Not a Drop of Sympathy Over Flooded IRS Building

Cleanup crews sweep water toward a drainage hole in one of the basement hallways that had flooded from heavy rains. It is expected to take round-the-clock crews at least a month to repair the IRS headquarters on Constitution Avenue NW. (Linda Davidson - Linda Davidson)

Mother Nature must've been audited.

How else to explain more than 20 feet of rainwater that flooded the headquarters of the Internal Revenue Service in downtown Washington this week -- a flood of tax-code proportions that ravaged the agency, closing it for a month, yet only strafed the nearby Museum of Natural History, with its dinosaur bones and diamonds?

Surging torrents zapped the electrical transformers and air-conditioning equipment. Rising waters ruined the fitness center where tax officials exercise, the cafeteria where they eat, and office furniture and computers where they have been known to pick apart every figure on our 1040 forms.

"Ha! That teaches them for picking on us," howled Harold Brown, who owns a consulting business in South Carolina and couldn't help but laugh when he saw the construction cones and yellow tape at the IRS headquarters at 1111 Constitution Ave. NW.

His wife, Cathy Brown, who has helped navigate the family through several audits, thought of the worst-case scenario. "I just hope they didn't lose all our paperwork and re-audit us," she fretted.

Not to worry. The headquarters doesn't process tax claims. It houses top officials, including IRS Commissioner Mark W. Everson, plus tax attorneys, law enforcement agents and administrative staff -- 2,400 people who now will be scattered among a dozen offices in the region.

As tourists passed the area along the Mall, they lamented the brief closures of such buildings as the National Archives and the National Museum of Natural History.

But California resident Alex Castanon smiled when he heard the IRS building was knocked out for at least 30 days.

"It should be closed for 30 years," Castanon said.

The deluge spilled into the subbasement of the headquarters Sunday night. The torrent smashed through the windows, sending five feet of water into the basement one floor above, said Dick Moore, the building manager.

It broke two rows of windows in a transformer storage room, tore the voltage from its wall, pushed off the door and flowed into the halls. The pressure pried open the door into Moore's office and moved his cubicle about 10 feet.

Six to 12 pumps have been working to get the water out since Monday, IRS senior spokesman Terry Lemons said.