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At-Large Council Candidates Disagree on Future of UDC

In the race for two at-large seats on the D.C. Council, the nine candidates often blame the District's fiscal crisis on waste and mismanagement, and all contend they will clean up local government.

But when asked to make choices about what the District can and cannot afford to do, few are willing to give up any of the city's popular, costly services. One subject of particularly pointed disagreement is the University of the District of Columbia, which has been hobbled by a deep financial crisis.

In many ways, the situation at UDC offers a window on how candidates feel about the future of city government. Some argue that UDC is a vital service to District residents who want to pursue higher education and that it must be preserved as it is. Others contend that the school primarily offers a hefty, steady paycheck for longtime friends and supporters of the District's political leadership and say it must be cut deeply.

Mark Thompson, the Umoja Party nominee, opposes cuts at the school and in the government at large. For him, UDC is nonnegotiable.

"If nothing else, my election would ensure that institution's survival," said Thompson, who holds a similar loyalty for D.C. General Hospital.

Thompson established himself as an activist by leading a takeover of UDC several years ago. Students shut down the university for 11 days and forced the resignation of some members of the Board of Trustees. At a recent candidates forum, Thompson said he would again resort to direct protest action to prevent officials from trying to close UDC.

D.C. Statehood Party candidate Sam Jordan draws a similar line in the sand. When asked about UDC at a recent candidates forum, he said: "It used to be illegal to teach black people to read. It used to be illegal to teach black people to count. . . . Of the 51 land-grant institutions in the country, which one do you think is in danger of shutting down?"

Jordan, a research fellow, also argues that most public universities operate in the red and that taxpayers don't complain "because the public understands in most cases the value of publicly supported higher education . . . [and of] the upward mobility education gives to a community, particularly to the sons and daughters of the working class."

Rather than slash programs, Jordan said he would invest in efforts to make city government more efficient, such as computerizing two municipal departments -- Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, and Finance and Revenue. Those moves not only would save money but also would improve the collection of taxes and fees, he said.

Jordan blasted District leaders for spending city money on a the new convention center and sports arena, saying: "We don't need to subsidize a sports palace when we're shutting down the public health system and not maintaining roofs at the D.C. public schools. It's a question of priorities."

Independent candidates Don Folden Sr., Robert Hamilton Jr. and Ernest Brooks also said they would not scale back UDC's programs and instead would look for money to enhance them.

At the other end of the spectrum are Democrat Harold Brazil and Republican Carol Schwartz. Both of them said they would shut the D.C. School of Law, which was recently merged with UDC, scale back UDC's curriculum and cut the school's top-heavy administration.

"A law school is laudable, but it's not cost effective," said Brazil, who noted that each year only a handful of UDC graduates pass the bar exam. "If it's not producing lawyers in significant numbers who can practice the law, then it's not doing what it is set up to do."

Brazil, who currently represents Ward 6 on the council, has voted against the law school in the past, while voting to preserve or increase spending for such services as police and fire protection and public works. He also contends that UDC should focus on undergraduate studies with courses that prepare students to compete in the work place.

Schwartz, who served on the council in the late 1980s, said she voted against merging the law school with UDC. She said D.C. residents who want to attend law school should be given stipends to enroll in other local programs. She said she would preserve UDC's undergraduate programs, but she said tuition is too low.

Part of the reason for the chaos in District government, Schwartz argues, is the lack of priorities. At the top of her spending list would be public safety, education and public works.

Somewhere in between the hard-liners on both sides are independents Valencia Mohammed and James Baxter II.

Mohammed, an at-large member of the D.C. school board, questions whether city taxpayers are getting their money's worth from UDC. "In terms of local funding it's about $50 million we put into UDC, and last year they had only 889 graduates, 70 percent of which are two-year associate degree holders. The citizens are not getting the most for their money," Mohammed said.

Mohammed said that District government needs to be downsized and that some functions, such as running the prison at Lorton, should be turned back to the federal government. Mohammed said that, in general, the District's budget numbers don't add up.

"In Los Angeles, they have over 3 million people and an operating budget of $5.1 million," she said. "In the District of Columbia, we have 554,000 people and the exact same operating budget. Something is wrong with that picture."

Like Mohammed, Baxter said is concerned about whether UDC is operating efficiently. But he was not willing to call for closing the law school. "It's important to those students who we've told that education is the gateway to success," he said.

Baxter, who works as a lobbyist for the Washington Teachers Union, said he is not opposed to downsizing the government as long as the burden falls on management. He also favors privatizing some government services, but he would permit employees or former employees to have an opportunity to compete for the work.

Brooks, a financial consultant, opposes employee layoffs, which he said "cause massive panic. . . . We don't need to lay them off but retrain them to make them more efficient."

Hamilton agreed that the problem is waste and inefficiency. He called for better training and certification for employees performing procurement and contracting duties, where he thinks the District is losing of millions of dollars.

Folden also cited waste as a general problem. "The first thing I would do is start at the top, get rid all of the people who are here just for paychecks," he said. "They're too many of them."

All of the candidates argued that the federal government is not paying its fair share to the District government.

"It's irrational for us to keep saying we've got to cut," Thompson said. "There will always be a problem, as long as the federal payment is not adequate and as long as the federal payment is irregular."