March 4, 2008
Morning Roundup: Ready for Takeoff Edition
Good morning, Washington. Are you ready for another round of big presidential primary action? Democratic and Republican primaries are being held in Ohio, Vermont, Rhode Island and Texas today, with Ohio and Texas of course being the larger states on which Sen. Hillary Clinton has staked her fortunes. We're not sure who's going to be more insufferable tonight if today ends up going their way -- fervent supporters of either Obama or Clinton, or people who snapped up great seats to the Nationals games they really wanted (single game tickets went on sale today at 9 a.m.).
Housing Agency to Move to Anacostia: The city plans to move 170 employees in the city's housing and community development agency to a new headquarters at Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue and Good Hope Road SE, near Poplar Point. The move is part of a strategy to revitalize the struggling neighborhood.
Council May Stop Fenty's Buyouts: Some members of the D.C. Council, led principally by At-large member Carol Schwartz, are trying to alter Mayor Fenty's early retirement buyout plan that would weed out the oldest city employees by offering incentives to retire now. The Examiner says that Schwartz, who recently scolded the mayor for implementing the buyout plan without working with the Council, will try to gather support for halving the amount those who choose to retire would get, and actually offer a retention bonus of up to $25,000 for staffers who opt to continue working for the District. Schwartz says she is concerned Fenty's package is too attractive and could lead to a "brain drain" of the best city employees.
Briefly Noted: Man arrested in burglary, sexual assault in Southeast ... College Park groper strikes again ... One killed, one wounded in Oxon Hill party shooting ... Virginia jurisdictions ordered to stop collecting transportation taxes ... Magna Carta back at National Archives.
Photo by mosley.brian
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i had firefox, safari, and internet explorer open on my computer, and both safari and IE were able to get through the nats ticketing morass. i was able to get far enough to choose a seating section, and type in the captcha, then both times it threw an error up in my way.
needless to say, no tickets here, and i sure as hell am not going to submit myself to the vultures on craigslist.
have fun on opening day, jerks.
Um, why is the Council meddling in what seems to me to be the responsibilities of the executive? The Council writes the laws, the Mayor implements them. They passed a buyout plan, Fenty needs to put it into effect in the manner he sees fit. This seems like either a power grab on Schwartz' part or a pathetic attempt to remain relevant.
As for a "brain drain," you can't lose what you never had, can you?
IMGoph, I had a similar set up (minus the Safari action) but only got as far as seeing the stadium layout and clicking a seat selection, at which point I was promptly thrown back into the virtual waiting room (only this one loaded every 30 seconds, rather than every 15), never to return.
However, my friend was able to fight through everything the Nationals threw at her and got us tickets! I think she's already posted them on Craigslist (Just kidding).
same problem as imgoph and voteprime. However, my friend got through and got us 4 seats!
booya!
Housing and Development Agency to move to Anacostia, eh!? Sounds like a big new step in progression of "THE PLAN". Yeah that's right, I listened to yesterday's 'This American Life', and yes, I'm white. Woohoo...I expect to see a Container Store, Apple Store, and Whole Foods in Anacostia by end of 2008.
I didn't get shit. :( I lose.
I'd have a better chance of going to see da Pope-ah.
Don't you me da freakin' Pope-ah?
A retention bonus as part of a buyout plan?? Wha? I'm a bit confused.. Hubby works for a DC agency where there are long time employees (hired pre-1985) and new employees (hired last 5 years) and very few in the middle. The middle folks were let go in a purge that just happened to help ensure the older staff had job security. The imbalance is really coming to a head as the young folks finally get numbers up again and start to build influence. An attractive retirement buyout would be a blessing! Bring it on!
Well my opening day will be 4/10 on Curly W Car Magnet night...so I guess that is better.
we get a curly W lanyard on opening day RJ :)
I just read that they're considering rehabilitating the Armory for concerts and other events. I understand they had roller derby there this weekend. This is exciting news.
well, if anyone feels like selling a reasonably-priced ticket to a braves fan who would love to be there for opening day at the new stadium, please drop me a line.
i'll buy you beer....
Jimmney cricket, does Schwartz have any data to back up her "brain drain" fear mongering? And ditto on monkey's observation that draining brains is impossible if they were never there to begin with.
Ditching the folks hired in the era of patronage jobs seems like a good idea to me. Who knows how many other 20-year embezzlers are hanging out in the DC bureaucracy....
Despite the proposed retention bonus of 25k many city employees still cannot afford Bentleys. Mother Harriette we hardly knew ye.
I had Firefox and IE working overtime this morning, and got through and got 4 tix in right field. No Ebay/Cragislist selling for me.
By moving DHCD to Anacostia, is the city hoping to cause the same sort of "revitalization" the Reeves building caused on the U Street area? You know - the revitalization that came a decade after the building went up.
So with the Schwartz plan, who are the lucky DC gov't employees who would get $25k in order to stay on the payroll? Does that even make any sense? Instead of Carol worrying about the long-term MD residents on the DC payroll, maybe she should focus more on hiring younger, smarter workers to fill positions.
zilch for me on the tickets as well... at least I didn't fail after standing in line outside the park for 5 hours trying to score opening day seats like I did for the first game at pnc park... unless anyone from GW or st. joe's wants to hook me up, it looks like I'll probably wait to see the nats' new digs 'til the beginning of may...
There is the smallest glimmer of hope for Opening day tix at face value. WTOP is reporting that "On game day there will be a limited number of tickets available at the box office." So let the cluster f. begin!