C A P I C O S T I A

In her National Review Online column, Michelle Malkin says, "...Mrs. Obama leveraged her hubby’s Senate victory to snag a lucrative seat on the corporate board of directors of TreeHouse Foods, Inc. despite having zero experience in the industry...", among oth ... er accusations. Most people, who sit on these boards (including myself) have little or no prior experience in whatever business their board oversees. Just the same, Michelle Malkin thinks we should ignore that and hate Mrs. Obama for it..and for anything that marks her as successful, upper class or otherwise extraordinary. [A U.S. president's wife is automatically 'upper class', even without a billion dollars. Sorry?] Political ideology aside, what I reject is the suggestion in Malkin's column and past scribblings that the Obamas weren't already successful and extraordinary,  before they moved into the White House -Malkin's subtextual cues that they don't belong there..and are stealing f

The newly renovated Washington Star building in Southeast -soon to be CFSA headquarters. (From JDLand.com ) [May 11, 2012, Washington, D.C.] Today, D.C. Child and Family Services Agency, once slated for a move next door to the Benning Road Metrorail Station, has confirmed it will be moving into a newly renovated, Near Southeast building that once headquartered the  Washington Star newspaper, this August -right on schedule.  When all the vans have been unloaded, the lights switched on and computers set-up in the old Star offices, Benning area and East-of-river residents will surely recall the big move's one, silent casualty: the  $108 million mixed-use Benning Station project , gutted and left for dead in 2010, by the D.C. Office of Property Management ex-director, Robin-Eve Jasper. In 2009, the real estate blog, DC Mud, reported that developer and Fenty Administration friend, Ben Soto, had invested eleven million dollars into pre-development of Benning Station, which stood to i

[May 7, 2012 from DCUM Weblog] "David Grosso's last name means 'big' in Italian. True to form, he has taken on a big challenge in running against two well-known incumbents in the At-Large DC Council race. Moreover, Grosso's solutions to the District's problems are..." Have a look, Capicostia. Mel

Union Square at 941 North Capitol Street, NE, currently hosts the Office of Tax and Revenue Customer Service Center (photo from Wikimedia Commons)   My once very strong desire to see Penn Branch Center renovated into a small 'town center', with condos, has evolved. There was a time, when I could imagine a new shopping complex resembling newly renovated Fox Chase in Alexandria, Virginia; I still can, truthfully, but not sure that would best serve Penn Branch and surrounding areas. I just do not think, with new developments on the horizon, like Capital Gateway (also in Ward Seven), promising to fatten the city's coffers with more annual revenue than Penn Branch can presently generate, that having a stable taxbase of modestly well-off retirees and hard-working, middleclass families will be enough to keep local politicians interested in our concerns.  What's needed at the corner of Pennsylvania and Branch Avenues is a large, important government building and pu