front page - search - community 

ANC funding eliminated in compromise bill

(Published October 12, 1998)

By REBECCA CHARRY

Staff Writer

A compromise D.C. budget bill crafted last week by chairmen of the House and Senate D.C. appropriations subcommittees eliminates all funding for the 37 Advisory Neighborhood Commissions created by Congress in 1974 as part of the city’s home rule charter.

The compromise fiscal 1999 budget is attached to an omnibus spending package that includes appropriations for the Departments of Commerce, Justice, Interior, Labor and Energy. The non-amendable omnibus bill could come up for votes on the House and Senate floors this week, as Congress hurries to wrap up business and adjourn the session to allow time for re-election campaigning.

Under the bill, ANCs would lose $573,000 currently spent on office rent, phones, clerical staff, postage, copying and office supplies. Commissioners are elected for two-year terms but are not paid.

House appropriations subcommittee chairman Charles Taylor, R-N.C., said he decided to cut the funds after reading reports of ANC mismanagement and fraud in local newspapers and in reports requested from D.C. Inspector General E. Barrett Prettyman.

Prettyman’s letters, dated Aug. 27 and Sept. 29, detail long lists of ANC problems and suggest that "some tightening of the law governing ANCs would appear to be in order."

Prettyman noted in the letters, addressed to Senate D.C. appropriations committee chairman Lauch Faircloth, R-N.C., that constraints on staff and resources in the office of the D.C. auditor have cut back on the ability to audit ANCs thoroughly. He also noted that many ANCs do not spend all the money that is allotted to them and that many forfeit their allotments by not filing quarterly reports.

Among Prettyman’s suggestions for tightening oversight of ANC spending is transferring responsibility for auditing ANCs from the D.C. auditor to the inspector general.

The need for reform of laws governing ANCs has long been a concern of local elected officials and of many ANC commissioners, said D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, who led a recent unsuccessful fight to restore funding in Congress. A group of commissioners working with Norton in recent weeks visited Taylor, Faircloth and Rep. Thomas M. Davis III, R-Va., chairman of the House oversight D.C. subcommittee. Commissioners explained the work that ANCs do getting street signs put up, working with police and fighting unwanted businesses such as liquor stores.

The group also plans a list of suggested ANC reforms. Many ANC commissioners say they receive no training on record keeping.

"We fully acknowledge that there is need for reform in ANCs," said Barbara Zartman, president of the Federation of Citizens Associations who lobbied to restore ANC funding. "I’d be happy to work with the city council or Congress to come to a compromise."

Norton’s spokeswoman, Donna Brazile, said the delegate would "fight till the bitter end" to restore ANC funding as the clock ticks toward a final appropriation vote.

But some say it’s time the troubled institutions were put out of their misery. Others say the ANCs can continue to function even without funds for offices and supplies.

"I think the jobs of the ANC can be done out of people’s homes," said Westy Byrd, a former commissioner in ANC 2E. "Pick up the phone."

While ANC opinions on matters such as liquor licenses and zoning variances must by law be given "great weight" by city agencies, in reality ANCs have little clout, she said: "Great weight doesn’t exist."

Copyright 1998, The Common Denominator