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Taking note . . .

Observations about public affairs in the nation’s capital
by the editor of The Common Denominator

WHO NEEDS SPEED BUMPS? Remember the big deal that Mayor Tony Williams made about fixing potholes when he first took office? Remember the public furor over poor repairs of street cuts that were made for installing underground fiber optics?

So where is the motorist outrage over the increasing number of D.C. roadways that are now sending vehicles careening – and nearly launching them into flight while braking at legal speeds – due to their washboard-like asphalt surfaces?

Last week while running a few errands, yours truly began making a short list of some of the more obvious problem stretches that have grown progressively worse in recent months – many of them located along major commuter thoroughfares. Among them:

• South Dakota Avenue NE, southeast of Bertie Backus Junior High School and the Gallatin Street entrance to the Fort Totten Metro station;
• Benning Road NE, both east and west of the Minnesota Avenue intersection;
• Benning Road NE westbound lanes at northbound 17th Street;
• Brentwood Road NE from W Street, near Black Entertainment Television and the District’s shuttered main post office, to Saratoga Avenue – including the entrance to the District’s heralded Home Depot and newest Giant Food stores.

That list, compiled during a quick trip, certainly is not meant to be exhaustive – only illustrative of how easily such a list can be compiled due to the prevalence of the problem. It’s a curious problem, as well, since many of the affected stretches of pavement aren’t very old. And the District’s relatively cool summer wasn’t exactly conducive to heat-induced buckling of roadways.

So what’s the problem? Is the District getting defective workmanship? Defective materials? And why don’t officials at the District’s Department of Transportation, created under Mayor Williams’ watch to pay closer attention to such matters, seem to be noticing and remedying such obvious flaws along roadways that carry thousands of vehicles every day?

OWNING UP TO 911 PROBLEMS: Well, almost owning up might be more accurate. Readers of this column may recall MPD Communications Director Kevin Morison claiming on Aug. 15 that the District’s 911 emergency call system was "working the way it’s supposed to." That was in response to yours truly’s complaint that 911 emergency calls were being answered that afternoon by a recording that told callers they had reached the 311 non-emergency call center.

That was four days after Howard Baker began his short-lived service as the $140,000-a-year director of the District’s 911 communications center. Baker resigned in disgrace on Oct. 29, effective immediately, after subordinates alleged that he had made a racially derogatory remark nine days earlier.

Mayor Williams praised Baker’s "contribution to the improvement of our 911 systems" in a press release announcing the resignation. Under Baker’s tenure, according to the press release, "911 calls answered within 5 seconds went from 56% to 80%. The abandoned call rate dropped nearly 50%."

With that much room for improvement under Baker’s watch, D.C. taxpayers might well wonder what standard of 911 service MPD considered to be acceptable in mid-August as the "way it’s supposed to work."

Copyright 2003, The Common Denominator