DCPS students shafted again - sign petition to keep Jelleff field public

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:AU has a nice field they never seem to use. Maybe DC could rent that for the key two hours and "give" it to Maret if Maret "gives up" those Jelleff hours.

Why is DC in the business of providing facilities for private schools in the first place?

Maret, with the help of corrupt Jack Evans, found a mark in the DC government and is taking advantage of it.

More power to them for pulling it off, but it is no wonder they have the second/third-tier reputation among private schools.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why are DCPS students “shafted” again? It’s basically the fault of lazy, incompetent school system administrators who are more interested in scoring more “free stuff” and perks, rather than focusing on building one of the best public school systems.

Huh? Are you a bot? The only one scoring free stuff is Maret who has a sweetheart deal paying less than 100k/year for exclusive access to one of DC’s few public playing fields in that area while poor DC resident kids get stuck using a basement to spend their afterschool hours.

Ha! Half of the “poor DC resident kids” are probably PG residents whose parents sneak them into DCPS and aftercare programs for their convenience. In many cases the cheating parents even “work” for the DC government. Talk about “free stuff” - except, of course, to the DC taxpayers who foot the bill for such fraud.

Any evidence that the kids at the Boys and Girls club at Jelleff are non-residents? Or are you just a Maret parent spewing lies because you can’t defend your own behavior.

Do public funded or subsidized rec programs check residency? I doubt it. The public schools do a pretty poor job of it.

You are doing a poor job of defending poor behavior by Maret where a significant number of students are known to be non-residents. While the historic designation limits building on the Maret campus (gosh, I wonder why Maret sought out that des ignation, hm?$), there is nothing stopping Maret from finding and buying a parcel and building their own field.

Keep in mind that Maret used to have a baseball field. They made the choice to build a building there.

+1. Maret has champagne tastes with a beer budget. They don’t seem to be able to put up the money for a field like every other private in this area does. DC doesn’t need to provide welfare to a private school, even if Jack Evans kid did go there.

Yes paying for a fields development and upkeep is welfare.

Maret will be paying less than 100k/year to use a piece of land that DC paid 15 million dollars a year to buy. If Maret is so sure it’s paying a fair market rate for the field, why did it push to get a no-bid contract for the field?

So when you rent an apartment that cost the owner $1 million to buy or build, do you rent if for $1 million per year? DC bought a capital asset that it intends to own and operate for a very long time horizon. Maret then paid for improvements and maintenance. One can debate whether the Market rent should be higher, but citing the purchase price for real estate in expensive Georgetown is a silly comparison.

No, you don't rent it for the purchase price BUT you do rent it out for at least the monthly mortgage price. In this case, the financing cost was 5% ($750,000 per year) and Maret has come no where near paying that much. What makes this situation even worse is that DC never had full rights to the property. To use your analogy, we purchased an investment property and immediately rented it out for a gigantic loss! If this was a private transaction the IRS would be all over it investigating everyone involved for money laundering.

This. I hope the Maret deal becomes part of the various investigations into the corrupt activities of Jack Evans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t get this talk about Maret being in financial trouble. That certainly is not the case. If Maret made any mistakes, it was in not making an offer to buy the Hardy property cheap, when Hardy was basically a small failing urban school that no one in Northwest Washington would even go near.

Lol so stupid

There was a time when Hearst was failing also and headed for closure, and there was talk of selling the property to a private school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why are DCPS students “shafted” again? It’s basically the fault of lazy, incompetent school system administrators who are more interested in scoring more “free stuff” and perks, rather than focusing on building one of the best public school systems.

Huh? Are you a bot? The only one scoring free stuff is Maret who has a sweetheart deal paying less than 100k/year for exclusive access to one of DC’s few public playing fields in that area while poor DC resident kids get stuck using a basement to spend their afterschool hours.

Ha! Half of the “poor DC resident kids” are probably PG residents whose parents sneak them into DCPS and aftercare programs for their convenience. In many cases the cheating parents even “work” for the DC government. Talk about “free stuff” - except, of course, to the DC taxpayers who foot the bill for such fraud.

Any evidence that the kids at the Boys and Girls club at Jelleff are non-residents? Or are you just a Maret parent spewing lies because you can’t defend your own behavior.

Do public funded or subsidized rec programs check residency? I doubt it. The public schools do a pretty poor job of it.

You are doing a poor job of defending poor behavior by Maret where a significant number of students are known to be non-residents. While the historic designation limits building on the Maret campus (gosh, I wonder why Maret sought out that des ignation, hm?$), there is nothing stopping Maret from finding and buying a parcel and building their own field.

Keep in mind that Maret used to have a baseball field. They made the choice to build a building there.

+1. Maret has champagne tastes with a beer budget. They don’t seem to be able to put up the money for a field like every other private in this area does. DC doesn’t need to provide welfare to a private school, even if Jack Evans kid did go there.

Yes paying for a fields development and upkeep is welfare.

Maret will be paying less than 100k/year to use a piece of land that DC paid 15 million dollars a year to buy. If Maret is so sure it’s paying a fair market rate for the field, why did it push to get a no-bid contract for the field?

So when you rent an apartment that cost the owner $1 million to buy or build, do you rent if for $1 million per year? DC bought a capital asset that it intends to own and operate for a very long time horizon. Maret then paid for improvements and maintenance. One can debate whether the Market rent should be higher, but citing the purchase price for real estate in expensive Georgetown is a silly comparison.

No, you don't rent it for the purchase price BUT you do rent it out for at least the monthly mortgage price. In this case, the financing cost was 5% ($750,000 per year) and Maret has come no where near paying that much. What makes this situation even worse is that DC never had full rights to the property. To use your analogy, we purchased an investment property and immediately rented it out for a gigantic loss! If this was a private transaction the IRS would be all over it investigating everyone involved for money laundering.

This. I hope the Maret deal becomes part of the various investigations into the corrupt activities of Jack Evans.

The public integrity section of the FBI will certainly be busy, what with Evans, the Ellington cost overruns and kickback scandal, Bowser's unexplained favors to cronies and developers, etc. The list goes on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t get this talk about Maret being in financial trouble. That certainly is not the case. If Maret made any mistakes, it was in not making an offer to buy the Hardy property cheap, when Hardy was basically a small failing urban school that no one in Northwest Washington would even go near.

Lol so stupid

There was a time when Hearst was failing also and headed for closure, and there was talk of selling the property to a private school.

That's the context of all of this. DCPS went from almost 150,000 kids in 1968 to slightly over 45,000 in 2008. Not coincidentally, 2008 was the year DCPS hit its post-WWII low enrollment, and 2009 was when this deal started. It wasn't the case that kids were leaving for private school; the city was losing families at a rapid rate. It's the same reason that the Boys and Girls Club happened to go bankrupt that year, there just weren't kids in the city any more. As a result the city had too many schools, too many libraries, too many rec centers and too many Boys and Girls Clubs. The city sold off dozens of schools, and was basically willing to turn rec centers over to anyone who would look after them. Since 2008 the city has had a baby boom, particularly in the western part of the city, and all of a sudden those schools and parks that were surplus a decade ago are in short supply.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t get this talk about Maret being in financial trouble. That certainly is not the case. If Maret made any mistakes, it was in not making an offer to buy the Hardy property cheap, when Hardy was basically a small failing urban school that no one in Northwest Washington would even go near.

Lol so stupid

There was a time when Hearst was failing also and headed for closure, and there was talk of selling the property to a private school.

That's the context of all of this. DCPS went from almost 150,000 kids in 1968 to slightly over 45,000 in 2008. Not coincidentally, 2008 was the year DCPS hit its post-WWII low enrollment, and 2009 was when this deal started. It wasn't the case that kids were leaving for private school; the city was losing families at a rapid rate. It's the same reason that the Boys and Girls Club happened to go bankrupt that year, there just weren't kids in the city any more. As a result the city had too many schools, too many libraries, too many rec centers and too many Boys and Girls Clubs. The city sold off dozens of schools, and was basically willing to turn rec centers over to anyone who would look after them. Since 2008 the city has had a baby boom, particularly in the western part of the city, and all of a sudden those schools and parks that were surplus a decade ago are in short supply.

Context for the original deal (though it was still a backroom, sweetheart deal). But the renewal flies in the face of current context.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t get this talk about Maret being in financial trouble. That certainly is not the case. If Maret made any mistakes, it was in not making an offer to buy the Hardy property cheap, when Hardy was basically a small failing urban school that no one in Northwest Washington would even go near.

Lol so stupid

There was a time when Hearst was failing also and headed for closure, and there was talk of selling the property to a private school.

That's the context of all of this. DCPS went from almost 150,000 kids in 1968 to slightly over 45,000 in 2008. Not coincidentally, 2008 was the year DCPS hit its post-WWII low enrollment, and 2009 was when this deal started. It wasn't the case that kids were leaving for private school; the city was losing families at a rapid rate. It's the same reason that the Boys and Girls Club happened to go bankrupt that year, there just weren't kids in the city any more. As a result the city had too many schools, too many libraries, too many rec centers and too many Boys and Girls Clubs. The city sold off dozens of schools, and was basically willing to turn rec centers over to anyone who would look after them. Since 2008 the city has had a baby boom, particularly in the western part of the city, and all of a sudden those schools and parks that were surplus a decade ago are in short supply.

Context for the original deal (though it was still a backroom, sweetheart deal). But the renewal flies in the face of current context.

+1. It ain’t 2009 anymore. But Maret still thinks it is (how they could not have found a field in the last decade is beyond me, given that their 2010 deal was criticized for being an elitist backroom deal)

[Anonymous]

This context is helpful. Maret shouldn’t be pilloried for the original deal, as there was clear benefit to the District and to Maret. But that doesn’t mean that the arrangement should be renewed now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This context is helpful. Maret shouldn’t be pilloried for the original deal, as there was clear benefit to the District and to Maret. But that doesn’t mean that the arrangement should be renewed now.

The context in 2009 made more sense, but Maret should still be pilloried for the original deal. It was a backroom, no-bid deal designed to avoid Council oversight done in concert with Jack Evans at the same time that his son was applying for admission to Maret.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This context is helpful. Maret shouldn’t be pilloried for the original deal, as there was clear benefit to the District and to Maret. But that doesn’t mean that the arrangement should be renewed now.

The context in 2009 made more sense, but Maret should still be pilloried for the original deal. It was a backroom, no-bid deal designed to avoid Council oversight done in concert with Jack Evans at the same time that his son was applying for admission to Maret.

It’s not like the Marion Barry Memorial Aftercare Program was coming forward to raise funds to fix Jelleff. DC got a good deal at the time and should thank Maret for stepping up when everyone else was too lazy and unmotivated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t get this talk about Maret being in financial trouble. That certainly is not the case. If Maret made any mistakes, it was in not making an offer to buy the Hardy property cheap, when Hardy was basically a small failing urban school that no one in Northwest Washington would even go near.

Lol so stupid

There was a time when Hearst was failing also and headed for closure, and there was talk of selling the property to a private school.

That's the context of all of this. DCPS went from almost 150,000 kids in 1968 to slightly over 45,000 in 2008. Not coincidentally, 2008 was the year DCPS hit its post-WWII low enrollment, and 2009 was when this deal started. It wasn't the case that kids were leaving for private school; the city was losing families at a rapid rate. It's the same reason that the Boys and Girls Club happened to go bankrupt that year, there just weren't kids in the city any more. As a result the city had too many schools, too many libraries, too many rec centers and too many Boys and Girls Clubs. The city sold off dozens of schools, and was basically willing to turn rec centers over to anyone who would look after them. Since 2008 the city has had a baby boom, particularly in the western part of the city, and all of a sudden those schools and parks that were surplus a decade ago are in short supply.

Context for the original deal (though it was still a backroom, sweetheart deal). But the renewal flies in the face of current context.

+1. It ain’t 2009 anymore. But Maret still thinks it is (how they could not have found a field in the last decade is beyond me, given that their 2010 deal was criticized for being an elitist backroom deal)

There are many reasons why Maret is consistently considered below a host of other privates in the city. Here's another example why.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This context is helpful. Maret shouldn’t be pilloried for the original deal, as there was clear benefit to the District and to Maret. But that doesn’t mean that the arrangement should be renewed now.

The context in 2009 made more sense, but Maret should still be pilloried for the original deal. It was a backroom, no-bid deal designed to avoid Council oversight done in concert with Jack Evans at the same time that his son was applying for admission to Maret.

It’s not like the Marion Barry Memorial Aftercare Program was coming forward to raise funds to fix Jelleff. DC got a good deal at the time and should thank Maret for stepping up when everyone else was too lazy and unmotivated.

Because you really believe DC could come up with $20 million to buy the BCG properties, but couldn’t swing another $500k or $1 million for improvements?

(And before you say Maret spent more than that, yes, hat is what they say (no public proof, however). But the field didn’t have to be “top of the line” to be usable, and the pool, field, etc. didn’t all have to be renovated in the same budget year.)

[Anonymous]

Wow people are racist. Marion Barry has been gone a lot time now. Get over it. Move on.

And Jellef is not a school, it's a field and community/rec center More similar to Guy Mason, Volta, Palisades Park & Rec, Friendship Park, etc....

If you told the communities of Georgetown, Glover, Burleith, Palisades, etc about the opportunity to raise $ to support the field and have use - that would've been one thing (note for examples how quickly funds were raised to repair after the fire at GT library) -- or given any other groups the chance to bid or support it. There was no other effort to try to raise $ other than the backroom deal with Maret.

[Anonymous]

Barry has been gone a while bit only in DC would they erect a large statue to a corrupt, tax-evading, crack-smoking, racist sexual harasser-kleptocrat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Barry has been gone a while bit only in DC would they erect a large statue to a corrupt, tax-evading, crack-smoking, racist sexual harasser-kleptocrat.

And Maret, with help from Jack Evans, is keeping the tradition of corruption alive.