Part 26 of 26 -- Afterword

This is the twenty-sixth and last installment of a series (see the first installment here) summarizing the 1994 book Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington, D.C.by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood. This book has recently been republished as an ebook and a paper book. HBO has plans to use material from the book to make a movie about the life of Marion Barry.

Afterword (four of four)

The last part of this book describes the rise of Mayor Vincent C. Gray up until April 2014, when it went to press.

“[Gray] grew up in a one-bedroom apartment in Northeast Washington.... His partents never attended high school. Gray graduated Dunbar High School... and went on to George Washington University.... After graduating college, Gray went into social work, first for senior citizens, later for people with developmental disabilities” (Kindle location 6363).

“Mayor Sharon Pratt Kelly appointed Gray to run her human-services department in 1991. When she lost reelection in 1994, Gray became executive director of Covenant House, an organiation that served the homeless and at-risk children. He ran it for a decade” (l. 6364).

“In 2004, at the age of 62, Vince Gray won the Ward Seven seat on the council... Just two years later in 2006, Gray ran citywide for council chairman and won.... He was deliberate, patient, collegial – all qualities that helped the 13-member legislative group function well. He watched the new Mayor Fenty treat the council with indifference” (l. 6364).

“Members of the 'old guard' lobbied Gray and promised to raise funds for his campaign.... Polls showed Gray could challenge Fenty. In March the council chairman declared his candidacy for mayor; a month later Fenty officially entered the race” (l. 6375).

“On quality of life and civic accomplishments, Mayor Fenty could run on a solid record. The city was safer. Crime was down. Homocides had fallen to 140 in 2009, a 45-year low. District agencies were running more efficiently.... Residents said in polls that the city was headed in the right direction” (l. 6377).

“But Fenty could not shake the widespread impression that he was arrogant and insensitive. He refused to accept polls that showed his popularity in free fall” (l. 6377).

“An undercurrent theme in the campaign to unseat Fenty was that Gray would resurrect Marion Barry's power base, bring back his machine, and redirect the flow of city contracts to Barry's friends. Fenty had tossed many old-guard Washingtonians from his government and from city contracts. Encouraged by Barry, they wanted back in” (l. 6402).

“In the decisive Democratic primary on September 14, Vince Gray trounced Fenty with 54 percent of the vote to Fenty's 44 percent. The city cleaved along racial lines: In black precincts across Anacostia in Ward Seven, Gray polled 82 percent of the vote. Fenty got 80 percent of the mostly white votes in Ward Three” (l. 6404).

“Mayor Vincent Gray was in office for fewer than two months when more than a few voters experienced an extreme case of buyer's remorse” (l. 6415).

“Gray had run as the clean candidate – 'Character, Integrity, Leadership' – and promised high ethical standards and a more approachable city government than Fenty had run. Gray had barely moved into the executive suite when news broke that his appointees and staff in top jobs in his administration were busy installing dozens of family members and friends in other posts with high salaries” (l. 6416).

Sulaimon Brown had run against both Fenty and Gray for mayor, but spent much of his time on the campaign trail attacking Fenty. Brown then got a $110,000-a-year job in the Gray administation. 

“When his past legal problems surfaced in the news, Brown was fired and escorted his office by police” (l. 6421).

Brown accused the mayor of paying him to attack Fenty.

“The mayor and his campaign advisors scoffed. Gray hastily called a news conference and called for an investigation to clear his administration's name. But Brown produced documents, money order receipts, and phone records to help prove his account” (l. 6427).

"When Gray could rise above the fray, he governed well..." (l. 6432).

"His economic-development aides helped jumpstart projects that had been in the planning stages during the Williams and Fenty administrations. Construction cranes once again defined the District's skyline. Gray cut ribbons for the long-stalled Skyland shopping center in Ward Seven; new shops, offices, and housing at the O Street Market site along 9th Street, Northwest; and a total redevelopment of the Southwest waterfront along Maine Avenue" (l. 6444).

"... Young couples pushing baby strollers began showing up in traditionally African American neighborhoods like Petworth along Georgia Avenue. Newcomers moved into row houses in Bloomingdale and Eckington, east of North Capital Street" (l. 6540).

"Nowhere was the revival more evident than on 14th Street north of downtown. The eight blocks from Massachusetts Avenue to U Street became famous -- and infamous -- for redevelopment and gentrification. Developers knocked down warehouses and replaced them with condominiums. The Central Union Mission, which had housed homeless people for decades at 14th and R Streets, sold its building and moved to another location...." (l. 6543).

"The city's revival failed to lift all boats: The District's poor residents suffered from unemployment, poor health, and violent crime, especially if they lived east of the Anacostia" (l. 6552).

"The first polls in the mayor's race showed Gray with a lead, thanks to his base in the black wards east of the Anacostia River and a field jammed with challengers...." (l. 6579)

Meanwhile, corruption investigations that had been picking off members of the Grey administration closed in.

"On March 10, three weeks before the election, [businessman and Gray confidant] Jeff Thompson pleaded guilty to violating campaign-finance laws. Among many admissions, he said he had paid former councilmember Michael Brown to drop out of the 2006 mayor's race and endorse Linda Cropp against Adrian Fenty. He admitted to funneling more than $2-million in illegal contributions to local and federal campaigns over a six-year period. His pleas detailed how he had raised and directed more than $650,000 for Gray's 2010 election" (l. 6591).

"The blockbuster: In open court, Thompson alleged that Vincent Gray knew of the illegal contributions. Vernon Hawkins and other Gray aides had asked Thompson for $400,000 to help Gray get out the vote" (l. 6592).

"Mayor Gray needed to rally his base in the black wards. He never had much support among white voters, who pined for Fenty... and assumed Gray knew of the corrupt campaign" (l. 6594).

"Whom was he going to call? Marion Barry" (l. 6603).

"On Wednesday, March 19, Barry showed up in the basement of Matthews Memorial Baptist Church in Anacostia to endorse Gray's reelection bid. He had to help helped onto the stage" (l. 6604).


"The weekend before the April 1 vote, Barry joined a caravan through African American wards. Riding shotgun, Barry used a megaphone to exhort voters to turn out for Grey" (l. 6617).

"[Muriel] Bowser won the April 1st primary decisively. She captured 44 percent of the vote to Gray's 32 percent" (l. 6618).

"Few voters showed up citywide to vote on April 1. The 83,000 votes cast represented the lowest turnout in nearly 30 years. Precious few showed up in the black precincts Gray needed to win. While half of the voters turned out in some white precincts, fewer than 10 percent bothered to vote in black precincts along the Prince Georges County line" (l. 6621).

"Gray had failed to assume the cloak of victimhood that Barry tried to pass to him. In his first campaign defeating Fenty, Grey had received more than 25,000 votes east of the Anacostia. In the new election, despite Barry, Grey got fewer than 9,000 votes" (l. 6624).

"At the Democratic Unity Breakfast a few days after the election, Gray had to be goaded into shaking Bowser's hand" (l. 6629).

The chapter ends with a brief portrait of David Catania and the threat his campaign might pose to Muriel Bowser. At the time of the writing, Carol Schwartz had not announced her candidacy.

The books ends with a nod to its subject, Marion Barry.

"Marion Barry showed up in a wheelchair at Grey's election-night party. He said it was time for city voters to rally against Catania. Barry, the survivor, endorsed Bowser" (l. 6641).

Cheater's Guide to Dream City ends

There was a lot of fascinating detail in this book which I left out of this summary. If you want to understand the local politics of DC, you must read this a great book in its entirety.


RIP Marion Barry -- read the Washington Post Obituary here

Part 25 -- Afterword

This is the twenty-fifth installment of a series (see the first installment here) summarizing the 1994 book Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington, D.C.by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood. This book has recently been republished as an ebook and a paper book. HBO has plans to use material from the book to make a movie about the life of Marion Barry.

Afterword (three of four)

"When Mayor [Anthony] Williams announced in September 2005 that he would not seek a third term, DC Council chairman Linda Cropp seemed to be his natural council success" (Kindle locaton 6202).

But Adrian Fenty, DC council member from Ward Four, had other ideas.

"To Fenty, Cropp was another standard-bearer for the city's old guard, the people who had failed to govern his native city for decades, going back to Marion Barry" (l. 6203).

"From the start, Fenty's campaign focused on contrasts -- youth against experience, change versus the status quo" (l. 6204)

Fenty grew up in Mt. Pleasant, where he worked in his parents' running-gear store. He graduated from Howard University Law School, interned for several members of Congress, and was a staff for a city councilmember before successfully running for DC council himself.

"On the council for six years, Fenty made few friends among his colleagues. He devoted his time and his staff's to constituent services. No street light, trashy alley, or dispute with the city escaped their attention. With two Blackberries connecting him to staff and the streets, he patrolled his realm in upper Northwest DC along 16th Street and Georgia Avenue in a white Suburban. He was executive rather than collegial. His council colleagues neither knew nor respected him. Fenty didn't care. He was looking past them all" (l. 6224).

"Fenty began running for mayor in June 2005 at age 35. He set a goal of walking every street and knocking on every door, and by the height of the campaign in the fall of 2006, he had come close" (l. 6226).

 "In the Democratic primary that September, Fenty trounced Cropp in all eight wards, 57 percent to 31 percent, carrying every one of the city's 142 precincts. That had never been done before. Fenty had swept the field in a city long divided along racial and class lines" (l. 6228).

"...The mayor-elect scanned the nation for talent. To run his planning office, he hired Harriet Tregoning, a leader in smart growth and urban planning. As police chief, he appointed Cathy Lanier, the first woman to run the high-profile force. Fenty knew Lanier from her days commanding cops in his ward.... Fenty installed Allen Lew to run the massive school-reconstruction operation. Lew had managed construction of the new convention center and the new baseball stadium" (l. 6250).

Fenty also appointed Michelle Rhee to be the District's first school chancellor.

"In her first five months on the job, Rhee met with 144 principals and fired two on the spot" (l. 6290).

"Rhee, 38, brought in allies from the reform movement. Kaya Henderson become her chief deputy. Working for Rhee's New Teacher Project out of New York, Henderson deep into city schools and its tough battles with the Washington teachers union. Abigail "Abby" Smith joined the reform team along with a phalanx of other Rhee acolytes" (l. 6300).

"Beyond the nation's capital, Michelle Rhee became a new breed of celebrity: an 'edu-celeb'. Educators rarely show up on the covers of national news magazines. Michelle Rhee broke the mold. Time magazine featured a stern Rhee on its cover holding a broom, the better to clean up the schools" (l. 6302).

"But within the District, Rhee was piling up enemies, especially among the teachers and some parents groups. Every school she closed wounded a neighborhood and forced students to travel to class. Many teachers were middle-class African American women who served as backbones of families and communities. Firing a teacher who didn't measure up could disrupt an entire neighborhood" (l. 6313).

"Fenty's popularity sank, but the damage came more from self-inflicted wounds than from Rhee's reforms" (l. 6315).

"Fenty never warmed to the bare-minimum political practice of cultivating firends, let alone disarming enemies. Idle chats with voters bored him. He didn't like attending civic functions. If he showed up at a Chamber of Commerce reception, he arrived late and left early. He treated other business groups the same way -- with the back of his hand" (l. 6322).

Fenty appointed personal friends with no experience to political positions and picked fights with members of the DC council.

"Fenty's image also suffered when it seemed he was spending more time training for triathlons than running the city. WTOP reporter Mark Segraves caught him using police escorts to guide his cycling runs through Rock Creek Park and other heavily traveled parkways. Segraves' cell phone video became a hit on the station's website. It didn't help when Fenty scheduled a trip to Dubai without disclosing either his plans or who paid for the travel, as required by law" (l. 6347).

"A poll conducted by the Washington Post in January 2010 showed Fenty's approval ratings had plummeted, especially among black Washingtonians. African Americans switched from 68-percent approval after his first year in office to 65-percent disapproval, according the poll. Citywide, 49 percent of residents disapprove of his performance as mayor" (l. 6352).

"Nevertheless, Fenty started raising money for a second term in the summer of 2009, amassing a war chest of more than $4 million. He left crumbs on the table for a challenger. It looked as though he would run unopposed" (l. 6353).

Cheater's Guide to Dream City continues

All posts are cross-posted on Short Articles about Long Meetings.

Full disclosure: I have a commercial relationship with Amazon. I will receive a very small portion of the money people spend after clicking on an Amazon link on this site.

This is a great book and well worth reading in its entirety.

Read the next installment here.

Part 24 -- Afterword

This is the twenty-fourth installment of a series (see the first installment here) summarizing the 1994 book Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington, D.C.by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood. This book has recently been republished as an ebook and a paper book. HBO has plans to use material from the book to make a movie about the life of Marion Barry.

Afterword (two of four) 

Anthony Williams served two terms as mayor, from 1999 to 2007.
"Mayor Tony Williams governed quietly and without fanfare. He was the anti-Barry, boring but competent” (Kindle location 6031).

“[H]e made the District balance its book. He lured competent bureaucrats to run city agencies” (l. 6036).

“When Williams became mayor, five of the city's social-services agencies were in receivership or under court ordered management. One by one, he gradually brought them back under District control” (l. 6040).

“If Williams had a weakness, it was his disdain for the rituals of politics. Where Barry had nurtured his network in the neighborhoods and sensed every shift in sentiment, Williams was removed and remained tone deaf” (l. 6059).

“... Williams proposed cutting the city work force and farming out government functions to private companies. City Union leaders howled. Williams seemed surprised” (l. 6069).

“I didn't get elected to adjust the air-conditioning,” Williams said.

“Williams and his top assistants assembled lower-level line employees in the convention center. They held seminars to teach them how to answer phones and perform routine public-service tasks. Williams did what Marion Barrt had failed to do: he trained the work force. For city government, it was nothing less than revolutionary” (l. 6078).

 “... After four consecutive balanced budgets, in September 2001, the federal financial control board suspended its activities and put the city's government and budget back in the hands of the mayor and the council” (l. 6092).

“... [W]hen [Williams] ran for reelection in 2002, his campaign failed to collect the required number of valid signatures to place him in the ballot. He needed only 2,000. TV reporters with NBC4 found that half of the signatures the Williams campaign turned in were fake. The Board of Elections ruled Williams ineligible for the ballot and fined his campaign $250,000” (l. 6093).

“Williams had to run as a write in candidate. Still, he won. His success at reforming the government overcame his political ineptitude” (l. 6096).

Williams' success at improving city finances drew the approval and attention of investors in many fields, including Major League Baseball. “Williams wanted a team, but Jack Evans craved one. The Ward Two council member had been coveting a franchise since 1996... As chair of the [DC City-] council finance and revenue committee, Evans played a crucial role in lobbying MLB owners and persuading the council to pay for a new stadium with public funds" (l. 6139).

"It took three more contentious months to convince the DC council to agree to finance the new stadium.... Critics argued that the estimated $500-million in bonds would be better devoted to more pressing needs" (l. 6140).

" 'Why can't the team owners pay their fair share?' asked Adrian Fenty, the upstart young Ward Four council member. "No, voting against the stadium doesn't mean money will automatically go to schools and other needs. But it does mean that a government that does not get those things right should not be exploring putting hundreds of millions of dollars into the pockets of multi-millionaires" (l. 6141).

"Politically, landing the team was a win for Williams and Evans. But Adrian Fenty, the lawmaker who said 'no' to public financing, got his first dose of notoriety. It would not be his last" (l. 6143).

"[A]fter eight years with Williams at the helm, the city was better off in measurable ways. He valued competence in the bureaucracies, trained workers, and expected accountability. Trash got picked up. The motor-vehicle department actually issued licenses without making residents reserve a day to wait in line. City workers were less surly and more willing to serve the public. In short, Williams reformed the city government. He organized its finances. And he balanced the budget every year" (l. 6199).

"By 2006, local Washington had the feel of a metropolitan center poised to hit is stride as an international capital" (l. 6200).

Cheater's Guide to Dream City continues

All posts are cross-posted on Short Articles about Long Meetings.

Full disclosure: I have a commercial relationship with Amazon. I will receive a very small portion of the money people spend after clicking on an Amazon link on this site.

This is a great book and well worth reading in its entirety.

Read the next installment here.

Part 23 -- Afterword

This is the twenty-third installment of a series (see the first installment here) summarizing the 1994 book Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington, D.C.by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood. This book has recently been republished as an ebook and a paper book. HBO has plans to use material from the book to make a movie about the life of Marion Barry.

Afterword (one of four)

The first edition of this book ends in 1994. For the 2014 issues, the authors wrote a long afterword, speeding through the last 20 years of DC politics. During that period, there were four mayors: Marion Barry, Anthony Williams, Adrian Fenty, and Vincent Grey. This installment of the summary covers the final term of Marion Barry.


"As the 1994 race for mayor of the District of Columbia unfolded, the nation was aghast that the city was on the verge of electing Marion Barry once again" (Kindle location 5840).

"The city remained segregated by race and class.... Ambulances didn't show up when called. School buildings still were falling apart, and classrooms were failing to educated their children. Young thugs with guns fighting over drug turf controlled the streets in Shaw, Trinidad, Congress Heights, and scores of other neighborhoods.... In that tense and unsettled landscape, Marion Barry recognized familiary political terrain. He was 58, fit, and had reassembled his political team" (l. 5854).

Opposition to Barry was split between unpopular incumbent Sharon Pratt Kelly and buttoned-down at-large city councilmember John Ray.

"It didn't take polling or deep political insight for Barry to realize that he could rack up more votes than either Kelly or Ray: They would split the opposition... Barry's core constituency of African American voters east of the Anacostia River believed he had been run out of office by federal prosecutors in 1990. On the campaign trail, he portrayed himself as a flawed individual who had overcome his problems and was ready to lead the city once again" (l. 5889).

"In the September primary, Barry trounced his competitors. He won with 66,777 votes, 47 percent of the total. John Ray came in second with 37 percent. Sharon Pratt Kelly got just 13 percent of the vote, a measly show for an incumbent in
any election nationwide" (l. 5900).

"...[H]is victory was split along sharp racial lines. In largely white Ward Three, only 586 of the 17,333 votes went to Barry. In Ward Eight, where Barry punched up registration, 10,497 of the 12,791 ballots were cast for him" (l. 5901).

In the general election, Barry beat city councilmember Carol Schwartz with 58 percent of the vote.

"In the early months of [Barry's] term, congressmen read banner headlines projecting a $722-million deficit in the District's $3.2-billion budget, most of which he had inherited from Kelly. The Congressional Budget Office in February declared the District 'technically insolvent' " (l. 5926).

Congress "establish the Financial Responsibility and Management Assistance Authority. Under the law, a five-member board had the authority to regulate DC spending, disapprove labor contracts, and delve deeply into agencies to reform the government. It reduced Barry's influence and rendered the 13-member council essentially powerless" (l. 5939).

Barry had the authority to appoint a chief financial officer for the city. On the advice of Jeffrey Earl Thompson, Barry appointed Anthony Williams.

"...Tony Williams seemed to be the perfect choice for Barry's purposes. Williams came across as shy and mild-mannered to a fault. He had few local connections.... A California native, Williams had a gold-plated resume: undergraduate degree from Yale, law degree from Harvard, master of public policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a stint in the Air Force.... His only flirtation with politics had been his election as an alderman in New Haven when he was at Yale. Tony Williams seemed meek, wore bow ties, often spoke in a mumble" (l. 5950).

"Marion Barry complained when Tony Williams got the authority to hire and fire, but the mayor was powerless to intercede. Williams drastically reduced the city work force that Barry had padded in his three terms" (l. 5975).

"Marion Barry was no longer having fun. On May 22, 1998, the 'Mayor for Life' summoned reporters and supporters to the DC council chambers to call it quits" (l. 5985).

The career politicians who declared themselves candidates for mayor did not inspire. A genuine grass-roots "draft Williams" campaign emerged. Williams resisted, then succumbed.

Williams won 50 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary against three opponents, and easily outpolled Carol Schwartz in the general election.

"In conversations on the streets and in barber shops, African Americans still wondered if Williams was 'black enough' to represent their interests.... But the majority of voters where interested in a mayor who could manage a city ready to emerge from federal control...." (l. 6023).

Cheater's Guide to Dream City continues

All posts are cross-posted on Short Articles about Long Meetings.

Full disclosure: I have a commercial relationship with Amazon. I will receive a very small portion of the money people spend after clicking on an Amazon link on this site.

This is a great book and well worth reading in its entirety.

Read the next installment here. 

Part 22 -- Epilogue

This is the twenty-second installment of a series (see the first installment here) summarizing the 1994 book Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington, D.C.by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood. This book has recently been republished as an ebook and a paper book. HBO has plans to use material from the book to make a movie about the life of Marion Barry.

Epilogue

The epilogue of this book was written in 1993 or 1994. It suggests some possible futures for the city, but first it describes the crime and violence-ridden atmosphere under then-Mayor Sharon Pratt Kelly.

“Sharon Kelly wasn't much of a field marshall, but even if she'd been George Patton, she would have had little chance of winning the war. The police force she inherited was not prepared to fight, because her predecessor, Marion Barry, had wrecked it” (Kindle location 5749).

“For all his achievements and failures, the dispirited and desperate  state of the city's police department in a time of turmoil was perhaps Barry’s most damning legacy” (l. 5750).

“Given the uniqueness of the setting, Barry had the opportunity to create a modern urban center that worked.... Expecting Marion Barry and [his allies] to make the city function at an ideal level may be unrealistic, but there's no reason it had to sink to the level of poverty, infirmity and fear that it occupies today” (l. 5762).

“...[T]he District of Columbia had become a mesmerizing mirror for black and white America's inability to integrate African-Americans -- economically, politically, and socially” (l. 5773).

“In essence, the poor parts of the city were becoming unhitched from the upper and middle class sections of the capital -- and from the rest of America” (l. 5786).

"As Mayor Kelly and other politicians jockeyed for position in the 1994 mayoral and council campaigns, wealthy whites and middle class blacks were voting with their feet. The District’s population in 1993 dipped below 600,000 for a 25 percent loss from the high of 800,000. Nearly 50,000 black Washingtonians had left during the 1980s, and the exodus picked up momentum in the early 1990s” (l. 5801).

“Thus the conundrum: Washington, D.C. won’t die because it’s the capital city; but if it weren't the capital, it might not be in such dire straits. If it hadn't been under the thumb of racists in Congress for a hundred years, it might have developed politics such as those in Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, or other cities” (l. 5810).

“Lacking clear divisions of power and identity, the city and its residents have become addicted to the blame game. No one is responsible for his or her actions -- not the people, not the politicians, not the criminals. The well-healed whites of Ward Three have little stake in the city, and most don't care about the politics or the government. What happens across the Anacostia River doesn't concern them. African-Americans often pin their problem on racism and blame Ward Three” (l. 5814).

The authors (again, writing in the mid-1990s) imagine two possible futures for the district.

“One leads gradually toward true home rule, independence, and possibly statehood. This would require the kind of incremental change envisioned by Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, as opposed to any quick fixes” (l. 5822).

The authors consider a possible deal with Congress. It proposes, as possibilities, the hiring of a professional city manager, doubling the size of the city council but halving its salary, and increasing city control of finances, the judiciary, and criminal systems. These include the local election of an attorney general, and the election of judges, or perhaps appointment of judges by the city council and the mayor.

“To spur economic development, laws could be changed to make the city into a haven for corporate headquarters, similar to Delaware. Or it could become a tax free zone that would promote jobs and development on hundreds of acres of prime vacant land, much of it east of the Anacostia” (l. 5834).

“On the other hand, the federal government could tighten its control over the city. As we finish our work, there is growing unease about the financial stability, of the local government, even as the city's social problems draw the attention of both demogagic and well meaning members of Congress” (l. 5835).

“We've argued that Washington is unique, but we can argue the other side, as well. It is enough like other cities with financial and racial strains to be a barometer for how well the nation tends to urban America. The problem of race -- so evident in the District -- is the paramount domestic problem facing America” (l. 5842).

The original version ends at this point. The newly-released revision continues the story up to 2014 in an Afterword.

Cheater's Guide to Dream City continues

All posts are cross-posted on Short Articles about Long Meetings.

Full disclosure: I have a commercial relationship with Amazon. I will receive a very small portion of the money people spend after clicking on an Amazon link on this site.

This is a great book and well worth reading in its entirety.

Read the next installment here.

Part 21 - Resurrection

This is the twenty-first installment of a series (see the first installment here) summarizing the 1994 book Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington, D.C.by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood. This book has recently been republished as an ebook and a paper book. HBO has plans to use material from the book to make a movie about the life of Marion Barry.

Chapter 16: Resurrection (three of three)

Marion Barry was released from a Pennsylvania jail on April 23, 1992.

Hundreds of people, including his mother, escorted him back to DC on buses. “The five buses pulled up to the Union Temple Church in Anacostia at 8:00 p.m. and hundreds of screaming, chanting supporters exploded in ’Barry’s back, Barry’s back, Barry’s back’ “ (Kindle location 5536).

“A few weeks later, Marion Barry moved into a small apartment in Ward Eight to establish residency and start running for the council seat that would be filled by voters on September 15 -- four months down the line.... In Barry’s eyes, still guided by tremendous political instincts, it was a natural fit: the outlaw candidate for the outcast ward” (l. 5542).

“Ward Eight was the only place in the city that Barry could have hoped to start a political comeback. He's always tapped into the anger in the black community, and there's plenty there -- for good reason” (l. 5543).

“It is the city's poorest Ward. The median income is $16,000. According to city statistics, 15,000 people live in public housing and another 10,000 live in subsidized apartments, so that 35 percent of the population qualifies for government help. Forty-one percent didn't graduate from college. In the midst of a homelessness crisis, there are 5,000 vacant housing units, and at least 1,700 are boarded up. In comparison, there are five boarded-up units in Ward Three, where the whites dwell” (l. 5551).

“ ’This isn't a campaign,’ [Barry] preached in his kickoff speech, ’this is a crusade to bring power and dignity and services back to us here in Ward Eight’ “ (l. 5567).

“ ’I’ll tell you why Marion Barry’s running,’ said Absalom Jordan, a Ward Eight activist who was also running for the council seat. ’He wants to run for mayor again in two years. It's that simple’ “ (l. 5575).

“ ’His premise is that people have short memories,’ said Absalom Jordan, ’and he can keep playing the race game again and again. He says “look at what the white man did to me.” He wants people to forget that for years he was the white man, he was the law, he was in control of the city...’ “ (l. 5595).

“On September 15, a record number of Ward Eight voters elected Marion Barry over [opponent Wilhelmina] Rolark by a 3-1 margin. Victory was his, and it was sweet” (l. 5604).

“Many people were mystified that he'd won, but the reasons were clear. Neighborhoods with terrific views of the sparkling lights on the Mall and the national monuments were breeding grounds for violence and drug addiction. Why Barry? Because no one else had helped them. They had no better choices. At least he could bring some attention. He could bring some hope” (l. 5611).

1992 also brought Bill Clinton to the White House. “...Clinton’s greatest impact was to give hope to Washingtonians who wanted the District of Columbia to become the state of New Columbia. Statehood is the holy grail of Washington politics....Clinton was the first president who publicly supported the District’s becoming the fifty-first state; he'd even testified on its behalf early in 1992" (l. 5620).

“Unfortunately, Mayor Sharon Pratt Kelly didn't do much to help the District’s case. Kelly used statehood as a political weapon, blaming Congress for the city’s problems and leading people to believe that all would be fine if Congress would grant statehood. It was pure demagoguery.... Kelly’s campaign only served to make enemies in Congress. As Kelly dangled statehood in front of the city, the prospect that Congress would appoint a federal financial oversight commission was much more likely” (l. 5643).

“On Inauguration Day, January 20, 1993, when the capital city was in the spotlight of the world for a swearing in of a new president, the mayor had her aides changing the locks to doors to keep council members away from choice seats to view the parade from the city's District Building” (l. 5656).

“The city council job was a cakewalk for [Marion Barry]. He'd already been a councilman for four years before he was mayor, and he knew the executive branch better than anyone in the city. He had virtually created it. In private working sessions and public committee meetings, Barry applied himself to the task of representing his ward. he was studious and conscientious, asked intelligent questions, and cooperated with the other twelve council members” (l. 5673).

“In fact, he could hardly get his mind off a total comeback. The next election would be in September 1994. He could run for mayor and not give up his council seat, so there would be no risk. He loved campaigning more than anything else and he could parlay the threat of running to gain favors from Kelly or other council members. Kelly appeared to be weak. If another candidate or two got into the race and split the vote, even Barry’s most vitriolic detractors had to admit that he had a real chance to win the Democratic primary” (l. 5696).

“Many felt another Barry campaign would be bad for him personally, bad for business, and bad for the city. It was time for other challenges. Barry should let go. They shared some of their feelings with him, but just as in his race for Ward Eight council seat, Marion Barry had his own sense of timing, his own vision” (l. 5707).

Cheater's Guide to Dream City continues

All posts are cross-posted on Short Articles about Long Meetings.

Full disclosure: I have a commercial relationship with Amazon. I will receive a very small portion of the money people spend after clicking on an Amazon link on this site.

This is a great book and well worth reading in its entirety.

Read the next installment here.

Part 20 -- Resurrection

This is the twentieth installment of a series (see the first installment here) summarizing the 1994 book Dream City: Race, Power, and the Decline of Washington, D.C.by Harry Jaffe and Tom Sherwood. This book has recently been republished as an ebook and a paper book. HBO has plans to use material from the book to make a movie about the life of Marion Barry.

Chapter 16: Resurrection (two of three)

Sharon Pratt Dixon succeeded Marion Barry as mayor in January 1991. (In December 1991, she married a New York businessman and changed her name to Sharon Pratt Kelly.)

"Dixon had a tough job, no matter what level her political and leadership skills. Barry had left the city and the government in terrible shape. Records were nonexistant; phones had been ripped from the walls; all the top bureaucrats had resigned, at her request" (Kindle location 5327).

"Dixon was slow to assemble her staff, and she had a hard time keeping it. She ran as a 'native Washingtonian' and promised to hire local talent to manage her government, but either she couldn't find any or they wouldn't work for her. She wound up going as far as Alaska for a housing director, brought her economic development chief in from Oakland, hired an administrative services director from Boson, and chose a press secretary from East St. Louis via Arizona" (l. 5331).

On May 5, 1991, a 30-year-old immigrant construction worker from El Salvador pulled a knife on a DC police officer in Mount Pleasant and was shot.

"Within hours, angry crowds of Latino and black youths took to the streets and started burning buildings and looting stores. The next night people around the world were treated to televised scenes of burning buses and overturned police cars in the American capital. For three nights, roving bands of teenagers staged running battles with police east across the city.... Mayor Dixon slapped a curfew on the neighborhood and ordered police not to shoot anything but tear gas. When the rioting was over, at least 31 businesses ... had suffered some damage...." (l. 5362).

The riots plus Barry's departure from the mayor's office disrupted business-as-usual. Local real estate moguls took the hit. Planned real estate development in Shaw went nowhere. Blocks "gobbled up in the 1980s were either boarded up, fenced in, or piled up with rubble and refuse" (l. 5370). Other moguls drastically cut back their plans or went bankrupt.

"The demise of the local real estate moguls marked a watershed in the District's business life. Washington was always known as a political colony because Congress maintained ultimate control; by 1990 it was becoming an economic colony as well. Real estate development was one of the last purely local businesses.... The depression knocked out many of the local players and replaced them with Texans, Canadians, and foreigners" (l. 5380).

Marion Barry left his DC home for jail on October 26, 1991. His mother saw him off -- his wife and child did not. "[T]he crowd of 100 or so working-class supporters, many wearing baseball caps, some with public works insignias, smiled and waved and said, 'Yes, Marion, yes.' He trashed the government one last time for its 'political persecution' and he made ready to head down the road to the minimum-security prison for white-collar criminals in Petersburg, Virginia..." (l. 5406).

"The district was losing population throughout the 1980s, and the trend accelerated in the early 1990s, but unlike the outmigrations of the 1960s, this was black flight. Working couples, families with young children, and people simply trying to escape the city's high crime rate moved out in droves. From its high of 802,178 in 1950, the city's population dropped to 606,900 in the 1990 census and fell below 600,000 two years later. Nearly one-third of those remaining -- 180,000 -- were on public assistance rolls" (l. 5435).

The police department went on a Congressionally-ordered hiring binge in 1990 and 1991. "In a rush to fill the rolls, the department neglected background checks, lowered entrance standards, and skimped on training. The shoddy policies bore fruit when the recruits hit the streets and started wrecking police cars at the rate of one a day, conspiring with drug dealers, and selling cocaine. The classes of 1990 and 1991 put dozens of dirty cops on the streets, so dirty that the FBI formed a special unit to police the police" (l. 5446).

"In 1992, 35 Washington police officers were indicted on criminal charges ranging from murder, theft, assault with a deadly weapon, and sodomy to kidnapping while armed and making threats. At least 70 more were indicted in 1993. Police employees were caught selling handguns that had been confiscated and stored by the department" (l. 5450).

Dixon spent a lot of time cultivating Congress. "The mayor had good reason to be on Capitol Hill. The city was close to broke. Barry's profligate spending programs had put the budget in the red, and the real estate bust dried up tax revenues. Dixon lobbied for months against long odds to extract a $200-million increase in the federal payment from a budget-weary Congress. She got the money and looked like a lion-tamer" (l. 5470).

"... Though the mayor continued to make rousing speeches, no one on her staff was answering mail, returning phone calls, or meeting with constituents. She bristled at any criticism, telling everyone she had a different style and they'd just have to get used to it. But her style angered both foes and friends, and within a year she had somehow squandered all the goodwill that grew out of her improbable victory at the polls" (l. 5477).

"City politics is a sweaty contact sport. People have to believe that they can touch their leaders and make their government work for them. Dixon was on the road so much during her first year that constituents would have had to grab her in the airport..." (l. 5485).

"Around the District Building they started to call her 'Mayor of America' and 'Air Dixon' " (l. 5487).

"Dixon simply couldn't make the transition from the candidate ... to the empathetic politician who could manage a government and build coalitions. Her way of getting support was by threat and intimidation, and it wasn't working" (l. 5496).

Cheater's Guide to Dream City continues

All posts are cross-posted on Short Articles about Long Meetings.

Full disclosure: I have a commercial relationship with Amazon. I will receive a very small portion of the money people spend after clicking on an Amazon link on this site.

This is a great book and well worth reading in its entirety.

Read the next installment here.