Denny Hastert and the ‘Others’
• August 1, 2015

After the terrible event in Charleston, there was a press conference where an African-American minister called for taking down the Confederate battle flag that flies on the state capitol grounds in Columbia, South Carolina. The minister was explaining his vehement opposition to this symbol and stated that the flag was directed at what he described as “others.” He then went on to say that he viewed himself as one of the “others.”

The choice of the word “others” brought back my one and only conversation with the now disgraced former Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert. As we all know, Hastert is under federal indictment and awaiting trial on a variety of felony charges. I am telling this story because I believe it clearly shows what kind of person Hastert is.

One very early morning, I was in the U.S. Capitol building. I looked up and saw Hastert walking down the corridors of power surrounded by aides and security personnel. It just so happens that I had, at that time, written a series of commentaries for WAMU advocating for a statue for D.C. to be placed in the U.S. Capitol. Every state has at least one statue of a prominent individual to represent that state.

D.C. had no such representation, just as it has no vote on the floor of House of Representatives. The District was further insulted by its exclusion from even having a block of granite signifying its existence. I approached Hastert and asked for his support. The then Speaker was visibly annoyed. He looked at me with disdain and then uttered, or I should say mumbled, his disapproval by saying with a dismissive and contemptuous tone, “Then, the others will want one.”

Hastert’s use of the word, “others,” referred to Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa and the Northern Marianas. I didn’t feel it was necessary to inform Hastert that all the “others” were American citizens. All of these places had residents who had served in our Armed Forces, and some had died in service to our country.

“Others” is a way to look down at, to imply they don’t belong, that they are inferior. Hastert was not being sloppy with his language. He was sending a clear message. He was voicing his core philosophy of exclusion.

D.C. does have a statue in the U.S. Capitol today. It is of Frederick Douglass. It stands proudly in the visitor’s center of the Capitol. The statue was beautifully created by sculptor Steven Weitzman, whom D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton neglected to mention during the opening ceremony. When you walk by it and admire it, just remember Dennis Hastert had nothing to do with it. To him, it and we were just one of the “others.”

Seeking Solutions to Our Traffic Woes
• July 16, 2015

It is an issue as old as the town itself: where did all the traffic come from? Why is it totally stopped, moving too slowly or too quickly? Why is it in front of my house?

The Citizens Association of Georgetown tackled these topics less than three months ago with its meeting, “Talking Traffic, Transportation & Bridges,” in hope of answering such questions as: Can traffic congestion ever be reduced in Georgetown? Is there a solution to the nightmarish rush-hour backups on 34th Street? How will repairs on the Pennsylvania Avenue and Key bridges affect us?

Similarly, at the June Advisory Neighborhood Commission meeting, discussions with representatives from the D.C. Department of Transportation honed in on the 34th Street traffic blues.

The CAG meeting had the time to discuss many topics — from the Metro to taxi and buses to traffic congestion — and proved informative and illuminating. It did hear from neighbors about the change in the traffic patterns for 34th and M Streets.

One 34th Street resident, Ann Satterthwaite, and her neighbor complained about traffic on 34th Street that is snarled from M Street north to Q Street and sometimes farther. Traffic used to back up later in the week, she said. Now, it is four days, at least. A neighbor said his house vibrates with the increased traffic: “I wake up every morning at 5:30 to 7 a.m. with the house shaking.”
DDOT reps said at both meetings said they would look into the matter at 34 and M, as if it were vaguely recurring and dimly seen. Why was this back-up going up to Reservior Road? What happened? DDOT said simply: “We don’t know.”

But this negative change did start about four months ago, the same time that the Key Bridge intersection was repainted and re-drawn, so to speak.

The ANC talk did get specific. DDOT heard from residents and commissioners about traffic saturation directly due to traffic-light time, a change in sequence and those dividing poles that designate each lane.

Along with this discussion came the obvious, known for more than a century: there is heavy pedestrian traffic at the corner of Wisconsin and M. That slows car traffic. Add to the traffic mix an illegally parked car blocking a rush-hour parking lane, and you’ve got a lane out — one third of the traffic flow jammed by one car. With that, let us reiterate our request: bring back a traffic control officer to Washington’s busiest corner.

Commissioner Ed Solomon suggested a simple solution: take away some of these plastic poles that make the cars turn more tightly — and thus more slowly — onto the bridge. Yes, this might definitely help.

And, yes, frustrations abound, and at least neighbors are speaking up more often, and DDOT is listening better. To this end, ANC chair Ron Lewis expressed a certain resignation: “Traffic will go where it wants to go.”

The Jeb and Hillary Show
•

With Jeb Bush now solidly and officially in the field of presidential candidates, the two front-runners are solidly and officially on board.

It’s the Hillary and Jeb show, Clinton II and Bush III. Bush, the former Republican governor of Florida, announced his candidacy for the presidency Monday, promising to erase dysfunction in Washington, making him yet another Washington insider who’s an outsider.

He promised to be “on the side of free enterprise,” “to fix this thing, because I’ve done it,” “to get things moving our way in the world.”

“I will run with heart and I will run to win,” he said.

What with Clinton emphatically saying the other day, “If there’s one thing I’m not, it’s a quitter,” it could be quite the shoving match among the two clear favorites.

Except maybe it’s not all that clear that they’re favorites.

Bush is bidding to be the third Bush to become president — father and brother preceded, if you hadn’t noticed — and Hilary is still trying to be the second Clinton, after husband Bill, and the first woman.

They’re odd front-runners. Clinton was in the same position eight years ago, when a very junior senator from Illinois, named Barack Obama, entered the race. She is already running a cautious campaign, although, looking over her shoulder, she might not see much competition — at least not for the Democratic nomination. (Sorry, Bernie, Martin and the other guy.)

Bush, on the other hand, can’t even look over his shoulder. He can barely cross the street without running into a Republican rival, some of whom I’m sure he’s never heard of. He is a man among many, plus one woman.

The response to the Clinton and Bush candidacies has so far been underwhelming. It’s true, folks. Familiarity does indeed sometimes breed, if not contempt, then disinterest.

The Jack Evans Report: Taking Charge of Metro’s Finances
•

Many of you have read about the troubled financial state of the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, also known as Metro.

I rejoined the Metro board of directors in January because I could see that system wasn’t running as well as in the past. (I previously served on the board from 1993 to 1999 and as chairman in 1994 and 1997.) It soon became clear that WMATA was in much worse shape than I had imagined.

In addition to January’s fatal Yellow Line incident and numerous operational challenges, there has been a continued delay of WMATA’s independent audit for fiscal 2014 and a downgrade in the agency’s credit rating. These problems make it more expensive and difficult to pay for necessary system improvements and maintenance.

Earlier this year, I steered the WMATA board to reject a proposed fare increase and service reduction. People are switching from using Metro to other forms of transit, in part because they are no longer willing to ride a system that is inconvenient and costly. We can’t make it more expensive and less convenient and expect anything other than a further loss of ridership.

Those are just some of the reasons why I have agreed to become chairman of the Finance and Administration Committee at Metro.
I’ve written frequently to you over the years about my service as the District Council’s Finance Committee chair. In my opinion, fiscal management is the chief responsibility of any legislative or governance body. I now feel compelled to bring the same fiscal scrutiny to Metro that I’ve brought to the District government.

Last week, at my first Finance Committee meeting as chair, we authorized the purchase of new railcars that will significantly improve safety, reliability and capacity. The purchase will replace older 5000-series cars with new 7000-series cars. This will help increase the number of eight-car trains in the system, replacing six-car trains.

Additionally, we approved the elimination of paper farecards beginning in December. Paper farecards might seem like a small matter, but they create a huge environmental waste and a lot of wear-and-tear on the magnetic-stripe readers.

In the coming months, I’ll continue to keep you updated about the state of Metro. My role as finance chair will require me to spend significant time on WMATA financial affairs, but I will also be advocating for safety and service improvements. We’ve worked hard to make the District the most dynamic city in the country and a transit system to match is long overdue.

I will also continue as chairman of the Finance Committee here at the council. We are on the cusp of our 20th consecutive balanced budget; our audits are completed on time, giving us a clean bill-of-health; and our credit rating has received seven increases since I’ve led the committee. I have every intention of keeping us on the same fiscal course until our credit rating is AAA.

*Jack Evans is the District Council member for Ward 2, representing Georgetown and other neighborhoods since 1991.*

Time to Invest in Our Roads and Alleys
•

I like to use this column to provide helpful information that you might not otherwise hear about. Information about the budget, our credit rating or legislation I’m proposing. This time, I’m writing about something I know almost all of you are familiar with … the poor condition of our roads.

Last week, a transportation research organization called TRIP ranked the District as having the worst roads in the country compared to the 50 states. The study deemed 92 percent of our major roadways in “poor” condition. A story about the rankings appeared in the Washington Post.

Obviously, our frequently used city roads are going to receive much more wear-and-tear than a miles-long straightaway in Montana, but that’s no excuse to accept our roadways in the poor condition we all too often find them.

I was shocked when the District Council voted to transfer funds away from street and alley repair with this year’s budget. I introduced an amendment to restore the higher funding level that the Mayor had initially proposed, but my colleagues voted against it.

Since the beginning of my time on the Council, I’ve championed investments in our streets, alleys and sidewalks. These kinds of public infrastructure investments not only make our city more livable, but pay for themselves with increased residential and commercial activity, improved public safety, and higher tax revenues.

In the budget that the Council just passed, we earmarked $113 million for the D.C. Department of Transportation (DDOT). This budget includes funding for streets, alley, and sidewalks, along with several major bridge repair projects. It is a huge sum of money to be sure, and now we need to make sure that we are getting our money’s worth.

We can’t spend money to repave a street and then tear it up a month later for utility work. I introduced a bill several years ago that forbids the city from tearing up a street that has been repaved for five years. We need to coordinate across agencies to get utility or other underground work done before we repave a street. While I’m pleased to say that bill passed, I’ve had to step in at least once to make sure it’s followed.

I’ve driven through streets all across the Ward with our new DDOT Director, Leif Dormsjo. I believe Director Dormsjo has already taken important steps to improve his agency and begun the necessary work to better maintain our public assets. I’ll continue to work with him to make sure this happens.

G.U. Divests from Coal; Maintains Oil, Gas Investments
•

Georgetown University’s board of directors passed a resolution June 4 — upon a recommendation by the university’s Committee on Investing and Social Responsibility — to divest “from companies whose principal business is mining coal for use in energy production.”

In a statement about the divestment, Georgetown University President John DeGioia said: “As a Catholic and Jesuit university, we are called to powerfully engage the world, human culture, and the environment — bringing to bear the intellectual and spiritual resources that our community is built upon. The work of understanding and responding to the demands of climate change is urgent and complex. It requires our most serious attention. As a university community, we can best respond to this evolving and ongoing challenge when we acknowledge the tensions embedded in this work — and the variety of perspectives that are present in this moment.”

The tensions which DeGioia mentions refer to G.U. Fossil Free, a student-run campaign, that called for further divestment from oil and gas companies in meetings with CISR and DeGioia last year.

GUFF is pushing for complete university divestment from the fossil fuels industry and argued that the board’s move was “insubstantial” and “morally indefensible,” because coal investments make up a “miniscule” part (less than 2 percent) of the school’s $1.5-billion endowment and all fossil fuels contribute to climate change. The group also argued that the divestment matters little as the coal industry has been in sharp decline over the past few years.

In an effort to blunt GUFF’s criticisms, the university’s statement on the divestment touted the school’s environmental achievements, including its use of renewable energy (100 percent of power on the main campus comes from renewable sources), a number of LEED-certified buildings on campus, a $5-million grant “designed to foster innovative approaches to energy efficiency in cities and counties throughout the U.S.” called the Georgetown University Energy Prize and more.

The issue is sure to rise again as GUFF has indicated that it will continue to fight for the university’s full divestment from the fossil fuels industry.

Gondola is a ‘Bad Idea’
• June 22, 2015

To the editor:

The whole gondola thing over Key Bridge is a joke and a bad idea proposed by non-Washingtonians (or Columbians as we called ourselves back in the day). What is its purpose? Tourism, commuter traffic, or to keep themselves relevant, and to keep billing us by running a meter at taxpayer/business/community expense?

Come on, the rendition looks like a bad 1980s theme-park ride. How about a trolley car that runs on a track attached to the existing Key Bridge structure? It could look historic and classic, and it would have a function like the one that was used for decades. The one that opened when the “Free Bridge,” the second version of the Aqueduct Bridge, opened to fireworks, parades and the support of the merchants association (which my family helped found) and residents, in 1889. The bridge’s Georgetown entrance at 36th Street was steps from the old house (now gone) where Francis Scott Key and his family lived on what would be called M Street. That bridge was replaced in 1923 by the Key Bridge, in his honor.

The whole London Eye tourist attraction gondola thing has no historic connection to Georgetown, and what is proposed would be a big eyesore!

Mike Copperthite

To the Editor:

I can’t believe anyone takes seriously the Georgetown Business Improvement District’s proposal to build a gondola across the Potomac, at an estimated cost between $50 and $80 million. There are some much less expensive alternatives, including a water ferry. Or take the Circulator. It costs $1 and runs every ten minutes. Problem solved.

Charles Pinck

End the Delay on Hyde-Addison Renovations
• May 31, 2015

The parents and supporters of Hyde-Addison Elementary School on O Street are to be commended for their unwavering commitment to the best education possible for their children and everyone’s – and for their patience.

Hyde-Addison stands for excellence. It is a point of pride for Georgetown, its only public elementary school. The school is over capacity, with 59 percent of its students attending from outside its boundaries. Indeed, Hyde-Addison has students from all eight wards of the District.

The school also desperately needs a real gymnasium, more classroom and meeting space and a connection between the two buildings. The time for delay is over.

We agree with Council member Jack Evans, with the Georgetown-Burleith Advisory Neighborhood Commission and, most importantly, with the parents and teachers of Hyde-Addison. The construction needs to get underway by this time next year.

Here is what an online petition by Hyde supporters argues: “Our Hyde-Addison E.S. community is grateful the Mayor’s FY16 Budget Proposal includes $22.8 million for the completion of our campus modernization. However, our community was stunned to see the proposed budget delays the funding and construction start date for our Hyde-Addison Addition until 2017 despite being assured on March 26, 2015, that construction would begin in May-June 2016.

“Without this re-allocation of the funding into FY16, our campus modernization –which Department of General Services has been working on since fall 2012 – will be stopped mid-way and our children will suffer. Our modernization has already been delayed three times. It was originally scheduled to start in 2013, then 2014 and most recently in 2015.

“Simply put, our children and community must not be expected to wait three more years before having access to a fully resourced campus – complete with sorely needed athletic space, additional classroom space, an updated media center, all-school meeting and performance space and ADA-compliant fixtures.”

We couldn’t agree more. Contact the Office of the Mayor, District Council Chairman Phil Mendelson, At-large Council member David Grosso as well as Chancellor Kaya Henderson and make your voice heard. To support Hyde, for the sake of our children, visit www.gopetition.com/petitions/mayjune-2016-start-for-hyde-addison-es-addition.html.

Culture of Traffic, Culture of Transit
•

Nearly 60 years and roughly half a trillion inflation-adjusted dollars after President Eisenhower signed the Federal Aid-Highway Act of 1956, most of us spend a significant chunk of our lives on Uncle Ike’s interstates.
Few imagined how the highway system would transform our lives and our nation. One who did was sociologist and critic Lewis Mumford, who wrote the New Yorker column “The Sky Line.” In addition to attacking highways as destroyers of city neighborhoods (and, in the long run, cities themselves), he deplored the overreliance on the private automobile that would result from such a massive investment:

“Now that motorcars are becoming universal, many people take for granted that pedestrian movement will disappear and that the railroad system will in time be abandoned; in fact, many of the proponents of highway building talk as if that day were already here, or if not, they have every intention of making it dawn quickly.”
Any Beltway commuter would recognize Mumford’s 1958 description of the self-defeating process by which the automobile’s promise of freedom leads to gridlock. Washingtonians – and other Americans in densely populated regions – have embraced a culture of traffic.

Twenty years after the highway act, the first segment of D.C.’s Metrorail system opened (Farragut North to Rhode Island Avenue). Probably the country’s greatest transit initiative of the second half of the 20th century, Metrorail went from a standing start to the second-busiest rapid transit system in the United States. It’s hard to imagine Washington without it or remember what the city was like before it.

Yet even as Metrorail continues to expand, what was once a world-class system has been allowed to deteriorate and, in certain respects, become obsolete – sometimes (as recently as this past January) with fatal consequences.

The same process is consuming our national rail system, even as ridership increases. Last week’s derailment in Philadelphia – which resulted in eight passenger deaths – is only the most tragic of numerous warning signals. Even if the investigation ends up calling it a case of human error, the incident is a tangle of contributing factors and if-onlys.

To what extent the deficiencies of Metrorail, Amtrak and other rail (and bus) systems are due to inadequate funding, inept management, insufficiently qualified and trained staff and bureaucratic snafus is debatable. However, all of these conditions are made worse by the absence of a culture of transit: a widely held belief that public transportation is of social and economic value.

Despite the multiplication of services that reduce the reliance on privately owned automobiles, such as Zipcar, Car2Go, Uber, Lyft and Capital Bikeshare; the implementation of bike lanes; and the lower rate of car-ownership among millennials associated with these trends, our obsession with personal vehicles continues to leave public transportation in the dust.

Just how destructive of our time and sanity, not to mention the environment does America’s culture of traffic need to become before a culture of transit – supporting the kind of reliable, efficient and affordable service taken for granted in Europe, Japan and elsewhere – gains traction?

Helping Out Our College Grads
•

Touring my old neighborhood in Logan Circle with my daughter recently, looking for her first one-bedroom apartment without roommates, I was shocked to find that the average rent was north of $2,000.

What 20-something, much less a recent college graduate, can afford that rent by herself? I often hear people say that they don’t know how kids these days can afford to live, but this didn’t sound right.

I went home and crunched some numbers. When I lived in my daughter’s neighborhood 34 years ago, my rent was $875 with an inflation rate of three percent. That same rent would be $2,390 today. I did some more math. My starting salary was $18,000, which is the equivalent of $49,175 today.

It is any wonder that over the next couple of weeks college graduates all across the country will be accepting jobs, packing their bags and moving back in with their parents?

As parents we have raised our children, begged them to do their homework, sent them packing for college and cheered at their college graduations. After they graduate, it’s time for them move out, pay rent and start contributing to their 401(k), right?
It’s harder than ever for college graduates to find jobs, afford rent and pay off rising student-loan interest rates. Even more worrisome, only one in four Americans has emergency savings. We, their parents, are the primary source of help when our graduates have to deal with emergencies.

This got me thinking. Maybe, if we really want our children to be independent, we should welcome them back home rather than encourage them to move into an apartment they cannot afford without our financial support. Perhaps we are making the biggest parenting mistake of all by helping them with money, rather than with wisdom and experience.

This is the time to help our recent college grads get a head start on their financial future by saving for law school tuition, for a down payment on their first house or for the seed money to launch their own business.

But no matter what it is, make them pay. If they move back home, mandate that they save the monthly equivalent of rent in the community they want to live in, teach them to maintain a budget, encourage them to sign up for online money-management apps and show them how to grow their credit score.

After a couple months, they will have saved enough money for an emergency fund and to splurge on life experiences. You will have taught them to live within their income, while giving them the tools and understanding to save systematically. Perhaps most important, you have also given yourself the time to get to know your kids as adults, a friendship that you will treasure.

Walking around my old stomping grounds with my successful, financially independent daughter reminded me that parenting sometimes means being flexible. But when you get to watch them set themselves free, it is worth every penny.

A registered principal of Cambridge Investment Research and an Investment Advisor Representative of Capital Investment Advisors in Bethesda, Maryland, John E. Girouard is the author of “Take Back Your Money” and “The Ten Truths of Wealth Creation.”