Loose Lips attends the Obama Victory Party after polls closed on the Potomac Primary.

Loose Lips queries D.C. Councilmembers about The Real Super Tuesday, the Potomac Primary on Feb. 12.

Just when you think the terrible trend of randomly hung nooses is petering off, one ends up in the brand new baseball stadium. The noose was found Tuesday. According to NBC4, the worker who hung the noose was in his first day on the job for Reston-based Truland Systems, an electrical subcontractor. Another employee is expected to be fired today. The news broke last night, and apparently the political response couldn’t wait until the morning. This press release from At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown appeared in my box at exactly 11 p.m. last night:

Brown: I WANT ANSWERS NOW!–Brown to hold roundtable on noose discovered at ballpark

Tonight, At-Large Councilmember Kwame R. Brown was outraged after learning a noose was discovered in a break room at the new ballpark. An employee from Truland Systems Corp. was identified as a culprit. Brown, who chairs the Committee on Economic Development and has oversight of the DC Sports and Entertainment Commission, will hold a roundtable next week to investigate the incident.

“I want answers now,” exclaimed Brown. “This is an outrage. I will fight tooth and nail to discover the truth of what happened. I will also do what’s in my power to ensure that companies with a proven history of discriminatory practices never get contracts or do business with the District of Columbia. Hate crimes will not be tolerated.”

Brown is meeting with Clark/Hunt/Smoot and DCSEC [today] at 11:00 AM to begin the Committee’s inquiry. He is also considering a measure that would require the District to take into account the proven discriminatory history of a company and its employees when awarding city contracts.

When it comes to Truland’s “history of discriminatory practices,” the news coverage has already touched upon a sketchy incident. Five black electricians were fired recently after a Truland worker criticized their work and made what they considered to be derogatory comments.

This week, Loose Lips ran his Secret Santa column, resurrecting a tradition in which LL gives back to all those who have given him so much. Problem is, LL had to skip of lot of deserving folks in the Wilson Building and elsewhere, which has made for several unhappy politicos. All this week, LL’s been going around, saying he’d make a “supplemental appropriation.”

That’s a job I’m pawning off on you, readers. Here’s a selection of folks LL didn’t have room in his stocking to bestow with gifts, but are probably deserving all the same. Let ‘em have it in the comments:

• Ward 1 Councilmember Jim Graham
• Ward 2 Councilmember Jack Evans
• Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh
• Ward 4 Councilmember Muriel Bowser
• Ward 6 Councilmember Tommy Wells
• Ward 7 Councilmember Yvette Alexander
• At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown
• At-Large Councilmember Carol Schwartz
• Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development Neil Albert
• Fire Chief Dennis Rubin
• Fenty Communications Director Carrie Brooks
• Soon-to-be-former Attorney General Linda Singer
• Legendary tax thief Harriette Walters
• And anyone else is fair game, too…

From Mayor Adrian M. Fenty:

“Our city has lost a true legend today,” said Mayor Fenty. “From the earliest days of Home Rule to the present, as an elected official and a private citizen, Hilda Mason was a force behind the voting rights movement and the education of thousands of young people. On behalf of the entire District of Columbia government and the residents we serve, I want to extend my deepest condolences to Councilmember Mason’s family and friends.”

From Councilmember Kwame R. Brown:

“While I was saddened to hear of the loss of former Councilmember Hilda Mason, I have been and continue to be inspired by her steadfast dedication to the District,” said Brown. “I believe that her spirit of civic involvement will continue to encourage more residents to become active members of the community. I’m grateful for her tireless commitment to education and to providing our city with full voting representation in Congress. She helped lay the foundation for a brighter future for all District residents.”

And the Post’s obit is up. Unsurprisingly, it’s been in the can for a while—co-byline J.Y. Smith’s been dead himself almost two years.

UPDATE, 4:02 P.M.: From At-Large Councilmember Phil Mendelson:

I am sad to have learned of the passing of former Councilmember Hilda Howland Mason. But it is a blessing that she lived a long life full of great contributions to humanity – as a teacher, civil rights activist, warrior for Home Rule and statehood, and legislator. The shoes of her predecessor, Julius Hobson, were hard to fill, but I think she filled them. Her many years on the Council were marked with progressive legislation aimed to improve the lot of the average citizen. She was always known as a lady of grace and dignity. Her passing is another moment in closing of the curtain on a great generation.

At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown is introducing a bill at today’s Council meeting to finally give some names to buildings on the University of the District of Columbia’s Van Ness campus.

Right now, the buildings are numbered, which, in a perverse way, has always seemed to fit the campus’s cold, ’70s-era architecture. And the numbers don’t really make sense. The campus has nine buildings; the numbering starts at 32 and goes to 52, obviously skipping a whole bunch of numbers along the way.

Brown’s proposal, which has gained a number of cosponsors, would name each campus building after a different UDC alum, as determined by a seven-member commission. Good move, Kwame, but one question: Why not do what just about every other campus on the face of the planet does and use the names to raise some money for the school? Restricting the names to UDC alums is a noble gesture, but wouldn’t throwing some high rollers up there be even better for UDC?

UPDATE, 11:45 A.M.: Brown, via a spokesperson, says that “while it doesn’t specifically mention it in the bill, the idea is ultimately to work with sponsors to support the renaming of each building when an alumnus is chosen to be honored.”

A document distributed by the Washington Nationals has gay and lesbian activists up in arms.

The memo [PDF] outlines the Nats’ “Vendor Procurement Program,” which, the document says, “is a significant business, public relations, and legal issue for the Nationals.” It goes on to outline a five-point affirmative-action policy, the last point of which is a promise that the team not “discriminate against any employee or applicant…because of race, color, ethnic status, religion, sex, age, national origin, disabled veteran status, Vietnam era veteran status, or disability.”

Conspicuously absent: any mention of sexual orientation.

Legally speaking, the omission doesn’t mean a whole lot, considering that anti-gay discrimination is prohibited under the D.C. Human Rights Act, which covers all of the criteria in the Nats’ policy, plus sexual orientation, marital status, personal appearance, familial status, family responsibilities, matriculation, political affiliation, source of income, and place of residence or business. And the employment policy for the team itself, as listed on its Web site, includes sexual orientation as a protected class.

But relations between the baseball team and gay activists are particularly touchy considering that the Nationals’ stadium required the destruction of the city’s largest—well, only—gay entertainment district, meaning even perceived or inadvertent slights are grounds for mistrust and bad feelings.

Soon after receiving the document in a September meeting, longtime activist Philip Pannell dispatched an e-mail to Gregory McCarthy, the Nationals top local-affairs liaison, explaining his concerns and asking for a meeting.

“It is no secret that Major League Baseball has a history of being one of the most homophobic enterprises in our country and the omission of sexual orientation in its printed anti-discrimination policy may not be a simple omission…,” Pannell wrote. “Having a Gay Day once a year is not enough.

McCarthy, a former aide to Mayor Anthony A. Williams, wrote back, saying he’d asked the team’s general counsel to “ensure that our policies reflect local law (and local sensibilities)” and asked for more time to formulate a response.

Pannell followed up with a note last week, and when he did not hear a response from McCarthy, he took his concerns to the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, which had a meeting Monday.

Rick Rosendall, VP of political affairs for the Gay and Lesbian Activists Alliance, says his group has also gotten involved.

Rosendall says this is “an opportunity for the Nats to show their respect for, and connection with, the D.C. community of which they are a part.” Adding sexual orientation and other categories covered by the Human Rights Act to the Nats’ policy, he says, “would be an affirmative way to show their commitment to and embrace of the District’s policy.”

McCarthy referred questions on the matter to Nationals spokesperson Chartese Burnett, who says that Nationals President Stan Kasten had called Stein Club leaders today to ease their concerns. “They did have a conversation, and it was a positive one,” she says.

And after the issue was brought up at the club’s Monday meeting, At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown, who was present, contacted the Nationals on the club’s behalf.

“They’re working together to clarify the policy,” says Brown spokesperson Mike Price.

Early this morning, At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown and the D.C. Sports and Entertainment Commission invited folks down to the baseball stadium for a little tour and press conference.

Part of the deal was to let media folk and politicos ooh and aah at the stadium construction, which is coming along nicely, project manager Matt Haas said—sod will be laid by the first week of November, and seats are being installed at the rate of about 2,000 per week. But the main point of holding the presser was to address the project’s compliance with promises made regarding D.C.-resident labor back when the stadium deal was crafted.

Last month, City Paper’s Joe Eaton broke the story that D.C. residents aren’t doing anywhere near the amount of work that the stadium’s labor agreement promised. Instead of the 50 percent of journeyman hours the agreement laid out, Joe reported D.C. residents had worked only 23 percent.

Brown & Co. today tried to put the best face on things: When it comes to other aspects of the labor agreement, things are going pretty well. The project’s meeting a 50 percent minimum for contracts awarded to local, small, or disadvantaged businesses; it just barely missed a goal of having 51 percent of all new hires be D.C. residents; and District residents have worked 78 percent of all apprentice hours. Also, honchos pointed out, 245 of 270 new hires were D.C. residents (never mind the agreement specified 100 percent).

But there was little mention of how the project was complying with the journeyman-hours requirement—that detail certainly didn’t make the PowerPoint presentation. (Journeymen are the most skilled, best paid workers on the job, and they represent the majority of the hours worked on the site; it takes as much as five years as an apprentice, depending on the trade, to reach journeyman status.) When asked, project bigwigs said the figure was up to 28 or 29 percent.

The essential problem is that there aren’t enough skilled D.C. resident workers available to fill the jobs. If a subcontractor doesn’t have a D.C. resident to do a job, it can contact the city’s Department of Employment Services. If DOES has no workers, then the subcontractor can hire whoever.

The good news: Due to all the apprentice hires, there should be more available journeymen down the line, but not for years.

So why set an unattainable goal? A DOES staffer present this morning said that her agency—tasked with keeping tabs on the District’s labor force—had been present throughout the labor agreement’s negotiation. Shouldn’t they have pointed out that 50 percent employment is a pipe dream, at least in some trades?

Courtland Cox of the Sports and Entertainment Commission had a suggestion why the D.C. Council would do that: “If you don’t set high goals, you don’t accomplish anything.”

Today, the D.C. Council had its first reading of the Exploratory Committee Regulation Amendment Act, a piece of legislation meant to permanently impose financial reporting requirements and contribution limits for city candidates’ exploratory committees.

The problem the bill’s meant to address is the unfettered fundraising by candidates who haven’t officially declared yet. For instance, back in 2004, then-mayoral not-quite-candidate Vincent Orange threw himself a legendary fundraiser at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, which helped raise some $200,000 for his campaign, the donors of which remained anonymous.

At today’s legislative meeting, Councilmember Kwame Brown, one of six incumbent members up for reelection next year, asked bill sponsor Carol Schwartz for a “friendly amendment” that the bill’s implementation be delayed until 2009. On the dais, Brown cited his ongoing campaign and the need not to change the rules in the middle of the race.

Thing is, if the rules changed before the end of the campaign cycle, it could only hurt Brown. Brown seemed unaware of the fact that the rules are actually already in effect. Back in 2005, the Council passed a similar bill as emergency legislation and has reauthorized it as such since, but that legislation is scheduled to expire on Nov. 29. Brown already has an active principal campaign committee subject to donation limits and disclosure rules, so why let the competition gain any advantage by exempting them?

Lucky for Brown, Schwartz—up for reelection herself—covered for him: She rejected his proposal.

UPDATE, 4:36 P.M.: Brown spokesperson Mike Price says that his boss was trying to take the high ground and “wanted to prevent the appearance of a conflict of interest by voting on this [during] the campaign.”

“I’m not sure he articulated it the way he wanted,” Price says.

Today is Car-Free Day in the District of Columbia, which provided city politicos a chance to prove their ecocredentials during this morning’s commute.

Ward 6 Councilmember Tommy Wells, who masterminded the holiday, rode his bike to work, as did City Administrator Dan Tangherlini. Council Chairman Vincent Gray and Ward 2 Councilmember Jack Evans took Metro. But several other councilmembers chose less purist modes of transport.

At-Large Councilmember Carol Schwartz, for instance, says she was picked up and driven by a staffer to a morning appointment. She cited a rather bulky briefcase for the chauffeur treatment. She did, after the appointment, walk the remainder of the trip to the John A. Wilson Building. Her trademark Jaguar remained parked at home, she says.

The biggest splash came from At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown, who arrived with Wells atop a police-issue Segway he rode all the way from his Hillcrest home. LL suggested to Wells that the Segway was cheating, seeing as it has a motor that has to be charged off the electric grid. Gotta watch that carbon footprint, Kwame!

Wells defended Brown’s choice of wheels, calling them “in the spirit of the day.” Brown said his conveyance was inspired by a sense of empathy: “I wanted to see what it was like for the disabled.”

Ward 7 Councilmember Yvette Alexander chose not to eschew internal combustion for her commute: She showed up on a sharp purple Vespa Granturismo scooter. In her defense, she did manage to scooterpool: Friend and Hillcrest resident Darryl D. Rose piloted the petite vessel to the Wilson Building while Alexander held on behind.

“I drive a Land Rover,” she says. “I had to wean myself off.”

And it seems that Car-Free Day might turn out to be Car-Free Morning for the D.C. Council. At the Council’s pre-session breakfast meeting, discussions turned to transportation down to the Capitol for today’s Senate vote on District congressional representation. Gray offered use of his official car and a van to ferry councilmembers the 13-and-a-half blocks down Pennsylvania Avenue NW for the vote.

The D.C. Council’s long summer recess started weeks ago, giving the city’s overpaid legislators a head start on all sorts of leisure. In the past, our reps have made the most of their two-month leave, including junkets to Africa, ballgames on their PAC’s dime, and, of course, the classic Rehoboth break.

But At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown remains at work, in a way that yesterday yielded huge PR benefits. Brown was conducting an anti-violence forum at the Verizon Center, an event that just happened to precede Beyonce’s much-anticipated appearance in the same venue. Well, the pop star, it turned out, had a few spare minutes before taking the stage and dropped in for a visit with the girls at the forum. According to the Washington Post, Beyonce was wearing “silver high heels, skinny jeans and a gray blouse and sporting Barbie-doll hair.”

Brown was wearing a big smile. None of his previous stunts—like riding with the recycling trucks, for instance—could challenge this one for publicity. Washington Post put the story on the front of its Metro section, and the Examiner ran a piece as well.

On Tuesday, during its last session of the summer, the D.C. Council quickly passed dozens of resolutions and laws, including two “emergency” bills designed to resuscitate major real-estate developments: a Center-Leg Freeway air-rights project that was originally approved almost two decades ago, and a West End project that involves the city selling fire, police, and library property to a private developer. Neither proposal is by any measure an emergency, but treating them as such allowed the Council to skip the messy public-hearing phase of representative government.

The West End bill came as a shock to many in that community. At the Tuesday session, members of the Council congratulated themselves on having held “public roundtables” on the two bills last week, but those meetings were scheduled so quickly and publicized so poorly that few citizens knew they had occurred. The Friends of the West End Library scheduled a public meeting with the potential redeveloper, Georgetown-based Eastbanc, for 10 a.m., Saturday, July 14—unaware that the project would be a done deal by then.

Technically, neither deal is complete. Both proposals, which were sent to the Council by Mayor Adrian Fenty, are planned unit developments, which means the final designs will require Zoning Commission approval. They’ll also need a second Council vote. And in the West End case, the price of the three city parcels (at 24th and L, 23rd and L, and 23rd and M NW), minus Eastbanc’s cost of building a new fire station and library, must be negotiated and submitted to the Council for final approval.

The inaccuracy of the Council members’ remarks on Tuesday, however, didn’t offer much hope that the legislators will be informed or vigilant when the projects require further review.

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At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown can chalk up a win for female power in the District government. Along the way, he got some sweet payback on a political rival as well.

On May 31, at the request of Mayor Adrian Fenty, Council Chairman Vincent Gray introduced a confirmation resolution for Narda Newby to serve on the D.C. Sports and Entertainment Commission.

Her nomination means that lobbyist and Fenty money bundler Max Brown can give up on his efforts to be nominated to the commission. In February, the lobbyist was nominated by Fenty to the powerful and perks-laden sports panel. But Councilmember Brown refused to hold a hearing on lobbyist Brown’s nomination, saying that he wanted more females to be named to commissions under the jurisdiction of his Committee on Economic Development.

Of course, Max Brown’s leading role in the campaign of former At-Large Councilmember Harold Brazil had absolutely nothing to do with Kwame Brown’s aversion to Fenty’s original choice.

“Max is a good guy who I’m sure has a lot to offer the city,” says Kwame Brown, sticking to his original story on why Max Brown was never considered by his committee. “We just want to make sure we have a diverse group on a board of directors,” he says. “I’m excited that the mayor is so committed to advancing diversity.”

You might think At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown and Mayor Adrian Fenty have reason to be political rivals. After all, Brown was a co-chair of the Linda Cropp for Mayor campaign. His father was a field operative for Cropp. Brown also spiked the nomination of one of Fenty’s fundraising wizards, lobbyist Max Brown, who was up for a plum post on the D.C. Sports and Entertainment Commission.

But relations between the mayor and Brown can’t be too bad. Fenty’s campaign strategist, Tom Lindenfeld, is among a select group of voters to have planted a Kwame Brown in ’08 sign in their yards.

Lindenfeld calls reports of tension between the two young politicians “overblown.” He doesn’t consider any differences between the mayor and councilmember so intense that he would back off from his political loyalties. “I’ve supported Kwame from the beginning,” says Lindenfeld. “Why should anything change now?”

Photograph of Sign (Not Lindenfeld’s) by Darrow Montgomery

When Vincent B. Orange Sr. was the councilmember from Ward 5, he never tired of talking about his biggest success. Orange claimed to have wrangled the Brentwood Home Depot during a trip to Las Vegas. For at least five years, the councilmember was part of the city’s delegation to the gambling mecca for the annual conference of the International Council of Shopping Centers.

But Orange’s departure from public life via a trouncing in the 2006 mayoral contest hasn’t meant his Vegas streak was broken when reps from Target, Kmart, and JCPenney gathered in Sin City this week

Orange was sighted in the D.C. Economic Partnership booth yesterday, representing his new employer, Pepco.

Orange could not be reached for comment, but At-Large Councilmember Kwame Brown, who is in Vegas this week, confirms that Orange was shaking hands and slapping backs in the Partnership’s 2,000-square-foot booth. It’s one job his new bosses didn’t have to train Orange for.