I used to work for an organization with “connections” to then-Council Member Adrian Fenty, currently the newly elected mayor of the District of Columbia. This high-profile op-ed almost got me in trouble at the day job, and this direct response from Fenty (who didn’t know me from Adam) made them even more nervous.
My libertarian pal Casey Lartigue responded to Fenty’s letter here.
While at that day job, I was itching to write about local politics but couldn’t. Since leaving, the itch went away. Now it’s back. I’ve decided to blog more city government and what I don’t like about it.
For instance, after reading this Washington Post story, “D.C. Schools Considering Unusual Deal With Nonprofit,” I was shocked to learn that neither the Post nor any other major newspaper seemed concerned that EdBuild, a non-profit formed and operated by elected officials, is on the verge of landing a fat, no-bid government contract ostensibly to improve academic performance in schools and modernize facilities, for which is has very little experience, although more qualified companies were rejected. There is a $2.3 billion pot at stake. EdBuild’s founders served in Mayor Williams’s administration, and Fenty just hired one to serve in his. The connections are deep, yet no one is raising ethical or conflict of interest objections.
So I did a bit of investigating of my own and wrote “The EdBuild-D.C. government connection.”
If you have information on insider dealings and political connections between the D.C. government and EdBuild or other organizations, e-mail me in confidence: barbersview [at] yahoo [dot] com.
More to come…
