Talk is seemingly cheap but actually very expensive

This Brookland storefront window features signs from 3 of the 5 DC Mayoral candidates. The fourth sign is for a candidate that first put himself out there as a candidate for Mayor but he has since switched to the at-large Councilmember race.

(This blog entry was formerly titled "Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid.")

The Washington Post has a master webpage of stories and other materials on the people who are running in the 2006 Mayoral Election.

For a lesson in how the land use agenda dominates the local political agenda, read chapter four from the book Dream City, and this award-winning article from the Common Denominator, "THE DISTRICT'S POWER BEHIND THE SCENES."

To put it in broader perspective, then read Molotch's article City as a Growth Machine: Toward a Political Economy of Place.
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Today's Examiner has an excellent column by local political analyst and journalist Jonetta Rose Barras, about this very same issue, "Mayoral candidates need to lay it out for the voters to see." From the column:

This time last year, Mayor Anthony Williams, using his 2006 budget submission to the D.C. Council, presented an agenda intended to assault those intractable problems that create poverty: illiteracy, chronic adult unemployment, substance abuse and family deterioration.The proposal, which received rave reviews, was the logical next step in the District's march back from decades of mismanagement and near-insolvency. But as the mayor sometimes is wont, he became distracted. Baseball and the National Capital Medical Center have his attention...

There is little chance Williams will return to his urban plan. Even if his interest is restored, his administration is becoming bare - near naked, actually - and there isn't enough time. After the primary in September, he is a hobbled duck - though he may try to conceal his condition.The five mayoral candidates - Adrian Fenty, Vincent Orange, Linda Cropp, Marie Johns and Michael Brown - could review the mayor's proposal to inject substance into their skimpy platforms. Thus far, each has offered unimaginative, piecemeal approaches to what ails the city...

Williams has done much of the tough visionary, foundation-laying work, including bringing growth to communities in Ward 8. It rightly disturbs him that he has received little credit for his efforts, although a certain sitting council member and former mayor did far less and gets accolades on every street corner.

Despite the progress, the District's recovery remains incomplete. Residents can't wait until January, when a new mayor is swore in, to know exactly what, if anything, is planned for the city's future. Empty rhetoric about making room at the table for the least among us and "raising all boats" is insufficient.Voters should demand a four-year plan, replete with implementation road map. The door should slam shut, quickly, on any mayoral wannabe who comes calling empty-handed.

Speaking of empty hands, Marc Fisher's column today, "Big Plans Haven't Produced D.C. School Reform," about the latest revitalization plan for DC Public Schools isn't much different than the four or five other revitalization plans that have been developed over the past 15+ years.

Talk is seemingly very cheap, but actually very expensive in terms of stabilizing and revitalizing center cities. And we don't have so much money that we can afford to waste any.

The vacant Crummell Elementary School, a national landmark, has been so significantly neglected by its owner, the DC Government, that it will cost more than $7 million to rehabilitate this building. Photo by Peter Sefton.

Crummell School in better days.

Index Keywords: 2006-Election