unknown number of whom are already gone through the usual attrition) came from alternative training programs in which she and her senior staff have their roots: Teach for America and DC Teaching Fellows.
And although it took more than two years and a mediator, she secured a contract with the Washington Teachers' Union that gives principals new freedom to pick and choose teachers who were once guaranteed jobs in the system when their positions were "excessed," or eliminated by budget or enrollment issues. It also establishes a pay-for-performance system that links compensation to student achievement, something long resisted by teachers unions.
But there is a fragility to the changes Rhee has wrought. Elementary reading and math scores dipped in 2010 after two years of gains. Testing data also show that efforts to narrow the achievement gap separating white and African American students stalled this year. Many schools remain deeply troubled; 12 percent of sophomores at Spingarn High School in Northeast Washington are proficient in math, 17 percent in reading. At Johnson Middle School in Southeast, 14 percent of the students are proficient in reading and 14 percent in math.
Enrollment, another success story, also comes with questions. It's not clear whether the gains, mostly at the preschool and pre-kindergarten levels, mean that the system is actually capturing a larger proportion of school-age children or merely benefiting from mini-baby booms in some D.C. neighborhoods.
Miguel Rosario, who is a parent at Watkins Elementary on Capitol Hill but lives in Ward 8, said schools in his neighborhood have felt the churn of Rhee's changes but received little benefit. "Principal after principal, security company after security company, a little touch-up paint, but the bathrooms are still the same. The children are not being educated," he said.
The changes also came, as Rhee now acknowledges, without a successful attempt to build a base of support that gave residents ownership of the changes.
"We made a ton of mistakes," she said Thursday. "I thought, very naively, that if we just put our heads down and we worked hard and produced the results, people would be so happy that they would want to continue the work. We were absolutely incorrect about that."
Other stakeholders said they appreciated Rhee's attempts at reaching out. "I think she tried to engage the parents," said Lisa Barton, former PTA president at Ballou Senior High School, from which her daughter graduated last spring. "I would have liked her to stay. I felt like she was doing something good."
Rhee's difficulties were compounded by questionable management and maladroit sense of public relations, embodied most notoriously in her broom-wielding Time magazine cover of December 2008.
A week after a triumphal announcement of a breakthrough contract last April, she touched off a furor that nearly scuttled the deal, first by disclosing that she discovered a $34 million surplus in the school system budget earlier in the year - just four months after laying off 266 teachers for budgetary reasons. That led to a lengthy public scuffle over how to pay for the pact with D.C. Chief Financial Officer Natwar M. Gandhi, who said no such surplus existed.
With teachers still raw from the layoffs, she told a business magazine that an unspecified number of the sacked educators "had had sex" with students or had engaged in corporal punishment. When she produced the actual numbers, they were tiny: one accused sexual predator and five disciplined for corporal punishment.
"It's been one explosion after another," said Washington Teachers' Union President George Parker. "I thought she would know when enough had been said. I thought she would understand the power of words."
Hopkins gets D.C. OK to add Sibley
Washington Business Journal - By Ben Fischer
Date: Thursday, October 28, 2010, 4:11pm EDT
The D.C. Department of Health has formally approved Johns Hopkins Medicine's acquisition of Sibley Memorial Hospital, a department representative said moments ago.
Formal letters granting a certificate of need went out this afternoon to both the Baltimore-based academic medical center and the Northwest D.C. community hospital, who first announced their intentions to affiliate in May, said D.C. spokeswoman Mahlori Isaacs.
Hopkins filed the request on Aug. 30, and District regulators had sixty days to act on it.
In an interview earlier this month, Hopkins Senior Vice President Steven Thompson said joint planning with Sibley, and Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, acquired by Hopkins in 2009, would begin within hours of closing.
That will come within the next few business days. "We're still awaiting the final signatures from the leaders of each organization and that is expected to be done by early next week," a Hopkins representative said in an e-mail.
Hopkins gets D.C. OK to add Sibley | Washington Business Journal
GW development passes on a needed second Metro entrance
By: LIZ FARMER
Examiner Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/GW-development-passes-on-a-needed-second-Metro-entrance-1366023-106153043.html#ixzz13jnxjYwI
Examiner Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local/GW-development-passes-on-a-needed-second-Metro-entrance-1366023-106153043.html#ixzz13jnxjYwI
October 28, 2010
New development around Foggy Bottom's already bursting Metro station isn't enough to get a badly needed second station entrance built, unlike its counterpart in Rosslyn.
The Foggy Bottom station is the eighth-busiest one in the system and handles more than 40,800 passengers per day -- more than Baltimore's entire light rail system. Yet it's the only one of those eight that is served by a single entrance, creating problems of safety and efficiency that a Metro study said will only get worse over time.
Meanwhile, construction on a second entrance began this week in Rosslyn, which handles fewer than half the daily passengers as Foggy Bottom.
Metro's study in 2007 recommended a second station entrance at the intersection of 22nd and I streets, one block east of the existing entrance. The university plans to break ground on that block next year on a $275 million science and engineering complex.
But a new station entrance would cost an estimated $21.2 million -- and the city and school are passing the buck.
Metro spokeswoman Angela Gates said funding a station improvement is typically up to the station's surrounding jurisdiction. A spokesman for the District Department of Transportation said while the agency would likely support a second entrance, it's not footing the bill.
"As far as I know, we're not proposing it," said John Lisle.
He said it is up to the university or developer Boston Properties to raise the issue.
"If it's something that GW wanted or they were proposing, I would assume then most likely they would strike up negotiations with the city to ... share the cost," he said.
Boston Properties did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Jill Sankey, a GW spokeswoman, noted the developer did make a city zoning board-mandated $100,000 contribution in 2007 to Metro for design and engineering of a second station entrance. But Metro declined the contribution and the zoning board gave it to the Housing Production Trust Fund.
Gates said the contribution was too small.
"We did not believe that amount would have been sufficient to take the concept plans to a higher level of design specificity ... [which] are much more time-consuming and expensive," she said in an e-mail.
In the case of the Rosslyn station, where ridership is expected to reach 22,000 by 2020, Arlington County contributed $32.6 million to cover the cost of the project.
Chris Zimmerman, vice chairman of the Arlington County Board and Metro board member, said station modifications ultimately require action from the jurisdiction and a developer that's onboard.
"It's a matter of what the jurisdiction wants to do," he said. "[In Rosslyn], it was a fundamental part of the planning around the station."
Mike DeBonis: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/debonis/2010/10/demorning_debonis_oct_28_2010.html
Loose Lips (daily column): http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/looselips/2010/10/28/loose-lips-daily-we-can-report-too-edition/
