"For her to make comments like that, it’s stupid....She’s an angry woman.”

—Attorney General Peter Nickles, Oct. 25

In the vacuum created by the lack of a Fenty communications apparatus, Nickles has filled the void. The attorney general is always happy to talk—to the reporters he likes, anyway—and he's liable to toss off pithy, compelling, but often ill-advised quotes. After Hartsock's nomination was derailed, Nickles ordered her to stay in place for as long as 180 days, prompting Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh to refer to the Fenty regime as "almost becoming a lawless administration." Nickles went ad feminam, as above. The sexist undertones to the utterance led Nickles to deliver an apology to one of his most strident critics, accompanied by a bouquet of flowers.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

More from LL's Quotes of 2009

"I was mistreated. Not only me, but my entire heritage....If Marion Barry was a white person and I was a black person, there would be riots in the streets right now."

—Ximena Hartsock, parks and recreation director, Oct. 10

Warring between Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and the D.C. Council reached its apex on Oct. 6, when legislators voted down Hartsock’s nomination as parks-and-rec director. Fenty and top aides had done little to whip their votes ahead of time, but afterward, the blitz was on. Hartsock wasn’t shy about retroactively playing the race card, emboldened by ugly rhetoric on display at a prior hearing on the nomination—including Barry’s declaration that majority-black Washington needs “someone who understands our culture.” But the jawing of Latino activists wasn’t enough to get Hartsock her job back.

More from LL's Quotes of 2009

Jesús Aguirre, the new boss of the D.C. Department of Parks and Recreation (DPR), has quite a bit in common with the departing boss, Ximena Hartsock:

1) He's Hispanic;

2) He comes to DPR from a top post in the school system, where he worked as director of school operations; and

3) He's an interim director.

There's more to that third point than meets the eye. When mayors hold press conferences to announce their pick to head an agency, they usually send the name immediately to the D.C. Council for confirmation. Not so in this case, explained Mayor Adrian M. Fenty at a press conference this morning: The administration will wait a while before passing along Aguirre's credentials to the council.

In Fenty's own words: "We will make sure we have exhausted every avenue to make sure the person we submit is the best person for the job."

Odd, huh? Does that mean that the Fenty people don't have confidence in Aguirre? Not necessarily. What it does mean is that the mayor is committed to avoiding a repeat of the nasty showdown that ended with the rejection of Hartsock as the permanent director of the agency.

Hartsock is a Fenty favorite and was hastily placed at the top of DPR in April following the summary dismissal of Clark Ray. The council declined to confirm her appointment in large part because of its frustrations with the whole Fenty way of life—including stonewalling on crucial mayoral-legislative matters and its failure to heed council directives in the recreation realm.

Though Hartsock will no longer be calling the shots at DPR, she has landed a slot as an analyst in the office of the city administrator. Neither Fenty nor City Administrator Neil O. Albert denied that Hartsock is a strong candidate to head up the Children and Youth Investment Trust Corp., a quasi-governmental outfit that partners with both public and private entities to fund youth-related programs.

Reporting by Mike DeBonis

UPDATE, 12:20 P.M.: Some initial thoughts from Ward 5 Councilmember Harry Thomas Jr., who as chair of the parks committee, played the lead role in derailing Hartsock's nomination: "I don't know much about him; I don't know if he has a recreation background."

Thomas did credit Albert with bringing Aguirre by his office this morning, but, like many a frustrated legislator, he felt he should have had a role in the selection process that he's not exactly entitled to. "I wanted them to work with us to find someone with relevant experience" in a "transparent process," Thomas said.

The "recreation background" thing may or may not be a big deal; Thomas made great hay out of Hartsock's "lack of subject matter experience," and Aguirre likewise doesn't have any particular resume items in the field—he's been in education for his entire career. But, says Thomas, "I don't know if it's automatically a deal-breaker," saying he'd credit experience in "budgets, managing people and programs." That Aguirre certainly has done at DCPS, as the guy charged with making the trains run on time.

The fact that Aguirre is in on an interim basis, Thomas says, also gives him succor. He called upon Fenty to conduct a broader search in the coming months in order to get the "best of the best." —Mike DeBonis

The soon-to-be-ex-director of the city parks and recreation department might have been rejected by the D.C. Council, but Mayor Adrian M. Fenty has made no bones about declaring Hartsock to be a model municipal administrator deserving of continued government employment.

And yet, the confirmation battle has soured relations between Hartsock and several councilmembers, making any appointment to a council-confirmed post a futile exercise. But a solution may exist.

The rumblings are this: Hartsock's next stop in municipal government is likely to be as chief executive of the Children and Youth Investment Trust Corp. That is a quasi-governmental nonprofit that partners public and private entities to fund and oversee various youth programs. Crucially, the president/CEO post is appointed solely by the nonprofit's board.

Fenty last year asserted control over the body by ousting several high-powered board members and replacing them with close allies. After the power move, the board selected Millicent Williams, who had been Fenty's volunteerism head, as chief executive.

Williams departed late last month to take over the Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency; she's been replaced on an interim basis by longtime CYITC exec Ellen London.

The move would play to Hartsock's strengths—CYITC's focus is more purely on out-of-school youth programs (which was Hartsock's job as a top official for the D.C. Public Schools) than DPR's—while avoiding her political Achilles' heel.

Then again, perhaps not. Ward 5 Councilmember Harry Thomas Jr. tells LL that a Hartsock appointment "would lead to a tough funding situation" for businesses that partner with the CYTIC. "Funders would look at the controversy around her, and they would perceive her as not having the most positive relationship with the council," he says. (The agency's budget is overseen by Ward 6 Councilmember Tommy Wells, who voted for Hartsock's confirmation.)

Thomas, for the record, put in a good word for London: "Why doesn't this administration, instead of shuffling people around, look at people who have experience, who have worked at these agencies, and who have done good work?"

Hartsock's spokesperson had no comment on the matter. London tells LL she's heard nothing from board members except that a search would be undertaken. One board member tells LL that the Hartsock move is rumored but that the mayor has yet to pass any names to the board.

Today, the D.C. Wire reported that a five-member council delegation met with Mayor Adrian Fenty last night to discuss the standoff over Ximena Hartsock. A symbol of testy council-mayoral relations, Hartsock is Fenty's choice to helm the D.C. Department of Parks and Recreation. Following some discord among the council, Hartsock, and Fenty, however, the council voted against confirming Hartsock. The mayor responded by keeping Hartsock in place.

According to a source familiar with the meeting, the prevailing sentiment among the councilmembers in attendance (Chairman Vincent Gray and councilmembers David Catania, Mary Cheh, Harry Thomas Jr., and Muriel Bowser) was that Hartsock had to go.

Fenty, according to the source, assured that he was looking for her replacement but stressed that the search wasn't an easy one. The meeting ended with a promise: The mayor would replace Hartsock by Dec. 1, the source recalls.

Still, Fenty still couldn't help being Fenty.

At one point in the meeting, Fenty apparently told the councilmembers: "I want you to understand something—anything we agree to will not dictate my actions as mayor."

*photo by Darrow Montgomery.

Interim parks director Ximena Hartsock and her capital projects director had been asked to come to today's hearing on the matter, but they did not show.

That prompted Ward 5 Councilmember Harry Thomas Jr., chairing the inquiry, to announce at the hearing that he will be issuing subpoenas for the witnesses and related documents.

I know the fight between AG Peter Nickles and Councilmember Mary Cheh is getting a lot of play on City Desk. LL noted it. And our Weekend in Reviewer picked it up as well. I think it needs a third look. WaPo wrote on Sunday:

“It’s almost becoming a lawless administration,” said council member Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3). “They seem to have no limits or restraint on what they are willing to do.”

Attorney General Peter Nickles, who often speaks on behalf of the administration, said Cheh “has no idea what she’s talking about.” “For her to make comments like that, it’s stupid,” he said. “She’s an angry woman.”

What struck me was Nickles' blatant sexism (which DCist picked up on). Nickles' comment that "she's an angry woman" feels like he's channeling Mad Men. It's made all the more ironic considering that Nickles had played the race and gender card over the very topic he and Cheh are fighting about: Ximena Hartsock.

I don't care if Cheh is an accomplished lawyer/professor/councilmember. Nickles fights are getting increasingly personaly with Cheh. It's not doing him any favors.

Nickles owes Cheh an apology. He's a tough lawyer. He should be able to come up with a better retort than the tired "angry woman" cliche.

*photo by Darrow Montgomery.

Spoke to Wapo ed board folks about you today. Told them you are the most qualified person possible, that you have amazing capacity and that everything you do has your hallmark of excellence. They'll write a good piece for tomorrow.

Et voilà.

Ward 5 Councilmember Harry Thomas Jr. released a late statement this evening decrying the move: "Once again we are witnessing the flagrant disregard of our City's workforce....These are individuals with families, children, mortgages, and obligations. They are our neighbors and our fellow residents, and include many hardworking childcare service providers."

LL has heard rumblings, unconfirmed, that Hartsock's team at DCPS will be moving with her to Parks and Rec, where they will jointly administer DPR and DCPS programs this summer.

At a press conference this morning, Mayor Adrian M. Fenty announced the installation of former D.C. public schools principal Ximena Hartsock as the head of the Department of Parks and Recreation.

Hold on–that means someone was fired.

Yes, that was Clark Ray, who was nominated by Fenty in August 2007 to run DPR. True to the administration's workaholic ways, the dismissal wasn't done in accordance with any standard of work-life balance. City Administrator Dan Tangherlini brought Ray in for a talking-to on Sunday evening.

Said Fenty of the abrupt leadership change: "It was very clear we needed to shift gears." He said that the department's programming "needs to go to the next level." Fenty said that Ray would be moving to a job with the Greater Washington Sports Alliance.

As for Hartsock, she was principal of Ross Elementary School in Dupont Circle before getting pulled into the administration of DCPS Chancellor Michelle Rhee. There, she ran the office of "out-of-school" affairs, managing afterschool, summer school, and Saturday programs—about 30,000 students, said Hartsock. Hartsock faces questions about her suitability for the job, considering that her resume is big on stuff like bilingual education but short on parks stuff. "Managing summer school is like running a school system," said Hartsock at the press conference. Hartsock, a longtime resident of Arlington, will move to the District, as the law requires of agency directors.

At least one onlooker is puzzled by the move: "I just think he was a very responsive director," says Ward 5 Councilmember Harry Thomas Jr., who oversees the department. "He set a standard so I don't know what reason the administration had for letting him go.

Fenty was asked whether the dumping of Ray had anything to do with the controversy over his kids' participation in a city basketball rec league. Michael Williams, who administered youth leagues at DPR, claims in a recently filed lawsuit that he was dismissed from his job after raising questions about whether the Fenty children were playing in the proper age bracket.

Hizzoner had no trouble dodging this question. "That's a double no-comment, the first in the administration," he said, referring to the fact that the matter is both under litigation and concerns personnel.

Reporting by Mike DeBonis