‘final days’
courtesy of ‘zenobia_joy’

The District is on the verge of announcing a two-month amnesty for most taxes, including sales and income taxes, according to the Business Journal’s Michael Neibauer.  That means you can pay your back taxes without penalty, but still including the interest owed.  Currently outstanding to the District’s CFO are $200M in unpaid taxes.  Getting the chance to pay them without penalty might get a few of the scofflaws to pony up with the dough necessary to help offset the massive $550M budget deficit that the District is currently facing.

Do tax amnesty programs help?  Well, when Pennsylvania did the same thing last month, they collected $261M in back taxes that they were owed, approximately $70M more than they expected.  New Jersey collected $725M in their tax amnesty last year. While tax cheats in the District owe significantly less than New Jersey or PA, it’d be a surprise to not see the city pickup a good $50-75M on this amnesty, and hopefully more.

‘DSCN0179 – Privacy in Digital Public Spaces’
courtesy of ‘Planetrussell’

This morning’s piece by Michael Neibauer in the Business Journal pores over the report to the Council on OCTO, the Office of the Chief Technology Officer for the District.  OCTO is a wide-reaching organization that handle’s the city’s IT infrastructure in both the schools and in the DC Government.  The report suggests that a high reliance (50-70% of the department!) on contracting organizations to do the work has lead to fraud and abuse being built into the culture, including awarding of contracts to local businesses that are underprepared to do the work. According to Neibauer, OCTO agrees with much of the findings and has said that most of the recommended remedies are already in place or soon to be in place.

The report also contains allegations that the local businesses that are not certified to sell certain solutions to the District are using gray market solutions for District offices, meaning that they’re selling solutions they cannot necessarily support. Working in the technology field, I’m not sure that I buy the hullaballoo over the grey market solutions. Some vendors make it extraordinarily difficult to join their partner programs, or require such high premiums on the businesses that unless you’re going to sell a large number of the very expensive devices, it doesn’t make sense to join. So yes, this happens all the time in the technology field, but it doesn’t mean that the vendors are incompetent, merely that they don’t want to pay for either a certification or for a partner program that will cost them money instead of making them money.

Full Disclosure: my business has one client that interacts with OCTO for technology support, but I do not speak for my business or my clients in this case.

‘GREASE’
courtesy of ‘kschlot1’

According to DDOT, a grease spill has closed U Street NW from 9th to 16th, and 14th Street NW from T to V, as the road is currently unsafe. The grease makes the whole roadbed slippery like you would not believe. The grease may have come from a trash hauler, according to DDOT’s twitter account. The city is putting out sand for the moment, but will also have to clean the street before it can be reopened. Avoid the area by car.

‘Eastern Market Manhole’
courtesy of ‘Kevin H.’

Two big electrical outages in DC plague the Capitol Hill neighborhood this morning.  An electrical fire in underground conduit at 12th and H Street NE, and a generator fire at 7th & Penn Ave SE, have put two commercial strips in Capitol Hill in a bit of trouble this morning.  

DC Fire & EMS responded with a Foam/Hazmat truck to 12th & H last night around 11pm as the underground electric conduits had caught fire.  While they were able to, with Pepco’s help, put out the fire there quickly, the damage was done, and much of that area is without power. If you’ve got plans for Granville Moore’s, Sticky Rice or The Black and The Red later, you may want to call in ahead and make sure they’ve gotten power back.

In addition, a generator at 650 Penn Ave SE overheated, and that means that corner of businesses, from Peregrine Espresso, around to at least the Yes! Organic Market are out currently out commission. Peregrine announced that they are closing until Pepco restores power.
Now, they’re contacting one of the best panel upgrade services to help them get their power back up.

‘By the light of 100 suns’
courtesy of ‘euphro’

The next two days, we’re in for some absolutely scorching heat. Capital Weather Gang is forecasting that we’ll hit 100 for Tuesday and Wednesday, and that relief, should it come, will mean low 90s again. In this sort of baking weather, please do try to look in on elderly or disabled people in your neighborhood.  Cooling Centers will be open from noon to six today and tomorrow, at One Judiciary Square, the Reeves Center, the King Office Building and 920 Rhode Island Ave NE to help those who are without any climate control.

The humidity will also play a factor in your discomfort on Wednesday, as the front begins to break. Today should be just awful, while tomorrow will be super extra extreme awful. Expect heat index values up near 110. While today’s 101°F forecast will not break the 103°F record set in 1999, tomorrow’s 100°F forecast will likely eclipse the 1991 record of 99°F.

Please take steps to make sure that you’re getting enough water today. If you’re looking for some exercise, take a swim, DC’s pools are free to all residents! Limit outdoor work during the heat wave, I promise the lawn can wait until Thursday or Friday when things will be a bit cooler. Look for storms by the weekend.

 

‘Grass’
courtesy of ‘Eric M Martin’

While the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission repairs a 96″ water main in Montgomery County, all WSSC water customers are under mandatory water restrictions. The 96″ main near Tuckerman Lane and Gainsborough Road in Potomac set off early warning alarms this morning concerning its stability, and WSSC leapt into action. During these restrictions, WSSC customers are to:

• Stop all outside water use – no watering lawns, no washing cars, no topping off swimming pools
• Use water only as necessary
• Limit flushing toilets (do not flush after every use)
• Limit using washing machines and dishwashers (wash full loads only)

 

This will preserve enough water to allow for firefighting and medical uses of water. So if you see your neighbor in MoCo washing his car, tell ’em to wait until after the pipe’s fixed. And don’t water the lawn.

‘Obama and his endorsers’
courtesy of ‘ragesoss’

It was announced this afternoon that President Obama will speak about the state of immigration reform from the brand new School of International Service building on American University’s main campus Thursday, the same morning a slew of new freshman enter the grounds for new student orientation.

This is not Obama’s first time on campus. He was endorsed by the late Sen. Ted Kenedy (D-Mass.) who was accompanied by his niece Caroline Kennedy on Jan. 28, 2008 during the presidential election season from Bender Arena in the heart of AU’s main campus.

Update 4:38 p.m.: The event is invitation only and only attendees approved by the White House will be allowed near the building.

The speech will be streamed live at: whitehouse.gov/live.

‘Catcher’
courtesy of ‘bp6316 is alive’

In Fort Dupont Park, in Ward 7, there are a few beat up old baseball fields that are about to get a facelift, thanks to the City’s Department of Parks and Recreation and the Washington Nationals.  This afternoon, I talked to Council Chair Vince Gray at the Nationals game, and he filled me in on a few details.  The City has completed the land transfer with the Park Service, and the Nationals have committed to spending $1M on the academy to get things started and $250k/yr to run the youth academy, designed to get kids active in baseball.

Talking about the academy, it’s clear this is a project near and dear to Gray, who went on about his own time playing at Dunbar High School (he boasted a .500 average his junior and seniors years).  To Gray, getting youth active in baseball is in tandem to getting them employed in the summertime, which could do a lot to keep young people engaged in the community and out of trouble.  He’s also hoping that it might spur on the growth an adult league. Who knows, perhaps we’ll see the Council Chair out in the field some summery night in the future, bat in hand in an adult league?