Taking Action for D.C. Schools

D.C. Public Schools (DCPS) currently leads the nation in the percentage of special education issues resolved through costly, adversarial hearings.

That's not a good thing.

Reducing the number and cost of these disputes between parents of special education students and DCPS would allow funding to be redirected where it really counts--to the classroom--and would help these students quickly get the services they need.

When we issued our report on the need to repair the system for resolving special education disputes in DCPS, we called it A Time for Action.

Now is the time.

When Clifford Janey became DCPS Superintendent in 2004, he inherited scores of problems.

Special education was only one of many.

So Mr. Janey has been a busy man since 2004. To his credit, he has implemented new educational standards, issued a Master Education Plan, and put together a budget and administration to carry it out.

One of the many critical goals in Superintendent Janey's new Master Plan is to reduce by 25 percent annually the number of adversarial hearings related to special education services and placements.

DC Appleseed is working to make this goal a reality.

We have helped design an independent mediation program that would provide an effective alternative to the special education hearing process. We've also helped create a non-profit called "SchoolTalk" to train school personnel and facilitate early stage meetings to ensure that all parties are heard and feel they have been treated fairly.

The D.C. Board of Education recently issued a white paper on special education that cited DC Appleseed's "tremendous work" on these issues.

DCPS must now begin to transform the culture of special education through the use of mediation and skillful conflict resolution. And DC Appleseed hopes to assist in this transformation.

It is time for action.

Posted on Mar 2, 2006 at 11:34 AM | Comments (3)

DC Appleseed Petitions U.S. Supreme Court

After two unsuccessful attempts to have a federal court declare unconstitutional the congressional prohibition on the District's ability to collect income tax from non-residents who work, and earn income, in the District, we are now taking our plea to the highest Court in the land.  Today DC Appleseed, along with our friends at the law firms of Howrey, LLP, Gilbert Heintz & Randolph, LLP, and White & Case, LLP, will file a Petition for a Writ of Certiorari in the Supreme Court of the United States.  In the Petition, we will attempt to convince the Court that our case is an important one that is worthy of the Court's attention.  If the Petition is granted, our case will be placed on the Court's schedule, probably for argument next fall, and we will file additional papers explaining why we believe that singling out the District as the one place where non-residents may not be asked to pay their fair share of the costs of services they receive is unconstitutional.

We believe that our case is important because, as we say in the Petition, it "involves an issue of fairness in the tax treatment of citizens who do not have the vote."  The lower courts pointed out that Congress is the local legislature of the District, and so has the right to pass a law that defines how the District will collect income taxes--just as any other state or local legislature would.  However, Congress is not just any other local legislature when it comes to matter that concern the District.  We believe that since members of Congress do not have to answer to District residents on Election Day, courts must provide extra protection against laws that benefit residents of other states at the expense of District residents.  Indeed, one of the foundations of our own Declaration of Independence was a protest against "taxation without representation," and this law is a perfect example of a tax law imposed on a group that is not represented in Congress.

Our country's Framers, because they had seen firsthand the unfairness of "taxation without representation," put two protections into the Constitution that we think require a court to look very closely at whether this law is fair.  First, the Constitution requires that all groups of people are guaranteed equal treatment under the law.  We think this law violates that provision because it benefits people in states that have representation in Congress, and places a burden on District residents because they do not have representation--clearly unequal treatment that favors one group over another.  Second, the Constitution requires that all tax laws adopted by Congress must be uniform, particularly where the tax law is designed to benefit one part of the country at the expense of another part.

Every other state in the country that imposes an income tax on its residents also collects income tax from non-residents who come into that state to work.  The United States and all other countries in the world collect income tax from income earned within their borders, regardless of where the person who earns that income lives.  None of these situations result in the "double taxation" that many fear a non-resident income tax will lead to--because non-residents always receive a credit for the taxes that they pay to another jurisdiction when they are filing in their home jurisdiction.

The effect of this extremely abnormal tax law that we are challenging is that the District has to give up between $530 million and $1.4 billion in tax revenues every year.  In order to raise funds needed for local services, District residents end up paying higher state and local taxes than anywhere else in the country.  The GAO issued a report in 2003 that found that the District has a permanent budgetary imbalance, and named the inability to collect income tax on 70% of the income that is earned within its borders as a prime cause of that imbalance.  This means that the District, no matter how efficiently the government operates, will never be able to provide even an average level of services without imposing above average taxes on its residents.  And the result is that the District must overtax its residents and under serve everyone--including non-residents.

While a favorable decision in this case will not change the fact that the District of Columbia has no voting representation in Congress, we believe that the very fact that we are unrepresented in Congress means that a court should closely scrutinize this prohibition on collecting taxes, especially when it causes such significant harm to our Nation's Capital.  If the Supreme Court agrees with us, we are certain that the law will not survive a close inspection against the protections that our Constitution provides for all citizens--including those in the District of Columbia.

Posted on Feb 2, 2006 at 10:52 AM | Comments (0)

"Instant Democracy" for DC

In recognition of the Iraq elections in February 2005, DC Appleseed wrote the following unpublished op-ed:

On December 12, 2004, Congressman Tom Davis wrote an article for Close to Home ["Right Goal, Right Means"] making clear his commitment to bring voting representation to the Nation's Capital.  Davis joins other Republican members of Congress and DC Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton in this fight.  Three extraordinary events in the last week made clear that the battle taken up by this bi-partisan group can and should be won, and won immediately. 

The first extraordinary event is the Iraq elections.  The picture of millions of Iraqi citizens going to the polls has caught the imagination of this country and the world.  And that election has been rightly hailed a triumph by the President of the United States.  The election abroad has reminded all of us of the value of the vote and the fact that people are willing to die in order to obtain it.  That reminder could not have been more poignant than in the story of an Iraqi man named Saleh Hery who, the Post reported, voted in nearby New Carrolton and said: "First time in my life I feel that I am a human being, because I can elect the people who rule my country" ["Applause, Pride Mark New Carrollton Balloting," Washington Post, January 31]. 

What Mr. Hery felt is something the citizens right here at home in the nation's capital have never felt.  The Iraqi election was the first in that country in almost fifty years.  But the citizens of the District have been without voting representation for more than two hundred years.  It seems to us unimaginable that our country would have committed the resources it has to bring the vote to Iraqis and do nothing to bring the vote to Washington, DC. 

The second recent event that made clear the time for voting representation has arrived is the poll commissioned by DC Vote and reported by The Post last week showing that DC voting rights is supported by a super- majority of Americans.  82% of the country believes that DC residents should have voting representation in Congress.  We do not see how their views can any longer be denied. 

Finally, and maybe most important, was the President's Inaugural Address.  In that address, he made clear his unalterable commitment to freedom and democracy both at home and abroad.  As he said, "Across the generations we have proclaimed the imperative of self government."  He also said, "When you stand for liberty, we will stand with you."  The next day at his press conference he cautioned that "there won't be instant democracy" everywhere we support liberty, but it remains important that we support it everywhere.

We believe the time for liberty in Washington, DC has at last come. We believe the events of this past week show that to be so.  And we believe that if the President now stands with us in favor of our liberty it will happen and happen immediately. Unlike the situation in Iraq and other places where there cannot yet be "instant democracy," here we think there can be. We think a word from the President stating that his stand for liberty includes voting representation in the nation's capital will make it happen. We urge him to do so now.  It should become part of his legacy and become one of his great gifts to freedom and democracy.

Posted on Dec 20, 2005 at 9:41 AM | Comments (0)

DC Appleseed's "Report Card" on the Epidemic

When we ask whose lives are at risk in the HIV/AIDS epidemic, we too often answer "not mine."

It is in part this reflexive answer--"other people are affected...but not me"--that keeps our community from being truly dedicated to addressing HIV/AIDS in the Nation's Capital.  Yet 1 in 20 District residents are HIV-infected and a quarter of them don't know it.

Today, on World AIDS Day, we must not be afraid to say to ourselves and others:  the epidemic affects all of us.

Our whole community--that means our public officials, our neighbors, our colleagues, our friends, our families--must focus on preventing new HIV infections.

This means everyone should be tested, and everyone should be educated about HIV prevention practices.  Right now this is not happening in the District--and so the epidemic continues.

In our August 2005 report, HIV/AIDS in the Nation's Capital, we described the dire state of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the District and made recommendations for improvement. 

To help implement our recommendations, DC Appleseed will issue periodic "report cards" to track the District's progress addressing HIV/AIDS.

Today, DC Appleseed announced the subjects to be "graded" on the first report card.  In February 2006, grades will be assigned to the District's progress in implementing 12 key recommendations from the DC Appleseed report in the six months following the report release. 

By drawing public attention to the areas to be assessed well ahead of the February 2006 release, DC Appleseed hopes to keep progress moving forward in those areas.

To see the report card and more information about the 12 areas to be graded, click here.

Posted on Dec 1, 2005 at 12:53 PM | Comments (0)

The importance of getting tested for HIV

Be sure to read Richard Holbrooke's important piece in the Washington Post entitled "AIDS: The Strategy Is Wrong" [Nov 29, 2005; Page A21]. 

In the piece, Mr. Holbrooke laments: "We are not winning the war on AIDS, and our current strategies are not working."  The thesis of Mr. Holbrooke's piece is that HIV testing and detection are vital to attacking the HIV/AIDS epidemic. 

Holbrooke writes:  "Only effective prevention strategies can stop the spread of AIDS. Yet it is precisely here that current policies have failed most seriously. In the long chain of actions required to stop the spread of AIDS, attack on all fronts is necessary. But on one vital front, the world health community has been shamefully quiet for two decades: testing and detection."

DC Appleseed advocates for HIV testing and counseling being offered as a routine part of all medical care.  Look at our report, HIV/AIDS in the Nation's Capital, for more information.

Posted on Nov 30, 2005 at 7:20 AM | Comments (0)