Economist.com Cities Guide: Washington, DC Briefing - December 2005

News this month

Ballpark figures

District of Columbia officials spent November in slow-moving negotiations with their counterparts from Major League Baseball (MLB), the entity in charge of professional baseball, discussing the terms of the lease for a planned ballpark for the Washington Nationals. Issues under consideration, according to the Washington Post, include the city’s demands for a guaranteed $6m annual rent, regardless of circumstance (players may strike; terrorists may attack), and for MLB to pay for any over-runs in construction costs, which could reach $20m. If lease negotiations are not resolved by the end of the year, baseball officials will take the case to arbitration.

There are fears that the cost of the 41,000-seat stadium, which will have a glass-and-steel façade with limestone entrances, could rise above the original $535m projection. This is forcing the city council to cut back on other related projects, such as revamping the local Metro station and repaving roads in the area.

No commuter tax

A panel of federal judges—among them John Roberts, now Chief Justice of the Supreme Court—ruled in November that the District of Columbia cannot impose a commuter tax without an act of Congress. The tax would have been levied on income earned in the city by non-residents. The mayor, Anthony Williams, had brought the suit, along with the city council, the city and several residents, to try to overturn a provision of DC’s 1973 Home Rule act, which prohibits the city from imposing a tax on any non-District residents.

The plaintiffs argued that the law discriminated against District residents because it imposed a higher tax burden on them. They estimated that the commuter-tax ban deprives the District of $30 billion in taxable income, or roughly $1.4 billion in actual annual revenue according to current tax rates. Some 300,000 people commute to work in the city every day. The governments of Maryland and Virginia intervened against the suit, arguing that DC was a special case and that such a tax would hurt their economies. This argument was dismissed by a federal judge last year, when the case was initially brought.

Able Kaine

In early November, Virginia voters elected their new governor, Tim Kaine, the Democrat nominee and lieutenant-governor, by a large margin. He took 52% of the vote, trumping the 46% secured by Jerry Kilgore, the Republican candidate and former state attorney-general. Russell Potts, a Republican state senator who ran as an independent, won a mere 2%. The vote is widely seen as a boost for the departing governor, Mark Warner, a centrist barred by the state constitution from standing for a second term. Messrs Kaine and Warner have benefited from Virginia’s habit, since 1977, of electing a governor from the party that lost the state in the presidential election. Mr Warner is seen as a contender for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.

Mr Kaine made the most of Mr Warner’s popularity in the state, and promised more of the same. Mr Kilgore, meanwhile, argued that Mr Kaine was too liberal for Virginia, and attacked his opposition to the death penalty. National politics hung heavily over the election: eyebrows were raised when Mr Kilgore skipped a rally with George Bush in October, but the president made an appearance anyway on the final day of the race.

Housing prices

A typical family in the District of Columbia could not afford 80% of the properties sold in the city last year. According to the Urban Institute, a think-tank, costs rose across the city, especially in less affluent neighbourhoods, with the average DC home selling for $450,000. Rents have also escalated in recent years because of diminishing vacancies. In the first half of 2005, 2,500 apartments were turned into condominiums, three times as many as in all of 2004. As an example, the report showed how the buying power of typical teachers had dropped in recent years: in 2001, they could afford one in three houses sold, while in 2004 that figure was under one in five.

Metro crime

Metro Transit officials substantially undercount the number of serious crimes in the city’s stations, the Washington Post reported in November. According to the Post, officials leave dozens of assaults, robberies and other incidents off the tallies that they submit to the system’s board of directors and to the public.

During the 18 months to June 2005, Metro Transit Police reported 73 aggravated assaults at Metro stations, but that figure did not include 21 incidents reported by other police departments. This is because the officials do not count incidents that are handled by law officers other than Transit Police, even if the incidents take place on Metro platforms or other Metro areas. During the 18 months, the Metro reported 463 serious crimes, but the Post counted 98 others, including robberies and assaults, some involving handguns, box-cutters and baseball bats.

Catch if you can

December 2005

“The Warhol Legacy”

Until February 20th 2006

Andy Warhol, with his pop-culture images and striking colours, remains perhaps the most iconic and recognisable artist of the latter half of the 20th century. This huge show features more than 150 Warhol pieces, covering the full range of his career and media. They are grouped by theme, including portraiture, abstraction and drawings, and there is a whole room devoted to portraits of Mao Zedong. Many of the artist’s more famous works appear, including his Marilyn Monroe portraits and the Campbell’s Soup series. “Brillo boxes”, also on display, depicts boxes that are, as the accompanying blurb helpfully notes, “nearly indistinguishable” from the real thing.

The Corcoran Gallery of Art, 500 17th Street, NW. Open Wed-Sun, 10am-5pm (Thurs till 9pm). Entry: $8. For more information, visit the gallery’s website.

More from the Washington, DC cultural calendar