I testified at 12:30 a.m. I think Committee Chair Jack Evans' plan for this hearing worked almost as well as he was hoping. He could have spaced it out over a couple days, and given people a block of hours to know when to show up. But he wanted to get it over with in a day (consistent with the fast-tracking of this deal), hoping that people toward the end of the witness list would drop off. It worked, but probably not as well as he wished. For instance, All of the students who were on the list, probably about 20-25, couldn't stick around. They were already missing school and wouln't have been able to testify until midnight. Mothers, fathers, workers? The same can be said. Democracy in Action! Although the tone was very negative, all of the big business people that are in favor were toward the top of the list, and many were from Virginia or Maryland. And D.C. residents (even those in the footprint of the proposed stadium) were listed toward the bottom. In fact, the fellow who stands to lose the most land and his businesses in the footprint, was on right before me pleading for his livelihood and for Evans not to push this deal through. The opposition was large and diverse. Most brought up the fact that the vast independent economic evidence was on our side (which prompted Evans to keep picking up these two huge binders that were sitting next to him that he said contained solid evidence to the contrary). Every time someone brought up San Francisco and St. Louis (including me, through Neil's testimony) Evans would stick on this silly point that those teams, and any other MLB team, weren't allowed to leave their cities so it doesn't apply to D.C. Councilmember David Catania dominated the questioning of Government and business witnesses, and it was a heroic effort. He also gets the award for being the member who took the fewest breaks and was present the most. Councilmember Jim Graham exposed Williams' $400 million TIF proposal as hogwash. The TIF was supposed to be gravy to drown community concerns. The largest District TIF to date was for $75 million. In the area of the proposed stadium, there are just too many boundaries, natural and otherwise, for a TIF to work. And at $400 million, it would have to end up being a TIF district that extended far far away from the stadium, and require the removal of many homes. I'd like to thank Neil for taking the time to write testimony for this. Common Courage press was also kind enough to donate copies of Field of Schemes, so I could present the book to each of the Councilmembers as Neil's full written testimony. Jack Evans is sure to hold a good old fashioned book burning in the Council chambers today. Shawn McCarthy
Posted by: Shawn McCarthy at October 29, 2004 12:51 PM

If I was a resident of DC it would be a bit depressing that a lame duck city council can stick the people of DC with a half a billion dollar boondoggle, or over $900 in debt for every man, woman and child in DC. This would be especially galling considering the pro-stadium council members were voted out of office in the primary.
Posted by: Michael Kim at October 29, 2004 06:42 PM

(NOTE: The original version of this item implied that Sharon Ambrose was a lame-duck councilmember; it's actually Kevin Chavous, the third no-show, who was voted out in September along with Allen.)
Posted by: Neil at October 29, 2004 09:57 PM

230 attendees hardly seems like a groundswell of opposition. If the public were really as incensed about this deal as suggested by our esteemed webmaster, I would think we would have seen quite a few more.
Posted by: Thomas Croke at October 30, 2004 12:06 PM

230 was the number of people who'd signed up to testify. I haven't seen a number for total attendees, though I did see one news report that said everyone couldn't fit into the hearing room at first. Shawn, did you get a headcount?
Posted by: Neil deMause at October 30, 2004 08:21 PM

I got to testify at the October 28 hearing, but only because I was patient. I arrived around 2:30 PM to find some sort of demonstration or news conference with people waving "End the Gridlock" signs by the Board of Trade. However, what was going on was inaudible, and I doubted that the gridlock referred to vehicular traffic, given the probable effects the stadium would have on creating a traffic clot. I went inside the Wilson Building and heard some anti-stadium demonstrators complain about being sent to some room away from the hearing. I decided to follow the professionally dressed people to Room 500 (I was wearing a business jacket with now protest stickers or signs, other then an "Alexandria Orb" button- see "Projects" at www.HighwaysandcOmmunities.com) where it was being held and followed the other people when we heard an order to go into a door to the right, and view the City Council. I had to wait until 9:52PM to speak, and I was only speaker #71 on a list with 200+. I was dismayed to see a pair of television cameras fold up and leave at about 9PM, but was able to find a fellow attendee to use my camcorder to recrod my testimony and the response from the City Council. Despite my bringing up numerous points about how the stadium would complicate the tunnel, the bridge and stop the greenway, only one councilperson responded (Carol Schwartz) who thanked me for reminding her about the stadium being directly atop the proposed tunnel route, and thus presenting another significent potential cost overrun. At that time, Councilpersons Brazil and Cantania werer there but said essentially nothing. Alas, Evans was not present when I gave my testimony. My testimony was televised, according to a post in reply to my posting of my testimony on the newsgroup dc.urban-planning (searchable on www.Google.com) Douglas A. Willinger Takoma Park highway Design Studio http://www.HighwaysAndCommunities.com PS- an interesting site: http://www.jdland.com/dc/index.html
Posted by: Douglas Willinger at November 4, 2004 07:27 PM