ABCDE METRO friday, august 13, 2010
POSTLOCAL.com 77, 9 a.m. 81, noon 83, 5 p.m. 77, 9 p.m.
Obituaries Vietnam veteran David C. Dolby, 64, received the Medal of Honor for saving his Army platoon, but his post-military life was marked by arrests and controversy. B7
Officer in Pr. George’s shoots and
wounds 3 Men drove van toward partner at end of
chase, authorities say by Matt Zapotosky
A Prince George’s County police officer shot and wounded three men — one of them critically — in the parking lot be- hind the county courthouse Wednesday night after the men drove a van toward the officer’s partner at the end of a pur- suit, authorities said. The incident started about 11 p.m., when an officer spotted a group of men loitering and acting suspiciously at the Exxon station at Route 202 and Campus Way South in the Largo area, said Capt. Misty Mints, a police spokeswoman. The officer was on a special patrol to deter armed robberies, which have been a problem in the area, she said. As the officer approached the group, three of the men got into a burgundy van and drove on Route 202 toward Upper Marlboro, Mints said. The officer began to follow it as others in the group fled on foot, she said. “His interest was piqued by their activ-
ity,” Mints said. “Then they all take off like that, which is pretty strange.” Mints said that the officer tried an “in-
vestigative stop” of the van but that the men did not pull over. Soon he was chas- ing the van on Route 202, she said. At some point when he was behind the van, he checked its plates and determined it was stolen, she said. The chase wound its way to a parking lot across the street from the entrance to the court commissioner’s office, Mints said. It was a dead end full of security cameras. The van tried to turn around in the parking lot, Mints said, and came face to face with another police cruiser. Thinking the men in the van were go- ing to flee on foot, the two officers in that
shooting continued on B10
Got weekend plans? From festivals to ballgames, hot shopping spots to hotter nightspots, the Going Out Guide will help you fill in your calendar with this weekend’s best bets.
MARYLAND
Missed opportunity A man accused of shooting his girlfriend in the head was charged two weeks earlier with threatening her with a gun, but deputies never tried to arrest him on that warrant. B4
VIRGINIA
Schools miss new targets Across the state, average test scores rose slightly or remained at their levels from last year, but the vast majority of schools failed to meet new performance benchmarks for graduation rates and for students with disabilites. B4
Shrinking reserves at issue in D.C.
In some quarters, alarm grows over Fenty strategy for balancing the budget
by Nikita Stewart When Mayor Adrian M. Fenty took of-
fice in 2007, he inherited a savings ac- count that mayors in other major U.S. cities would envy: a $1.5 billion rainy- day fund. The fund — known to budget profes- sionals as the city’s fund balance — was flush with cash because of an economic boom that had piled up surpluses since 2002, with much of that money coming from more than 200 special-purpose ac- counts established for specific pro- grams.
But in the past two years, this fiscal
cushion has grown much thinner in the face of declining city revenue, Fenty’s no-new-taxes pledge and overspending on some programs. Since 2008, the may- or has withdrawn nearly $840 million to subsidize general government operating expenses, causing the fund balance to drop to a projected $654 million in fiscal 2011, according to the Office of the Chief Financial Officer. In the process, the mayor has tapped those special-purpose accounts — sec- ond only to taxes as a source of city rev- enue — and diverted money from their specific programs and agencies to the general government. It is difficult to trace diverted money to a particular part of the general fund, but beneficia- ries include the summer youth jobs pro- gram, special-education transportation and private tuition subsidies, according to District records. Redirected funds in the fiscal 2011
budget include $24 million from work- ers’ compensation insurance, $5million from child support collections, $3 mil- lion in natural gas and electric utility
reserves continued on B10 PETULA DVORAK
Really, Steven Slater? You think you’ve got it bad?
guess the parent equivalent would be screaming into the Playskool microphone, filling the blow-up pool with pinot grigio, hopping in and letting the kids fend for themselves on Cheez Doodles and limitless SpongeBob. Ah, to vent one’s frustrations with the flamboyance of JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater would be great fun. Then again, a parent who did that would probably be thrown in jail. As should Cowboy Steve, whose entire story is increasingly suspect but who already has Web sites, theme music and a spectacular, out-on-bail grin for the cameras after his epic runway tantrum. So many of us want to deploy that chute, too, Steve, but often it’s to escape from someone like you. Already, Slater’s folk-hero status is taking a hit from a report by ABC News that he might have been drinking before he got on that flight from Pittsburgh to New York. Two women who were on the flight told the Wall Street Journal that Slater was an obnoxious jerk from the get-go, ignoring requests for help and snapping at a passenger. Sound familiar? The vibe between flight attendants
I dvorak continued on B4
Fed-up JetBlue flight attendant says he wants to get back to work. A15
XIAOMEI CHEN/THE WASHINGTON POST On Longfellow Road NW, Victorine Nguekam looks up at the fallen tree that smashed into the roof.
Back-to-back blows smack region around
Streets flood and trees fall as powerful storms inundate parts of the area on
washingtonpost.com
by Michael E. Ruane
A second wave of violent weather roared across the Washington region late Thursday, dumping rain and hail and whipping up dangerous winds only 12 hours after a similar line of storms brought havoc to the area in the morn- ing.
Violent downpours from gusty thun- derstorms drenched areas already soaked from the morning’s deluge, and the National Weather Service issued a se- ries of tornado and flash-flood warnings from northern Maryland to as far south as Richmond. But after leaving inundated streets, downed trees and tens of thousands of power outages over a huge swath of the region, the severe weather weakened and the threat of tornadoes dissipated, though waterspouts were reported on the Honga River on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. The region might see more showers Friday, but forecasters said that any pre-
Here, there, everywhere: Evidence aplenty of storms
See the damage recorded by area readers and Post journalists; offer
your own report; check out travel updates and forecasts.
postlocal.com
Man abandons minivan before vehicle is swept away by flash flood in D.C. B5
cipitation would fall far short of Thurs- day’s levels, when a minivan was swept into Rock Creek in the District and car- ried a quarter-mile downstream. The driver escaped unhurt. It was the third day of violent, de-
structive weather locally in three weeks. And it came on top of a July earthquake and a summer of excruciating heat. Repent, someone tweeted, partly in
jest.
Thursday’s storms struck a week after a similar system smashed across Alexan- dria and Prince George’s County on Aug. 5. Another, even stronger, system pound- ed Montgomery County and the District on July 25. The damage and power outages from this summer’s storms seem unprecedent- ed, and forecasters have noted that it has been a particularly hot summer. There have been 51 days of 90-degree or higher temperatures, according to the Capital Weather Gang, and 20 days of 95-degree readings or higher. There have also been four 100-degree
days. “This has been a very extreme sum-
mer,” said Dan Stillman of the Capital Weather Gang, noting that there were no 100-degree days last summer and only 21 days when the temperature reached 90. But Stillman said the heat extremes might not be entirely to blame for the se- vere weather. “You could easily get the kind of
storms continued on B5
Hundreds of trees cut at Trump’s new golf club
by Kafia A. Hosh
John Mathwin of Rockville was met with surprise on what should have been a typical day fishing with his grand- children. He launched his canoe one day last month and paddled upstream. But when he looked across the river to the Virginia side, Mathwin was shocked: An acre of trees had disappeared from the shoreline. “Where there was once trees, now
there’s virtually nothing,” he said. “I couldn’t believe it.” The trees were along the edge of
Trump National Golf Club, Washington D.C., an 800-acre facility that real estate mogul Donald Trump purchased in Lou- doun County last year. Two weeks ago, Mathwin and a friend canoed up the river and counted about 465 tree stumps. Mathwin, who has fished along the Potomac for more than 30 years, said he is concerned that flood- water “will eat away at the unprotected banks,” sending dirt and chemicals into the river. But officials with the Trump Organi-
zation said the trees threatened the shoreline. Many of the trees, which in- cluded American elms, green ashes and black locusts, were under stress and eroding the soil, the officials said. “When you have weak trees, they’re
subject to disease, and it spreads,” said Ed Russo, an environmental expert with
trees continued on B6 B DC MD VA S
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128