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

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Vol. XXV, No. 17

The Georgetown Current

Noisy dispute on leaf blowers reaches council

Georgetown BID urges end to restaurant cap

a wonder f u l li f e

■ Liquor licenses: ANC to

By BRADY HOLT

vote on proposal next week

Current Staff Writer

As autumn ramps up the use of leaf blowers on D.C. yards, the Palisades/Wesley Heights/Spring Valley advisory neighborhood commission is also making some noise — asking for a ban on versions of the machines with two-stroke gasoline engines. At their Nov. 4 meeting, commissioners said these leaf blowers are not only too loud but also emit disproportionate amounts of pollution and send unhealthy dust and small debris flying into the air. By an 8-1 vote, they asked Ward 3 D.C. Council member Mary Cheh to introduce legislation prohibiting them. “We all get complaints from time to time about leaf blowers and we just throw up our hands — ‘What can we do?’” said commission chair Tom Smith. But this month, commissioners were armed with research by a group of Wesley Heights residents, who attended the meeting with leaves pinned to their chests as they discussed their review of health effects and alternatives to two-stroke engines. In pressing Cheh, the commission and community members are presenting these leaf blowers not as a trivial annoyance to well-heeled silence-seekers, but as a hazard to both the environment and the lowpaid landscaping crews that handle them. “Whenever I discuss this issue, the phrase ‘first-world problems’ comes up: ‘Those people in Wesley Heights are just sissies,’” said Dexter Street resident James Fallows. “Actually, the first-world attitude is, ‘We don’t care about these leaf blower people.’ … I think it actually is part of a correct consciousness of the social contract to think about the people who are doing this work.” The risks crews face include hearing loss and inhalation of exhaust fumes and debris kicked up by the leaf blowers, the residents said. Switching to electric, battery or more advanced four-stroke gas See Leaf Blowers/Page 12

NEWS

By MARK LIEBERMAN Current Staff Writer

Brian Kapur/The Current

The Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School Masqueraders performed “It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play,” Joe Landry’s version of the classic holiday film structured as a 1940s radio broadcast, at the Nolan Center over the weekend.

— Page 3

Brian Kapur/The Current

Community leaders hope an end to the cap on restaurants will help draw desirable new eateries to the historic neighborhood.

1989. In addition to restricting restaurant licenses, the current restrictions, expiring on Feb. 3, prohibit any new tavern and nightclub licenses. “The conditions for which the moratorium was created no longer exist in Georgetown,” BID president and CEO Joe Sternlieb said in an interview Tuesday. “At the same time, there are folks in the residential community who don’t want to give up all their influence and control over who comes in and how.” The BID’s proposal, drafted after collaboration with the neighborhood commission and Citizens AssociaSee Licenses/Page 14

Georgetown’s Tudor Place plans for bicentennial celebrations By MARK LIEBERMAN Current Staff Writer

When Tudor Place in Georgetown was built, electricity was nearly a century away. Slavery was legal. James Madison was president. The United States was just hitting middle age, by human standards. Nationally and locally, much of what was left from that time period has long since crumbled, yet Tudor Place remains not only standing, but thriving. As the historic estate museum approaches its yearlong bicentennial celebration — kicking off in January — officials have plans for a series of events to honor the history of one of the city’s most history-infused buildings. At a press preview party Nov. 20, Tudor Place executive director Mark Hudson pointed out that the house is significant in large part due to the people who have walked its halls.

SPOR TS

Activists fight to improve downtown restroom access

The Georgetown Business Improvement District has voted in favor of abandoning the neighborhood’s moratorium on liquor licenses for restaurants, and the advisory neighborhood commission plans to vote on the proposal on Monday. The BID’s proposal advocates for removing the existing cap that limits Georgetown to 67 restaurant licenses, while adding new protections on restaurant behavior. The proposal asks the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board to review its settlement agreement template for legal efficiency, in order to ensure that new restaurants comply with community members’ preferences for noise control, trash maintenance and hours of operation. The recommendation also calls for a mandatory BID meeting every six months to ensure that the community remains satisfied with business operations in the neighborhood. Georgetown’s liquor license moratorium was first established in

Junior quarterback leads Tigers’ return to the Turkey Bowl — Page 11

Photo courtesy of Tudor Place Historic House & Garden

The historic Georgetown home was built in 1816. Generations of the Peter family lived there until it became a museum in the 1980s.

“Tudor Place reminds us that American history is not fixed in time,” he said. “It’s evolving, it’s fluid and it’s dynamic. It reminds us also that American history was different for the people who

HOLIDAYS

Tree lighting events in D.C. mark arrival of holiday season — Page 15

dined on fine china than with those who served them. But it’s the stories of these people that give life to Tudor Place.” The bicentennial celebration will include events like an open house on Presidents Day; a re-enactment of George Washington pitching Revolutionary War tents on the South Lawn; a special edition of the museum’s annual garden party; an invitation-only reunion of the family that built the house; a birthday party for the building shortly before Independence Day; and a September book launch in partnership with the White House Historical Association. Though he’s leading the charge on the bicentennial, Hudson is new on the job, having just moved to Tudor Place from a historical society in Vermont eight weeks ago. Though he hadn’t known about the place before learning of the job opening, he said he’s quickly felt at home among See Tudor Place/Page 14

INDEX Calendar/16 Classifieds/22 District Digest/2 Exhibits/17 In Your Neighborhood/4 Opinion/8

Police Report/6 Real Estate/13 School Dispatches/10 Service Directory/20 Sports/11 Week Ahead/3

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