Inauguration Day is still two months away, and you can already sense the panic among public officials in the Metro D.C. area.
Yesterday, the D.C. Examiner reported that Inauguration-related expenses might bust the District’s budget:
Soaring costs expected to accompany huge crowds in town for the Jan. 20 inauguration of Barack Obama could stick cash-strapped Washington, D.C., with a record-breaking bill for services.
Security and capacity measures recommended by the District’s congressional delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton and others will almost certainly surpass the $15 million the federal government gives to the District each year to defray the cost of events, Norton said.
In 2005, with an estimated 300,000 in attendance, the second inauguration of President Bush cost the city more than $17 million, some of which was reimbursed with federal funds. This year, officials estimate nearly five times that many people for the swearing in of President-elect Barack Obama.
Police Chief Cathy Lanier expects to use an additional 4,000 police officers from all over the country in addition to her 4,000-member force, she said earlier this month. The city’s inaugural budget allows for only 3,000 extra uniformed officers.
“There will be an additional amount necessary to handle the unprecedented crowds, and I am now working with my colleagues to deal with that amount,” Norton said, adding “it’s an outrage to have costs incurred for federal events.”
Norton recommended to the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies the opening of private sites off the Mall, such as the Verizon Center and Nationals Park, to accommodate visitors without a ticket to the official events.
Use of the Verizon Center alone would apparently cost as much as $ 200,000, and that apparently doesn’t include the cost associated with police and other public safety coverage for the venue.
Metro, meanwhile, is anticipating crowded trains:
The Washington Area Metro Transit Authority announced today that it will run rush hour service for 15 consecutive hours from 4 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Inauguration Day Jan. 20, but the authority will charge riders off-peak holiday fares, the Post’s Lena Sun reports. Metro will be open from 4 a.m. Jan. 20 until 2 a.m. Jan. 21, to handle commuters after the inaugural balls, General Manager John Catoe announced at a board meeting. (Here is the full announcement from Metro.)
Metro is expecting to move 1.6 million people on Inauguration Day, which would double the previous high of 850,000 on July 11. That number includes rail and bus service. The authority will issue 35,000 SmarTrip commemorative cards with a picture of Barack Obama, which can be purchased for $10 apiece on a special Web site that will be set up Friday and can be found by going to www.wmata.com. Commuters can then add value to the cards, which will come with no value, at the stations, and move quickly through the fare gates.
Meanwhile, the question of what to do about schools in Northern Virginia on January 20th is still being debated:
When President-elect Barack Obama is sworn in Jan. 20, some local teachers, parents and children want to be there.
But as of right now, most of them will be in the classroom.
Prince William County Schools are scheduled to be open on Jan. 20, but some local parents and teachers are asking the School Board to change that.
At Tuesday’s board meeting, one parent, Tracey Brooks, said she hoped the School Board would make inauguration day a holiday, now and in the future.
“The experience and impact of actually participating in an event is far more educational and valuable than just watching it on television or hearing about it from others,” Brooks said.
She’s not the first parent to ask, board members said.
“We have all received a number of e-mails about this,” Grant Lattin, board representative from Occoquan, said at the meeting.
As it stands now, students who are attending the inauguration can take an excused absence to do so, school officials said.
But the date falls in the middle of high school exams and is a scheduled parent-teacher conference day for elementary schools, where a half-day is currently scheduled.
And a school board policy could prevent teachers and school staff members from taking leave that day, which falls the day after Martin Luther King Jr. Day, already a school holiday, Prince William Education Association president Bonnie Klakowicz said at the meeting.
“I suggested to Dr. [Stephen L.] Walts that we declare Jan. 20 a snow day,” Klakowicz said.
<sarcastic>Because, of course, the Prince William County School Board is very conservative in using snow days.</sarcastic>
My take ? Keep the schools open, let the kids watch the ceremonies from school. There’s no reason to close down schools for the day, especially since most of the students will end up staying home rather than going downtown.
