October 6, 2008
Morning Roundup: Wheels Keep on Turning Edition
Good morning, Washington. Redskins fans are still grappling with what yesterday's win on the road against the Eagles might mean - could the 'Skins be the real deal this year? Prospective voters are scrambling to file their registration paperwork before the end of the day today in the District and Virginia (you Marylanders have until next week). And former Washington Post Executive Editor Len Downie took to the Op-Ed pages over the weekend to defend our city's reputation against the usual attacks. "The other secret about our town, obscured by its distortion in political campaigns, is that the real Washington is a good place in which to live, despite the snarled traffic and a jumble of political jurisdictions," Downie writes. Give it a read if you'd like to feel a few warm fuzzies about our town.
Bicyclist Struck and Killed: U.S. Park Police are investigating the death of 24-year-old Bethesda resident Ian Wolfe, who was struck and killed while on his bicycle last night in West Potomac Park. No charges have been filed in the accident -- Wolfe was in a crosswalk on Maine Ave. when he was hit, at a little after 11 p.m.
Audit Points Finger at Eastern Market: A new audit accuses the city of mismanaging the contracts and finances of historic Eastern Market. The problems date back at least into Mayor Anthony Williams's administration, and may have even gotten worse after last year's fire.
Briefly Noted: Fire damages four buildings in Dupont Circle ... Two men shot in Northeast ... Two teens shot outside Boys and Girls Club.
Photo by MatthewBradley
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Accident? Aren't you jumping to conclusions? That's why they call these incidents "collisions" and not "accidents" anymore. An "accident" implies nobody's to blame.
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!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!ZORN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Well, I'm certain that the Eastern Market reconstruction contracts will have zero mismanagement problems. And on the slim chance they do, we'll read about it long after Fenty's finished serving his second term and the public's attention will be focused on Skynet's marauding armies of cyborgs set on exterminating the human race. I can only hope they start with that a$$hole server at Busboys and Poets.
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RJ, e-HIGH FIVE!!!!!
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Two teens shot outside Boys and Girls Club.
Heard the gunfire on this one from my apartment. The recent violence emanating from Faircliff Plaza and other low-income housing in Columbia Heights has been out of control. Two acquaintances were just mugged at gunpoint at 13th and Fairmont the other night by kids. As much as I love the economic and other diversity of the neighborhood, the only way the violence looks like its going to stop is if developers buy and plow under many of the low-income buildings, or if HUD and DC untie building managers hands (fat chance at that with an Obama administration) and allow them to more easily boot problem families and set restrictions on who be present and when.
And spare me the inevitable "EDUCATION/UNDERSTANDING/PEACE AND LOVE" claptrap. That's not going to stop the bullets from flying around my neighborhood.
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I really liked the Len Downie article - nicely stated and worth a read.
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Boomhauer: What leads you to believe that an Obama administration would make your scenario any less likely than a McCain one?
FYI-a similar program is currently underway in the buildings along the south side of the 1400 block of R St.
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cue poverty/crime arguement...
How's this, poverty is to crime as rain is to mushrooms?
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Boomhauer: What leads you to believe that an Obama administration would make your scenario any less likely than a McCain one?
Do you think that any kind of building management/neighborhood friendly HUD regs are going to be put into place? They'll turn tail at the first sign of community organizers.
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i thought the downie article was kind of crap. focused alot more on the federal aspect of the city than the local washington, which is what the title made you think he'd discuss...
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I really liked the Len Downie article - nicely stated and worth a read.
Word, but the piece was definitely written by an old fogey. All the stuff he talked about is great and I agree with it, but at the same time he totally missed what makes DC the hotness for a young person.
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I guess Penang and Porter's are history now. Has anyone been by there to see exactly how extensive the damage is? I can live without Porter's, but Penang wasn't half bad.
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I think 'grappling' is the wrong verb
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"Do you think that any kind of building management/neighborhood friendly HUD regs are going to be put into place? They'll turn tail at the first sign of community organizers."
If the regulations make it easier to evict tenants who possess violent criminal records, or who contribute to a nusiance presence in the area, I can't imagine many "coommunity organizers" will have a problem with that. If you talk to most people who live in properties/areas where violent crime is a persistent problem, they will tell you that the majority of the crimes are committed by a very small group of residents/individuals. Find a way to remove those individuals from the premises, and the crime rate drops dramatically.
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Does anyone know what happened in Adams Morgan on Sunday morning around 1:00am? I heard TONS of sirens (more than the usual), but haven't seen anything in the news. Was it just the usual drunken fratastic boys fighting in line at Jumbo Slice? It sounded more serious than that...
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AMDCer: From what I understand from my boyfriend who was bartending in Adams Morgan, there was an out and out street brawl, with about 20-30 people involved, apparently quite a few people sustained injuries.
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One of the problems with evicting criminal tenants is the snitches-get-stitches rule: you can't prosecute without witnesses and when no witnesses come forward, you can't get the criminals evicted. Cops don't take project tentant complaints seriously because they get little cooperation from the tenants. They can't wrap their tiny minds around the fact that you just can't arrest people to make the problem go away. The case has to go to trial and without witnesses and evidence, the case goes nowhere but back to the projects. Rinse. Lather. Repeat. Short of wholesale demolition, like they did in the projects south of the SE Freeway, the criminal element is as much an essential element of the project lifestyle as midday loitering.
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thatgirl: Thanks for the info. This is why I don't go out in Adams Morgan on the weekends anymore.
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I thought the Downie article was lame too. It was mostly filled with vague hyperbole and so forth. No real direct examples of what is new and exciting about living in DC. The residents. The food. The culture. The arts. etc.
Also, I used to live about half a block from the Boys & Girls club. I couldn't have gotten out faster. Seems things continue to get worse near there rather than better.
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If only they changed the name to the Jets and Sharks Club and taught the kids to solve their disagreements through dance and the songs of Stephen Sondheim. That would go far in making downtown a safer and more entertaining place to live.
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A handgun was found nearby but it was unclear if it had been used.
What more clarification do you need? An Alice-in Wonderland-style note tied to the trigger saying, "SHOOT ME?"