Lessons learned?

Tuesday, November 2nd sent a strong message to elected officials in Washington.  “Listen to the voice of the people.  If you do not, you will be out of a job.”  Having refused on several occasions to move the Town of Leesburg Election Day from May to November, the majority of the Town Council may learn this lesson.  (I wrote about this issue and the popularity of moving Election Day to November last month in an article Let Democracy Work and published it in Loudoun Leadership.)  The public comments, letters and emails to the Town Council overwhelmingly supported moving the Town Election Day.  Yet the majority of the Town Council voted No on a resolution to change the Town Election Day to November.  How can anyone not be in favor of getting the largest turnout for an election, unless they have some hidden agenda?  You can read Dave Butler’s and Kevin Wright’s reasons as explained to The Washington Post “Great Start” for Leesburg petition on Town elections.  Does this make any sense to you?  Not to me.

One Leesburg resident, Barbara Bayles-Roberts, who spoke to the council on this subject, developed a petition to place this issue on the ballot for next November.  I was one of about ten volunteers who stood at the polls on November 2^nd collecting signatures on the petition.  The support for the initiative was amazing.  There was more interest in signing the change petition than in talking with the surrogates for the two National candidates who were handing out literature.  Over 2,300 signatures were collected.  That’s more than voted in the May Town elections in 2008 and close to the number who voted last spring.

Barbara and her band of volunteers are continuing to collect signatures.  Watch for them at supermarkets, and other popular gathering places in Leesburg.  You can find more information on this effort at www.novembervoteyes.com.

Let Democracy Work

For over a year the Town Council has been debating moving the Town Election Day from even years in May to November.  They have been advised by the State Board of Elections, and studied the effect of change from a May date by other towns and cities in Virginia.  At the last Council meeting a public input session was held so the Council could get an understanding of how Leesburg residents felt about changing this date.  The Council received 45 comments from citizens who spoke in person and/or sent emails to the Council.  Of these 43 indicated that they were in favor of moving the Town Election Day to November.  Only two were opposed.

In the last Town election held in May this year, less than 2% of eligible voters voted.  This embarrassingly low turnout has been the same for many years.  Voting is not a subject that most citizens have on their mind in May.  I have helped many candidates running for the Town Council and Mayor for over ten years.  I have gone door-to-door talking to residents, and have been amazed, despite all the yard signs and newspaper articles, at how few actually knew there was an election in May.

November is National Election Day.  It is a National holiday.  Schools are closed, and most businesses grant employees extra time off to vote if necessary.  The turnout in the Leesburg District of Loudoun County exceeded 30% in the last November election.

Even years in November sees the largest turnout at the polls.  Every four years the Presidential election takes place in November.  The airways are full of election news and ads.  You may not like it, but your phone and door bell will ring with election messages.  This is what we do in a democracy.  However, in May you are seldom disturbed by election news.

May elections tend to favor the incumbents.  Their base will turn out regardless of when the election is held.  The incumbents only have to get a few supporters to the polls in order to assure another term.  The members of the Town Council who have opposed a change to Even years in November are all long term incumbents.  The incumbents opposing a change will use every excuse to delay a vote - a need to study the law, a need to hear from citizens, etc.  The need now is to bring this issue to a vote.

On Tuesday, October 12th the Town Council will be holding a work session to discuss a resolution to formally move the elections from May in Even numbered years to November.  (The input session I mentioned above was deemed not an official work session necessary to move a resolution forward to a vote as two Council members wanted to do.  This is another example of a delaying tactic on the part of some incumbents.

I urge you to either speak at the work session on October 12th or email the Town Council at council@leesburgva.org with your thoughts on this issue.  I hope you will agree that the Town Election Day should be on Even years in November.  An Even year is important as it will result in the largest turnout by a factor of 10.

AOL: the Rest of the Story

About the same time America On Line was founded in Vienna, Virginia, British Aerospace, another company in Fairfax County planned to build a flight simulator facility.  British Aerospace was located in an office building next to Dulles airport on the east side of Route 28 in Fairfax County.

Nicholas Graham recently wrote an excellent article in the Loudoun Times Mirror, AOL Turns 25.  A companion piece A Landmark Loudoun Land Deal Back in 1996 tells the story of how AOL came to Loudoun County.  Why British Aerospace moved to Loudoun County and built their North American Headquarters into which AOL settled 10 years later is another interesting story not known to many.

It all started with the Leesburg Airport.  I was developing a business at this airport in the early 1980s.  (See A Tale of Two Airports) One big problem was that there were no business jets based at the Leesburg Airport.  I soon discovered that there were no business jets in all of Loudoun County including Dulles International Airport, the only other airport in the County where business jets could land.

The reason soon became apparent.  Loudoun County had a personal property tax of 5% on aircraft and other equipment.  There was no such tax in Maryland and the District of Columbia.  Washington National Airport, now Reagan National, BWI in Baltimore, Frederick Municipal, and many other Maryland airports had many based business jets.  I was on the board of the Loudoun County Chamber of Commerce and convinced the Board to help me lobby the Board of Supervisors to eliminate the personal property tax on aircraft.  I arranged for Frank Raflo, the Chairman of the Board, to visit with the CEO of MCI, Orville Wright. (I didn’t make that name up.)  MCI was planning to buy two business jets and was considering basing them at BWI. These were $30 million airplanes.  The choice of paying the $3 million tax each year in Virginia as opposed to paying nothing in Maryland was easy.  I told Raflo that the economic impact of just these two airplanes would far out-strip the small sum being collected on the few small airplanes based in the County.  Wright confirmed my numbers.

Raflo convinced the Board.  The vote was unanimous to reduce the tax from 5% to 1%.  The rest is history.  Within a year four large jet hangars were built at Dulles.  MCI now had four jets, and Exxon/Mobile, and Gannet moved their business jets and flight departments to Dulles. Many others followed.

British Aerospace discovered that Virginia law classified flight simulators as aircraft.  When Fairfax County refused to lower their tax, British Aerospace built three simulator buildings in Loudoun County on property near their headquarters but on the west side of Route 28 in Loudoun County.  The building housed three $15 flight simulators.  Next they built their North American headquarters building on the same land.  Ten years later BA left and AOL moved in.

A Tale of Two Airports

For over 50 years I have watched the development of the Northern Virginia general aviation airports.  For almost 15 years I was deeply involved in the development of the Leesburg Airport.  In 1957, shortly after getting my pilots license at an airport in Alexandria, now long gone, I took some of my family for a flight out of the Leesburg Airport, then know locally as Godfrey’s cow pasture.  Arthur Godfrey, a radio and early television personality, gave this airfield land to the Town so they could swap it for the land where the Leesburg Airport now stands.  The new Godfrey Field opened with a paved runway in the early 1960s.  I was a Naval Aviator by this time.  I next visited this airport after leaving the Navy in the mid 60s and made several glider flights from there.  I returned again in 1980 to find the airport all but abandoned.

I quit my day job, and for almost 15 years, took on the task of changing Godfrey Field from a field into a real airport.  For most of these years the strong bond I formed with my company and the Town of Leesburg created great things at the airport.  I attracted a major FAA facility to the airport, which financed the building of water and sewer lines from the Rt. 15 by-pass down to the airport.  I built a jet fuel farm and 50 hangars, including the first jet hangar.  By the end of the 1980s the based aircraft population had grown to over 200, fifteen of these were business jets.

Then the political climate changed and the Town Government took over.  The entrepreneurial spirit died, and apparently so did the airport, at least financially and as an economic engine.  Today there is one business jet at the Leesburg Airport.  The jet hangars are all but empty as is the terminal building except for two flight schools.

All the other general aviation airports in northern Virginia closed in the 1970s except Manassas, Leesburg’s main competition.  The Manassas Airport was founded at its current location in 1963 with a single 3,700' x 100' paved runway, a rotating beacon, maintenance hangar and office.  This was almost identical to the Leesburg Airport at that time.  But today the there are stark differences.  Over 40 business jets are based at Manassas and one at Leesburg.  At Leesburg there are 3 hangars over 12,000 square feet for business jets.  At Manassas there are 18 hangars in this class.  Almost 3 million gallons of jet fuel are consumed annually at Manassas and only 200,000 gallons at Leesburg.  Major companies like Micron Technology occupy land adjacent to the airport.  Nothing even close to that is in Leesburg.

Manassas Airport has grown into a major reliever airport for the Washington region, while the Leesburg Airport struggles.

I have some thoughts about how Leesburg could begin to play catch up or at least stop stagnating.  I will save that for another post, but first I would like to have your thoughts.  Leave your comments here, or send me an email.

There's a Trail for That

The Department of Transportation’s mission is to "Serve the United States by ensuring a fast, safe, efficient, accessible and convenient transportation system that meets our vital national interests and enhances the quality of life of the American people, today and into the future."  Under the DOT is the FAA, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), The Federal Transit Administration (FTA), and the Federal Maritime Administration (FMA).  So now maybe we will have under the DOT: FAA, FHWA, FRA, FTA, FMA and be adding FBA, the Federal Bicycle Administration, to that alphabet soup.

Recently Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who likes to ride his bike in Washington’s Rock Creek Park on the weekends, has decided that the government is going to give bicycling the same importance as automobiles in transportation planning and the selection of projects for federal money.  A manufacturers' blog called the policy "nonsensical."  One congressman suggested LaHood was on drugs.

WWRD

After watching Sarah Palin give her speech at the Republican convention in 2008, I turned to my wife and said, “I felt like I was watching Ronald Reagan in high heels.”  In the Outlook section of the Washington Post (March 7, 2010) Steven Hayward wrote an article, Would Reagan Vote for Sarah Palin?  Hayward wasn’t really trying to answer this question, but was telling those trying to make themselves in Reagan’s image what this man was really about and how he became the leader we all remember.  He reminds us that Reagan voted four times for FDR, the ultimate populist and promoter of big government.  He ends by warning would-be Reagan heirs, “To pull it off, one thing above all is required: Do your homework. Reagan did his.”

After reading Barry Goldwater’s The Conscience of a Conservative in 1960, I finally understood what my father had been trying to explain to me.  FDR’s liberalism, big government, and high taxes were the wrong fork in the road.  Later I realized that Goldwater was both a Conservative and a Libertarian.  (If you wonder where you stand on the political spectrum, take The World’s Smallest Political Quiz.)

Hayward reminds us that Reagan described conservatism in populist term.  In October of 1964 in a speech, A Time for Choosing (worth reading again, I did), supporting Goldwater’s candidacy for President, Reagan warned, "This is the issue of this election, whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that an intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves."

As a populist Reagan would have admired the Tea Party movement.  Hayward says, “Reagan would have seen them as reviving the embers of what he called the prairie fire of populist resistance against centralized big government -- resistance that helped touch off the tax revolt of the 1970s. That movement was often dismissed as a tantrum, but when The Washington Post called California's 1978 anti-tax Proposition 13 a skirmish, Reagan replied that if so, then the Chicago fire was a backyard barbecue.”

Of course there is no answer to Hayward’s question on the vote, or the acronym WWRD, What Would Reagan Do?  But he concludes with the thought, “Wittingly or not, Palin hit the nail on the head in her keynote address at the Tea Party Convention last month when she said, Let us not get bogged down in the small squabbles; let us get caught up in the big ideas. To do so would be a fitting tribute to Ronald Reagan.  Hayward writes, “Meaningful limits on the size of government is one such idea, and it offers a substantive opening for Palin and other would-be heirs to Reagan.”   Makes sense to me.

Go Girls

I watched Angela Braly’s testimony before Congress and could not help drawing the contrast to the testimony two years ago by the automobile CEO’s.  Braly, CEO of WellPoint, a large health insurance company, was there to explain their recently announced rate increases.  She was polite but took a firm position defending her company.  When asked what her compensation was, she answered in detail explaining her salary, and all benefits, never looking at a note.  Her inquisitors, the congressional members, as usual looked foolish trying to be tough and get sound bites for the home town media.

I grew up in an age when the sexes were separated almost from birth.  After third grade and through college, I never had a class with a girl in it.  Now it is hard to find a single sex school or college.  My youngest daughter graduated two years ago from Washington & Lee University, which was all male until the 1980s.  Now I am told there are so many bright girls (sorry, I guess I should be saying women) that apply that the boys/men feel disadvantaged.

So when I see a bright attractive woman, there I got it right, dishing it back to some cranky old men, I say “Go Girls!”

The CPU Not in Your Computer

I’ll bet you didn’t know that there is a CPU in Leesburg, and it has nothing to do with a computer.  Neither did I.

There is nothing I dread more than a trip to the Leesburg Post office.  The post office on Catoctin Circle is open from 9 to 5 PM on week days and 9 to noon on Saturday.  Parking is difficult.  Cars wait in line on Catoctin Circle, a four lane highway, to enter the parking lot.  Once inside the line for counter service often extends out the door into the postal box lobby.

During the holidays the situation reached crisis conditions.  In addition to the parking problem, collection bins jammed with over flows.  Customers arriving with packages when the post office was closed and expecting to use the Automated Postage Machine, could stamp their packages but had nowhere to leave them.

A letter I wrote to Congressman Frank Wolf resulted in a call to me from the manager of the Postal Service Loudoun region.  He agreed to get more collection boxes and see that the existing boxes were emptied more often.

He asked me if I was aware of a Contract Postal Unit (CPU) in Leesburg.  I was surprise to find this CPU located at 28-B Plaza Street on the first floor of an office building with ample parking.  But the best news is this CPU is open 7 days a week from 10 AM to 9 PM.  They can provide almost all postal services.  Passport applications are the only exception I am aware of.

For some reason the Town of Leesburg wants to keep this service a secret.  The CPU is inside Loudoun Checks Cashed, which is what the sign over the door says.  A small Postal Service sign with the eagle logo is in the window.  It is almost invisible from the street.

When mailing a package to Europe with a custom form, I asked the very helpful employee about the signage.  He told me the Town had not approved their request for better signage.

The the Postal Service was convinced to put a sign with the location of the CPU on the front door of the Catoctin Circle branch.  That took one phone call from a customer, me.  Not a meeting of local government committees.

Where has Dr. Marcus Welby Gone?

An article in the Outlook section of The Washington Post recently asked the question, Is Marcus Welby History? In my case the answer is, No; He is alive and well in Leesburg, VA.

I am 72. A few weeks ago my wife was concerned that I was not recovering properly from a minor out-patient procedure performed at our local hospital. She called our family physician, Dr. John Andrew’s cell phone. When he answered sounding out of breath, she asked if he was OK. His answer was, “Yes, I am running the last leg of the Boston Marathon with my daughter.” He then discussed my condition with my wife, and made several suggestions. As it turns out, as he predicted, I was fine.

This was not the first of these “after hours” calls. Last winter Dr. Andrew returned a message my wife left at his office from a chairlift in Utah.

Over a year ago Dr. Andrew realized that he could not practice the medicine he was trained to and wanted to provide. His practice had grown to several thousand patients and, like me, most were “senior citizens” and the rest were soon to be. John and one of his partners, Dr. Jack Cook, formed a new practice giving his then current patients a choice of staying with the larger group practice, or becoming patients at a new practice restricted to 400 patients for each doctor. This new practice carries a $1,500 annual fee, which is not covered by insurance. This year my annual physical, covered by this fee, was the most thorough I have ever received. I carry the results, including all lab tests (covered by insurance), on a mini CD in my wallet.

Dr. Andrew and his partner’s practice is part of MDVIP, a national organization helping doctors practice preventive care and provide the personal attention long ago forgotten.

Culture of Civility

A place where everybody knows your name – I am not referring to Cheers, the popular Boston bar made famous by the TV sitcom, but to a small university in the central Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

Washington & Lee University traces its name to two of our country’s greatest leaders. Founded in 1749 as Augusta Academy, the trustees filled with patriotism in 1776 changed the name to Liberty Hall. When fire destroyed the main building and financial trouble threatened the school, George Washington donated $20,000. This was one of the largest gifts to any educational institution at that time. In recognition of his generosity the school was renamed Washington College. Robert E. Lee believed that education was important to reunite a deeply divided nation. After the Civil War, Lee moved to Lexington, Virginia and was appointed president of Washington College. Lee established colleges of commerce, journalism, and arts. After his death, Washington College was renamed Washington & Lee University.

Lee and Grant saved the Nation from years of insurgent gorilla warfare. With great civility they negotiated the Confederate Army’s surrender at Appomattox and sent the soldiers home to farm their fields. Lee established traditions at Washington & Lee that are observed today. Honor, trust, and civility were beliefs held high by Lee. Students today can leave their books, cell phones, iPods, etc. anywhere on Campus and know that they will be there hours or days later. Anyone walking onto the W&L campus will be spoken to with a friendly greeting and with an offer of help if necessary. This respect for others has been called the culture of civility.

From this culture has grown great leaders of my life time,governors, senators, Supreme Court justices, authors, journalists, and many others who have served their county with distinction and without great publicity. With civility comes humility.

As I watched my daughter graduate this June from W&L with her 430 classmates, I knew I was in the presence of some of the future great leaders of the 21st Century. Of course there is no doubt in my mind that she will be one.

A Breath of Fresh Air

Glen Caroline, the newly elected chairman of the Loudoun County Republican Committee, recently held a meeting of a small group of Republican activists to discuss his and their goals for the Republican Party in Loudon County. A few years ago I lost interest in the LCRC when the meetings I attended turned into the equivalent of a food fight. This recent meeting was not a formal LCRC meeting but rather Glen’s opportunity to repeat his views, which he expressed in his acceptance speech, on the newly organized Committee, and to get a feeling about how best to help Republican candidates.

Glen impressed me as someone who could chair an efficient meeting of many strong willed individuals who are not reticent about expressing their views. He focused on the common beliefs of most Republican. “Respect” was a word I heard him use often. Glen quoted Abraham Lincoln and clearly espoused Ronald Reagan’s “Big Tent” philosophy of welcoming all who share the core beliefs of Republicans such as limited government, fiscal responsibility, free markets, and a strong national defense. Social issues were not discussed, for which I am glad, as these are the issues that are the most divisive.

As word spreads about Glen’s leadership, I predict membership in the LCRC and the Republican Party will grow, and in time, so will the success of Republican candidates. With new leadership, and a strong positive message, the Republican Party and the Loudoun County Committee will have a message that will inspire and attract liberal, moderate, and conservative Republican to the big tent. If you want to be inspired, play this Video put together for the new LCRC website by my good friend Dave D'Onofrio.

Back on My Feet

While working out at my gym recently and listening and watching the news on an overhead TV, a short segment on CNN caught my attention - maybe because it was a very different story than the usual pieces on politics, the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. It was an interview with a young marathon runner in Philadelphia who is helping the homeless get back on their feet.

I must admit I have never been one pursue the challenges of working with the homeless. However, I do admire those that help anyone who is down on their luck and struggling to put their lives back together. For some reason this story really struck a chord with me.

Anne Mahlum, the Philadelphia marathoner and the founder of Back on My Feet, hands out running shoes, hats, and other running gear to homeless individuals who are clean, sober and live in a shelter. Moving everyone’s life forward, homeless or not, is their goal.

Last year there was a lot of NIMBY angst in the press and elsewhere about Good Shepherd Alliances' Center of Hope homeless facility in Ashburn. Perhaps running in the morning with doctors, lawyers, merchants, chiefs, and the homeless as happens in Philly, might benefit everyone in Loudoun County.

A Step Ahead of the President

Our daughter Inslee is a talented artist. Since she was five years old, she has been sketching and drawing pictures that have amazed her mother and me. Every year for the last sixteen years she has designed our Christmas cards. Many friends have saved every one. It was no surprise when many of her college classmates asked her to create sketches for special events, invitations, etc. This sparked the idea of designing note cards for a web-based business. The note cards she designed were in color. Finding a printer that could print high quality cards in high quality color in a relatively low volume at a price we could afford proved challenging - until we discovered Colorcraft in Sterling, Virginia. Their staff was as intrigued with Inslee’s work as we were. They were able to take her drawings, convert them into digital images, and print them on a digital press.

On March 26th the President visited Colorcraft and saw a postcard printed especially for him on their digital press - the same one that produces Inslee’s cards. The next day I jokingly asked our account executive, Bryan Koons who lives in Purcellville, if he shook the President’s hand. The answer was, “yes.” The President shook the hand of every Colorcraft employee, answered questions and told personal stories like why his father, Bush I, decided to make a parachute jump after he left The White House.

The President’s visit was front page news in the local papers. He told Jim Mayes, the president of Colorcraft, that the economic stimulus bill he had just signed would help companies like Colorcraft that are capital intensive. Accelerating depreciation on expensive presses and software the company needs to grow and maintain their competitive position will help the local economy and create more jobs. The President was pleased to hear that Colorcraft is sensitive to the environment using soy based ink, recycled paper and other green processes when ever possible.

My family had already discovered Colorcraft and had experienced first hand the fine work they do. (Pardon the commercial – you can too, by going to Inslee’s website) If you go to Colorcraft’s website, you will see examples of the work they do. Look carefully and you will also see several of Inslee’s images on their website.

Not Yet on Life Support But…

Health care is one of the top issues for the presidential candidates this year. But in Loudoun County we have our own health care issues. Not who pays but where we get the hospital and emergency room service all of us will require at sometime.

Loudoun County has a first class hospital, INOVA’s Loudoun Hospital at Lansdowne, with an ER both at the Lansdowne facility and in downtown Leesburg where the original hospital was located before it moved to Lansdowne. INOVA Health Systems is a large hospital and medical facility holding company based in Northern Virginia. In addition to Loudoun, INOVA owns and operates, Alexandria Hospital, Fairfax Hospital, Fairfax Hospital for Children, Fair Oaks Hospital, and Mt. Vernon Hospital.

Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), based in Nashville, Tennessee owns and operates 170 hospitals in the United States. Reston Hospital is owned by HCA.

Several years ago, HCA sought to build a second hospital in Broadlands at the intersection of the Greenway and Belmont Ridge Road. This proposed hospital, known as the Broadlands Regional Medical Center (BRMC) would have a full ER service and a number of other medical facilities associated with major hospitals. The State of Virginia Department of Health granted BRMC the required “certificate of public need” expressly stating that Loudoun County needed a 2nd hospital. HCA, now armed with the COPN turned to the Loudoun Board of Supervisors and INOVA pulled out all the stops and persuaded the Board to deny HCA’s application in August 2005.

With the growth of Loudoun certainly the need is even greater today. Nevertheless INOVA is doing everything to see that the BRMC is never built. The land use decision by the BOS is now the subject of a law suite by HCA.

As readers will remember I am a believer in “free markets” be it toll roads, hospitals, or most private businesses, and a few government businesses that should be private like air traffic control (Of Vacuum Tubes and Sealing Wax). In fact I am a bit puzzled as to why the State of Virginia even has a say in this.

Some say that the last BOS turned down the HCA application purely for political reasons. Now we have a new BOS, the majority of which represents a different party. Let’s hope this time reason prevails and not politics. It is time to compromise, drop the law suite, and build this critically needed medical center – in fact, it is probably easy to argue that the County needs a third hospital once this is approved. HCA has the ability to do this and bring not only first class medical service to our community, but also high paying jobs that will have a very significant economic impact. With the loss of AOL and other high-tech companies, BRMC would bring a lot to the table and the County’s vital signs would improve.

Déjà vu All Over Again

I thought of Yogi Berra, the king of the malaprop, when I heard about the goings-on during this week’s Town Council meeting. Frank Holtz, who has been a law enforcement professional for 23 years, was nominated by Ken Reid for the Town’s Standing Residential Traffic Committee. It would seem to Yogi and any other clear thinking individual that the Town would be lucky to have such a professional advising the Council on traffic and public safety. Then politics got in the way of reason.

Kelly Burk suddenly announced that she had several other, presumably, more qualified candidates. Mayor Umstattd, at Burk’s request, asked the Council to table the appointment. The night before, when Reid discussed this appointment at the Town Council work session, there was no objection. What happened between late Monday and Tuesday night? Frank Holtz announced that he would run for the Town Council next May, and Burk discovered that Holtz was helping Jim Clem in his reelection bid for the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors. Clem’s opponent? Kelly Burk of course. A three-year-old can connect these dots.

I remember well three years ago when Katie Hammler tried to appoint yours truly to the Airport Commission. A long line of speakers, including former Council members, Town managers, and prominent citizens spoke to support my nomination. There were no negative comments. Yet, Umstattd, Burk, Martinez and Kramer, the Democratic gang of four, voted no and the nomination failed. Was there any connection to the fact that a year earlier I had worked on Bob Zoldos’s campaign to unseat Umstattd? You connect those dots.

Umstattd and Burk do not need Halloween costumes. We are tasting the witch’s brew, and watching the cauldron bubble.

Where’s Wegmans?

In 2004 a rezoning application for a mixed used development, The Village at Leesburg, with Wegmans as an anchor tenant, was presented to the Town of Leesburg. After another year, in November of 2005, the rezoning was approved. This summer, almost two years later, grading finally began for the project. But unbelievably the site plan for the project has still not been approved. Will Wegmans be patient, or will they find another site that can be approved more efficiently? Think One Loudoun.

A loss of Wegmans would be a loss for Leesburg. I remember another very similar project that like The Village of Leesburg that was compelled to build a very expensive grade-separated flyover interchange. The project was forced to file for bankruptcy. It was then was taken over by the lender. Eventually the development was completed after millions had been lost by all parties. The project was Cascades.

We can blame the Town planning department for this delay but there is a higher authority to which the planners report - the Town Council. The Town Council is led by the Mayor who has great influence. For years she was a member of the Planning Commission.

Mayor Kristen Umstattd and her close allies, Kelly Burk and Marty Martinez, tend to vote in lock-step and believe Leesburg is just the downtown Historic District. To this group Economic Development means brick sidewalks, way finding signs, and traffic calming medians filled with weeds. (Drive into Leesburg via South King Street to see this “garden” of weeds.)

This Wegmans mess is only one example of the difficulty of doing business in Leesburg, opportunities lost, revenues lost and unnecessary expenditures. It is systemic of our Town government. Stay tuned as I will be writing about other perhaps more dramatic examples.

Bull Moose

Garrison Keillor had some words today that all Republican and Democrats should think about.

It was on this day in 1912 that Teddy Roosevelt was nominated by the Progressive Party to run for President, an election that went on to define the Republican Party for the rest of the 20th Century.

Republicans had dominated politics ever since the Civil War. A Republican had been in the White House for 44 of the previous 52 years. They were the party of civil rights and, under the presidency of
Teddy Roosevelt, the Republican Party became the party of environmental conservation, antitrust laws, and consumer protection.

Teddy Roosevelt was one of the most popular presidents in history, the youngest too. He was 42 when he took office. He was the first president to ride in an automobile and in an airplane, and the first to visit a foreign country while in office. He was a naturalist. He was an author of history. He published almost 50 books.

After he'd served two terms, he announced that he would not seek a third term. He handpicked his successor, William Howard Taft, and then went off on an African safari. But when he got back, Teddy Roosevelt found that Taft had moved away from progressive principles and aligned himself with the conservative wing of the Republican Party.

Teddy Roosevelt ran against Taft in the primaries, won the primary in Taft's home state of Ohio, but eventually it was party insiders who picked the nominee, and they gave it to Taft. And so Roosevelt called for the creation of a new progressive party and accepted its nomination on this day in 1912. It was nicknamed the Bull Moose Party because Roosevelt said, "I am as strong as a bull moose, and you can use me to the limit."

He was in a three-way race with Taft and Woodrow Wilson, campaigning on a platform that called for income taxes, inheritance taxes, the eight-hour workday, and voting rights for women. He drew huge crowds wherever he went. In Milwaukee, October 14, 1912, on the way to give his speech, he was shot by a man six feet away, the bullet deflected by the speech in his pocket, along with a metal eyeglasses case. Roosevelt went on to give the speech, but Woodrow Wilson won the election. Despite Roosevelt making the best showing of any third party candidate in American history. He came in second.

And one of the results of his Progressive Party campaign was splitting the Republican Party between conservatives and progressives, and the progressives have never been in charge since.

A Day that Will Live in Infamy

July 17, 2007 will be remembered as the day that Crosstrail was defeated. Meaning Loudoun County and the Town of Leesburg said “no thank you” to over $42 million of badly needed road improvements. The County also said no thank you to over $200 million in tax revenue over the next 20 years. The community lost an elementary school site. Residents of Leesburg and near by Loudoun lost a proven Town Center concept where they could shop, eat and be entertained in style. The Leesburg Airport lost the opportunity to acquire 40 acres of land for expansion, and the opportunity to finally make this airport financially self-sufficient. (See Train Wreck). The Town of Leesburg lost an opportunity to sell sewer and water service from their new $15 million plant. But most of all, the opportunity to have two million square feet of Class A office space occupied by Fortune 500 companies in our community is gone.

Congratulation to Kelly Burk who made it her sole purpose for the last year to defeat the Crosstrail rezoning. Congratulations to traitor Ken Reid who reneged on his pledge to his Party, and in an even more bazaar move joined with his Democratic opponent, Burk, to defeat Crosstrail. Finally, congratulations to Dennis Boykin, Chairman of the Leesburg Airport Commission, for finally getting his wish for a hobbyist airport filled with little airplanes to match his own toy.

A Modern Mikado

The Mikado, a very popular Gilbert and Sullivan opera, is the story of the “crime” of flirting, for which the punishment in this Japanese city is beheading. When the audience learns that Ko-Ko, who has committed this flirtatious act with Yum-Yum, has been promoted to the position of Lord High Executioner, the cast sings, Let the Punishment Fit the Crime. A ridiculous story? Maybe. But here in our country, in modern times, strange thing are also happening.

Today in the United States we seem to be seeing an ever increasing need on the part of prosecutors, judges, legislators, and the public to “imprison not only those we fear, but those we hate”. Our jails and prisons are filled with non-violent criminals. We release both the violent and non-violent into society, many because our prisons are overcrowded, to make way for those more recently sentenced. Most of those released are not prepared to return to a non-prison environment. Seventy percent will commit another crime and return to jail. Others like John Rigas, CEO of Adelphia, and Bernie Ebbers, CEO of WorldCom, will never have a chance to commit another crime, but will most likely die in prison having received the equivalent of a death sentence. Regas, 80 and ill, is serving 20 years. Ebbers, 63, is serving 25 years.

I recently met a man who lives in Leesburg and is doing something about this American embarrassment. Pat Nolan is the president of the Justice Fellowship, a non-profit foundation that works to reform the criminal justice system. Over breakfast Pat discussed with me and two other friends his mission and his experience. Pat has been there done that. If you don’t click on any other link, please read his amazing story as reported in a recent LA Times article, He found a calling in prison. In the opinion of many Pat was framed, but found guilty and sent to prison. (After considerable research, you can consider me among those that share this belief.) Pat emerged from prison, not bitter and revengeful, but determined to make a difference in our prison system. One of my favorite quotes from Pat in the Times article was, “If hospitals were failing to heal two out of three patients, would we continue to pour money into them?”

Here in Leesburg we have just opened a new jail, which was over crowded on opening day. Plans are underway to spend millions on an expansion. How many of the prisoners are returning “guests” of Loudoun County at prices that would make a stay at the Lansdowne resort seem a bargain? How many are locked up for non-violent crimes of drug possession, perjury, etc.? I don’t know but I am going to ask – and maybe you should too.

Not Ann Coulter

I was elected as a volunteer to serve on the Board of Trustees (BOT) of my homeowner’s association (HOA). I love my community and want to maintain the very high standards that were set years ago by those that first developed the homes and the community where I live. I have the same feelings about the Town of Leesburg and Loudoun County. For that reason I write the articles you read here, sharing my opinions with anyone interested in reading them, and more importantly hoping to get a larger percentage of our community, both large and small, interested in local politics.

At our last BOT meeting, one member of our HOA community raised an objection to a link on our community website that pointed to outside.in. This website consolidates news of what is happening in communities all over America. (Click on the link, enter the zip code or neighborhood name, and you will see what is happening and being talked about.) The news comes from local bloggers and newspaper articles. Our resident’s concern was that a summary of the articles I publish here appear and are linked to on Outside.in. She wants the link on the HOA website removed. Unless I missed something, I am not aware of any restriction for anyone linking to any site or page on the Web. Freedom of Speech is still part the Bill of Rights, the first amendment to our Constitution.

The morning after this BOT meeting I watched a report about a segment on the MSNBC program Hardball where Ann Coulter was engaged in a telephone debate with Elizabeth Edwards, wife of presidential candidate John Edwards. Chris Matthews called Coulter a very bright provocateur. I am sure Coulter would be the first to agree. Getting the wife of a presidential candidate to call a TV talk-show and engage her, to me and millions of others, was amazing. Whether you agree with Edwards or Coulter, it was interesting to watch and probably either garnered votes for either John Edwards or his opponents in the race. It might even get a few more voters out to vote in the primaries. If you click here, you can read a transcript of the debate as well as the many comments. One comment that I related to read: This is the liberal mind at work. They can say anything they want to say, they can do anything they want to do. But if something is said or done to offend them and their agenda, they start to scream and want the government to legislate what is said. This country was founded on the principle of the freedom of speech. No matter if you agree or disagree with Ann C, IT IS HER RIGHT AS AN AMERICAN!

I do not agree with Coulter's style in this debate, but I do think she and MSNBC have the right to publish it. I do not consider myself a provocateur in the style of Ann Coulter. You will not find any personal attacks on this website, but you will find opinion. I am free to write mine, and you are free to express yours. In fact I look forward to hearing from you. If you disagree with me, fine. That’s what makes our nation and our community, large and small, great.