GTC -- 03/02/2011

Page 1

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Serving Burleith, Foxhall, Georgetown, Georgetown Reservoir & Glover Park

Vol. XX, No. 32

THE GEORGETOWN CURRENT ANC objects to GU plans for campus

Evans bill would bring back Hardy principal

O N S TA G E

■ Schools: Initial discussion

By CAROL BUCKLEY

focuses on role of city council

Current Staff Writer

In a speedy resolution to a yearslong process, the Georgetown advisory neighborhood commission voted Monday to oppose Georgetown University’s campus plan when the Zoning Commission weighs the document later this year. The 6-1 vote, with university student commissioner Jake Sticka the lone voice in opposition, came as a surprise to no one who had even casually followed the plan’s evolution. Hours of meetings and university capitulation on a few items failed to bridge the divide over the key point of disagreement: undergraduate housing. University officials have long said they have no need to build additional undergraduate dormitories, and neighbors have long replied that the impacts of so many students in off-campus housing have pushed the community to the breaking point. In a detailed, 16-page resolution, neighborhood commissioners outlined the reasons behind their opposition, including findings that the university has exploded in growth in many categories other than tradiSee Campus/Page 13

By JESSICA GOULD Current Staff Writer

Ward 2 D.C. Council member Jack Evans introduced legislation yesterday to reinstate Patrick Pope as principal of Hardy Middle School in Georgetown. “The decision to remove Mr. Pope has not rested well with many members of the school community,” Evans said. “At the end of the day, this issue needs to get settled.”

Groups urge city to tax sales from food trucks ■ Business: Critics contend

vendors’ exemption is unfair Bill Petros/The Current

By CAROL BUCKLEY

Arena Stage and Georgetown University partnered to present Tennessee Williams’ “The Glass Menagerie” on Saturday and Sunday at the Davis Performing Arts Center's Gonda Theatre. The show will continue through March 26.

Current Staff Writer

City starts long-stalled O, P streets rehab and preservationists — local and Current Staff Writer federal — debated what to do. But D.C. Department of Transportation is now promising to Even in a city notorious for finish rehabilitating both streets and stalled projects, repairing cobbleportions of their historic tracks withstoned O and P streets in in 18 months, while laying a stable Georgetown and their historic but foundation beneath so cars no unused streetcar tracks is taking an longer slide, swerve and bump as unusually long time. The roadwork, Matt Petros/The Current they navigate the narrow blocks first envisioned in 1982, finally between Wisconsin Avenue and kicked off last week, with a bevy of City and neighborhood leaders 37th Street. D.C. officials wielding gold-painted broke ground last week. There will also be new streetshovels. It’s been nearly three decades since residents realized lights, sidewalks and curbs — all safer but still historithe aging tracks, and sagging pavers around them, were cally correct — at a total cost of about $10 million, 80 a major hazard to modern cars. The tracks have rusted, percent of that courtesy of the federal government. See Streets/Page 20 and sinkholes deepened while transportation officials By ELIZABETH WIENER

NEWS ■ Earth, Wind & Fire raises $500,000 for Ellington School. Page 3. ■ Parents push Zoo to reverse decision to close Kids’ Farm. Page 2.

Former Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee removed Pope from his longtime post last year so that he could plan and lead a new artsfocused magnet middle school. She appointed Hyde Elementary School principal Dana Nerenberg to take the helm of both schools as part of a “cluster” model. But many parents decried the decision and lobbied vigorously for Pope’s return, citing increased discipline problems and scheduling chaos after he left the school. In January, Interim Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson disSee Hardy/Page 7

SPORTS ■ Shorthanded Gonzaga loses to DeMatha in WCAC finals. Page 11. ■ St. John’s, Sidwell and Roosevelt capture titles. Page 11.

Though this week brought the welcome news that next year’s budget gap is less dire than predicted, the remaining hole still leaves city officials scrambling to trim expenses and plug every fiscal leak. A few business and restaurant leaders are happy to help with a suggestion: Start charging sales tax on the lobster rolls, cupcakes and more offered by the trendy food trucks that have sprung up in recent years. Now, mobile vendors pay a $1,500 yearly sum in lieu of taxes. While that figure may have been reasonable for ice cream trucks, hot dog stands and the like when the payment was established in the 1990s, some say the city is leaving serious money on the table by not charging D.C.’s 10 percent prepared-food tax on the pricier fare now for sale. Ward 7 Council member Yvette Alexander, who oversees the city

EVENTS ■ Studio Gallery shows explore memories, gray scale. Page 25. ■ Howard University students stage ‘All Night Strut.’ Page 25 .

Bill Petros/The Current

All vendors now pay a $1,500 annual fee to the District. agency that regulates vending, said that once the city budget is put to bed she will consider a hearing this spring on the sales-tax matter and other issues that surround the popular new vendors. “I think they’re great,” Alexander said. “But they’re making a sizable amount of income. … We want things to be fair” between the trucks and existing, brick-andmortar restaurants. “I don’t know that [charging See Vendors/Page 18

INDEX Calendar/25 Classifieds/30 District Digest/4 Exhibits/25 In Your Neighborhood/10 Opinion/8

Police Report/6 School Dispatches/14 Real Estate/17 Service Directory/26 Sports/11 Theater/25


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