I’m in Washington for a few days at an I.T. Conference but I’m making some time here and there to get out into the City and see some things. Not the touristy things but your more everyday things.

A couple of observations:

1. D.C. is lousy with bikes. I’m not sure if it’s just because I’m more aware of it but there are bikes everywhere. There are bike lanes, bike racks and bikes locked to just about everything that is nailed down. You see, as you might expect, lots of young folks riding and some actual hipsters as well as reasonably well dressed people on a bike. Some with helmets and some without. Saw one guy drinking a Starbucks on his bike going to Connecticut avenue – busses whizzing around him and he was just cruising along. It drives me to distraction – I’m always looking to see what everyone is riding. Certianly cyclists are killed and injured in DC but drivers seem to be pretty comfortable with them overall. Saw a women in heels and a skirt on a bike.

2. The Capital Bikeshare program must be going gangbusters. Those bikes are everywhere and look to be very well designed to me – built in flashing red lights on the back!!

3. I’m not from the city so maybe I don’t understand the rules but a primary rule seems to be that you simply ignore everyone else. A majority of people go everywhere with earbuds jammed in their heads. So many so that I wondered if they are not standard-issue (although I didn’t get mine when i crossed the river). I can’t imagine being around that many people and not being able to hear what’s going on around me. Hell, I don’t like running with the things in and can’t tolerate cycling with them. What are all of those people listening to?

4. The other wierd thing that you don’t see much in our area is bluetooth headsets for cell phones. Honestly, it’s so normal here that people are completely comfortable with it. I was walking down the sidewalk yesterday behind a guy I was certain was unhinged – he was gesticulating and generally having a very spirited debate with himself when I noticed the little dongle in his ear. If you did that in Manassas it might generate several calls to the non-emergency hotline for the PD.

5. The City looks better at night than it does during the day.

6. Traffic signs and lights are more like “suggestions” than actual rules or laws that you’re supposed to obey. If it fights into your plan, you can roll with it but if not, lay on your horn and hope for the best….

All in all I really like the City but I can’t abide being around this many people. I’m also becoming convinced that the people that are here can’t abide it either because each seems to be ensconced in their own cacoon of auditory isolation. In a hurry to get from wherever they came from to where they want to be. Ignoring everything in between….

Awhile back (April), I had asked for a presentation to the Finance committee on the particulars of the School Budget and the revenue sharing agreement. That presentation was made last Wednesday night (agenda is here). There were also several School Board members present. Here are the facts, short and sweet:

If we had no revenue sharing agreement, the Council could allocate whatever revenue they allocated to the schools by broad category. There are 8 categories (instruction, transporation, etc). The law doesn’t give the Council the authority to allocate on any sort of line-item basis. That’s in the state law, not city code. You can find the details in the Agenda.

Under the revenue sharing agreement, it doesn’t appear that the Council has the authority to allocate on any basis except a lump-sum payment.

The opinions of the longest serving members on both bodies are very interesting. Mr. Bushnell (former chair of the school board) observed that “when the agreement was struck, it was his opinion that the Council wanted to divorce itself from the details of the schools”. I think that’s about right but now that we’re having mixed rsults that’s changed. Mr. Randolph well remembers the food-fights before the agreement was struck.

I believe that the performance of the schools are the City’s biggest challenge. To that end, I, and the rest of the Council have asked the City Manager to schedule a meeting with the School Board to cover the performance of the system and some recent studies that have been printed – the ROI study and the Challenge index in particular but the State report card is also of interest. This meeting will be important and people should attend. I’ll post back when the meeting is scheduled.

Another moving piece here is the Education Forward committee (a piece of the original Manassas Next). The committee is scheduled to meet August 11th at 7:00, second floor conference room. The schools proposal, as I understand it, is to add 4 reading specialists to the schools. I’ll wait until I see all of it but it sounds a little less ambitious than I had hoped for…..

My Side of the Fence

The danger isn't going too far. It's that we don't go far enough.

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