DISTRICT BRIEFING

Thursday, October 4, 2007

SENATE OFFICES

4 Fires Break Out in Bathrooms

Four suspicious small fires broke out in bathroom trash cans in two Senate office buildings yesterday, authorities said.

No one was injured in the fires, which were quickly extinguished, said Sgt. Kimberly Schneider of the U.S. Capitol Police.

Two fires burned in the Dirksen building and one in the Hart building between 10:45 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. About 2 p.m., another blaze broke out in Dirksen, Schneider said. Authorities are trying to determine if the fires are linked.

-- Allison Klein

POLICE

Body Found on School Playground

D.C. police are investigating the slaying of a woman whose body was found on the playground of a Southeast Washington elementary school yesterday morning.

A gym teacher discovered the nude body about 9:45 a.m. behind Wilkinson Elementary, at 2330 Pomeroy Rd. Assistant Police Chief Diane Groomes said the woman, whose name was not released, appeared to be in her 20s.

Principal Margaret Stephens-Aliendre immediately put the school on lockdown and called 911. No students saw the body, the principal said.

-- Theola Labb¿ and Allison Klein

Hate Crime Alleged at Gallaudet

D.C. police are investigating a possible hate crime at the high school on the Gallaudet University campus, after a black student was held against his will by a group of students who wrote "KKK" and drew swastikas on him, according to Chief Cathy L. Lanier.

Lanier said what apparently started as horseplay among students early Sunday in a dorm turned ugly when six white students and one black student, ages 15 to 19, ganged up on a black student at the Model Secondary School for the Deaf.

The residential and day high school has about 170 students from across the country.

No charges have been filed.

Gallaudet administrators emphasized that they are taking the incident seriously. A schoolwide assembly was held at the high school this week.

"I'm torn up about it," Provost Stephen Weiner said yesterday. "I can understand high school kids trying to play with each other -- but to use hate symbols . . .

"I'm a deaf person and I'm Jewish," he said. "As a person who has experienced discrimination . . . I don't want anyone to experience that."

-- Susan Kinzie

ADAMS MORGAN

Officials Grilled Over Water Mains

City water officials faced pointed questions last night from Adams Morgan residents concerned about antiquated water mains and adequate flow to fire hydrants after a major fire early Monday on the roof of an apartment building.

At an advisory neighborhood commission meeting, about 40 residents questioned the coordination between the city's water authority and the D.C. fire department, after firefighters were forced to run thousands of feet of hose to obtain adequate water pressure to extinguish the fire in the building in the 2600 block of Adams Mill Road. No one was injured, but the blaze took hours to extinguish because of the water shortage, authorities said.

Neighbors said they fear that firefighters lack adequate information about which hydrants are hooked up to larger water mains and that many older pipes are too small to provide adequate water pressure and volume to fight large fires.

Bryan Weaver, chairman of the neighborhood group, told D.C. Water and Sewer Authority General Manager Jerry N. Johnson that if a similar fire had broken out on 18th Street during a busy weekend night, "it would have been a tenfold tragedy."

Johnson told residents that the agency provides the fire department with all the mapping information it has and that officials would conduct tests on hydrants to ensure adequate pressure. He also said the agency would consider amending its plan to replace aging pipes in older areas of the city.

D.C. Council member Jim Graham (D-Ward 1), who represents the area and heads the council's public works committee, will host a roundtable hearing on the issue today. "It's clear the system didn't operate as effectively as it should have," Graham said.

-- Clarence Williams

VIETNAM MEMORIAL CENTER

ConocoPhillips Donates $2 Million

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Center has received a pledge of $2 million from Houston-based energy company ConocoPhillips, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund's president, Jan C. Scruggs, announced yesterday.

The center is planned as an underground educational facility focused on the war. It is to be built on the Mall near the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

The fund has raised $14 million of the estimated $75 million to $100 million cost of the center. The design is just entering the approval process, and fund officials have said the full cost must be raised before construction can start. Groundbreaking is expected in 2010, with completion 18 months later.

-- Michael E. Ruane

EPISCOPAL CHURCH

Clergy Will Bless Pets Today

Episcopal clergy will bless dogs and cats today in honor of the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals. One service will be at 11 a.m. at the Washington Animal Rescue League shelter, at 71 Oglethorpe St. NW. The annual Blessing of the Animals will be at 6:15 p.m. at Washington National Cathedral, at Wisconsin and Massachusetts avenues NW. That service will be attended by Rep. Tom Lantos (D-Calif.) and Rep. Edward Whitfield (R-Ky.).

-- Michelle Boorstein