Simon’s store, the LeDroit Park Market at Fourth and T Streets NW was robbed earlier this afternoon. The suspect is described as a black man, 5′ 6″ to 5′ 7″, bearded, and wearing a green shirt, white sunglasses, a dark colored hat, blue jeans with black shoes. The neighborhood-funded surveillance camera placed on Simon’s store may have caught a glimpse of the suspect.

When Simon opened his second business, Cookie’s Corner at the corner of Second and Elm Streets NW, some decried the presence of bullet-proof glass at the counter.  Does this latest robbery vindicate that decision?

 

 

 

 

A new mural graces the side of a house near Twelfth and W Streets NW.  The mural’s bright colors and cartoonish theme have provoked us to think about murals.

Over the past few years, more stunning public art has adorned the sides of Washington’s buildings.  Murals in Washington’s neighborhoods, unlike our national monuments and museums, are usually local in subject matter and local in intended audience.

In the mural above, bright colors strike the view because they dominate vast expanses of the canvas.  The background is plain white, but that actually enhances the rest of the colors— the corn yellow hair and flesh, the turquoise hat, the brick-red bandanna.  This palate is no shrinking violet.

The mural’s cartoon illustration style differs drastically from traditional painting. Notice the lack of gradients; the colors are not blended. The shapes are filled in solidly as they are in a coloring book. As a result there are no shadows and no obvious sources of light.

The subject matter is whimsical, but cohesive. The children on the left are watering flowers in the most cumbersome way.  One girl strains to hold up another girl on her shoulders.  The girl on the bottom exhibits an expression on her fact that confirms the strain placed on her deeply arched spine.

On the right, a boy dressed like a vagrant in the winter places one hand against the edge of the painting to support himself as he kneels down to inspect a plant on the ground.  His left hand on the edge of the painting and the fact the the flowers and grass merge with the grassy field beside the painting subtly call attention to the physical location of the painting.  It’s not obvious at first, but this mural is in fact well suited for its location.

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We can contrast this mural with our very own masterpiece in LeDroit Park, “This is How We Live”, another brilliant work, but of a different sort.

The most striking feature of the LeDroit mural is that it makes clear that it is a neighborhood mural.  The mural is composed of four scenes skillfully merged into one cohesive work.

The upper-left corner depicts a wreath of tree foliage surrounding the bell tower atop Founders Library on Howard University.  The wreath-lined cameo honors the university as a prize.

The lower scene of the LeDroit mural depicts the corner of T Street, Sixth Street, and Florida Avenue.  The scene here is an autumnal entry to LeDroit Park featuring the historic McGill architecture on the 500 block of T Street.  Our entry gate, a recent addition to the neighborhood, serves as a prominent architectural feature.

The top-right corner features children looking at the viewer— a neighborhood image as children tend to spend much of their time near home.  To their left is a view of the Capitol from Pennsylvania Avenue NW.  The inclusion of the Capitol is a nod to Washington’s national identity.

The pixelated seams between each scene are unusual, yet successful, methods of merging different subjects. Pixelation is a product of the Digital Age and at first appear out of place in a mural employing traditional portraiture and landscape panting. Nonetheless, the pixelation in our mural is a skillful work of transition.

What do you think of these two murals?

Back in March, LeDroit Park and Bloomingdale residents mobilized to prevent Councilmember Harry Thomas, Jr. (D – Ward 5) from blocking the transfer of funding to the park project here in LeDroit Park.  Our hard work paid off: Mr. Thomas reversed his resolution in the face of an avalanche of angry calls and emails, a good number coming from his constituents in Bloomingdale.

Now Councilmember Marion Barry (D – Ward 8) has inexplicably placed a hold on the new park contract, possibly delaying construction by at least 45 days.  When reached by the City Paper, Mr. Barry responded,

The Gage-Eckington contract was one of those not authorized by the council, not voted on. The mayor in his shenanigans sent it over the council, and I have the responsibility to protect the taxpayers’ money…There’s no money available, and there’s no authority to do this.

Mr. Barry’s statement contains a half-true and a lie. This current contract is being submitted to the Council for passive approval, which is required of city contracts over $1 million.  If the Council does not act on it within a certain period of time, the contract is approved.  This is common method of review since the Council does not have the time to vote explicitly on every city contract.  So, yes, this contract with Keystone Plus Construction Corporation has not been voted on, but few contracts of this size are.

More distressing is that Mr. Barry is absolutely wrong to state that the money isn’t available and that the mayor doesn’t have the authority to build this park.  On March 2, Mr. Barry and the rest of the Council voted unanimously to approve the mayor’s request to re-appropriate $1.5 million for this park:

Sec. 2. (a) Pursuant to section 47-363 of the District of Columbia Official Code, the Mayor transmitted to the Council on February 19, 2010, a reprogramming request of $1.5 million from the capital budget authority and allotment from the Department of Parks and Recreation and the District Department of Transportation to the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development.

(b) The Council approves the $1.5 million reprogramming request.

Sec. 3. The Secretary to the Council shall transmit a copy of this resolution, upon its adoption, to the Office of the Mayor.

Sec. 4. This resolution shall take effect immediately. (our emphasis)

Facts are stubborn things, Mr. Barry.

Mr. Barry’s new-found scrutiny (obstruction, really) of city projects is especially ironic considering he doled out d0-nothing city contracts to his girlfriend and when questioned on the conflict of interest, responded to the Post,

“You all think it is inappropriate to hire a girlfriend. I don’t think it is. In fact, there is no law against it.” When asked whether he would hire another woman he becomes romantically involved with, Barry said, “Unless the law changes, why not?”

The Council’s fair-weather watchdog is likely angling for a quid pro quo from the rest of the Council before he withdraws his resolution.  Perhaps he’s holding out for the Council to cut him a deal he can’t get by any other means than logrolling.

Or he may simply want attention, since his unanimous Council censure and ejection from committee positions has spared the city from much of his legislative influence.

But even if Mr. Barry’s stubbornly refuses to withdraw his disapproval, his huffing and puffing will be for naught since he likely doesn’t have the votes to defeat the contract.

Several civic groups in LeDroit Park and Bloomingdale are turning up the pressure on Mr. Barry and the Council.  He may not have realized what he has provoked.

Yesterday Councilmember Marion Barry (D – Ward 8) issued a disapproval motion to block the contract for the new park here in LeDroit Park.  Mr. Barry couldn’t even bother to issue an explanation for meddling in a Ward One park and Councilmember Jim Graham is duly upset.  Contracts over $1 million must be submitted to the Council and such contracts are approved if the Council takes no action within a certain number of days.  Mr. Barry’s procedural move will delay the project by at least 45 days until the Council reconvenes in September and can vote on the motion.

Mr. Barry also issued another mysterious disapproval resolution yesterday to block DDOT’s consolidation of its offices into one building near Nats Stadium.  Mr. Barry was stripped of his chairmanship in March after it was revealed last July that he was issuing do-nothing city contracts to his girlfriend.  Our sources tell us that since then he has taken to generously sprinkling disapproval measures for projects throughout the District in a desperate move to show that he still matters.

The park can still move forward without the extra delay if Mr. Barry is convinced— likely with an old-school lobbying effort— to withdraw his motion.  It’s a pity, though, that important government projects are subject to the whims of childish councilmembers.  It should not take yet another lobbying effort to get this park built.

In a city that decries Congressional meddling in local affairs, it’s truly ironic that a desperately need Ward One project is put on hold by a councilmember we didn’t even elect.

We passed by Pharmacare today at the corner of Georgia and Florida Avenues and they were hosting their grand opening. Pharmacare is not your average pharmacy. They stock pharmaceuticals not readily available at most pharmacies and they provide home delivery too. Pharmacare is a local chain and we’re told that they were among the only pharmacies in Washington that braved our snow storms to deliver critical medicines.

We welcome them to the neighborhood and we hope they succeed.

On the night of Sunday, November 12, 2006, a drunk driver speeding as fast as 80 mph on Florida Avenue slammed his SUV into the back of a stopped car, killing two occupants, and then veered into 607 Florida Avenue NW on the edge of LeDroit Park.  The driver’s SUV punctured the brick façade of the turret damaging it to a degree that DCRA declared the house uninhabitable and had the turret demolished.

The owners’ son explained (with some interesting photos) to the Prince of Petworth his difficulty renovating the house, from delays with the insurance payment to contractor disputes to an Army deployment to Kuwait.

Finally, after three and half years, the shabby plywood covering the turret has come down and the renovation (we hope) is back on track.

At Thursday’s ANC1B meeting, Chip Ellis, head of the Howard Theatre’s restoration, announced that the much-delayed renovations will start in the last week of August.  The theater, when it opens, will host R&B acts, jazz, and Sunday gospel brunches in a venue that Ellis describes as “cabaret style”.

Careful observers of the restoration sketch (above) will notice the statue at the top of the façade.  Originally the theater featured a statue of Apollo playing the lyre; the new statue, fabricated in metal and lit with LEDs will be themed “the Jazz Man”.  Mr. Ellis will return in a few months with design drawings.

When asked about parking, Mr. Ellis stated that the restoration project plans to partner with Howard University to offer parking in one of its lots a few blocks away on Georgia Avenue.  He also proposed the idea of building a garage on the southern portion of the parking lot of Howard University Hospital.

We appreciate Mr. Ellis’s efforts restoring the Howard Theatre, but we would not welcome a parking garage on Georgia Avenue.  A garage would contradict the Office of Planning’s DUKE Plan, which specifically calls for ground-floor retail and offices on that site.  A street-fronting garage would deprive Georgia Avenue of the streetlife that retail uses generate.

Furthermore, since parking is a necessary component of driving; providing more parking will induce more driving, something the area suffers from already.

A cab crashed into 408 U Street NW yesterday. According to a neighbor, a cab customer attempted to rob the cab driver, who then flipped out, ran over the curb, reversed in a panic and slammed into one of the McGill houses.

The culprit escaped and there’s no word on the state of the cab driver.  The house appears to be unoccupied.

We know we’re a tad late in posting this, but the monthly meeting of ANC1B takes place tonight at 7pm on the second floor of the Reeves Building at Fourteenth and U Streets NW.

Here are some of the highlights planned for tonight:

• Councilmember David Catania (I – at large)
• Howard Theatre Restoration, Inc., presumably will discuss the much-delayed restoration of the Howard Theatre
• Douglas Development, one of the city’s largest developers
• American Ice Company (917 V Street), new liquor license application
• Bella (900 Florida Avenue), new liquor license

The commission will also discuss two zoning variance making their way through the system, eventually to the Board of Zoning Adjustments, which is obliged to consider, but not necessary follow, the opinion of the relevant ANC.

The two variances, both of which we have researched, are modest changes for two existing properties.

The applicant for 928 Euclid Street NW bought a parking lot that used to be the site of a rowhouse many decades ago.  Though the lot is shaped like a house lot and though what the applicant proposes to build is similar in massing and lot coverage to all the neighboring row houses, our zoning code currently— and wrongheadedly, in our opinion— declares such a new structure illegal.

Thus to build what what was there before and what will match the adjacent structures in massing and use will require a zoning adjustment.*  The ANC’s Design Review Committee, a committee for which your author is a member, will recommend that the ANC support the application.

* * *

The applicant for 1201 S Street NW seeks a variance solely on account of use, not physical form.  The building used to be a small corner store, but the applicant proposes turning it into a deli with seating for twelve patrons.  The deli will be managed by a non-profit that will train students, presumably in food preparation.

This application will be a bit more controversial since the applicant, Mr. Charles Emor, has already earned a conspiracy conviction in his other “educational” endeavors and some neighbors doubt his sincerity in keeping the property as a proper deli.

Neighbors are welcome to question the commission and applicant, if he appears, at tonight’s meeting.

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* Much of DC, including some of the city’s most charming and desired neighborhoods, including much of LeDroit Park, would be illegal to build under today’s zoning.  This is an issue we hope the current zoning re-write will resolve.

There are few things the four candidates for the Ward One council seat agree on, but there’s one thing for sure: when asked which mayoral candidate they each endorse, all four candidates claimed to be undecided at this point.

At the Ward One Candidates Forum on Tuesday, all four candidates stated their cases for representing the ward after the upcoming election.

Jim Graham (D) spent the entirety of his five minutes as most incumbents do, listing his accomplishments since his first election in 1998.  Specifically he listed the following:

• that he secured funding for the beautification of Anna J. Cooper Circle in 2003;
• that he supported the Mary Church Terrell House project;
• that he got the 400 block of T Street named Walter Washington Way, after the LeDroit resident who was also DC’s first elected mayor;
• that he was “part of the neighborhood mobilization” in response to the robberies at the LeDroit Park Market several years back;
• that he was able to get the city to restore and renovate the Williston Apartments at 236 W Street into affordable housing apartments;
• that he has helped get city money for the Howard Theatre for its pending revitalization;
• that he has secured tax abatement legislation to get UNCF to move to Shaw, despite others’ objections to the use of tax abatement to lure development; and
• that he supported from the start the effort to turn the now-demolished Gage-Eckington School into something other than an abandoned building.

During the question and answer session, Mr. Graham also stated his support for school vouchers.

When asked about small-business set-asides for city contracts, Mr. Graham expressed his disappointment with the lack of enforcement.  The problem, he stated, was not with the laws, but rather with their enforcement.

Marc Morgan (R), a resident of LeDroit Park, announced his love of the neighborhood and focused a good deal of attention on crime and small business development.  He asked how many people feel safe walking around at night.  He said he wants to facilitate the improvement of the District’s small businesses, which serve as the best sources of local employment.

Mr. Morgan also announced his environmental credentials and the importance of reducing carbon footprints.  Throughout much of the question and answer session, Mr. Morgan touted the value of leveraging public-private partnerships to accomplish various worthy tasks, such as environmental protection and energy conservation.  When asked if he had held elected office before, Mr. Morgan responded that he had owned a chain of restaurants in Ohio and Arizona and that he served as an environmental official in Ehrlich Administration in Maryland.

Jeff Smith (D) brought photos and graphs for his speech, which he started with the complaint that Ward One has become less green and over-developed.  He didn’t hesitate to mention that one of Councilmember Graham’s top staff members had been indicted on corruption charges and that the Metro, under Mr. Graham’s continuing tenure on the WMATA board, has suffered a catastrophic crash and subsequent loss of public confidence.

Mr. Smith held up graphs illustrating that Ward One leads the city in robberies and thefts and a graph comparing proficiency ratings for DC public school students versus their counterparts in Maryland and Virginia.

Beyond graphs, Mr. Smith also held up photos of various blighted spots in Ward One that he claims languish despite the glitz in Columbia Heights and U Street.  The crumbling Howard Theatre was one of them.

Mr. Smith expressed cautious support of Michelle Rhee and charter schools.  When asked how he would pay for his plans, he trotted out the usual response of better management of existing funds.

The evening’s final candidate was Bryan Weaver (D), who is currently an ANC commissioner in Adams Morgan.  Mr. Weaver started off announcing that his campaign’s theme was to bring accountability and oversight to the District government, a hot topic lately.  He criticized DCPS for improperly assigning teachers and called nearby Cardozo High School the “school of least resistance,” by which he meant the dumping ground of problem children.  Nonetheless, he praised Michelle Rhee for making “great progress” and he cautioned residents to be patient about school reform.

Regarding the city’s falling revenues, he said that we need to restructure the District’s tax code and rethink how the city does business.  He brought up the recent park construction fracas as a prime example of waste.

Weaver was the only candidate of the evening to express the concern that Ward One is headed for a widening income gap and that we would become a ward of the well-off and the poor.

What issues matter to you the most?