Our District of Columbia is experiencing giddy times. We have a nationally coveted bond rating and financial outlook and a new budget promising to lift the tide of development to all quarters of the city, and the Nationals have brought America's pastime back to Washington. The D.C. government generates income faster than a mid-1990s mutual fund. So much to celebrate -- yet something isn't right.
We see new buildings and tourists flocking into the city. These visitors are strangers, but they are no less stranger than we are to our own neighbors. We remain divided by our income, our color and our neighborhood boundaries. The civic strength that held us together after the riots and fiscal and government malfeasance seems to weaken with each new success. Our bounty grows while our sense of connectedness and concern for each other lessens. What is going on?
Growing up in my neighborhood, I had a friend who seemed to have everything. His parents were wealthy; he had the best toys, and he was the first to have his own car. Summer vacations were in Europe, not Ocean City. Years later I learned that the family's happiness was just an illusion. The parents divorced; I found out that inside their fancy house, the words that were supposed to bind this family together were never spoken. But questions cannot go unanswered unless they are first asked. As city residents, do we ask the right questions about how we want to live together?
Division prevents us from learning together about our public concerns. We learn by getting involved in issues and by talking to our neighbors, whether it's over coffee on a bright morning or over a cold beer on a hot summer night. We are watchful of young kids on the corner and we wonder about the height of our neighbor's grass. Looking around my neighborhood and listening to folks across the city, there is a sense that something is not right, but we can't quite express what that is. How do we talk to each other? How do we want to live together?
Our advisory neighborhood commissions, civic associations, engaged residents, the faith community and others have made an effort to ask the right questions -- but these efforts have fallen short. I believe the failure lies mostly with the fact that the D.C. government does not have the capacity to listen to the public voice and generate trust between residents. Mayor Anthony A. Williams attempted a significant innovation in engaging residents with his neighborhood action initiative, which included citizen summits. But cynicism and bureaucratic obstacles led to its failure. The collapse of this initiative illustrates what is missing in our city and in this administration: an ability to connect and unite residents.
We need to begin asking ourselves some serious questions before development and gentrification balkanize and silence us into likeminded enclaves. The conversation may be difficult, but it is time to put our house in order. What are we D.C. residents willing to do to make this happen?
-- D. Neil Richardson
Ananda001@aol.com
