The Washington Post - 05.11.2019

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TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 5 , 2019. WASHINGTONPOST.COM/REGIONAL EZ M2 B

JOHN KELLY’S WASHINGTON

From Beggar’s Night to

Mischief Night, a lot of

windows used to get

soaped. B3

MARYLAND

A jury awards $800,000

to a man who said he

was beaten by Six Flags

security guards. B5

OBITUARIES

French actress and singer

Marie Laforêt was known

for her piercing eyes and

50 ° 61 ° 62 ° 56 ° melancholy voice. B6

8 a.m. Noon 4 p.m. 8 p.m.

High today at

approx. 3 p.m.

65

°

Precip: 60%

Wind: W

4-8 mph

that literally one vote can mean so

much, I wanted to make a

difference.”

The problem is that Raunak, of

course, is just a teen from the

Virginia suburb of Herndon who

likes basketball, video games and

computers. He can’t even cast that

one vote.

But he’s also a smart kid, a

junior in the land of the super-

smarts: Thomas Jefferson High

School for Science and

Technology. And after he and

some of his friends hatched their

plan in July to make a difference

through technology, they got 750

votes rolling.

With the help of two friends

from Thomas Jefferson — alum

Robert Greene and sophomore

Sumanth Ratna — Raunak

created a website that streamlines

the process of applying for an

absentee ballot.

The absentee vote is a huge

SEE DVORAK ON B5

Okay, Virginia. No

one should know

better than y’all

that every vote

matters.

Raunak Daga

knows this.

He was floored

when he heard

about the bonkers election that

happened two years ago, when he

was just 14, when Virginia showed

the world that the democratic

process can come down to the

luck of the draw.

“I learned about the startling

statistics,” Raunak said of the 2017

race that ended with two

candidates tied at 11,608 votes

apiece and with control of the

House of Delegates determined in

a drawing.

“They picked a name out of a

bowl. A bowl,” said Raunak, now

16. He was incredulous that our
    electoral process can end up like a
    raffle or a bingo game. “To see

Unable to vote, Va. teens

helped in a different way

Petula

Dvorak

BY JULIE ZAUZMER

They came in floor-length sequined dresses and

fabulous hats, tuxedos and African print robes, for a

sprawling program of more than six hours of rousing

gospel music, video tributes, booming sermons and

round after round of standing ovations.

It was an all-encompassing tribute to a man who

once seemed to be everywhere that politics and

religion crossed paths in Washington.

At the civil rights demonstrations on the Mall and

at the neighborhood disputes in Anacostia, the Rev.

Willie Wilson was in the mix. At the church sermons

and the council debates, the rallies and the organiz-

ing meetings and the memorial services, Wilson was

at the microphone. He lent the weight of his endorse-

ment to D.C. Council candidates for decades and

once ran for mayor himself, winning more than 21

percent of the vote in a Democratic primary against

incumbent Anthony Williams.

As Wilson, 75, prepares to retire after 46 years at

the pulpit of Anacostia’s Union Temple Baptist

Church, he enjoyed the adulation of more than 900

SEE WILSON ON B2

A minister’s enduring gospel

D.C. pastor Willie Wilson is retiring from the pulpit after 46 years. But his activism isn’t finished.

KATHERINE FREY/THE WASHINGTON POST

The Rev. Willie Wilson entered his retirement gala in Upper Marlboro on

Sunday in regal fashion, sitting on carved wooden thrones with his wife, the

Rev. Mary Wilson. More than 900 people came to celebrate his career.

unknown.

Jones “has got to know he has

the support of the county execu-

tive,” said Timothy Firestine, who

for 12 years was the top aide for

Elrich’s predecessor as county ex-

ecutive, Isiah Leggett.

“And I think that’s going to be a

SEE SEARCH ON B4

chance to reiterate his plans for

expanded community policing

and ongoing support for officers to

do enforcement.

At a diner, the two were coming

to an agreement.

On Tuesday, Jones’s name will

be put before the Montgomery

County Council, where he is ex-

pected to be confirmed to head the

1,300 sworn officers in Maryland’s

most populous jurisdiction, with

1.1 million residents. But how they

will move past their stormy court-

ship to collaborate remains the big

as Elrich said he didn’t want him

permanently and repudiated

many efforts of the department

Jones had served for 34 years.

Yet on a fall afternoon, Jones

was sitting across from Elrich, at

the county executive’s invitation.

If Elrich had decided to restart

the search, it probably would have

meant three more months without

a permanent leader.

If Jones had decided to focus on

what he later called the “tumultu-

ous process” and some of its bad

days, he wouldn’t have had a

(D) continued to say publicly that

he didn’t want an internal candi-

date because of his long-held view

that officers were overly aggres-

sive in stops and searches.

That stance left the leading

in-house contender, acting chief

Marcus Jones, doing the job even

BY DAN MORSE

By late September, Montgom-

ery County’s top elected official,

Marc Elrich, had painted himself

into a political corner.

He’d spent eight months trying

to name a police chief, the

highest-profile position in his new

administration, for a post that was

open for the first time in more

than a decade. Elrich’s three fa-

vored outsiders had each bailed on

him.

As the search sputtered, Elrich

In search for Montgomery police chief, pair is able to work it out

After favored outsiders

bowed out, Elrich and

Jones finally reached deal

BY LUZ LAZO

Nearly two years after electric

scooters entered the nation’s capi-

tal, residents weighed in Monday

with their views on the now-

ubiquitous devices.

More than two dozen people

signed up to speak at a D.C. Coun-

cil hearing where representatives

for some of the eight scooter com-

panies operating in the city high-

lighted their benefits, from clos-

ing gaps in the transit network to

replacing cars for short trips. They

faced critics armed with a long list

of concerns, including that scoot-

ers are carelessly parked or are

ridden on sidewalks, creating haz-

ards for pedestrians, the elderly

and people with disabilities, and

have made streets more danger-

ous for all road users.

During some of the early-morn-

ing testimony, the mother of a

child who was struck and serious-

ly injured by a scooter in a park

called on the city to ban the scoot-

ers altogether. Representatives of

some of the city’s nightlife busi-

nesses warned against over regu-

lation, saying scooters are facili-

SEE SCOOTERS ON B3

Future of e-scooters in D.C. debated

SALWAN GEORGES/THE WASHINGTON POST

Critics of electric scooters say they create hazards for pedestrians

when the scooters are ridden on sidewalks or are parked carelessly.

Residents, officials

weigh in on bill that aims

to ‘control’ the devices

BY GREGORY S. SCHNEIDER

AND LAURA VOZZELLA

richmond — Voters go to the polls

Tuesday for Virginia’s most conse-

quential legislative elections in a

generation, with control of state

government at stake and the results

marking an early skirmish in next

year’s presidential contest.

An unprecedented flood of mon-

ey has boosted many General As-

sembly races to the spending level of

congressional contests. Virginia is

the only state where this fall’s elec-

tions will determine the balance of

power in the legislature, and both

national parties regard it as a proxy

war over President Trump and his

political future.

All 140 seats in the General As-

sembly are on the ballot, but much

of the battle has focused on subur-

ban districts in Northern Virginia,

Richmond and Hampton Roads,

where voters can swing left or right.

“Virginia has the best Unemploy-

ment and Economic numbers in the

history of the State. If the Demo-

crats get in, those numbers will go

rapidly in the other direction. On

Tuesday, Vote Republican!” Trump

tweeted Monday night, one of a se-

ries of presidential proclamations

on the state.

“We were also named the best

state for business this year. Thanks

for noticing what Democratic lead-

ership is doing for our Common-

wealth!” Democratic Gov. Ralph

Northam tweeted in reply.

Trump is deeply unpopular in

Virginia, and he made no visits

there to boost GOP candidates.

When Vice President Pence attend-

ed a campaign rally in Virginia

SEE VIRGINIA ON B5

Va. vote

sets stage

for 2020

campaign

ALL 140 SEATS UP IN

GENERAL ASSEMBLY

Cash-heavy suburban

races may steer results

Dispute over ‘thin blue line’ flag

Maryland’s governor is at odds with

Montgomery County liberals. B4

BY FENIT NIRAPPIL

D.C. Council member Jack

Evans repeatedly used his office

on behalf of private clients who

paid him hundreds of thousands

of dollars, failing to recognize

the conflicts and never properly

disclosing the payments, accord-

ing to an investigation by a law

firm hired by the council.

The confidential report by

O’Melveny & Myers, distributed

Monday to lawmakers and re-

viewed by The Washington Post,

identified 11 instances since 2014

in which Evans violated the

council’s rules governing ethics.

It marks the first time the D.C.

Council has detailed ethical laps-

es by Evans, the Ward 2 Demo-

crat and the city’s longest-serv-

ing lawmaker. His business in-

terests and his public actions

have been the target of a federal

investigation, as well as a probe

by the Washington Metropolitan

Area Transit Authority.

But a majority of D.C. Council

members had been reluctant to

investigate their colleague until

this summer, after a law firm

hired by WMATA concluded that

Evans had violated a Metro eth-

SEE EVANS ON B2

Evans used

office to

aid clients,

probe finds

D.C. Council member

disputes report, says he

acted in public’s interest