jonetta rose barras: The DC Council engages in unauthorized spending and endorses the actions of election violators

There seemed to be exuberance around the DC Council’s first vote to approve an amended version of Mayor Muriel Bowser’s $22 billion Fiscal Year 2026 Budget and Financial Plan. The legislature’s changes, as expected, included restoring funding to several social services, education and access to justice programs, among others. Councilmembers also retained nearly $800 million in the capital budget that is slated to cover the cost to upgrade infrastructure around a new Washington Commanders stadium — although they have yet to sign off on the deal unveiled in April.

Still, Bowser seemed mostly satisfied: “I am optimistic that we can work together to pass a final budget that lives up to our DC values, grows our economy and does both without additional burdens on taxpayers and businesses,” she said in a prepared statement posted on social media Monday after the council’s vote.

Some lawmakers may be taking victory laps, but many of those restorations constitute one-time spending, leaving residents without a permanent solution to the challenges they may face. 

When the smoke clears, the mirrors will be broken. 

“I am truly concerned about the District’s fiscal health — the massive growth in the District’s budget, the unbridled over-spending, the lack of accountability, and the unwillingness to provide effective oversight,” said Dorothy Brizill, founding director of DC Watch, a government watchdog organization that has been involved in District affairs for more than 30 years.  

“No one wants to roll up their sleeves to study and assess what is and isn’t working in the government, especially with regard to District programs and agencies,” added Brizill in her email to me a day after the council’s vote.

Equally troubling, I think, is that the council, once again, has endorsed violations and violators of District laws. It has turned its back on the pleas for help from local small-business owners in favor of outside, dark money interests. And it has potentially triggered a fight with the city’s independent chief financial officer, Glen Lee.

In other words, this week marked a typical near end of budget season in the District.

During the last cycle, DC Council Chair Phil Mendelson tangled with Lee over adherence to federal and District laws that required the mayor and the legislature to replenish reserve accounts within a certain time period. The CFO demanded these requirements be honored. Bowser was complying; Mendelson was not. 

The council eventually changed the rules related to two reserves that had been created by the legislature. Nevertheless, when I checked a few months ago, only one of the city’s four reserve accounts was at 100%.

Now, Mendelson has decided, despite CFO Lee’s objections, to tap $60 million of new revenues expected to be collected by the end of the fiscal year, which is Sept. 30. Mendelson and his members are using that money to cover restorations of mayoral budget cuts. 

If the legislature loses this battle, can its budget be considered balanced as is legally required?

Am I the only person who remembers that Moody’s recently dropped DC’s credit rating from Aaa to Aa1 with a negative outlook? That downgrade was generally due to economic factors beyond the District’s control. Is the council willing to risk introducing additional arguments for future credit rating hits? 

The council’s myopia also prevented it from responding favorably to Bowser’s call to repeal Initiative 82 and end the phaseout of the tipped minimum wage. Yes, that ballot measure won nearly 74% of the votes cast when it was approved in the 2022 general election. However, it has been a bane for many restaurant owners. They have repeatedly complained about skyrocketing expenses that have forced them to lay off workers or completely close their operations.

Just in case anyone is confused: Laid-off restaurant workers cannot collect tips. If they aren’t collecting tips, it doesn’t matter whether President Donald Trump is supposedly exempting tips from income taxes.

Raise your hand if you understand these points.

Some councilmembers do, but they seem to lack the courage to make tough decisions. They prefer engaging in magical thinking. 

DC Council Chair Pro Tempore Kenyan McDuffie collaborated with Ward 2 Councilmember Brooke Pinto to introduce a convoluted compromise within the FY 2026 Budget Support Act (BSA), the policy document that provides legal authorization for spending and revenue changes that appear in the budget.  

The duo proposed setting the base wage for tipped workers at $8 — a decrease from the current $10. That would be offset by a “super minimum wage” of $20 that would apply only to tipped workers, such that employers must guarantee that their base wage plus tips reaches $20 per hour.

Other workers in the city currently receiving the minimum wage of $17.95 would not have been beneficiaries of that proposed hike. The McDuffie-Pinto compromise would foster an inverted version of the inequity that proponents said prompted Initiative 82. 

When the cure looks like the disease, it’s time to take the express back to the lab.

Unsurprisingly, Ward 4’s Janeese Lewis George — who has been an ardent supporter of Initiative 82 — pounced on the proposed solution. I’m not a fan of the initiative, but I had a similar reaction when Mendelson shared it with the press on Sunday. 

Lewis George made a motion to remove the compromise language from the BSA. She spouted some will-of-the-people rhetoric and talked about workers and their families being hurt by a compromise that favored businesses. (Maybe someone should tell her that many of those business owners also have families and I-82 is hurting them as well.) 

While the vote was 7-5 in favor of her motion, every councilmember, including Lewis George, understood that the deteriorating condition of one of the city’s most important industries demands their attention. “I think there are ways to find a solution,” said Ward 6’s Charles Allen, who stated emphatically that he does not support an outright repeal of Initiative 82. He added, however, that “my vote is not to keep the status quo.” 

Legislators are expected to revisit the issue at their next and final budget vote on July 28.

The plight of businesses may not sufficiently animate councilmembers, but there is nothing like self-interest as rocket fuel. In an 8-4 vote, they approved an amendment, introduced by at-large Councilmember Christina Henderson and Ward 1’s Brianne Nadeau, to allocate $1.5 million to fund implementation of a portion of Initiative 83, a ballot measure that authorizes implementation of ranked choice voting and semi-open primaries in the District.

The $1.5 million is for the ranked part — not the open part.

DC Republican Party Chairman Patrick Mara said, “There is a strong argument to be made that Initiative 83 passed largely because it promised to open [partisan] primaries to independent voters. 

“The DC Council’s refusal to implement that key component is a betrayal of voter intent. This follows a troubling pattern, including legislation allowing non-citizens to vote, that continues to dilute the voice of DC residents,” added Mara in a statement released after the budget vote.

“The council’s decision to fund this initiative at this stage signals complicity with a fraudulent process,” said Deirdre Brown, chair of the Vote NO on Initiative 83 committee. “They are backing an initiative whose very foundation has been called into question.”

The move by Henderson and Nadeau also made folly of their laments throughout the budget cycle about the plight of poor and working-class residents in the city. During one of the legislature’s administrative meetings, Henderson asked her colleagues to redirect any surplus money from their committees to health care.

This week, the two decided that redirecting $1.5 million for the 2026 political game is far more important. 

In a joint statement, they asserted that ranking means DC voters “can vote for the candidates they most want to see in office without fear that they will ‘waste’ their vote.”

Citizens can do that now — without Initiative 83. Further, no vote in a fair and honest election is ever wasted. Perhaps someone’s candidate doesn’t win, but that is the democratic system. Some people want to game the system to boost the chances of their preferred outcome.

That may be Henderson and Nadeau’s motivation. Their statement noted that ranking will mean that “winners of elections will reflect a broader constituency.”

Is that some kind of coded language? In reporting on this issue for the past few years, I have come to realize that there is a great interest in upending the city’s current leadership. Many proponents think ranked choice voting is perhaps their best vehicle.

I also have no doubt that most incumbents will find a way to use the ranking system to their advantage.

Allen, Nadeau, Ward 5’s Zachary Parker and Ward 3’s Matt Frumin — four of the eight who supported the $1.5 million allocation — are expected to run for reelection in next year’s primary. Sources told me a couple of the others may have their eye on DC Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton’s seat, if she retires.

To justify their actions, Henderson and Nadeau said that ranked choice voting was overwhelmingly approved in all eight wards last November. True enough, but gauging the actual level of support for the initiative is not so simple. 

In fact, a report of the petition-gathering process prepared by the DC Board of Elections and made public in August last year suggests the number of signatories from predominantly Black Wards 8 and 5 was so low that neither ward reached the 5% threshold of duly registered voters used to determine an initiative’s ballot eligibility. (The threshold must be reached in at least five wards, as well as the city overall.)

In reality, Initiative 83 has been a sordid tale from the beginning. The DC Board of Elections seemed to give preferential treatment to the proponents, as did DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb. While the council’s general counsel stated that by law ranked choice voting was not a proper subject for an initiative because it appropriated funds, Schwalb, in an extremely contorted opinion, advised the board that it could authorize the initiative by including the phrase “subject to appropriations.” That’s what elections officials did. 

Members of the DC Democratic State Committee filed a lawsuit. In a Trump-esque move, the council acted this week knowing that the lawsuit is still pending in DC Superior Court. Has the legislative branch no respect for the judiciary or the legal rights of citizens?

Earlier this year, more than six months after it initially learned that the leaders of Initiative 83 had violated the District law governing the handling of qualifying petitions, the Elections Board cited and levied fines against some of those individuals, including the campaign’s chair, Lisa Rice, and chief operative, Adam Edinger. The violations carried the potential for criminal sanctions. However, receiving favored treatment, the violators were fined a mere $500 each.

Shamefully, councilmembers chose to use $1.5 million of the public’s money for ranked choice voting in the face of documented corruption and during a fiscal crisis in which low-income residents and others have been forced to accept program cuts.

I find it absolutely appalling. 

DC elected officials have seemingly never seen criminals or violators of local laws they haven’t wanted to coddle: Jump the subway fare gate, don’t worry — you won’t be subjected to an arrest or any significant fine. 

Hijack someone’s car at 13 or 14 years old, don’t worry — you won’t be prosecuted. Fail to pay for parking tickets, don’t worry — you’ll still be able to do business with the District government. Sell marijuana illegally, don’t worry — everyone is looking the other way. Get caught allegedly taking a bribe and plotting to prey on mentally ill people, don’t worry — you can run for reelection and retake the council seat from which you were expelled.

A city becomes lawless when lawlessness is considered acceptable by the people who create the laws and are responsible for ensuring their enforcement. (And please don’t mention the felon in the White House. He’s no moral guide.)

“Let’s be clear: this is not just bad policy — it’s bad governance,” said Brown about the $1.5 million allocation. “The Council still has time to correct this mistake … We urge every member who cares about transparency, integrity, and democratic accountability to reverse course.”

jonetta rose barras is an author and DC-based freelance journalist, covering national and local issues. She can be reached at thebarrasreport@gmail.com.