By Annapolis Notebook
Sunday, May 27, 2007
For more than four years, every visitor and tenant of one of the tallest buildings in downtown Rockville, 51 Monroe St., was greeted with the Fox News channel on large, flat-screen televisions mounted near the elevators of the ground and first floors. The channel never changed.
To those who complained, building management offered a standard answer: Only one channel was available on the sets. This assertion went unchallenged until the district office of Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), a tenant on the fifth floor, got involved.
As part of the renegotiation of its lease last fall, the district office insisted that the televisions be tuned to different news channels, not exclusively Fox, said Joan D. Kleinman, the office's district director. It's not written in the lease, which took effect in January, but it was brought up in negotiations, Kleinman said.
Management appears to have relented.
A building employee said yesterday that the channels are rotated weekly. Now, on some days, tenants and visitors can watch CNN while waiting for the elevators. On other days, they can watch a local news station. And still, on other days, Fox News appears.
The building, also home to The Washington Post's Montgomery County bureau, is owned and managed by Washington Real Estate Investment Trust. The building property manager did not return calls for comment Friday.
-- Aruna Jain
Franchot to Study Gas Prices
Why is it that the gas stations at one corner all have the same price for gas? Or that gas stations at another corner miles away will share another price -- perhaps lower than the first corner's but the same as the adjacent businesses?
Comptroller Peter Franchot (D) pledged Friday to gather information from the oil industry to determine how companies are setting rates as gas prices continue to rise to near-record levels.
Franchot, at a news conference at a Bethesda gas station and again in Annapolis, questioned why gas prices varied substantially within a few miles.
The same brand, he said, could be sold at "wildly fluctuating prices."
Inspectors from his office as well as the state Agriculture Department will be dispatched to ensure that underground gasoline storage tanks have a temperature of 60 degrees or cooler. At greater than 60 degrees, Franchot said, the gasoline expands and could result in customers getting shortchanged at the pump.
Franchot said his office's Web site, http://www.marylandtaxes.com, will begin listing fuel prices to help motorists find cheaper gas. He also called for renewal of an expired state tax credit for purchasers of hybrid vehicles.
The comptroller's office regulates distribution and sale of motor fuels in Maryland.
-- Miranda S. Spivack
Harris Officially Weighing a House Run
State Sen. Andrew P. Harris (R-Baltimore County) announced an exploratory committee last week to look at launching a primary challenge next year against U.S. Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest (Md.), a moderate Eastern Shore Republican.
The move was hardly unexpected. Harris has been appearing at political events this spring, including the Maryland GOP convention last weekend, with buttons and stickers pleading: "Run, Andy, Run."
Harris said in an interview that he "can't imagine" anything that would keep him from moving forward with a bid, short of struggling to raise money. "And I've never had any problems raising money for my state Senate seat," Harris said.
-- John Wagner
Poll of Democrats Puts Obama Ahead
Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley's endorsement of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) for president apparently held little sway with fellow Democrats participating in an online poll sponsored by the Maryland Democratic Party.
Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) was the top vote getter, capturing 25.7 percent of the 4,117 online ballots cast in the poll, which ended Tuesday. He was followed by former vice president Al Gore, who is not currently running, with 21.3 percent.
Clinton finished third, with 18.4 percent. She was followed by former North Carolina senator John Edwards, with 14.4 percent. Edwards has been called the most electable Democrat by state Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert).
No other Democratic hopeful received more than 10 percent of the vote.
-- John Wagner
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