Wednesday, February 16, 2011 Serving Chevy Chase, Colonial Village, Shepherd Park, Brightwood, Crestwood, Petworth & 16th Street Heights
Vol. XLIV, No. 7
THE NORTHWEST CURRENT Pepco, PSC take heat for outages
Cheh flags school growth, boundaries
SWISH
■ Enrollment: Crowding at
By BRADY HOLT
Janney, Mann and Key at issue
Current Staff Writer
After a storm leaves large sections of the District without electricity, it is routine for Pepco to come before the D.C. Public Service Commission to explain how it will prevent the problem from recurring. It is also routine, Ward 3 D.C. Council member Mary Cheh said, for the utility to make the same promises while failing to improve the reliability of its system. “The recommendations that they’re offering and the promises that they made, they’re the same, and the problems recur,” Cheh said at a Friday evening roundtable held by the council’s Committee on Public Services and Consumer Affairs. The hearing was called to discuss Pepco’s performance during the Jan. 26 “thundersnow,” which left about 32,000 District customers without power, some for more than three days. During the roughly six-hour hearing, Cheh called on the Public Service Commission to set tough standards for Pepco’s service reliability and to fine the company for poor performance — and sharply criticized the commission for not See Pepco/Page 23
By JESSICA GOULD Current Staff Writer
Ward 3 D.C. Council member Mary Cheh worries that with growing enrollment and limited space, some Northwest schools could soon become victims of their own success. “Going forward, we’re going to have to figure this out,” she said in an interview last week. So on Feb. 8, Cheh sent a letter to
Residents seek changes to AU law school plans ■ Development: Neighbors,
Cheh urge additional parking Matt Petros/The Current
Julius Ellerbe Jr. won MVP honors during a two-day wheelchair basketball tourney last weekend at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. The National Rehabilitation Hospital Ambassadors defeated the Magee Sixers Spokesmen in the final, 60-49.
2013, would have about 360 underCurrent Staff Report ground parking spots. The architecCommunity members battled ture would include arches, glass, over the proposed Walmart store in exposed steel and wide sidewalks, Ward 4 after a presentation by the and a vestibule with historic images developer and the retail company at of the area. the 16th Street Heights/Petworth “It won’t be like anything you’ve advisory neighborhood commisseen before,” said Morris. sion meeting last week. Trucks would service the store Foulger-Pratt’s Gary Vance and from a screened area off Missouri Walmart’s Keith Morris said the Bill Petros/Current File Photo Avenue, with customer vehicular new store would cover about access from Peabody Street. A large 100,000 square feet — about half Walmart plans to open a 100,000holding area for cars coming in and the size of the suburban versions. square-foot store in Ward 4. out would eliminate lines on surOf that amount, groceries would rounding streets, Vance said, and the developers have take up about 40,000 square feet. The store, which is expected to open at the corner of agreed to pay for updates to nearby intersections. See Walmart/Page 36 Missouri and Georgia avenues in late 2012 or early
■ Council funds Janney parking garage, Takoma rebuilding. Page 3. ■ Four projects aim for Connecticut Avenue improvements. Page 5.
SPORTS ■ Gonzaga beats DeMatha to move into first place. Page 13. ■ Coolidge downs Roosevelt to snap Riders’ streak. Page 13.
By CAROL BUCKLEY Current Staff Writer
Walmart plans draw opposing reactions
NEWS
interim Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson outlining her concerns. Specifically, she said, the number of students at Janney, Mann and Key elementary schools is beginning to overwhelm the space — and enrollment appears to be rising. Take Janney. According to D.C. Public Schools records, the school was already serving 489 students in 2008. Now, Janney serves 500, with nearly all of them coming from inboundary homes. And while Janney will have a capacity of 550 students once its $25 million modernization is complete, Cheh said it will not be See Schools/Page 12
While their neighbors south of Ward Circle press American University to alter plans to build dormitories on the site of a parking lot, residents around the school’s Tenley campus are girding for a different battle altogether. The university is proposing to relocate its law school from a commercially zoned building on Massachusetts Avenue to the peaceful expanse off Tenley Circle now home to the school’s Washington Semester program and a handful of administrative uses. The move, say university officials, is necessary so the law school can grow to 2,000 students from the current level of 1,770 — a number that has left the current building overcrowded, they say. The relocated law school would spread over about 300,000 square feet and four stories. Underground parking with 400 to 500 spaces
PA S S A G E S ■ NHL All-Star helps out elementary school’s garden project. Page 15. ■ Local film festival spotlights ‘Our City.’ Page 15 .
Bill Petros/The Current
School officials say moving the law school will allow growth. would serve the faculty and students who drive to the campus, which is much closer to a Metrorail stop than the current law school. But residents at a recent Tenleytown advisory neighborhood commission meeting challenged university representatives Jorge Abud and David Taylor to maximize underground parking to keep more students — about half of whom drive to the law school now — off the residential streets. Planners “will try to get as close to 500 [spaces] as possible,” Abud See Tenley/Page 23
INDEX Business/9 Calendar/27 Classifieds/37 District Digest/4 Exhibits/29 In Your Neighborhood/22 Opinion/10
Passages/15 Police Report/6 School Dispatches/16 Real Estate/21 Service Directory/33 Sports/13 Theater/29