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

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"The clubhouse is budgeted to get an upgrade of $7 million in the FY2020 budget. I do not think this funding is sufficient to bring the facility to where it needs to be and what the residents want. I have met with the Mayor and she has agreed to build a brand-new clubhouse. I will work with her to identify the funding in next year’s budget."

Wow, that's news! That a big quid for the quo.

A nicer, newer cave — still with no use outside space?!

Exactly. Evans is shameless and a complete a-hole to boot. Does the community WANT Jelleff to be completely razed? Where do all the aftercare kids go during the years that it's being rebuilt? What happens to the tradition of Jelleff basketball?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Jack Evans is posting the following bogus explanation on neighborhood listservs. He uses such squishy language:

From: "'Evans, Jack (COUNCIL)' [e-mail]
Subject: [georgetownforum] Jelleff
Reply-To: "Evans, Jack (COUNCIL)" <[e-mail]>

There’s a history to the Jelleff field and clubhouse that may not be known to everyone. This was originally a clubhouse owned and operated by the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Washington (BGCGW).

Facing extreme financial hardship in 2008, BGCGW made the decision to sell Jelleff and their Capitol Hill facility. The city did not want to lose these iconic facilities where so many DC residents had spent hours after school. The city purchased the facilities and the fields for $20 million. This was a sizeable investment for the city, especially during the financial crisis of 2008. There was no additional funding at the time to upgrade the field and the pool, which were unusable.

DC’s DPR entered into a public-private partnership with Maret that would preserve the field. I approached other schools and entities to partner on the renovations; no one else was interested.

We agreed to a contract to allow the BGCGW to continue using the facility, and I personally advocated for long time manager Bob Stowers to stay on as manager.

In 2009, Maret put $2.4 million worth of upgrades including a new AstroTurf field, new field lights, and a brand-new pool. Without this investment, the field and pool would have sat vacant for many more years.

As part of the school’s arrangement with the city, Maret received preferred permitting for 10 years, for 2 hours a day after school for 10 weeks in the fall and spring. The rest of the time the field is available to the entire community. Maret wanted a 20-year agreement with the city for their investment. A compromise was reached where the city agreed to extend the relationship for an additional 10 years, if Maret delivered on the terms of the contract in the first 10 years.

Maret has lived up to their end of the agreement. When Maret approached DPR to extend the agreement, per the original terms, they offered to invest an additional $1 million in the field, and in improvements to the clubhouse.

The clubhouse is budgeted to get an upgrade of $7 million in the FY2020 budget. I do not think this funding is sufficient to bring the facility to where it needs to be and what the residents want. I have met with the Mayor and she has agreed to build a brand-new clubhouse. I will work with her to identify the funding in next year’s budget.

Many years ago, then Western High School (now Ellington) and Gordon Junior High School (now Hardy) used Ellington field for after school athletic programs. More recently, it was used for youth football and baseball programs. This could be an option for additional field space. However, I have asked Mayor Bowser to hold off on any decision over the use of Ellington until a series of public meetings are held to understand what the residents want.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the use of Ellington field.

Jack

Okay, Jack.

- Back in 2008, why didn’t Maret just buy the property? If there were not other parties interested [in what you characterize as DC’s $20 million favor for BGC], why didn’t DC bargain down on the price such that it had $1-2 million left over for improvements?

- Why do you mention Bob Stowers? Are you trying to bully him by saying he should be grateful to you for his job?

- Why don’t you show us the contract with the automatic extension clause?

- What year was your son admitted to Maret?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have sent an email to my council member, the major and a few others. anything more to do?

Yes! OCCUPY JELLEFF!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"The clubhouse is budgeted to get an upgrade of $7 million in the FY2020 budget. I do not think this funding is sufficient to bring the facility to where it needs to be and what the residents want. I have met with the Mayor and she has agreed to build a brand-new clubhouse. I will work with her to identify the funding in next year’s budget."

Wow, that's news! That a big quid for the quo.

the kids still need outdoor space! the 100 aftercare kids need to be able to play outdoors after being in school all day. Sports teams of nearby public schools need places to practice. Evans is a disgrace.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have sent an email to my council member, the major and a few others. anything more to do?

Yes! OCCUPY JELLEFF!

You keep advocating for this. if you are a DC resident, please organize it yourself or STFU.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have sent an email to my council member, the major and a few others. anything more to do?

Yes! OCCUPY JELLEFF!

You keep advocating for this. if you are a DC resident, please organize it yourself or STFU.

Nah. I’m in Australia, so no can do. But I will come over when its scheduled.

[Anonymous]

No one in this thread has any idea how the meeting with the mayor went? Have those involved not reported back to their constituents?

[Anonymous]

From: Kishan Putta [e-mail]
Date: Thu, Sep 12, 2019 at 12:41 PM
Subject: [GloverParkFamilies] YESTERDAY - Update on Our Meeting With Mayor Bowser on Jelleff, Sharing Scarce Public Resources
To: Elizabeth Miller Jr. (ANC 2E07) <[e-mail]>, Commissioner Kishan Putta (ANC 2E01) <[e-mail]>


Dear Neighbors,

Yesterday, we met with Mayor Muriel Bowser, Deputy Mayor Paul Kihn, Parks & Recreation Director Delano Hunter, and our fellow Commissioner Joe Gibbons. We wanted to give you this update:

We gave her the community's petition signed by over 2,300 DC residents and explained why our constituents feel so hurt and ignored by the Jelleff deal. Those feeling this way are not anti-private schools and many are private school parents and alumni. They simply want to see SHARING of the high-demand hours - which are a scare public resource.

We explained that our constituents tell us that the immediate afterschool hours (3:30pm-5:30pm) are the ones that matter most to families - they are the most in-demand hours - and this deal gives just one school ALL of those most important hours for another decade. We told her that residents have been saying for years that different schools should SHARE hours more fairly.

We told her that the original deal said "consent may be withheld or conditioned in the sole discretion of the District," and DPR had acknowledged that since many things have changed in the last decade in DC and in the area, they were open to changing the afterschool hours allocation - and that is what residents wanted. We explained that, for over 9 months, we have asked DPR for transparency, but in the end, residents feel that they made the decision without a transparent process, and ignored the pleas of so many children and parents at so many other schools.

We explained that every day, over 100 kids in the free Jelleff afterschool program cannot play on the reserved field and have to hang out in the basement or watch the school athletes instead of getting any outdoor physical activity themselves.

We reiterated that this deal is not just bad precedent for other public facilities, but also a terrible lesson for our children. We should be teaching them that sharing high-demand public resources is important and that all children deserve to share them. Public private partnerships can work, but not when they are exclusive rights to all of the most high-demand hours for 20 years. How do we explain that to our kids?

Mayor Bowser said that she would instruct her agencies to take another look at the deal.
She said she would consider increasing funding for the Jelleff Rec Center building renovation -- something we have been asking for for the last year.. We told her that while that funding is welcomed, residents continue to tell us that another decade of one-school-only on the field afterschool was not acceptable to our community or to the nine other schools that requested to share some non-exclusive afterschool access.
She said that she is interested in DPR taking over management of Duke Ellington Field. We told her that, for many months, we and other civic leaders have been asking DPR to come before our community to explain their plans - but they have resisted doing so. We told her they must have a robust community consultation process (like DDOT and other agencies often do) and discuss all the options fairly and openly - before making any decisions on that field. And we told her what many constituents have told us: just because the city may have plans for Ellington Field (that they have not shared, despite our repeated requests), that does not change their desire for the Jelleff deal to be reopened for other schools and for the children of the Jelleff afterschool program to have outdoor space.
We mentioned that the chair of the DC Council committee overseeing DPR, Trayon White, is on our side and plans to hold a hearing into this issue - other Councilmembers including CMs Silverman and Cheh have also asked for this and for rescinding the deal. White's office says that the city could/should pay for any field renovations themselves and does not need to give away exclusivity. Mary Cheh's letter says, "I cannot understand why the District would agree to renew that agreement when doing so denies students from the neighborhood access for 9 more years"
We mentioned that 3 ANCS have passed resolutions asking to reopen the deal and that there is a letter that has been signed by over a half-dozen different PTAs/PTOs of elementary, middle, and high schools, including Hardy MS and School Without Walls.
Lastly, we told the Mayor that, as our city grows, DC needs to work with the community transparently to devise a better plan and process for how to share scarce public resources without having “turf battles” every time. That is why we called for transparency from the start. We wish they had listened, and we hope it is not too late. We will push onward.
We stand ready to work with all leaders and stakeholders to achieve better fairness and sharing of our public facilities.
Next Steps:
Please sign up to testify at the DC Council hearing - if you click here to sign up to join our coalition, we will notify you and you can also input your written testimony in case you cannot appear in person...

Please share the petition.

Please keep emailing/calling the Mayor, AG, and Council - click here for our Action Flier!

Please write letters to editors of your local blogs and publications - contact us for guidance.


Elizabeth Miller, ANC 2E07
Kishan Putta, ANC 2E01

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Jack Evans is posting the following bogus explanation on neighborhood listservs. He uses such squishy language:

From: "'Evans, Jack (COUNCIL)' [e-mail]
Subject: [georgetownforum] Jelleff
Reply-To: "Evans, Jack (COUNCIL)" <[e-mail]>

There’s a history to the Jelleff field and clubhouse that may not be known to everyone. This was originally a clubhouse owned and operated by the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Washington (BGCGW).

Facing extreme financial hardship in 2008, BGCGW made the decision to sell Jelleff and their Capitol Hill facility. The city did not want to lose these iconic facilities where so many DC residents had spent hours after school. The city purchased the facilities and the fields for $20 million. This was a sizeable investment for the city, especially during the financial crisis of 2008. There was no additional funding at the time to upgrade the field and the pool, which were unusable.

DC’s DPR entered into a public-private partnership with Maret that would preserve the field. I approached other schools and entities to partner on the renovations; no one else was interested.

We agreed to a contract to allow the BGCGW to continue using the facility, and I personally advocated for long time manager Bob Stowers to stay on as manager.

In 2009, Maret put $2.4 million worth of upgrades including a new AstroTurf field, new field lights, and a brand-new pool. Without this investment, the field and pool would have sat vacant for many more years.

As part of the school’s arrangement with the city, Maret received preferred permitting for 10 years, for 2 hours a day after school for 10 weeks in the fall and spring. The rest of the time the field is available to the entire community. Maret wanted a 20-year agreement with the city for their investment. A compromise was reached where the city agreed to extend the relationship for an additional 10 years, if Maret delivered on the terms of the contract in the first 10 years.

Maret has lived up to their end of the agreement. When Maret approached DPR to extend the agreement, per the original terms, they offered to invest an additional $1 million in the field, and in improvements to the clubhouse.

The clubhouse is budgeted to get an upgrade of $7 million in the FY2020 budget. I do not think this funding is sufficient to bring the facility to where it needs to be and what the residents want. I have met with the Mayor and she has agreed to build a brand-new clubhouse. I will work with her to identify the funding in next year’s budget.

Many years ago, then Western High School (now Ellington) and Gordon Junior High School (now Hardy) used Ellington field for after school athletic programs. More recently, it was used for youth football and baseball programs. This could be an option for additional field space. However, I have asked Mayor Bowser to hold off on any decision over the use of Ellington until a series of public meetings are held to understand what the residents want.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the use of Ellington field.

Jack

Okay, Jack.

- Back in 2008, why didn’t Maret just buy the property? If there were not other parties interested [in what you characterize as DC’s $20 million favor for BGC], why didn’t DC bargain down on the price such that it had $1-2 million left over for improvements?

- Why do you mention Bob Stowers? Are you trying to bully him by saying he should be grateful to you for his job?

- Why don’t you show us the contract with the automatic extension clause?

- What year was your son admitted to Maret?

Regardless of what you think of this "deal," the bolded misstates what Evans wrote. He didn't say that there weren't any other potential buyers for the property, he said there weren't any other potential public-private partners. Even in 2008, I imagine there would have been developers salivating over that parcel.

Also, you're asking why Maret didn't spend $20m on the property? The answer to that should be fairly obvious - because that's a lot of money, and more than 8 times the $2.4m they actually spent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Okay, Jack.

- Back in 2008, why didn’t Maret just buy the property? If there were not other parties interested [in what you characterize as DC’s $20 million favor for BGC], why didn’t DC bargain down on the price such that it had $1-2 million left over for improvements?

- Why do you mention Bob Stowers? Are you trying to bully him by saying he should be grateful to you for his job?

- Why don’t you show us the contract with the automatic extension clause?

- What year was your son admitted to Maret?

This letter is all of “Make Jelleff Public”’s christmases at once. With all the detail he provides, Jack makes clear that he was intimately involved in both the original agreement and its extension. Even putting aside the fact that his son attends/ed Maret, his history of ethical challenges only strengthens the appearance of malfeasance. Maret is digging a deep PR hole trying to defend this sham.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:From: Kishan Putta [e-mail]
Date: Thu, Sep 12, 2019 at 12:41 PM
Subject: [GloverParkFamilies] YESTERDAY - Update on Our Meeting With Mayor Bowser on Jelleff, Sharing Scarce Public Resources
To: Elizabeth Miller Jr. (ANC 2E07) <[e-mail]>, Commissioner Kishan Putta (ANC 2E01) <[e-mail]>


Dear Neighbors,

Yesterday, we met with Mayor Muriel Bowser, Deputy Mayor Paul Kihn, Parks & Recreation Director Delano Hunter, and our fellow Commissioner Joe Gibbons. We wanted to give you this update:

We gave her the community's petition signed by over 2,300 DC residents and explained why our constituents feel so hurt and ignored by the Jelleff deal. Those feeling this way are not anti-private schools and many are private school parents and alumni. They simply want to see SHARING of the high-demand hours - which are a scare public resource.

We explained that our constituents tell us that the immediate afterschool hours (3:30pm-5:30pm) are the ones that matter most to families - they are the most in-demand hours - and this deal gives just one school ALL of those most important hours for another decade. We told her that residents have been saying for years that different schools should SHARE hours more fairly.

We told her that the original deal said "consent may be withheld or conditioned in the sole discretion of the District," and DPR had acknowledged that since many things have changed in the last decade in DC and in the area, they were open to changing the afterschool hours allocation - and that is what residents wanted. We explained that, for over 9 months, we have asked DPR for transparency, but in the end, residents feel that they made the decision without a transparent process, and ignored the pleas of so many children and parents at so many other schools.

We explained that every day, over 100 kids in the free Jelleff afterschool program cannot play on the reserved field and have to hang out in the basement or watch the school athletes instead of getting any outdoor physical activity themselves.

We reiterated that this deal is not just bad precedent for other public facilities, but also a terrible lesson for our children. We should be teaching them that sharing high-demand public resources is important and that all children deserve to share them. Public private partnerships can work, but not when they are exclusive rights to all of the most high-demand hours for 20 years. How do we explain that to our kids?

Mayor Bowser said that she would instruct her agencies to take another look at the deal.
She said she would consider increasing funding for the Jelleff Rec Center building renovation -- something we have been asking for for the last year.. We told her that while that funding is welcomed, residents continue to tell us that another decade of one-school-only on the field afterschool was not acceptable to our community or to the nine other schools that requested to share some non-exclusive afterschool access.
She said that she is interested in DPR taking over management of Duke Ellington Field. We told her that, for many months, we and other civic leaders have been asking DPR to come before our community to explain their plans - but they have resisted doing so. We told her they must have a robust community consultation process (like DDOT and other agencies often do) and discuss all the options fairly and openly - before making any decisions on that field. And we told her what many constituents have told us: just because the city may have plans for Ellington Field (that they have not shared, despite our repeated requests), that does not change their desire for the Jelleff deal to be reopened for other schools and for the children of the Jelleff afterschool program to have outdoor space.
We mentioned that the chair of the DC Council committee overseeing DPR, Trayon White, is on our side and plans to hold a hearing into this issue - other Councilmembers including CMs Silverman and Cheh have also asked for this and for rescinding the deal. White's office says that the city could/should pay for any field renovations themselves and does not need to give away exclusivity. Mary Cheh's letter says, "I cannot understand why the District would agree to renew that agreement when doing so denies students from the neighborhood access for 9 more years"
We mentioned that 3 ANCS have passed resolutions asking to reopen the deal and that there is a letter that has been signed by over a half-dozen different PTAs/PTOs of elementary, middle, and high schools, including Hardy MS and School Without Walls.
Lastly, we told the Mayor that, as our city grows, DC needs to work with the community transparently to devise a better plan and process for how to share scarce public resources without having “turf battles” every time. That is why we called for transparency from the start. We wish they had listened, and we hope it is not too late. We will push onward.
We stand ready to work with all leaders and stakeholders to achieve better fairness and sharing of our public facilities.
Next Steps:
Please sign up to testify at the DC Council hearing - if you click here to sign up to join our coalition, we will notify you and you can also input your written testimony in case you cannot appear in person...

Please share the petition.

Please keep emailing/calling the Mayor, AG, and Council - click here for our Action Flier!

Please write letters to editors of your local blogs and publications - contact us for guidance.


Elizabeth Miller, ANC 2E07
Kishan Putta, ANC 2E01

tl/dr: The mayor doesn’t give a shit about the kids. Surprise surprise. Silverman, Cheh and White need to call a council vote. See who else backs the crooked Jack-Maret-DPR triumvirate. Then go back to the mayor and ask her if she wants to reconsider whose side she is on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Okay, Jack.

- Back in 2008, why didn’t Maret just buy the property? If there were not other parties interested [in what you characterize as DC’s $20 million favor for BGC], why didn’t DC bargain down on the price such that it had $1-2 million left over for improvements?

- Why do you mention Bob Stowers? Are you trying to bully him by saying he should be grateful to you for his job?

- Why don’t you show us the contract with the automatic extension clause?

- What year was your son admitted to Maret?

Regardless of what you think of this "deal," the bolded misstates what Evans wrote. He didn't say that there weren't any other potential buyers for the property, he said there weren't any other potential public-private partners. Even in 2008, I imagine there would have been developers salivating over that parcel.

Also, you're asking why Maret didn't spend $20m on the property? The answer to that should be fairly obvious - because that's a lot of money, and more than 8 times the $2.4m they actually spent.

I know that’s not what Jack wrote. I’m not relying on him for facts! Maret considered buying BGC. In the end, DC ended up buying it on Maret’s behalf. Why? Why does someone buy a property in need of renovation if they don’t have the money to renovate it? In particular, what’s the point of DC buying a property that it has to lease out for the long-term to make it worthwhile? It’s not like it was something the city already owned that had fallen into disrepair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Okay, Jack.

- Back in 2008, why didn’t Maret just buy the property? If there were not other parties interested [in what you characterize as DC’s $20 million favor for BGC], why didn’t DC bargain down on the price such that it had $1-2 million left over for improvements?

- Why do you mention Bob Stowers? Are you trying to bully him by saying he should be grateful to you for his job?

- Why don’t you show us the contract with the automatic extension clause?

- What year was your son admitted to Maret?

This letter is all of “Make Jelleff Public”’s christmases at once. With all the detail he provides, Jack makes clear that he was intimately involved in both the original agreement and its extension. Even putting aside the fact that his son attends/ed Maret, his history of ethical challenges only strengthens the appearance of malfeasance. Maret is digging a deep PR hole trying to defend this sham.

Absolutely right. When will Maret leadership recognize this as something that's not going to go away and they're going to get pulled under by the Jack Evans sinking ship? They need to show leadership and ethical behavior by either offering to cancel the deal or make a big public show of sharing the field during afterschool hours in a meaningful way...not this crap about an hour on "most" Wednesdays (they weren't sharing it on Wednesday 9/4). Give the Jelleff aftercare program standing rights to half of the enormous field from 3:30 to 4:30 every school day. You can still play a soccer game on the other half. Tell Hardy soccer teams that they can use the field for an hour 3 days a week, or let them host a weekly game there. something MEANINGFUL...not token.

[Anonymous]

Can someone please share the letter to Maret families about this?

[Anonymous]

Good context here:

“Focusing solely on Maret obfuscates the larger policy problem, however. In the late 1990s, struggling to stay afloat financially, the government used third-party organizations to help it maintain its infrastructure and meet program service needs. The practice continued even as the District’s financial condition improved. These agreements resulted in organizations gaining priority use over that of taxpayers. For example, Georgetown University’s softball team claims Guy Mason athletic field as its home turf. I was excoriated years ago when I raised questions about three baseball organizations — Home Run Baseball Camp, Headfirst, and Northwest Washington Little League — that critics said acted as a sort of sports mafia, using Friendship Park fields as their private preserve, with the city government reaping little financial benefit; it was only when the two founders of Headfirst began fighting over profits of its multi-million dollar operation that District residents learned just how lucrative those businesses had been.” (https://thedcline.org/2019/09/12/jonetta-rose-barras-the-dc-councils-fall-fight/)

How many baseball fields does DPR / DCPS have in Wards 2-3? Friendship, Guy Mason, Volta, Stoddert, Lafayette, Rose, Palisades and so on and so on. Who uses these? NWLL and GU. How often are they used? Not a lot. Who makes money off them? NWLL, GU etc. etc. etc.

Meanwhile, there is a drastic shortage of soccer / football / lacrosse / rugby fields across Wards 2-3 despite the fact that the number of players of these sports vastly outstrip baseball. To find a field to play soccer, NW kids have to head over to the NE.

What the hell is really going on at DPR?