Nationals, D.C. Officials Tangle Over Street Vending, Controversial Sign
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Saturday, March 15, 2008; Page B01
With a few weeks before Opening Day for the Washington Nationals' new stadium, the team and the D.C. Council are at odds over street vending and the council's desire to post a sign protesting the city's lack of a vote in Congress, District officials and vendors said yesterday.
Council members Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3) and Jim Graham (D-Ward 1) have threatened to introduce emergency legislation to ensure that vendors are allowed to hawk their goods outside the stadium.
And a bill calling for electronic boards displaying the ticking amount of federal taxes paid by the District, to be erected at the John A. Wilson Building and the stadium, is on the verge of getting approved by the council, although the Nationals have told Gray that the sign is too controversial and political for a ballpark.
"They wanted to know if we could put it somewhere else," council Chairman Vincent C. Gray said.
"No" was his response, he said, adding that the point of putting a sign at the stadium is that it is a high-visibility site.
During the past year, the council and the Nationals have had a strained relationship, fueled by disputes about everything from parking to parties. The council consistently returns to one point: District taxpayers have coughed up $611 million for the project, and the city is getting dissed.
"It has to be a source of continuing concern," Gray (D) said.
This week the tension has centered on vendors and the sign.
"The place a hot dog belongs is the baseball stadium," Graham said. "It's part of the pastime. It's like peanuts. It's like popcorn. . . . They should be vended at the baseball stadium, inside and out."
Twenty-three licensed hot dog vendors and souvenir peddlers were fixtures in front of RFK Stadium, where the Nationals played while awaiting the construction of the new stadium.
But they worry that the Nationals' concerns about competition for revenue is the reason the city Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs has not given them a definitive answer about vending at the new stadium.
"We have not had any resolution of vendors being at the stadium at all," said Brenda Sayles, 60, who sold souvenirs at RFK.
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