Marion Barry went on Fox Business news today to talk about his plan to reform the welfare system, but got taken off on a tangent to talk about his arrest 20 years ago for crack cocaine.

Fox: “Are you the best person to do this? With all due respect, your honor, you disgraced yourself in office…and now you’re trying to be the example for welfare reform and a real shift.  I put it to you sir, you’re not the best example.

Barry: “Well, that’s your view about it. The FBI 20 years ago set me up, entrapped me, spent $50M. That’s all behind us now.”

Barry then went on to compare himself to Nixon going to China.  Gotta love hizzoner. The whole clip is worthwhile, as the TANF situation is certainly that could use reform, but is reform lead by Marion Barry worth working on?

‘Urban Wal-Mart in White Plains, NY’
courtesy of ‘pasa47’

Late last night, Twitter was abuzz with news of development across the river in Ward 7.  Council member Yvette Alexander (W7) tweeted, “Big box retailer coming to Ward 7? Stay tuned!” This being the age of instant gratification and always-on communication, Fairfax Village‘s Veronica Davis pressed Alexander for more details.  Councilman Tommy Wells (W6) replied with the bombshell: “Walmart’s coming to DC.“

That was enough to get things rolling on Twitter and for the council members to respond with some critical details concerning the new sites: there would be multiple smaller, more urban Wal-Marts in the District with Wards 7 and 5 being locations on the current plan.  The total number would be “less than 10” and the sites would largely be 80,000-90,000 square feet instead of the 220,000 square feet sites in the suburbs.

The new urban model Wal-marts start at 20,000 square feet, and have at their heart a grocery model, which Wells says has Wal-mart playing average grocery store wages in the new locations, including the ones slated for DC, according to Wells.  These new stores could go a long way to solving some of the Food Desert problems that the eastern side of the city frequently have, but there are concerns around the big box model that have a lot to do with abandonable, non-reuseable storefronts, and that’s something the city will have to address as part of the development process.  The good news is, though, that multiple new retail venues can mean an increase in jobs for both skilled and unskilled labor, and in a city with double digit unemployment, it’s hard to argue with jobs.

‘lemon kush day 105, flower 77’
courtesy of ‘eggrole’

The news is out this afternoon, CBS Radio News Bureau Chief Howard Arenstein and his wife Orly Katz are free after charges have been dropped in the case due to a witness that was a no-show at their hearings today.  It’s likely they’ll be re-filed, but for now, Arenstein and Katz are free.

Arenstein and Katz are likely to try the “for personal medical use” excuse, according to the City Paper, which has a source with knowledge of their defense. As many have said, the new laws in the city concerning medical marijuana do not permit citizens to grow their own medical marijuana, which means they’re probably not going to see a lot of support in that regard.

‘Megabus’
courtesy of ‘andertho’

Megabus announced early this morning that they would be adding DC to the list of their hub cities, and expanding service from the 11th and H transit location to 10 new cities from the District.  The move will bring 85 news jobs, as well as 32 new buses, to the DC area.  The bus company is offering free tickets for trips between December 15th through January 15th with the code ILUVDC.

New routes include Toronto, Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, Raleigh, and Buffalo. See you on the bus!

’95/365′
courtesy of ‘Danilo.Lewis|Fotography’

Friday saw the arrest of PG County Executive Jack Johnson on charges of witness and evidence tampering and charges surrounding alleged bribery are likely forthcoming in the coming days.  This morning, three PG County law enforcement officers were arrested on related charges according to TBD and the FBI.  It’s not known how far these arrests are going to go at this time.  The scandal, which involves bras full of money and $100,000 developer checks, is likely to be a circus for the next few days.

‘Beware the Jaws that Bite, the Claws that Catch…’
courtesy of ‘Kevin H.’

You might have missed it in all the kerfuffle yesterday, but Unsuck DC Metro broke some major news yesterday: Metro knew that its escalators could fail under heavy weight and freewheel to the bottom, sending all those on the escalator to a pile at its feet.  The money quote? “Obvious signs of conditions requiring immediate maintenance/service address are being overlooked.”

Specifically, the report is concerned that numerous brake pads were worn beyond usable life expectancy, and out of adjustment, numerous switches in the safety circuits were dirty, out of adjustment and ineffective, and major amounts of oil and lubricant on the steps which are symptomatic of major leaks at the drive motor.

The date on these documents? September 30th, well in advance of the Rally for Sanity that saw the escalator at L’Enfant plaza fail and send patrons tumbling to the foot of the escalator, causing multiple injuries.  Better yet, Metro’s now claiming that they’re engaging in “proactive precautionary measures” at stations throughout the system.  Guys: It’s only proactive if you do it before the escalators develop “brake pads worn beyond usable life.”

‘vince gray blogger roundtable’
courtesy of ‘Dave Stroup’

It’s going to be a long day for Vince Gray, Mayor-Elect of the District of Columbia.  Instead of attending the funeral of Officer Paul Dittamo, who died last week in the line of duty, Gray was in the dining room at the 4th Estate, the restaurant in the National Press Club, according to the restaurant’s Twitter account.  We called The Fourth Estate, and he arrived at 1pm for a lunch with Council Chair-Elect Kwame Brown, where he still sits at press time.

According to the Post’s Mike Debonis, Fraternal Order of Police chief Kris Baumann was “apoplectic” at the no-show.  You can understand his frustration and anger, given that Baumann and the Police union were leading supporters for Gray on his campaign.

I may not be a political consultant, but I can tell you that missing the funeral of an officer who died in the line of duty is probably a pretty bad idea, and you’re going to be doing more apologizing than you probably should be the first week of your transition.

Update, 4:25 PM: Gray told ABC7 that he missed the funeral because his staff didn’t tell him it was happening. (Which seems odd to us, because we sure knew it was happening and we’re not mayor-elect of anything.)

‘Station 17 Volunteers’
courtesy of ‘macmoov’

The apartment fire on Tuesday afternoon at 1444 Rhode Island Ave may only have done $250,000 in damage and sent six people to the hospital; it could have been a lot worse.

It also could have been a lot better. DC Fire & EMS had to move a truck illegally parked in the alley behind the building before they could get their ladder trucks close enough to rescue those people trapped on the upper levels of the building. There is nothing more frustrating than having to wait for a tow truck, or to have to spend time on actually moving the illegally parked vehicle, instead of spending that time actually rescuing people.

Don’t be that guy. You’re facing big fines for parking in a lane, and the wrath of firefighters and police, who aren’t going to exactly be careful while moving your car out of the lane. So don’t park your car in the fire lanes, people, you could be risking someone’s life.

‘Anacostia Station’
courtesy of ‘angela n.’

Yesterday evening around 7:45pm, Metro passengers at the Anacostia Metro station saw something that every Metro rider dreads: they saw a man fall from the raised platform and onto the tracks below.  To make matters worse, this man was in a motorized wheelchair and unable to help himself get free.  Four riders jumped to the tracks below, according to our source who preferred not be named, and began to help get him back to safety.

They were able to get the attention of the inbound Green Line train and were successful at summoning the station manager. They did require help, though, to get the passenger off the tracks and back to safety. A Metro spokesman confirmed that the man was transported to the hospital with a cut above his eye, and remarked that witnesses said the man strongly smelled of alcohol. Metro stopped all trains near the incident until the EMS responders were able to get him off the tracks and safely into the nearby ambulance.

We’d like to thank the people who jumped down to the tracks to help this man, but we also want to remind everyone that doing that is incredibly dangerous, and that the voltage going through the 3rd rail can severely injure you or outright kill you. Please be very careful in assisting anyone. There are intercoms throughout the metro stations that go directly to the Station Manager, who can call for trained help and also stop the trains coming into the station, who may not see you on the tracks if you’re going to help.

Update: We asked WMATA spokesman Ron Holzer why there had been no automated or manual notification of the stop in Green Line service around this incident. He said: “If an incident does not cause a delay of more than 10 minutes, there isn’t any notice given. Central control was notified and third rail power was cut. Anyone who was in the station at the time power was restored would have heard an announcement that the third rail is about to be energized and anyone with a reason for this not to happen should contact OCC immediately, otherwise consider the third rail energized. At the time of the incident, headways were 10 minutes apart. One train did sit for about 5 minutes but not long enough to cause the next train to be delayed.”

The election is done, the votes counted, and City Council Chairman Vincent Gray is now Mayor-Elect Vincent Gray. With turnout low (a scant 27%), Gray waltzed easily to victory as he was expected to do. Surprising, though, was the number of write-in votes, likely cast for Adrian Fenty. Though they will remain uncounted (DCBOEE only counts write-in votes in the event they could change the winner), it shows that we have a good long way before this is One City.

We’ll have more in the coming days about what the local district seats’ changes will mean, especially when it comes to the ANCs across the city.