Mismanagement of the City’s HIV/AIDS Program
The Post is running a series of articles (Part 1, Part 2) about rampant mismanagement of the District’s HIV/AIDS program. Over the past several years, the city has doled out millions to community groups that have misspent the funds while failing to provide adequate services to infected residents. Washington, lest we forget, suffers from a 3% infection rate, surpassing many West African nations.*
The Post’s articles lay much of the blame on Debra Rowe, the former housing chief of the D.C. Health Department’s HIV/AIDS Administration. Certainly Ms. Rowe holds much of the blame for the mismanagement and corruption—one of the most egregious grantees employed members of her family. However, District residents must wonder why neither the head of the D.C. Health Department, neither Mayors Fenty nor Williams, nor the City Council intervened to fix the problems, prosecute misconduct, or even sue to recoup the misspent money.
Fortunately these articles have embarrassed the Fenty administration into investigating the matter, hopefully to recover the money and to implement more oversight for the Banana Republic agency. Said the mayor yesterday, “Blame me as the mayor of the District of Columbia. We probably did not move fast enough to get at these inexcusable deficiencies.”
Yes, we do partly blame you.
Perhaps the Post will also investigate the Whitman-Walker Clinic, which itself may have engaged in some improper behavior to receive city money.
Nonetheless, the real victims are not so much the taxpayers as they are the AIDS patients who have been denied the care to which they are entitled. Let’s hope the city ends its investigation with a real resolution in addition to prosecution and restitution.
*Admittedly, the high statistical rate could be due to better methods of detection in the city.
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