Questions About Public Funds Fuel Ward 2 Controversy

An ugly battle is erupting in Ward 2 between neighborhood leaders in Shaw and Mount Vernon Square over race, gentrification and an alleged misuse of public funds that has drawn the attention of the D.C. auditor.

On one side is Cary Silverman, a former advisory neighborhood commissioner in Mount Vernon Square, who charges that a recently defeated ANC member in Shaw misused public funds weeks before leaving office last month by influencing colleagues to award thousands of dollars in grants to a community group connected to him.

And on the other side is Mahdi Leroy Thorpe, the former Shaw commissioner who says the charges are an attempt by a white newcomer to silence an outspoken black man who has lived in the community for more than 25 years.

Silverman, a former member of the ANC 2F, has written D.C. Auditor Deborah K. Nichols asking her to investigate whether the ANC 2C violated city policies by awarding a $3,000 grant to a community organization tied to Thorpe.

Thorpe's commission voted in December to use the money to purchase computers and a digital camera for the East Central Civic Association, one day after Thorpe was elected president of the association. Silverman asserts in his complaint that computers purchased through a previous grant from the commission "may be located in the home of an individual and used for personal, not public, purposes."

The association "doesn't have a Web site, doesn't publish a newsletter or have an e-mail distribution list or do anything that requires a computer," said Silverman, who is white. "We hope this complaint will spur further investigation of the grant allocation process of ANC 2C."

Thorpe, who is black, denied that awarding the money to East Central Civic Association was improper. He said the laptop computers and camera to be purchased with the money would be used to help the association fight crime.

The association, he said, used a previous ANC grant to buy desktop computers to print flyers and communicate with city officials about crime. Those computers, he said, are housed at the homes of officers because the association has no office.

"There is nothing illegal about the situation," Thorpe said, adding that he abstained when the ANC voted on the grant.

Thorpe produced an audit performed by the Office of the D.C. Auditor of the ANC 2C from 2003-05 that determined the awards to the association and other groups complied with city codes and policies governing grants. However, the report said, five of the 11 groups awarded grants by the commission failed to file required receipts documenting purchases made with the funds. Thorpe said East Central was not one of the five grantees that were cited.

Thorpe, who attributes his loss in the November election to an effort led by Silverman to defeat him, called the complaint "gentrified racism." Silverman has been "trying to assassinate my character since he moved into Mount Vernon" in 2004, Thorpe said. Silverman and his supporters have been "harassing African American organizations and leaders in Shaw. They don't want them to flourish in the community."

Doris L. Brooks, an ANC 2C member, agreed. "It's racism," she said. "They don't like Leroy because Leroy talks the truth."

Other residents in the Northwest Washington neighborhoods strongly deny that racism is at play. They say the nearly 25 residents who signed the complaint are black and white, newcomers and long-timers.

"It has nothing to do with race," Shaw resident Charles Walker said. "He's a divisive influence in the community. He pits people against each other."

D.C. Deputy Auditor Lawrence I. Perry said he is taking the allegations seriously.

"What we're doing is reviewing the complaint and the documents the complainant sent in," Perry said. "We're looking into it right now."