Month: August 2018

Street Archeology

We have a neighbor, Brian who picks up trash, that’s his thing. The Help, my lovely spouse, has found his thing, weeds. For some reason we bought a weed whacker, and so the Help has decided it is his duty to go out and whack weeds. Sometimes he picks up trash, because there is more than enough trash that is thrown and blown in for one person.

The Help sometimes likes to tell me of his adventures as Weedwhackerman. He says picking up trash and cleaning out storm drains choked with weeds is like urban archeology. He noticed the preferred cigarette that litterbugs like to litter the neighborhood with are Newports. Once he mentioned that, I began to notice Newport wrappers and empty boxes all over Shaw.

In his guise as Weedwhackerman, (hat, shades, maybe a dust mask) he meets all sorts of people. He’s very friendly and chatty. Being able to engage total strangers is his superpower. If you find yourself trapped in a conversation with Weedwhackerman say these magic words, “Well, I gotta go.” Then wave goodbye and walk away. If you cannot pull yourself away from Weedwhackerman, know that he’ll eventually let you go because he has to return to his alter ego (and paid job) of mild mannered librarian dude, aka the Help.

What what? Lewd act on 7th St NW in the middle of the day

So looking at the MPD listserv I spotted this:

August 22, 2018

Arrest Made in a Misdemeanor Sexual Abuse and a Lewd and Indecent Acts Offense: 1400 Block of 7th Street, Northwest

(Washington, DC) – Detectives from the Metropolitan Police Department’s Sexual Assault Unit have announced an arrest has been made in connection with a Misdemeanor Sexual Abuse and a Lewd and Indecent Acts offense that occurred on Monday, August 6, 2018, in the 1400 block of 7th Street, Northwest.

At approximately 2:58 pm, the victim was walking at the listed location. The suspect approached the victim from behind and engaged in sexual contact with the victim. The suspect then exposed himself to the victim and committed a lewd act. The suspect then fled the scene.

On Tuesday, August 22, 2018, pursuant to a DC Superior Court custody order, an 18-year old male, of Northwest, DC was arrested and charged with Misdemeanor Sexual Abuse and Lewd and Indecent Acts.

I’m glad someone, hopefully the right person, was arrested.

DCPS v DCPCS

Views from Dunbar High School

So one night I decided to test my spouse, the Help, about schools in DC. Sadly, despite all our conversations about schools, we were not in agreement about the nature of schools and our choices.

I created this table for the Help, maybe it will help you too.

 

DC Public School (DCPS) DC Public Charter School (DCPCS)
Free to DC students Free to DC students
DC Government owned buildings Mix (former DCPS buildings, rented commercial space, etc) and locations can change
Available to in boundary K-12 students. Out of boundary & Pre-K must enter My Schools DC Lottery New students must enter My Schools DC Lottery regardless of address
Has wait lists for popular schools Has wait lists for popular schools
Aftercare costs $850.50 for 2018-2019. Before care availability varies. Many have before and after care. Costs on a sliding scale.
More than 1/2 of students are in the DCPS system 47.5% of students are in DC charter schools
Quality varies by school Quality varies by school
State Board of Education members are elected DC Charter School Board members are nominated by Mayor

 

Baltimore City level of Historic Districts- When you have too many

DC has too many historic districts (HD) and just recently got one more as Bloomingdale fell to this sad fate of HD collecting. So about 1 in 5 DC properties is some historic something or another. DC is on its way to becoming like our sister city Baltimore where some historic districts are respected and others, kinda ignored, making the designation meaningless. Maybe it needs to be made meaningless.

mAP OF bALTIMORE cITY hISTORIC dISTRICTSSo I own a small rental in Baltimore which happens to be in a historic district and the neighborhood is listed with the National Register of Historic Places. Historic districts in Baltimore are a different animal than the HDs in DC from what I observed. When I had a local charm city architect over, I mentioned the vinyl window I had in my house and the other vinyl windows I saw in the neighborhood. He said, “Yeah, they’re not supposed to do that but….” and he shrugged and we moved on to other topics.

Baltimore has over 60 historic districts, DC has over 30. The Baltimore Sun supposed that 1 in 3 buildings was listed on the National Register. I have no idea how many of those include abandoned shells. Baltimore also has a local tax incentive to get homeowners on board, but the logic in how it applies confuse me. There are newish condos just outside the district’s boundaries that advertised the 10 year tax credit. Of course there is a lot in Baltimore where the logic of how they apply a lot of things confuse me.

I wonder if the trend to add more and more historic districts will create an environment where the original intents will be undermined because it brings in too many unwilling participants, thin supporters and stretch the resources of the enforcers. Maybe. We’ll see.

The problem with affordable housing on weaker neighborhoods

If you haven’t read Congress Heights on the Rise’s (CHotR) blog, please do. The author, Ms. Peele is telling some serious truths about the problem of affordable housing in her neighborhood. It is not the same problem of affordable housing experienced in NW, the problem is there is a little too much affordable housing and not enough market housing.

One of the post’s “Why investing ONLY in income-capped housing in Ward 8 is setting us up for failure,” can be summed up as affordable housing needs to be spread around more equally across all 8 wards and not concentrated East of the River (EotR). She points out that the majority of the available apartments for rent in her area are income capped, which means a single person making $51,000 cannot rent an apartment there, and forget about a married couple. Without those sort of renters, that middle class contingent, the urban amenities that make DC fun are in short supply in her neighborhood, and she has to drive elsewhere for fitness and food.

Continuing in another post “MORE OF THE SAME: 7 more income-capped housing projects planned for Ward 8,” she is obviously frustrated with the DC government’s (DHCD) housing policy of more income capped housing. This sort of policy keeps out the kind of residents who could support the businesses (and jobs) she wants and provide the kind of role models kids in the neighborhood need. The income limits keeps out nurses, police officers, teachers, and most other professionals. Many of the income limit apartment buildings are at 50% MFI/AMI (Median Family Income/ Area Median Income) so a single person cannot make more than $41,050. The starting salary for a DCPS teacher is supposed to be $55, 209, and the starting salary for a MPD police officer is $55,362. It would have to be at 80% MFI/AMI for a single income teacher or police officer. Logically, if you had a married couple (the cop married to a teacher) they would blow past the $46,900 50% MFI/ $76,000 80% MFI limits for a household of two, and three.

Aren’t we just repeating the mistakes of the past with new packaging? Concentrating poverty is destructive, cruel and wrong. We, as a city, have done it before with public housing and created environments of unemployment, crime, death and dysfunction.

Will Buy Your House For CA$H

It was something from a DCist post about the Hillcrest neighborhood I noticed. It seems the people of Hillcrest have been peppered with offers to sell their homes to developers. If those offers come in the form of post cards and yellow letters like the ones below, they aren’t special. I get these offers almost every week. Sometimes I get phone calls.

I have two rentals, bought for the price of a new car, in addition to our primary home. So every week, I will get some letter or postcard asking if I want to sell. These things are called yellow letters. Note, they are yellow. They come from people looking to buy houses for developer investors. Most are not a scam, but they aren’t going to offer you the amount of money you’d probably get if you were to sell with a Realtor. They are for people who want to sell a house quickly without doing anything (fixing things).

I don’t feel pestered by these mail in inquires. They are like any other service being offered that I don’t want. Don’t want a credit card. Don’t want your cable package. When it is an offer on my primary residence, I do feel slightly insulted, because, yes, the outside could use some sprucing up. I think they figured I’d want to sell because I haven’t gotten to fixing some things. Those things are on the 2019 docket of expensive house crap to do. I replaced the roof this year so the 2018 budget is blown.

So say you’ve gotten several of these yellow letters, what do you do? Are they serious offers? Well if you have no desire to sell, toss them in recycling and give it nary a thought. If you’re thinking about selling, but you want top dollar and you have time and are willing to repair and repaint, toss them in the recycling bin and hire a Realtor. But if you just want to get rid of it (bad tenants, repairs you can’t afford, desperately need to fund your mother in law’s stay in a nursing home) sure give the number on the letter or post card you got a call. Just be aware you’re going to be offered a price below market.  It doesn’t matter that the house next door to you sold for a million dollars, the people offering to buy your house are not going to offer a million dollars.

Please ID A ‘Person of Interest’ Regarding Armed-Gun Robbery

So this person, is wanted as a person of interest. The DC Police tweeted on July 20th a report of an armed robbery at the Unit block of Florida Ave NW, in Truxton Circle.

So here is the video of a person of interest related to that robbery at a chicken place on H St NE, buying what I gather is chicken.

If you can figure out who this person is, contact MPD by calling 911 (I guess since they don’t give any other number to reach them). You might just get one more idiot with a gun, who shouldn’t have a gun, off the streets.