Due to the Thanksgiving holiday, ANC 5A held its November meeting on November 13, 2019. Commissioners present: Frank Wilds (5A01); Grace Lewis (5A02); Chair Ronnie Edwards (5A05); Sandi Washington (5A07); Gordon Fletcher (5A08)

The ANC approved its fiscal year 2020 budget.

MPD Report

See resources and MPD stats for November here.

Ramdass Pharmacy was robbed of narcotics on Monday, November 4 around 2:30 am. Other pharmacies across the city were robbed the same week. Ramdass was robbed again at gunpoint on November 11 around 3:30 pm. T-Mobile on South Dakota Avenue has also been robbed a couple of times. Lt. Patrick Schaut said MPD has discussed security issues with both stores. For T-Mobile, Lt. Schaut said MPD has to go through corporate headquarters to obtain video and it is up to corporate headquarters what kind of security they want to have in their store.

There have been a couple of street robberies. As it is getting dark early, be aware of surroundings. Do not walk with phones out or earbuds in.

If you are doing online selling or buying and arranging for pickup of items, arrange to meet up at a police station. As holiday season approaches, have deliveries delivered to safe locations. Try not to have deliveries sitting unattended on the porch.

Ward 5 Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie Report

Councilmember McDuffie has two new staff members–Legislative Counsel Sandra Karpinsky and Committee Director Justin Roberts. Senior Advisor Silas Grant will be conducting a walkthrough of Commissioner Gordon Fletcher’s SMD (5A08) with Commissioner Fletcher, a Ward 5 MOCR, and DDOT on November 21 at 4:30 pm. Meet at the corner of South Dakota Avenue and Galloway Street NE.

The councilmember’s holiday party/toy drive will be on December 12 at Dock 5 at Union Market.

Rocketship Charter School

On October 28, 2019, the DC Public Charter School Board (DCPCSB) approved the opening of Rocketship’s third campus at 5450 Kennedy Street NE. Rocketship returned to the ANC to explain the kidnapping that occurred at its Rocketship RISE campus in Ward 8 on October 11. The incident was reported by Fox 5 DC.

Joyanna Smith, Rocketship DC Regional Director, stated that on October 11, Rocketship RISE Academy was holding parent-teacher conferences so the school was actually closed. Parents asked if care could be provided all day for parents who needed it, so Rocketship asked its before and aftercare provider Springboard to provide care for the day. Ms. Smith said that the school has two sets of doors, one at the entrance where visitors must be buzzed in. The second set is manned by a paid, off-duty police officer. A mother went to the school for her two sons. The alleged kidnapper walked in behind the mother and at the second set of doors, told the officer that he was with the mother and that she was the mother of his children. The officer believed him, did not ask for identification, and allowed him to enter. Then the alleged perpetrator went to the gym where the boys were playing and after playing with them for about 15 minutes, persuaded them to leave the gym with him. A Rocketship office manager saw the alleged perpetrator with the boys and suspected something was amiss and took the boys away from the man. Police were called and only then did anyone realize that the individual was a registered sex offender and that he should not have been on the property.

Rocketship terminated its relationship with Springboard as of November 8, 2019. Ms. Smith said she was not informed about the incident until several days after it happened and only a few days before DCPCSB’s October 28th meeting. She stated that probably the biggest failure was not alerting parents within 24 hours of the incident, so they are working to regain the trust of parents, which she said is a difficult process for everyone. They are also working on protocols to make sure everyone knows security procedures and each person’s role and responsibility, so that the communication gap between the school’s leadership and Rocketship leadership does not happen again.

There was protracted discussion among the commissioners led by Commissioner Frank Wilds (5A01) about whether the ANC should go on record with a vote on the school. This even though DCPCSB already held its public meeting and approved opening a third campus, and the ANC had several opportunities to take a vote and to submit comments before the new campus was approved and did not do so. Commissioner Wilds accused Commissioner Fletcher of “being on the take,” but offered no details on what that was supposed to mean. Commissioners Wilds, Grace Lewis (5A02), and Sandi Washington (5A07) voted in favor of taking a vote, with Commissioner Fletcher opposed. It was unclear how Chair Ronnie Edwards (5A05) voted. Chair Edwards stated the ANC will not have a December meeting, so it is unclear when exactly they plan to conduct this vote.

Construction on the interior of the new campus will continue throughout the winter months. Rocketship will continue to attend the ANC meetings to provide construction and other updates.

Social Justice Charter School

As previously noted, Social Justice Charter School will operate a middle school at Rocketship’s new Riggs Park campus beginning in school year 2020-2021. Representatives of the Social Justice School returned to talk about their school model. Students have crews and learning is based on a social justice model for each class. Social Justice School representatives hold a community engagement event each month. This month’s event is a design competition at Lamond-Riggs Library on November 23 at 2:00 pm. The school anticipates having a hearing before the DCPCSB in February 2020 about the school’s facilities. A condition of the school’s conditional charter approval is that the school must show that it has a lease or title for a sufficient school facility by February 2020.

Miscellaneous

During the community concerns portion of the meeting, I stated that I believe the ANC should have some sort of code of conduct because Commissioner Wilds continued to behave in a very unprofessional, inappropriate manner. Aside from constantly haranguing Commissioner Fletcher as well as guests to the ANC, he has more than once yelled at me on public streets, making false statements. Even though he would often miss ANC meetings, he would be sure to come to LRCA meetings on a monthly basis when I was president simply to disrupt them by constantly yelling about long-settled issues. During one such meeting, he told the treasurer of LRCA at that time “to go back to Africa.” He told a white resident that she should move out of the neighborhood and that she would never be welcome here. He still refuses to apologize for his very inappropriate behavior. I noted this is the same man who constantly defends Jack Evans amidst Evans’s very clear ethics violations. Commissioner Wilds did not have any comments during the meeting after I made my statement. But right after the meeting, he stormed up to me, got right in my face, wagging his finger in my face, saying that I am “disgusting.” Neighbors, this is a near 80-year-old man who knows better and should be doing better and none of the commissioners remaining in the room stepped in to tell him to chill. The ANC really needs to do a better job of speaking up when commissioners are behaving inappropriately.