Howard Croft
Democrat, Ward 6
Candidate for Ward 6 DC CouncilmemberSpecial Election: April 29, 1997
Cover letter accompanying questionnaire response
Letter to Councilmember Patterson on Office of Human Rights
Response to GLAA 1997 Questionnaire
for Ward 6 DC Council Candidates
1. Do you support legal recognition of marriages between persons of the same sex?
Yes, and I will fight any efforts by Congress or elsewhere to deny "full faith and credit" rights to District citizens should the State of Hawaii legalize same sex marriages.
The benefits and responsibilities of marriage are too important a right to be denied people simply because of their sexual orientation. I know many same sex couples who are personal friends of mine whose relationships are as significant and valuable to society as any married couple's. I think that same sex marriage is something that would contribute significantly to the stability of our society and I look forward to working with the community to attain the recognition which same sex couples rightly deserve.
2. Will you oppose efforts by Congress or other parties to stop the District of Columbia from recognizing same-sex marriages performed in Hawaii or other places?
Yes. As I stated above, I will fight any effort to deny District residents this right.
3. Do you oppose efforts by Congress or other parties to outlaw or restrict adoptions by unmarried couples in the District of Columbia?
Yes, there are enough needy children and never enough loving and willing families who wish to adopt, especially children who are hard to place. I will work with GLAA, Congresswoman Norton and others, to insure that the DC Appropriations bill in this and future years does not include language which will tie judges hands from ruling what is in the best interest of the child, and awarding an adoption to a loving qualified family, including lesbian or gay families, is the type of ruling we want those judges to continue to make.
4. If Congress ever repeals the D.C. Health Care Benefits Expansion Act of 1992 that established the registration of domestic partnerships, will you vote to reenact the same law?
Yes, in fact, I would be proud to be the Councilmember who would reintroduce this measure should Congress strike it from the books. I think that we should also be working to expand these benefits if possible. We cannot wait forever for the political climate in Congress to change; we must all become active agents in change for the better and I look forward to working with the community to move pro-active measures forward to see to it that same sex couples receive the full benefits which they have earned like anyone else.
5. As a member of the Committee on Government Operations, you would have oversight responsibilities for enforcement of the D.C. Human Rights Law of 1977. Do you support the reestablishment of the Office of Human Rights as an independent, adequately-staffed, Cabinet-level agency whose Director has direct access to the Mayor?
Yes. I understand that Councilwoman Kathy Patterson has recently held a hearing on the OHR budget and that a reorganization plan if forthcoming as well from the Mayor. I have enclosed a letter which I sent to Ms. Patterson outlining my concerns about the Office: that the Office is is down to 2 investigators, down from a high of 12 investigators in 1990; that the person responsible for the rapid processing of complaints from PWAs has left the office and that position has not been refilled; that the program of 'mandatory mediation', which has been an effecient screening device to rapidly process cases that do not require full investigation is scheduled to lapse this month--I support reauthorization of this law on a permanent basis; that I oppose Mayor Barry's plan to submerge the Office within the personnel department; and that I support elevating the Office to an independent, Cabinet-level position with direct access to the Mayor. When I join the Council later this month I intend to get right to work. When OHR becomes a Cabinet-level agency I intend to ask prospective nominees hard questions--the routine "rubber stamping" of appointees is one of the many reasons our city is in the shape it is now. I very much look forward to having the community's input while serving on the Committee and my door will always be open to you. Ultimately it's cheaper for the City to run a fully functioning OHR than to have these cases end up in the courts where they will undoubtedly cost more to settle.
6. Do you agree that the Boy Scouts of America is violating the D.C. Human Rights Law's ban on discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation by excluding gays from participating either as scouts or as leaders?
Yes, and I was glad to see that the Office of Human Rights recently ruled against the BSA on two of three counts. Please let me know if there is any way in which I can weigh in in support of the community once this case goes to the Commission on Human Rights. I am happy to help in any way I can.
7. Will you vote to repeal the Armstrong Amendment, which allows religiously-affiliated private educational institutions in the District to discriminate against student clubs that promote equal rights for lesbians and gay men?
Yes. Although there is not an active effort at this time to repeal, I will be involved in the repeal effort once we all decide it's time we can move forward on this issue. I will work with Councilman Evans and others to actively draft Georgetown University as part of any repeal effort.
8. Will you oppose efforts by Congress or other parties to abolish or restrict the right of our public school students to form clubs that promote greater understanding between gays and others?
Yes, and it amazes me that any state, such as Utah, would choose to abolish all student clubs rather than recognize just one gay-straight student alliance. That's homophobia in its starkest form. Lesbian and gay children deserve better than that. I would like to see SMYAL, which is located in my Ward, work more actively in the DC schools and I'm willing to work to facilitate that end.
9. Do you agree that our own elected officials, past and present, bear much of the responsibility for the District's current financial plight because of their reluctance to make tough budgetary decisions, to establish priorities, and to demand maximum efficiency and productivity (rather than political loyalty) from all District government gencies and workers?
Yes. While the Home Rule Charter is distincly limited as an effective road map for self-government, we do have as a Council more than adequate powers to conduct aggressive oversight over City functions. Too many Councilmembers in the past have not chosen to use these powers, but as a Councilman I will use my vote, suboena powers and confirmation votes to challenge our government to change for the better and to provide city residents with the services the very much deserve and need.
10. As a member of the Committee on Human Services, you would have oversight responsibilities in the public health struggles against AIDS and breast cancer. It has recently been revealed that the District failed to spend $1 million of its own appropriated funds to combat AIDS in the last fiscal year, jeopardizing our city's federal funding from the Ryan White Act and contributing to the District's failure to award a contract for an effective needle exchange program. What will you do to safeguard against such bureaucratic bumbling by our health agencies?
It shouldn't be necessary for AIDS heroes like Hank Carde to file Freedom of Information Act requests with the DC government to find out exactly how much local money we have, or have not, spent to fight HIV/AIDS. It is shocking and disgraceful that the city government may have left over a million dollars unspent in FY '96. Not only are these monies desparately needed by sick and dying people, but the fact of their being unspent jeopardizes federal Ryan White AIDS funding which is predicated upon the concept of local "maintenance of effort" which as you know means that these emergency federal funds are not designed to replace local money--they are to supplement them. It is my understanding the Committee Chair Linda Cropp recently has requested a report from the Agency for HIV/AIDS about the City's "maintenance of effort" requirements and I look forward to scrutinizing and acting upon that report immediately upon taking office.
As a future member of the Committee on Human Services I will demand a monthly spread sheet and narrative describing the status of local disbursements and a full accounting of any problems the Department of Health is encountering. While we all need to understand that the District's overall financial structure is clearly disfunctional, we must also rise to the occasion and tackle these problems and work towards solutions. Because of this recent scandal, it is quite possible that we will need to confirm a new head of the Agency for HIV/AIDS. I will ask the hard questions and look forward to working with representatives of GLAA, the HIV/AIDS community and the community based service providers to work towards solutions.
You did not ask me about these concerns but I do also have concerns about how 'welfare reform' will affect PWAs and about seeing what we can do about increasing the local funding stream for the AIDS Drug Assistance Program--we need to do what we can to end the waiting list which currently exists for access to the new class of protease inhibitor drugs which are proving to be quite effective for many people living with AIDS.
11. Do you support the legalization of the medical use of marijuana when a patient's doctor recommends it as a means to combat the effects of AIDS, cancer, and other diseases when more conventional treatments for alleviating symptoms fail?
Yes. This should be one of many options that doctors and patients have to deal with treating AIDS. I am interested in learning more about Bill 12-12, "The Distribution of Marijuana Amendment Act of 1997" which was introduced by Councilwoman Jarvis, which seems to preemptively prohibit a medical marijuana program from moving forward here. That's the wrong approach it seems to me.
12. Do you support the condom availability programs that have been established in the District's public schools and prisons?
Yes. As someone who served on the Parole Board some years ago it seems plainly obvious to me that most incarcerated individuals will reenter the community at some point--given the rate of HIV infection in the corrections system, we must do what we can to stem the tide. I am concerned that the program in the prisons will be lost if we cede jurisdiction of the prison system to the federal government. That would be a big mistake.
Condom availibility programs gives us two important opportunities: to prevent the spread of HIV and to help educate people about having safer sex. These are both important goals that we should do everything we can to encourage. I fully support these programs in the public schools as well. Public health is everyone's responsibility.
13. In 1995, the Council summarily abolished the Civilian Complaint Review Board, thereby allowing the Metropolitan Police Depoartment to handle all public complaints about excessive use of force or abusive language by the police. Last year the Council failed to enact the Police Conduct Review Board Act of 1995, to establish an improved system for civilian review of such complaints against the police; the Council claimed there were no funds for establishing the new board. Will you vote to establish and fund the Police Conduct Review Board for FY 1998?
Yes, I support establishing an effective civilian complain review process based on an excellent proposal which was written by the ACLU. I was disturbed when the former Chair of the Committee on Judiciary summarily ended the program without notice. I am well aware of the problems associated with the old CCRB, most notably a lack of police cooperation with the process. Using a process similar to that now used at the Office of Human Rights, we can utilize "mandatory mediation" to screen and mediate the less difficult cases and utilize the resources of the new review system on those cases which truly mandate a full investigation. Ultimately the result of a more effective system will be greater confidence among various communities in the Metropolitan Police Department and this will enable greater cooperation with the department on community policing efforts and other strategies to fight crime. In other words, we will all benefit from such a program. The recent incident involving Justen Bennett-MacCubbin is one illustration of why such a review process is necessary. If we had one Mr. Bennett-MacCubbin would receive the apology he deserves from the MPD.
14. Do you support sensitivity and community relations training for all elements of our public safety system (police, fire department, etc.) that includes strong recognition of gay and lesbian community concerns, so that the District will never again tolerate the kind of insensitivity and incompetence reflected in the Fire Department's handling of the Tyra Hunter case and similar incidents?
Yes. I commend the work of Gay Men and Lesbians Opposing Violence (GLOV) and others throughout our city who have worked very hard over the last several years to design and implement sensitivity training for the MPD. It's a wonderful and too rare instance of the government and the community working together to solve a problem. It is not acceptable to me that a similar training program has not yet been implemented for the fire department. This simply must happen. Continued incidences, such as the one on P Street last year where two men were assaulted and denied medical treatment by emergency medical personnel indicate that this training needs to be implemented without delay. I will be a pro-active member of the Council who will meet with agency heads when problems arise and demand solutions; I will use suboena and other powers to solicit documents which will shed light on problems and work with my colleagues to design solutions.
On a related matter, I am concerned about how a federalization of our criminal code might impact such matters as the reformed sodomy statute and the hate crimes sentencing enhancement provisions now contained in District law. We must not allow an attractive bailout silence our concerns about negatively impacting the many positive things we have achieved here in the District.
15. Will you support legislation to authorize and regulate the issuance of liquor licenses to establishments (in designated nonresidential commercial districts) that want to offer nude dancing as entertainment?
Yes, although I am not aware that such legislation currently exists. Any establishment which serves liquor can cause problems with its neighbors. Pro-active community policing in all neighborhoods and allowing off duty MPD cops to moonlight as security guards are two ways in which we combat crimes that occur in entertainment districts. I don't see why establishments which offer nude dancing as entertainment should be singled out for a different class of treatment.
[signed]
Howard Croft
The Honorable Kathy Patterson
Chair
Committee on Government Operations
Council of the District of Columbia
1350 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20004
Dear Chairwoman Patterson:
I wanted to take the time to contact you with some of my concerns about the functioning of the Office of Human Rights and kindly ask you to submit this letter as part of the written record for the recent hearing you held in the Committee concerning OHR's budget for FY'97.
I am concerned that the Office is is down to 2 investigators, down from a high of 12 investigators in 1990. Ultimately it will cost the City more to have cases, which could be handled by the office, go through the court system, thus incurring all sorts of unnecessary costs. Good human rights laws without adequate enforcement mechanisms is a hollow promise, as I am sure you would agree. I look foward to working with you to insure that adequate resources are devoted to this function.
I also oppose Mayor Barry's plan to submerge the Office within the personnel department; and support elevating the Office to an independent, Cabinet-level position with direct access to the Mayor. I empathize with the difficulties the Committee has experience in gaining the details of the Mayor's plan but do feel that submerging the Office within personnel is the wrong direction. It's hopeful that there seems to be some backing off from this plan.
I'm concerned that the person responsible for the rapid processing of complaints from PWAs has left the office and that position has not been refilled. This is a problem that had been rectified but again demands our attention. Quite obviously, many PWA's do not have the luxury of time to process a civil rights complaint under the current functioning of the Office.
I support the program of 'mandatory mediation', which has been an effecient screening device to rapidly process cases that do not require full investigation and applaud your efforts to permanently enact this process into law. You have my complete support.
Thank you for your efforts; they are greatly appreciated. Please let me know if there is any way in which I may help you affect positive change in our City--it is a mission we both share. I can be contacted at my campaign office at 202/543-1700 should you have any questions.
Best regards.
Sincerely,
Howard Croft
Dear GLAA members,
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to participate in your candidate endorsement process. I had the honor of working with the lesbian and gay community many times over the years, most notably while working on the D.C. Constitution and during my campaign for the D.C. Democratic State Committee several years ago. I have lesbian and gay supporters working for me in my current campaign and I look forward to working with GLAA when I am Ward Six's Councilmember.
I have been a consistent and vocal supporter of lesbian and gay civil rights during the entirety of my political career, including supporting civil rights protections in the draft constitution our city adopted in the early 1980's. As a Professor of Urban Affairs at the University of the District of Columbia I am acutely aware of the contributions and stuggles of the lesbian and gay community and deeply appreciate the role the community has played in making up the multicultural quilt which blankets our city. I have lost friends and colleagues to AIDS and share that sense of frustration the community has in working towards effective AIDS programs in our city. As a former member of the Parole Board, I am accutely sensitive to the fact that people living with HIV/AIDS who are incarcerated require services in terms of both medical care and prevention efforts. I look foward to working with you on these and other issues.
I greatly appreciate your consideration of my questionnaire. I have taken the liberty of enclosing some of my literature from my campaign for your reference purposes. I intend to be a very active member of the Council and look forward to continuing our dialogue as a candidate and a Councilmember, and may be reached at my campaign headquarters at 202/543-1700.
Warm regards,
Sincerely,
Howard Croft