D.C. Hearing On Budget Packs Drama And Emotion

Fenty said in an earlier interview that Ford's expansion is part of continued efforts to revitalize downtown.

Other people also used connections yesterday. The unusual videotaped statements, which people sitting inside the council chambers could see on new monitors, were put together by the D.C. Chamber of Commerce.

Susan Calloway, who owns a fine arts shop in Georgetown, said in a phone interview that she was filmed Thursday. She had never testified at a hearing before but said she has felt compelled to get involved to help small entrepreneurs. "I love my business, and I work myself to death," she said.

Calloway and other business owners, including a few who appeared in person, want the council to reject Fenty's plan to scale back tax relief that the D.C. Council has already approved. Fenty wants to spread the commercial tax relief over three years to help fill a $96 million budget gap.

Ed Lazere, executive director of the D.C. Fiscal Policy Institute, testified that the mayor's proposal "splits relief between large and small businesses," which takes away from the idea of helping less-profitable local businesses.

But Lazere said the council should rethink its own plan and give businesses earning a capped amount of money "a tax credit equal to a certain percentage of the taxes they pay." The formula could guarantee that only small businesses benefit, he said.

That recommendation might have satisfied Morton Toole, owner of Capitol Hill Books, who was proud of a review that called his shop the "best messy bookstore" in the city. Toole, who said he was not sure the council's relief plan would be enough to keep his shop open, placed a baseball cap with his store's name on the witness table so that it faced the camera like an advertisement.

Gray commended him for his "interesting" testimony.