The D.C. mayor’s race feels like Newark, N.J., in 2002. Then, Sharpe James, the incumbent mayor, faced Corey Booker, a bright, savvy, 30-something councilman. Not to be outdone by someone he believed hadn’t paid his dues, James threw at Booker the entire political establishment — labor unions, the business community and civil rights leaders who had been feeding at the public trough since the death of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. The real mudslinging came in Act 3, when James deliberately distorted Booker’s record and accused him of, among other things, not being a “real” African-American.
Mayoral candidate and D.C. Council Chairwoman Linda Cropp appears to be a James disciple. Facing stagnant poll numbers, she has unleashed an attack on Adrian Fenty, her chief opponent, whom I have endorsed.
She says he doesn’t care about the safety of residents because he voted against the crime legislation without offering an alternative. (He did: Drag police officers out of Popeye’s, 7-Eleven and those squad cars with the blinking lights and put them on the streets where the criminals are.)
She asserts he will neglect senior citizens because before joining the council, he allegedly mishandled the estate of an elderly resident. He doesn’t care about school children because he voted against legislation the mayor eventually vetoed. Her supporters add that Fenty doesn’t believe in God, has had affairs on his wife and that his mother is Jewish. (She’s Italian.)
Someone suggested these assaults test whether Fenty can take a punch. In 2000, he faced titan Charlene Drew Jarvis: She didn’t throw spitballs. He defeated her. Test passed.
Cropp says she’s highlighting the differences between herself and Fenty. That’s fair. But her record might be a better vehicle for achieving that goal. During her tenure in the 1990s as chair of the Committee on Human Services, contractors, who provide services to vulnerable residents, were not paid. Invoices were buried in desk drawers and sundry places. The financial control board — not Cropp’s committee — discovered the problem.
She voted for that infamous fifth-quarter property tax year — a gimmick that masked the city’s fiscal woes and ushered in the financial control board.
As president of the D.C. Board of Education, she failed to implement important but unpopular recommendations to improve D.C. Public Schools. On the council, she prevented the rescue of tens of thousands of children, blocking a mayoral takeover.
Cropp boasts she helped stabilized the city’s financial health; the control board was breathing down her neck. It had neutered Mayor Marion Barry. She had to get with the program or see the legislature marginalized.
Candidates hoping to become the chief executive of the taxpayer-financed $9 billion corporation should stand on their record and their vision for the city — not attacks. A candidate incapable of this basic standard may not be ready to wear the title “leader.”
Jonetta Rose Barras is the political analyst for WAMU radio’s “D.C. Politics Hour with Kojo and Jonetta.” She can be reached at [email protected].
