Town Topics

Robert Devaney • June 27, 2012

The Potomac River breezes surely helped with the heat, and the sights were iconic, as the annual boat ride for the Georgetown Business Association left Washington Harbour. Cruising under Key Bridge and then down under Memorial Bridge, the group enjoyed food from Dean & Deluca and got a chance to check a new river boat line, Boomerang Tours. [gallery ids="100874,127379" nav="thumbs"]

Robert Devaney •

Hundreds of congressional hearings are held in Washington each year. Administration officials and others sit before House or Senate inquisitors answering each as fully and dutifully as they can. These hearings usually occur on Capitol Hill and often make for some drama or political theater.

On June 19, one particular congressional hearing was in held Washington — but away from the Hill in Georgetown. Not only was it in Georgetown, it was in a place which evoked the opposite of what most think about when considering Georgetown real estate: an empty, broken-down heating plant, now for sale by the federal government.

The hearing in the West Heating Plant on 29th Street was a bit of political theater, staged by Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.), Chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, and Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Calif.), Chairman of the Economic Development, Public Buildings and Emergency Management Subcommittee. Its title was “Sitting on Our Assets: The Georgetown Heating Plant.” Reviews have been generally favorable.

The representatives — including Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) and Rep. Richard Hanna (R-NY) — set up tables and chairs within the massive plant and grilled one witness: Flavio Peres, the deputy assistant commissioner for Real Property Utilization and Disposal at the General Services Administration (GSA).

Their questions hit on why it has taken so long to put up that for-sale sign for this highly valuable property, just south of the C&O Canal and the Four Seasons Hotel. (The sign went up the day before the hearing.) The 1940s-era structure once generated energy for federal buildings and then stood as a back-up. It has been totally shut down since 2000 and has cost the government $3.5 million in maintenance fees.

Denhan and Mica want other unused federal property to get on a faster track to be sold by the GSA, as urged by the Obama Administration. They aptly used their site-of-the-day to make that point to GSA and to the public. They have held hearings off Capitol Hill before and threaten to hold more around the country, if necessary.

Peres took his hits from Mica, who said of his testimony, “We don’t know if [the plant] was turned on. We don’t know if it has an operating license. We had other places to store what was stored here … It just doesn’t seem like anyone is minding the store or taking care of the assets. This is a pretty valuable piece of property.”

Denham asked: “How is GSA going to ensure that this time we are going to get the highest value on this property that is the biggest piece of acreage in downtown Georgetown?”

Peres said that the market was strong and that developers and planners knew of the impending sale. He said that the online sales auction for the heating plant property would likely be in late September.

As for the GSA, it holds 142 properties, compared to other agencies that hold 14,000. And, yes, a GSA official spoke to Georgetown’s Neighborhood Advisory Commission about the impending sale last year. There are plans, set by financiers and architects and ready to roll, as evidenced by the Levy Group’s designs. Neighborhood groups want to make sure that some land within the mixed-use site can be used for public parkland, connecting Rock Creek to the riverfront. The huge building itself must be gutted and restructured for condos and the like.

After the hearing, Mica, Denham, congressional aides and media went to the plant’s rooftop with its commanding views of Georgetown, Cathedral Heights, West End, Rosslyn and the Potomac River. Dramatic? Yes, political theater plays well in this town.

Sonya Bernhardt • June 18, 2012

In this issue of The Georgetowner, we celebrate Father’s Day, remember our fathers and honor the qualities and virtues of fatherhood.

It’s an especially poignant time for us at the Georgetowner because my sister, Susan, and I lost our much loved father, Owen G. Bernhardt. Dad died on March 24 after a long, arduous and pain-filled, but also life-filled, struggle with leukemia. It has not been long enough to acquire a distance from his passing and to continue to acquire inspiration from his life and his role as my father.

When you think about the loss of a loved one and try to talk about it, it seems almost surprising to see just how rich, unique and original a tapestry he had created with his life. He was always our father, and we tended to look at him, respond to him and see him in that way.

He was also a husband to our mother, Pilar, with whom he shared a remarkably deep and enduring 43-year marriage. She passed away at 62, much too young to lose, in 2002. Together, they formed an enduring marriage and partnership and made each other complete.

He was an absolutely doting grandfather to Elisa, now 13, and Stefan, now 11, my niece and nephew, my sister’s children.

He was more than that: of Swiss, German and Russian stock, he grew up on a farm in the small-town world of heartland Kansas with a childhood spent during the American Depression. He had some of that quiet, almost stoic, demeanor that might be typical of both his background and generation, but he was also warm, energetic, optimistic and strong and steady. His was the voice I knew that would listen to my plans, my hopes and fears, and he would hear me out, offer advice, and be totally supportive, no matter how crazy the idea or project. That included my foray into newspaper publishing by acquiring the Georgetowner newspaper. I know in my heart that the success we’ve had would not have happened without his support, without that steady voice on the phone, in person and now in spirit.

His own career was varied and — combined with his first enduring marriage to my mom —original and even colorful. He came from a large family of 11 children. At first, he dutifully took on the role of managing the family farm but ruefully discovered that perhaps he was not meant to be a farmer. Instead, he enlisted in the Air Force, a decision that landed him in Spain attached to the Air Ministry in Madrid in 1956 where he met my mother. He was an enlisted man but operated among the highest ranks. He served in Vietnam and acquired a Bronze Star. At the Pentagon, he had a successful career that made him travel to most places in the world.

My father had a keen curiosity about people, about everything he came in contact with. He was one of those hidden experts who knew a lot about some very specific things, and at least a little about most other things, a good quality for the father of two daughters to have. He played tennis with passion and loved sports, and his favorite football team remained the Kansas City Chiefs.

Mostly, I miss his expertise about life. Even when he was struggling with his illness, which at one point left him without a viable immune system, he remained a visible presence in his own life—and ours. Until the end, he had that unique skip in his gait that told everyone that everything was going to be fantastic.

On Father’s Day, I miss my dad, Owen Bernhardt, a lot. I know that everyone else who knew him more than casually does, too.

On Father’s Day, I remember my father and here at the Georgetowner, we remember and celebrate the life of all the dads, ever, and ask you to do the same.

— Sonya Bernhardt, publisher

Georgetowner • May 17, 2012

There was a time in Washington — circa the late 1960, 1970s and early 1980s — that French cuisine and French restaurants ruled the dining scene and all that went with it, with places like Rive Gauche and Chez Odette, to name just two.  

La Chaumiere, which established itself solidly in Georgetown on M Street near Furin’s (now closed) and the Biograph Theater (now a CVS), had an honored place among the French establishments, thanks largely to its founder Gerard Pain, who was of the old school and helped spark classic French bistro cuisine in the 1970s.  The Washingtonian food critic called him the “patriarch of local bistros.” Noted diners included President George H.W. Bush, Nancy Reagan and the Dalai Lama.

A native of France, Pain came to the U.S. in 1963, where he first worked at Le Bistro and then the American Lawyers Club. In 1971, Pain began his career as a French restaurateur by buying Pouget, a bistro in Cleveland Park which he renamed L’Escargot.

In 1976, Pain opened and founded La Chaumiere, remaining the owner until 2007. During his tenure, La Chaumiere was named one of the Washingtonian Magazine’s “Top 100 Restaurants every year beginning in 1978.  He was president of the American Restaurant Association in 1984 and a member of L’Amicale Culinaire and a member and past president of the Epicurean Club of Washington DC. In 1994, he bought Wolfcreek Farm where he became known as the “French Cowboy.”

Pain passed away March 14 at his home in Charlottesville from complications of a stroke He was 73.

He is survived by his wife of 51 years, Marie-Therese, daughters Geraldine and Stephanie and four grandchildren.

Contributions can be made in memory of Gerard Pain to Martha Jefferson Hospital Foundation, 500 Martha Jefferson Drive, Charlottesville, Va. 22911

Robert Devaney •

The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park faces more problems besides its decommissioned mule-pulled barge, The Georgetown, up and dry on timbers in the canal between 31st and Thomas Jefferson Streets. There will be a smaller motorize boat for the canal, but it is not seen as a long-term solution.

According to Charles Pekow, writing in the Washington Examiner, “the already cash-strapped budget for the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park may face a sequestration of nine or 10 percent next January. To avoid that, Congress will have to come to a budget resolution. If not, the backlog for upkeep and maintenance of the historic structures along the 184.5-mile linear park between Georgetown, D.C., and Cumberland, Md., would only worsen and the already barebone number of interpretive programs would shrink even further. So warned Park Superintendent Kevin Brandt, at the annual meeting of the C&O Canal Association in Williamsport, Md.”

“The barge in Georgetown no longer gives rides,” Pekow wrote. “The National Park Service (NPS) is trying to figure out what to do with the boat, including possibly moving it to Williamsport. The list of structural problems in the historic park continues to mount and the cash-strapped park service can only do so much. For instance, structural damage was recently found on the Arizona Avenue Bridge because a truck hit it. It would cost $400,000 to patch it together and $1 million to repair it completely, Brandt said. But neither NPS nor the District Department of Transportation contains the money in budget at the moment. The only vehicles allowed to use the bridge are emergency, law enforcement and NPS maintenance vehicles. It’s mainly used by trail users.”

Pekow, who is a member of the C&O Canal Association, also reported that the gate at locks 4 (near Thomas Jefferson Street) and others along the canal need to be replaced.