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MARYLAND
Science city in the real world
The May 9 Local Opinions letter from Allen W. Feldman [“Two cheers for science city”] criticizing those opposed to suburban growth requires rebuttal. It should be obvious that our horrendous and worsening traffic congestion is a consequence of growth, which is caused by an influx of people and their vehicles to this area. Mr. Feldman wrote that those who don’t want development should stop having children. The birth rate is irrelevant; a project such as the “science city” in Gaithersburg (praised in another letter by Richard Lampl) will mostly attract people from other places to the jobs it creates. Mr. Lampl and others insist that new transit systems will prevent traffic congestion in the area. Fine in theory, but when will they be built, if ever, and where’s the money? The intercounty connector is an apt example of what happens in the real world. After years of fierce debate, its construction only recently began long after the surrounding growth was in place and congested.
Anthony Mauger, Kensington
METRO
A way to save on senior discounts
Regarding the May 13 Metro article “Metro readies sweeping fare
hikes”: In 1992, I retired from government after 23 years, at age 70.
Having lost my parking place eight years earlier to an excess of political appointees, I had started riding Metro. I liked it. I always had a seat and read my morning Post with pleasure. Later, I refused the offer of another parking place. After I became eligible and began using the senior citizen farecard, I paid the very lowest fare for my ride to work and home. It often occurred to me that I was then making more but paying less to ride than almost all the others on the train. Since I assume the senior citizen fare is intended to ease the burden on retirees, it stands to reason that these low fares should only be effective during non-rush hours. This should be simple to program into the same system that deducts fare amounts when you leave the Metro. Such a change would be justifiable, and seniors should have no basis in equity to object. Has this been considered?
Irving Slott, Silver Spring
Local Blog Network
6voices.washingtonpost.com/local-opinions/
Some of the region’s best bloggers share work on the All Opinions Are Local blog. Below is one of this week’s posts.
Banner days for the bay
After decades of neglect and frustration, May 11 and 12 might go down in history as the days Chesapeake Bay finally started to get cleaned up. On May 11, a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection
Agency was settled by a host of groups interested in the bay, including the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, watermen’s groups from Maryland and Virginia, and legislators from both states. On May 12, the Obama administration announced its final version of federal initiatives to get off the dime and start cleaning up the Chesapeake. Taken together, the settlement and the Obama policies could
have far-reaching effects. They would take a snapshot of all the pollutants that flow into the estuary, limit and require set-asides for stormwater runoff from new housing subdivisions, and toughen pollution limits from large hog and poultry operations that can produce enormous levels of waste, Chuck Epes, spokesperson for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation-Virginia, told me. The sad part of the lawsuit is that it basically forces the EPA to do a job that it was given in 1972. The agency is supposed to enforce the Clean Water Act, but in 38 years, it hasn’t exactly done a bang-up job. Not only have populations of crabs, fish and oysters been regularly depleted, but oxygen-deprived “dead zones” show up in the summer months near the mouths of the Potomac, Rappahannock and York rivers. Fed up with EPA inaction, the plaintiffs filed their lawsuit in
2008. The administration of President George W. Bush was so out of touch on environmental issues so close to the capital that it essentially ignored the lawsuit. President Obama promised better, and the settlement is a result.
The good news: The lawsuit means there is a legal basis to go after the EPA if it doesn’t do what it is supposed to. The bad news: The settlement will mean millions in new expenses in lean times. And after nearly four decades of the bay being ignored, one wonders whether this latest deal will produce much. All earlier efforts involving Maryland, the District, Virginia and Pennsylvania have failed.
Peter Galuszka, Bacon’s Rebellion
Local Opinions, a place for commentary about where we live, is looking for submissions of 300 to 500 words on timely local topics. Submissions must include name, e-mail address, street address and phone number, and they will be edited for brevity and clarity. To submit your article, please go to
washingtonpost.com/localopinions.
NEXT WEEK’S TOPIC
Should the District impose a 1-cent-per-ounce soda tax?
MIKE TIDWELL TAKOMA PARK
Want to protect Virginia’s coast? Harvest wind, not oil
If Virginia Gov. Robert
McDonnell does it right, no one will need to fear his plan for big, offshore energy facilities along the state’s fragile coast- line. If he does it right, we’ll never see a single oil spill, guaranteed. Even a major hurricane blowing through the re- gion will result in zero pollution. That’s because, if he does it right, McDonnell will build only powerful, modern windmills off the coast. Instead of “drill, baby, drill” — with the now-vivid risk of black beaches from Vir- ginia Beach to Assa- teague to Bethany Beach, Del. — we’ll see graceful wind turbines creating 10,000 new jobs and enough power for 3.6 million elec- tric cars. Virginia’s coastline, it turns out, is a mini-Persian Gulf of wind power, ready to provide all the economic benefits of an “oil rush” without any of the pollution risks.
And McDonnell, to his credit,
supports offshore wind power. He’s taken positive steps — though small — to make it hap- pen. The bad news is he’s taken much bigger steps to support off- shore drilling for oil and natural gas. He wants to drill just 50 miles off the coast, opening up 3 million acres to such companies as Exxon and BP. He’s even pushing for an act of Congress to help make it happen. On wind power, unfortu- nately, he’s supported only minor incentives and opposes any con- gressional or statehouse action that would guarantee wind devel- opment. These tragically misplaced pri- orities — and missed opportuni-
SOEREN BIDSTRUP/AFP-GETTY IMAGES
Wind turbines off the coast of Denmark.
ties — were on full display on May 3 when McDonnell flew to Hous- ton for an inconveniently timed conference of offshore drilling companies. Even as satellite pho- tos showed that the Gulf of Mexi- co oil slick was as big as Puerto Ri- co, even as offshore fishing was banned from Louisiana to Florida and vacationers were abandoning the coast, McDonnell told the dril- ling crowd he couldn’t wait to get started in Virginia. Talk about shortsighted. If the gulf incident has taught us any- thing, it’s that when things go wrong on a drilling platform, the slope toward catastrophe is short. And sooner or later, something will go wrong. You can’t regulate an end to human error. Many argue that this is just the cost of doing business. The risk is worth it. But with one destroyed rig threatening beaches from Texas all the way to the Atlantic Coast, the jury is still out on how much “cost” the American people are willing to tolerate for this par- ticular business.
In Virginia, meanwhile, the evi- dence is crystal-clear: All gam- bling is absurd. At best, according to government and industry esti- mates, there is untapped oil off the Virginia coast equal to just six to 24 days’ worth of national de- mand. It will take many platforms to get to that oil, nonetheless, and any one of them could potentially replicate the gulf disaster, shut- ting down beach towns, devastat- ing watermen and affecting crit- ical naval operations around New- port News. Why would we risk all this for a
few weeks’ worth of oil? Why can’t McDonnell — at a minimum — ac- knowledge that serious delays are likely while we get all the facts in from the Gulf Coast? Cautious fed- eral officials have already post- poned key pre-drilling procedures in Virginia since the spill. And why drill at all when a per- manent, pollution-free energy source is ready instead? The same week the BP platform collapsed, the Interior Department ap- proved America’s first commercial
offshore wind farm in Massachusetts. And just last month, a Virginia panel declared that the commonwealth, using a small area and placing the windmills at a dis- tance barely visible from shore, could provide 10 percent of the state’s to- tal electricity. That’s enough for 750,000 households. To move forward, the wind industry needs real commitment from Mc- Donnell, creating the “market certainty” for rapid investments. Un- fortunately, while Mc- Donnell has worked tire- lessly on behalf of the oil
industry to secure federal com- mitments to offshore drilling and changes in federal oil-royalty laws, he has consistently opposed the policy the wind power indus- try says it needs most in Virginia: a clean electricity standard. Thir- ty-three U.S. states now require utilities to purchase at least a min- imal amount of clean energy for the grid. McDonnell opposes this. He thinks neither Virginia nor the federal government should have a mandatory renewable energy standard of any kind. Massachusetts and Delaware,
meanwhile, equipped with such policies, are moving forward with offshore wind farms set to begin construction in the next 12 to 24 months. One wonders if the long- suffering Gulf Coast will still be covered with oil 24 months from now. State governors, of course, make tough decisions all the time. But for McDonnell, this shouldn’t be one of them.
The writer is executive director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network.
R
C5
ALLAN G. ASSARSSON WASHINGTON
Dangerous charity: Private funds for public schools
Two weeks ago, D.C. Chief Finan-
cial Officer Natwar M. Gandhi testi- fied before the D.C. Council that, because of its conditional nature, supplemental funding from private foundations could not be relied upon to support the proposed $140 million contract negotiated be- tween the Washington Teachers’ Union and Schools Chancellor Mi- chelle A. Rhee. The D.C. Council in- sisted that Gandhi and Rhee work together to identify public dollars to back up a long-sought labor agreement that would also support school reform initiatives such as teacher bonuses for performance. Now, after a long and often conten- tious process, CFO Gandhi has stat- ed that the contract is fiscally sound. The Washington Teachers’
Union members who will soon vote on the contract, and indeed every-
one who lives in the city, would do well to pause and consider some of the worrying implications of this deal. I have two primary concerns:
The impact on elections: First,
the $64.5 million in foundation money in the D.C. public schools’ budget won’t just impact our schools; conditions placed by the foundations will inject themselves into this year’s electoral process, which could focus on education is- sues more than any other recent election. The four donors have re- served the right to withdraw the money if the leadership of the schools — read: Chancellor Rhee, Mayor Adrian M. Fenty’s contro- versial partner in reforming the D.C. system — were to leave. Do we want these outside foun-
dations to have a vote in our elec- tion? The qualified nature of their support creates the perception that
voting against Fenty could cost the city revenue that could help our city’s children. How many votes is this worth? This is a question you can be sure that both Fenty and his main challenger, Council Chair- man Vincent C. Gray, are asking.
The impact on school policy:
Second, by accepting such condi- tional money, we also are inviting the unacceptable dilemma of hav- ing to choose between the educa- tional approaches that we deter- mine are in the best interests of our children and the divergent priori- ties of private foundations. The Walton Family Foundation, one of the donors, has made major in- vestments in nonunionized charter schools and promoted privatiza- tion of public education; Rhee, too, has made clear that she is comfort- able with growing charter competi- tion in the city. It’s not hard to
imagine why this money would be conditioned on maintaining a D.C. public schools leadership that may be more than just sympathetic to the foundation’s cause. The Washington Teachers’
Union agreement is routinely de- scribed as “groundbreaking,” and Fenty and Rhee have unprecedent- ed powers to make changes in our schools. But the D.C. Council also has a role to play. The council can still step forward and set firm con- ditions for the acceptance of any private funds with the potential to create these serious conflicts of in- terest.
By exercising its responsible oversight and placing its own con- ditions on the acceptance and ap- plication of this private financial support, the council can protect the interests of both our schools and our democratic process.
ANDY PETTIS FAIRFAX
Mysteries of admissions at Virginia’s public colleges
During the season of college
graduations, I’d like to rewind this film to what took place more than four years ago to make all these happy ceremo- nies possible: the successful navigation of the college admis- sions process, particularly as it opens the doors to publicly sup- ported schools. Many Post readers may relate
to my family’s experience. Re- cently, my daughter, a senior at Robinson Secondary School in Fairfax County, was accepted by several Virginia public universi- ties. We found the run-up to col- lege admission frustrating, mys- terious, opaque and stressful. My daughter applied to six pub-
lic Virginia universities. She was rejected by two and accepted by four — and we don’t have a clue why. My wife and I went to college admissions briefings early in the process. When we reflected on them later, we realized that we came away with little real in- sight into why students are actu- ally admitted. We were told how to fill out forms, that students should “put their best selves for- ward in an essay,” that they should “get good grades.” But we were also told that admissions officers take a “holistic” ap- proach to each applicant — and what does that mean? In discussing this with guid-
ance counselors, other parents, tutors and teachers, we began to get a sense of what really counts. If what we learned is accurate, it is not openly conveyed to par- ents or students, and that’s trou-
out-of-state and international applicants factored in? What about Northern Vir- ginia vs. downstate? Do certain government offi- cials have influence?
These are taxpayer-supported institutions, and they should be transparent in their admissions policies.
bling. We were left to wonder, for instance, whether the follow- ing considerations play into the admissions process. And if so, is that appropriate? Do “legacy” applicants have an advantage? Are there gender quotas? Are the percentage of in-state,
Do the children of potential big donors have an advantage? Are there minority and ethnic quotas? Do novel or entertaining sub- missions make a difference? What’s the relevance of an ap- plicant’s socioeconomic back- ground or of any challenges he
or she has faced in life? This list could be longer, and admissions officers could pro- vide detailed answers for all of this, but they don’t. What hap- pens in the admissions office stays in the admissions office. All that is clear is that good grades and top test scores, which should be the determining fac- tors, play only a part in a suc- cessful admittance. My wife was told by a state of-
ficial that some relevant infor- mation can be shared if the stu- dent is accepted, but not if the student is not admitted. That is unfair. In fact, the whole process may be unfair, and it most cer- tainly presents a terrible exam-
ple to applying students of how government works. These are taxpayer-supported institutions, and they should be transparent in their admissions policies. If they are not — and they are not — these policies should at least be examined by some outside state authority. In today’s competitive world,
getting a higher education is a serious matter, with substantial repercussions for both the stu- dent and the nation. The selection process is far too
important to the nation to be left solely in the hands of a few col- lege administrators who are re- luctant to explain their selec- tions standards or model.
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