The cover story in this week’s Washington City Paper centers upon the “Mayor’s Conservation Corps (MCC), a branch of Adrian Fenty’s Summer Youth Employment Program in which kids complete beautification projects.”
The article’s author, Justin Moyer, paid a visit to the MM Washington School on the unit block of O Street NW – one of the sites where Summer Youth Employment Program participants are being deployed.
Note the description of the block – “block cries out for beautification.” (What an endorsement!)
Justin Moyer also mentions meeting James Williams, the MM Washington School’s site manager. The article indicates that James Williams lives in the neighborhood. So perhaps he is a DC BACA blog reader …?
I have provided a few paragraphs of this article below — as well as the article link if you want to read the entire WCP story.
The Best Summer Job Ever
The Mayor’s Conservation Corps has litter to pick up, time to kill, and the world’s best PR agent.
By Justin Moyer
Posted: August 19, 2009
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/display.php?id=37678
I drive to Margaret Murray Washington High School in the unit block of O Street NW for the MCC site visit Heymann has arranged. Heymann had balked at scheduling a visit the day before because of forecasted rain that, inconveniently, held off until this morning. The sky is overcast, pregnant with a thunderstorm. When I get out of my car and walk down O Street—home to the So Others Might Eat homeless outreach program, the block cries out for beautification—I face enough precipitation to make my visit difficult, but not enough to call it off.
Heymann and MCC Program Director Melissa McKnight meet me in front of MM Washington. They wear light blue MCC team leader shirts, a detail I find: 1) disingenuous—these are DDOE administrators, not kids at a summer job; 2) condescending to both me and program participants for the same reason; and 3) illustrative of the micromanaged site visit that follows. At MM Washington, I meet just about everybody Alan Heymann wants me to meet, including:
2) James Williams, MM Washington’s site manager. A middle-aged grad student at the University of the District of Columbia who lives two blocks from MM Washington, Williams reeks of credibility. There’s a trash weight quota—15 pounds per team, per sweep—at his site. He’s got a scale, even!
Bates Area Civic Association 