District Mayor Adrian Fenty used his first appearance before a national coalition of his colleagues to call for D.C. voting rights while urging fellow chief executives to empty their wallets during their two-day stay in the nation’s capital.
It was the companies lining the hallways of the Capital Hilton for the winter meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, however, that were really banking on the mayors’ generosity.
“Polyethylene pipe is the answer,” said the banner heralding the Texas-based Plastic Pipe Institute. Motorola was selling its 311 customer service system. Taser International Inc. was peddling its nonlethal law enforcement device.
Fenty kicked off the event with a plea for support for the District’s voting rights effort. His audience: More than 250 mayors from cities coast to coast, with populations ranging from 30,000 to several million.
“Right now in the House of Representatives, there is a bill which would give a voting member of the House to the District of Columbia, the only place in the entire of the country, in the history of our country, where 600,000 United States citizens pay federal taxes and don’t have a vote in the House of Representatives,” Fenty said. “This should offend people from all over the country and from both sides of the aisle.”
The conference of mayors’ 10-point plan for 2007 features specific strategies to reduce violent crime, address affordable housing, improve roads and schools through bonds and tax incentives, and tackle global warming.
“We don’t need the cities to be saved,” said Douglas Palmer, Trenton mayor and conference president. “We need the federal government to partner with us and build on our strengths.”
Outside the main ballroom, educators, nonprofits and private firms offered their services to a critical audience — municipal governments.
“What we’re trying to do is get the information out about how the technology can help cities,” said Clay Winn, vice president of Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Taser International. “Tasers are saving lives.”
The vendors would have been pleased by Fenty’s final remark. “If you were in my place, you would close with the only statement that any big-city mayor could say when he’s addressing a big group of residents who visit their city: Spend a lot of money,” he said.
