"While we have a budget for protests, we don't have this kind of money," Gray told NewsChannel 8.

[Gray spokeswoman Doxie] McCoy said asking the federal government for reimbursement is routine, and that Congress or the Department of Homeland Security typically reimburses the city for costs related to major events, such as inaugurations. She said the city isn't sure which agency they'll request reimbursement funds from.

Abe Rakov, a spokesman for Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D-D.C., said the federal government pays D.C. about $15 million a year to cover costs related to demonstrations and other federal events.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

When I was looking at the Tuesday wire service photographs from the Oakland City Hall grounds, the violent protest images were not in the mix because that confrontation had not yet occurred.  The late-night, violent protest was in response to the Tuesday eviction by the Oakland police.

Even though the story, written later in the evening, included information about the arrests and tear gas, no news images had moved by our production deadline, probably because Oakland is on Pacific time–a three-hour difference.

The photograph was chosen because it was a visual "moment" in time showing a police officer doing something interesting–not just walking through tents and trash.  The wire service images that moved overnight and this morning offer a much different look at last night's protest.

Credit should go to the Post for acknowledging the criticism and engaging it in a transparent way. But I'm not moved by McKaye's explanation. I understand deadlines, but considering that they actually had copy that indicated there was violence happening, the larger context should have been considered in picking the photo—or maybe, as Jason Linkins wrote, there shouldn't have been a image at all.

1000 Block Jefferson Drive, SW.   Jan. 31st.  © 2011 Matt Dunn

During the lunch hour today, protesters gathered outside the Pepco Building chanting for clean energy policies. Tensions between the protesters and D.C. Police intensified with individuals entered the building. Chants inevitably turned to the classic "fuck you pigs!"

*Video by Ryan J. Reilly.

Then you might join a group of carolers tonight gathering at 7 p.m. outside the Bank of America branch at 1501 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, right across from the Treasury building. Instead of "Feliz Navidad," they'll be singing "Fleeced and Robbed." Rather than "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen," there's "God Help Ye Greedy Bankers." Or "Go Tell It to the Homeless."

The anti-fat-cat carols were the brainchild of Denise Bowyer, 53, an insurance exec from Mount Pleasant. "This is the week that all the banks are announcing their big bonuses for their top earners, " she explains. "They've taken all this money...and we wanted to come up with a creative way to catch people's attention."

So she sat down with the carols and "started to tinker." Some of the rewrites are more faithful than others. Take the "Seven Days of Fleecemas." Says Bowyer, "I thought 12 might be too long. I couldn't come up with 12 verses that rhyme." Close enough!

If you're not in D.C. this evening, you may still be in luck. The group is affiliated with Americans for Financial Reform, and Bowyer says she's sent the lyrics out to dozens of other groups across the country. Tonight, rallies are planned in cities including Chicago, Denver, Richmond, San Francisco, and more.

Photo Credit:

"There will be no tea-dumping in the Potomac River — that's illegal — but organizers of today's national tea party tax protest found out this morning that so is their plan to dump a million tea bags in Lafayette Square to demonstrate displeasure at government spending and tax policies.

Protesters, using a rented truck to haul the million tea bags, began unloading their cargo at the park this morning but were told by officials that they didn't have proper permits and must move the tea. They complied with the order but are still considering what to do with the load."

Hilarious. Politico had reported that a lot of the establishment Republicans weren't so inclined to join the tea parties that are allegedly taking place all over the country. Paul Krugman has called the tea party fake trend "embarrassing."

12:07 update: MSNBC is reporting that organizers have told them that the presenting of the tea bags will take place at libertarian think tank instead of Lafayette Square. Big time letdown. Salon's Mike Madden is twittering crazy quotes from the protest(s).

12:35 p.m.: From Madden: "MCs now pleading with counterprotesters to clear out from in front of stage."

Sounds shocking, but a few things don't get mentioned, or get mentioned very briefly, in most press accounts.

First off, UDC has never made a very good distinction between its two-year community college and workforce development programs and its four-year baccalaureate degree-granting programs. The tuition hike is part of a plan to improve that situation. Second, this tuition hikes would only affect the four-year students. Under the new plan, students enrolled in two-year, community college classes would pay the old rate—$3,000.

While it's noble to speak of UDC's mission as providing a "quality and affordable education for residents of the District of Columbia"—as UDC student Joshua Lopez told WaPo this week—it's very hard to argue is that all its students are getting a quality education now. And $7,000 in-state yearly for a college degree still qualifies as affordable, compared to other state universities in this part of the country.

LL sees the facts this way: UDC has continually underwhelmed throughout its 35-year history, in no small part because of money. It's done only token, if any, private fundraising, it's never managed its budget well, and, especially, during the control board era, it's never been given the operating subsidy it needs.

Now UDC's programs and reputation aren't going to improve immediately, and students may not decide that $7,000 for a UDC education is worth it. But students can vote with their feet: Thanks to the federally funded Tuition Assistance Grants, D.C. residents can attend any public university at in-state prices. Or they can remain in community college programs.

UDC President Allen Sessoms doesn't expect that to happen, though. In an interview with LL earlier this month, he said, thanks to the economy and changes in programs, he expected UDC's enrollment to rise from about 5,500 this year to about 7,000—4,000 in four-year degree programs, the rest in community college classes.

Lest LL open himself up for ad hominem attacks, some full disclosure here—LL attended a very expensive private university, financed largely by his parents' savings. So he probably isn't the guy to stand up and say to UDC students: Hey, you need to take on a whole bunch more debt!

But the reality is that the status quo can't support making UDC what it needs to be. The alumni and other private support isn't there; the governmental support certainly isn't going to improve anytime soon, so if UDC is ever going to improve, things have to start with tuition.

LL reported Friday, and the Examiner reported today, about Cheh's proposed bill, which aimed to give police the ability to put the kibosh on allegedly hostile protests by a group called Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty. Labor and civil-rights groups raised immediate questions.

She did not cite those concerns this morning, when, at a council press conference, Cheh told reporters she won't be pressing the issue at tomorrow's council meeting. She explained that she has met with police and there's been an effort to clarify how existing laws can be enforced. "Given that there's been movement there," she says, "what I will do is I will not move forward on Tuesday."

Cheh says she still plans to explore permanent legislation when the new council term begins in January.

He just spoke to John Boardman, a leader with Local 25 of UNITE HERE, a union representing hotel and restaurant employees. He and his union's membership were key in getting the noise bill heavily amended.

Though neither he nor anyone else has seen the legislation that Cheh plans to introduce next week, he raised some general concerns about restricting protests at private homes. Says Boardman, "I can think personally of any number of times where on any given issue being in front of someone's house is very powerful."

For instance, he cited "a landlord who is a slumlord who lives in a mansion in another part of town. Are you saying that tenants living in squalor can't go to that residence?" He also raised an example from his own experience, when protesters "picketed the house of someone who had a homeworker who hadn't been paid....There's nowhere else you can go."

Boardman noted that if protesters are trespassing or threatening violence, "Those are two violations of law, and...there's a remedy already prescribed by law. You don't take away free speech generally because of an issue espoused by a single group."

"I don't understand this, I really don't," he says. "This is a very sensitive issue for us. The one thing working people have is a voice."

LL also spoke to Patrick Burke, assistant chief in charge of the D.C. police's homeland security division.

Burke spoke in general terms about the group whose behavior Cheh is trying to address—Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty. He didn't have many specifics about the group, other than that they tend to target "specific individuals." Their protests, he says, happen "sporadically."

"They've got right to be near the object of their protest so they can be seen and heard," he says. But any clarification regarding the rules for protesting at a residence are welcome, he says.

"The police department always wants to see things in black-and-white, " Burke says. "The clearer it is for us, the easier it makes out jobs."

Now prepare to revisit some similar ground: Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh yesterday informed her colleagues that she intends to introduce emergency legislation at next Tuesday's council meeting that would "prohibit targeted picketing of an individual's home in a residential neighborhood."

The proximate reason for such legislation, the notice reads, is that "[r]ecently a series of demonstrators have targeted individual home[s] in the District with loud, harassing, and abusive picketing practices."

Cheh, in an interview, says the protests in question have been by allies of an animal-rights organization called Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty. The group seeks to shut down Huntingdon Life Sciences, a multinational corporation that performs product-safety testing on animals, by targeting the company's customers, investors, or various other parties connected to its operations.

Cheh declines to name the targets of the "very hostile" protests, some of which have occurred in her ward. "They have the most remote, if any, connection to [Huntingdon]," she says. The protesters, she notes, "are very, very aggressive and they're scary....They yell at the people, bang on their doors, wear masks, and say you should die."

Police officials met with Cheh and informed her there is "a lot of ambiguity between what is permissible and what is not permissible" regarding protests at private homes, she says. A call to police regarding the protests has not been immediately returned.

A constitutional law professor (and, incidentally, an animal-rights supporter), Cheh says she intends to draw her bill up to pass legal muster—to wit, a 1988 Supreme Court ruling that a municipal ordinance passed by a Wisconsin town banning protests "before or about" a private residence was in fact proper.

Cheh says she plans to introduce permanent legislation when the next council term begins and, accordingly, hold public hearings. In the meantime, she says, the emergency measure is necessary. "I'm hoping to draw it up as precisely as I need to. This would be a very simple thing that would copy the [Wisconsin] ordinance as so far as it is constitutional."

Don't expect the local labor community to react too kindly. They succeeded in getting the noise bill severely watered down after targeting councilmembers with pickets and radio ads.

Here's one question LL has: What'll Jack Evans do? He's a reliable labor supporter and helped amend the noise bill—but he was also subjected to a early-morning residential protest on that very issue.

UPDATE, 3:55 P.M.: LL has reaction from labor and police sources.

If the sanctuary was largely filled with people concerned about the state of public education, the sidewalk outside the church was filled with folks who aren't letting go of Ayers' connection to the Weather Underground. Raoul Deming, a bearded, middle-aged man who drove to the event from Philadelphia, held up a sign reading, "AYERS LIED PEOPLE DIED NO JUSTICE NO PEACE." The end of the election cycle hasn't lessened his anger at Ayers' attachment to terrorist activity. "These people killed people," he says.

Conservative rageblog the Jawa Report has footage of Deming and a few other protesters in front of the church: