Or: Too good to be true?

I want to be clear from the jump that the following is so far nothing but hearsay. According to this Blue Virginia post left in one of our Linkalicious lists, some Republican activists who claim to have been at a recent gathering report that former delegate Dick “plastic fetus” Black has been “gladhanding” and talking about a 2011 run for the 33rd District Senate seat occupied by Mark Herring. Unless and until there is an announcement from a reputable source, this must be regarded as merely the bloggy gossip it is.

I do note, however: Given the current leadership of the Loudoun County Republican Committee, which even prominent GOP activists  refer to as “wingers” and “Jesus nuts” (the latter seems terribly unfair to Jesus; my far more accurate suggestion would be “Farrisees”), the likelihood of primary support for Mr. Black is high, were he actually to run.  Recent history supports this as well; first, they gave us former Sugarland Run District supervisor (and Dick Black’s own son-in-law) Mick Staton. Next, it was Concerned Women for America state director Patricia Phillips (Dick Black’s wife is a big CWA activist.  As far as I can tell, the group’s activity in Loudoun is limited to harassing the school board for acknowledging the existence of gay and lesbian people.)

Maybe the GOP thinking will be that these two Dick Black stand-ins were resoundingly spanked at the polls for not actually being Dick Black.

Also, the independent committee to retire Dick Black back in 2005 has made a re-appearance, or at least the archived website has –  I suppose as a kind of memorial to those good times.

Bonus comic material: A description of the apparent event at which Mr. Black is alleged to have made these statements, found on the website of an “Emy Flor Delgaudio.” This person is the new wife of Richard A. Delgaudio (by her own statement, married to him the day after arriving from the Phillipines). Richard A. Delgaudio is of course the brother of Eugene Delgaudio – the brother who was caught photographing sex acts with a 16 year old girl in Baltimore. Seriously, people. The post is very long, and in a style very similar to a Delgaudio fundraising letter, and contains this paragraph, which I find by turns chilling and hilarious:

I am very excited today to be an American by choice, not accident of birth, writing a blog (with help from my teacher and husband) about American exceptionalism.

Frankly, it’s sometimes hard to believe that the whole thing isn’t an elaborate parody. But I don’t think it is.

This week, I’ve been reading about Aiyana Stanley Jones, a 7-year-old girl killed by police while she was asleep in her living room.7-Year-Old Girl Killed By Detroit Police While Sleeping in Her Home The bare bones of the story.

There Is No Justice For Aiyana Adrienne talks about the vigil.

Aiyana Jones, 7-Year-Old Shot And Killed By Detroit Police, Was Sleeping According To Family HuffPost has more.

Silence Delia asks us to think about how and why this could happen.

Given that we have just sent a crew of R’s to the House of Delegates, I don’t see permission to switch to a county income tax from the property tax model coming anytime soon, but I do think that that is ultimately the answer to giving the county a reliable and fair taxing structure that doesn’t penalize low and fixed income property owners or those that have fallen on hard times.As I said in this comment on the roads thread:

Loudoun Interfaith Relief has seen a sharp increase in the number of people seeking food assistance.

More children than ever are qualifying for free lunch in our schools.

The number of people out of work for over a year is at a record high.

We have people in real distress.

Meanwhile, it is absolutely the case that we also have fabulous wealth in the county…And this is why an income tax is fair and a property tax isn’t.

I do feel that there are people who can afford to pay more, and an income tax would enable that.

I also feel that the (admittedly regressive) meals tax should have passed if as many people who are upset about the cut to schools had voted for that tax – which was clearly stated on the ballot as being reserved for school funding…but it failed by over 70%. So there is definitely a disconnect in people’s priorities.

Again, if you want to pay more in taxes than you are currently getting billed, you are absolutely allowed to do.

Our Board of Supervisors does all they can to gather input from the community before making important decisions about development. The hearings they hold are an opportunity to make your voice heard and influence how our county grows. Just in the past couple weeks, there have been hearings about Kincora and pedestrian traffic, for example.

This runs counter to the input philosophy of the previous Board of Supervisors, who saw the input of developer cash to their campaign coffers as the more important form of public input.

Which is why it is important for neighbors to come to a hearing tomorrow night on the next stage of the Dulles Town Center.

Dear Neighbor,

Please join us for an important community meeting on the Dulles Town Center rezoning proposal on Tuesday evening at 7pm.  The applicant, DTC Partners, will provide an update and answer your questions on their proposed development.  County staff will also be available to answer questions.  Many citizens in our district live in or near the Dulles Town Center property, and this community meeting will give you an opportunity to ask questions and provide your input.

Dulles Town Center has been designated as Loudoun’s urban center in the county’s Comprehensive Plan for many years.  The proposed development would fulfill this planned vision by rezoning portions of the land surrounding the Dulles Town Center mall to create a mixed use Urban Center with multi-family residences, retail, and office buildings.

Meeting details are listed below:

   * Date: Tuesday, May 18, 2010

   * Time: 7:00 p.m.

   * Location: Sterling Office, 21641 Ridgetop Circle, Suite 100, Sterling

There’s a map to the meeting below the fold.The proposed development at DTC, as noted in the announcement above, is different from developments like Kincora in that it is part of, and in line with, the Comprehensive Plan. The Dulles Town Center area is designed for high-density, mixed-use development, and is capable of managing the growth that comes with that development.

Next year the battles over development will be fought again as all of the Supervisors seats are up for re-election. It is likely that not all of the Supervisors will actually run for re-election, so we can expect that the developers and their allies who lost in 2007 will be focusing their efforts in 2010 to build campaign materials and tactics for next year. These opening skirmishes in campaign 2011 are fought at hearings like the one tomorrow night. That means we need to be there to hold the ground won three years ago, and insure that we do development well not willy-nilly.

Here’s a map to the hearing:

View Larger Map

Bus routes I think would be popular and cost effective:

One that goes to the George Mason campuses. It’s perfectly ridiculous that there isn’t a reasonable way to get to that campus via public transportation, unless you go to West Falls Church and get on the bus there….a two-hour trip.

A local bus or buses that could take people from Leesburg, Sterling, and all the HOA centers to AOL, Verizon, Orbital, Dulles Town Center, and other major businesses.

A bus route to take people to Herndon and Reston (there’s already one to take people to Tysons!)The only way to accomodate more people on our roads is to try to get as many folks as possible out of their cars and onto mass transit. And the only way to do that is to have routes that are varied and useful.

We know who our major employers are. We know where our major residential centers are. It’s not too hard to map out what routes would be busy enough to warrent regular bus service.

Don’t forget to sign up to help out with the Relay For Life!

A choice quote from Loudoun’s own David Waldman.

The convenient fiction of the “secret hold” is that one’s fellow Senators agree not to hold an objecting Senator’s obstruction against him personally, so long as he contends that he’s objecting on someone else’s behalf. But why would anyone allow this fiction to continue? An objection is an objection, and it extinguishes an unanimous consent request just as surely as if the Senator allegedly objecting in secret had done it himself. So why permit obstructionists to hide behind a colleague’s cloak? – There’s No Such Thing As The Secret Hold

Weekend links follow.

• Just When You Thought The Virginia GOP Couldn’t Get Any Crazier – Dick Black eyes a comeback.
• Quality of Child Care Linked to Academic Achievement: Behaviors Persist Into Adolescence – As a parent looking into pre-school for our daughter, this one caught my eye. Of course, I believe HeadStart or an equivalent should be available to everyone.
• There’s No Such Thing As The Secret Hold – David Waldman once again advocates common sense in the face of Senate tradition.
• Message To Democrats – If you’re someone who gets frustrated with Democrats who vote against things like health care reform, don’t give up, support primary opponents for those Democrats!

As people who have become active in the past decade or so, we get tons of email from various organizations asking us to sign this petition or fax that senator, not to mention the constant “send $10” requests. In some cases, we even sign this, or send that if the request strikes us so.

Follow below the fold for some of the progressive solicitations we’ve actually responded to recently.

• Move The Game, MoveOn.org – I am a big baseball fan, and I believe that MLB should move the all-star game out of Arizona in response to the new immigration law there, since many of the players on the field would qualify for the “reasonable suspicion” request for ID papers.
• One click support for Employment Non-Discrimination Act – according to reports from the Hill, there are now more than enough votes to pass an inclusive ENDA, and it will soon be moving forward. Here’s a brief piece from Roll Call about why this is needed, and needed yesterday.

Despite the news that Loudoun will receive a mere $1,024 for fiscal 2011-2016 from the state, people living near roads slated for improvements were elated that supervisors still would move forward with plans. – Loudoun Times-Mirror

One of the things that has impressed me while I’ve lived in Leesburg and Loudoun is the fact that our roads have improved over the past ten years in spite of the state government. Local funds and developer proffers have been used creatively to make sure that critical interchanges and throughways were built to help alleviate the crushing burden of traffic we experience every rush hour. Meanwhile, the Republican-controled General Assembly tries to ignore the problem.

This year, a significant decline in fuel consumption, vehicle sales, registrations and the state’s sales tax collections has drained funding for Loudoun, VDOT officials said.

County leaders and members of the General Assembly are asking Gov. Bob McDonnell to call a special session to address the state’s transportation woes.

McDonnell campaigned on promises to fix the state’s transportation problems, but so far has failed to do so, they say.

“I hope everyone understands the sad state of affairs we’re in with this six-year program,” said Loudoun Supervisor Jim Burton (I-Blue Ridge). “I just wish that the General Assembly would get its act together. Funding for these projects are the responsibility of the state and they haven’t stepped up.” – Loudoun Times-Mirror

In case you missed it, Supervisor Burton is referring to the fact that the state will be providing just under $171 per year for “secondary” roads in Loudoun over the next six years. For reference, that’s about what a commuter pays to ride the Greenway for three weeks.  I put the word secondary in quotes above, because what is secondary to Richmond is not secondary to you and me.

“There are areas of the commonwealth where their primary roads are what we would consider secondary roads,” Connaughton said. “And no matter what we do we will never be able to keep up with the subdivisions. We don’t have the resources and we don’t have the crews. VDOT’s down to 7,000 folks.” – Leesburg Today

Of course, roads (secondary and otherwise) have been built through local initiatives in Loudoun for years. Indeed, the proffer system has been invaluable in our ability to get the essential arteries of our area built. It was only last year that Assembly Republicans tried to kill even that!. Had we lost the ability to negotiate proffers from developers, Loudoun would have become impossible to traverse as new developments came without needed roads.

This history didn’t stop Gov. McDonnell’s Secretary of Transportation from coming to Loudoun to lecture us on doing more, however.

Connaughton said the biggest thing to help transportation is going to be localities partnering with the state to create funding.

“One thing you’re going to see is trying more and more to get localities to take up the burden of road building,” Connaughton said. “We just don’t have the resources to continue to meet the need. – Leesburg Today

Apparently, Secretary Connaughton is ignorant of how we’ve been doing things here for the past twenty years. We already are building our own roads, far more than the state is! Furthermore, it is remarkably disingenuous to say that “we just don’t have the resources” when it is the Governor’s own party that refuses to provide the resources.

Chairman York pointed out an inconvenient reality at that same event.

Funding for transportation projects locally would be difficult, if not impossible to sustain for Loudoun, York added.

“As long as we have a need for school construction, there’s really no capacity to start adding bond referenda,” he said. – Leesburg Today

The Governor and his administration are asking the county to put its good credit on the line to fulfill a responsibility the commonwealth has abdicated, even though the commonwealth continues to expect the county to send the same level of taxes and resources to Richmond. Our Supervisors are doing the best they can to keep up with our transportation needs, but the county is facing hundreds of millions of dollars in deficits each year, and being forced to choose between traffic and schools because the Assembly is playing politics with both is unconscionable.

But hey, at least we sill get to buy our liquor at state-run ABC stores.

(With a tip-o-the-hat to Loudoun County Traffic for the articles that inspired this post.)

Rosalind Helderman of the Washington Post Virginia Politics blog tells us that Governor McDonnell is creating a new prisoner reentry initiative:

McDonnell signed an executive order establishing a Prisoner Reentry Council, headed by [Marla] Decker and the state’s first prisoner reentry coordinator Banci Tewolde. Membership will also include representatives of 16 government agencies. The group has been asked to come up with a blueprint for its work on July 1 and a new strategy by Dec. 31.

The initiative is “designed to help Virginia attack a recividism rate that now stands at 29 percent.” According to a Catholic Eye article on evaluating reentry programs from just last month, the national recidivism rate is 60-70 percent – so that rate seems remarkably low to begin with. It will be important to carefully evaluate the Virginia plan. The article cites the criteria for such an evaluation, noting that there are many claims of successful programs but very little rigorous evaluation or data that supports those claims.  These basic minimum criteria are taken from the text Crime: Public Policies for Crime Control:

A rigorous evaluation requires four things to be done: First, people must be assigned randomly to either the prevention program or a control group…Second, the prevention must actually be applied. Sometimes people are enrolled in a program but do not in fact get the planned treatment. Third, the positive benefit, if any, of the program must last for at least one year after the program ends. It is not hard to change people while they are in a program; what is difficult is to make the change last afterward. Fourth, if the program produces a positive effect…that program should be evaluated again in a different location.

My concern about the potential for abuse of this initiative is due to the presence of Prison Fellowship Ministries as a tax-exempt organization in our county. The close ties of the governor to PFM – he appointed as a policy analyst Mark Earley Jr., who “previously worked with Prison Fellowship Ministries, where his father is president and CEO,” and the elder Mark Earley is also of course the former Virginia attorney general who happened to accompany the governor on his pre-inauguration visit to a Virginia jail. The affinity of both the governor and the current attorney general for sectarian religious approaches to public policy is well known. I would not be at all surprised to learn that PFM had already been named as the initiative’s sole service provider in a private arrangement.

Prison Fellowship Ministries was granted tax exempt status by our Board of Supervisors in early 2004, and would otherwise be paying around $250,000 per year in property taxes on its large headquarters in Ashburn. If there were evidence that the kind of program the organization administers were effective, this would all be less concerning, but that evidence simply doesn’t exist.  What does exist, however, is evidence that PFM has grossly misrepresented outcome data in order to claim success and garner political support.  For example, the apparent stunning success of PFM’s InnerChange Freedom Initiative was gleefully announced by then-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, along with a White House photo-op; here was proof that the kind of sectarian faith-based programs favored by the Bush administration were the answer. But when those results were examined, it turned out that the InnerChange participants were actually more likely than controls to be rearrested, and “noticeably more likely” to be reimprisoned. When reporting the results of the program, PFM had compared recidivism rates of only those inmates who had completed their program with the recidivism rates of all participants in the comparison programs – including those who dropped out, were kicked out, or got parole.

InnerChange started with 177 volunteer prisoners but only 75 of them “graduated.” Graduation involved sticking with the program, not only in prison but after release. No one counted as a graduate, for example, unless he got a job. Naturally, the graduates did better than the control group. Anything that selects out from a group of ex-inmates those who hold jobs is going to look like a miracle cure, because getting a job is among the very best predictors of staying out of trouble… Naturally, the non-graduates did worse than the control group. If you select out the winners, you leave mostly losers. [Emphasis added]

This is a methodological no-no called selection bias. The less polite term for it is “cooking the books.”

Researcher Dan Mears, of the Florida State University College of Criminology and Criminal Justice, has reviewed many such claims – and singled out PFM for criticism.

Unfortunately, anecdotes are many and clear answers few in the spate of methodologically flawed research currently being offered up to policymakers as proof of efficacy, concluded Mears and fellow reviewers at the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C. “Despite the call for evidence-based programs and policies instead of belief- and emotion-driven ones, current faith-based prisoner reentry programs don’t remotely constitute evidence-based practice,” Mears said.

As an example, Mears cites the Prison Fellowship Ministries, founded by Charles Colson, the former Nixon aide who became a born-again Christian while imprisoned for his part in the Watergate scandal. Colson has touted the success of his ministries based on studies that show lower recidivism rates among participants. However, Mears noted that the studies focused only on inmates who completed the program, while comparing its recidivism rates to those of all participants-including dropouts-of selected secular programs.

In fact, if recidivism rates in Colson’s programs were revised to include all participants, “graduates” or not, results would be worse than those for the comparison groups. Where successes might be construed to exist, it’s unclear what to credit-the computer and life skills classes or its fundamentalist Christian doctrine. Where recidivism increases among its program participants, did faith-based programming play a part by leading some inmates to believe that ultimate responsibility for their actions lies with God, not them? Like arguments that faith-based programs decrease recidivism, this possibility remains to be demonstrated empirically.

“Unquestionably, faith-based programs that rely exclusively on volunteers and require no in-kind contributions from correctional systems entail few costs,” Mears said. “Yet, important questions remain about what exactly a faith-based program is, why such programs should be expected to be effective and whether they are, and not least, particularly where some degree of coercion is possible, the appropriateness of using any taxpayer dollars for religious programming.”

The costs, in our case, are already being borne by Loudoun taxpayers. “Coercion” is yet another problem with the Prison Fellowship Ministries record, a problem that will be explored in a later post.

It’s shaping up to be a very nice weekend. What better way to support your community than by attending one of the many farmer’s markets sponsored by the Loudoun Valley HomeGrown Markets Association.

Whether you’re in Ashburn, Brambleton, Cascades, Leesburg, or Purcellville, there are plenty of local farms selling fresh produce, breads, and meats, among other items, for your refrigerator or pantry.

And if you can’t get out to one of these locations, how about trying Loudoun Flavor, a “virtual” local farmer’s market, where you can buy local, on-line, and pick up your order at various Loudoun locations.

Buy Fresh, Buy Local!