jonetta rose barras: The rogue board running DC’s elections system

Last month, on Oct. 17, the DC Board of Elections placed a notice published in the DC Register at 11 a.m., informing readers they had until 4 p.m. that day to sign up if they wanted to testify at a public hearing on Oct. 22 about “Referendum on the Tipped Minimum Wage Timeline Amendment Act of 2025.”

Undoubtedly, proponents of the measure must have received advance warning. After all, how could a hearing on their proposal occur without their presence? 

Residents, including tipped employees and restaurant owners, who may have wanted to testify against the measure, were noticeably absent — except for Christopher LaFon, a legal adviser to the Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington, who received a separate invitation in an apparent CYA move by the Elections Board. 

Oct. 17 was a Friday — a day often filled with distractions. Further, many folks who cared about the tipped wage issue may not have ever heard of the “DC Register,” let alone have known where to find a copy. Even if they made that discovery, they still had only a few hours to get on a list for a public hearing on a referendum about which they had only recently learned that would almost certainly affect their livelihood and the District’s economy.

I was appalled by the cavalier manner in which the Elections Board handled its primary mission of guaranteeing maximum enfranchisement of District residents in the democratic process. It wasn’t the first time it failed to ensure a fair, equitable and robust system of engagement. 

In a response to an email in which I raised several questions, Sarah Graham, a staff spokesperson for the board, asserted, “The meeting was timely and properly noticed in the October 17, 2025, edition of the DC Register and our website.” She provided links to both.

Was that it? 

Couldn’t the board have taken the additional step of distributing notices at physical places — restaurants, for example, where workers might have seen them? Couldn’t the information have been posted in popular community calendars and electronic bulletins?

It’s true there was a notice on the board’s website; however, GPS might have been needed to locate it or the agenda for the Oct. 22 hearing. The latter document did not clearly indicate the time during the meeting when people would be allowed to speak. No names were published to inform the public who had signed up to testify. There were no instructions about the rules for participation — for example, specifying that a person would have three minutes to speak, as they do during most DC Council hearings.

Ironically, a line at the bottom of the agenda offered, “This meeting is governed by the Open Meetings Act.” It provided the email address of the Office of Open Government for those who might have complaints.

You can’t make up this stuff. 

Let’s be clear: The Office of Open Government has no responsibility for the city’s elections or for enforcement of the city’s election laws. That is the job of the Elections Board, which is supposed to be composed of at least three members. 

For the past several months, it has operated with only two members — Gary Thompson, the chair, and Karyn Greenfield, who has rarely spoken during the meetings I’ve attended. The board has frequently exhibited Trumpian-like behaviors: blatantly flouting laws with impunity, for example, and demonstrating favoritism toward certain individuals and groups with which the chair appears politically aligned while discriminating against others. 

Earlier this year, I raised concerns about the fact that the Elections Board put ranked choice voting Initiative 83 before voters, knowing that lead proponents had violated the local law governing the collection of signatures on qualifying petitions. The board also authorized the measure, knowing that it required allocation of government funds; that fact alone should have prevented it from gaining a place on the ballot. Following a contorted opinion issued by DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb, the Thompson panel gave the green light using the phrase “subject to appropriations” — a contrivance that does not appear in the municipal code governing initiatives. 

As the board considered the tip referendum last month, that deceptive maneuver was unnecessary. After all, Schwalb and the DC Council’s General Counsel Nicole Streeter reached the conclusion that it was a proper measure for the ballot based on several legal criteria they identified. The board agreed.

I admit that I am no fan of Initiative 82, which called for phasing out the tipped minimum wage. I’m also no fan of the repeated misuse of the initiative and referendum process; in fact, in a previous column, I advocated for its elimination, or at least the enactment of reforms to ensure true citizen engagement. 

However, as I read the legal opinions about the tipped referendum, I found myself wondering: Who does Streeter actually represent? 

She opined that the measure did not “negate or limit an act of the council” approved as part of the local budget. But hadn’t the legislature approved the Tipped Minimum Wage Timeline Amendment Act as part of the Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Support Act in a 7-5 vote? 

Hadn’t councilmembers gone through multiple meetings to structure legislation that would protect the hospitality industry, especially restaurants that were suffering serious and adverse financial consequences partially instigated by the implementation of Initiative 82? Even while adopting a new timeline, hadn’t the lawmakers sought to ensure that workers would see the intended increase in their pay? 

And weren’t some legislators equally concerned about DC’s overall economy, including how the loss of workers and the shuttering of restaurants might ultimately reduce revenue? That surely has an impact on the council-approved budget — shouldn’t Streeter have made that argument in her memo to the board?

On Friday, Oct. 24, the Elections Board began the challenge period for Referendum No. 009, indicating that “any registered qualified elector of the District of Columbia who objects to the summary statement, short title, and/or legislative form of the referendum measure as formulated … may seek review in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia no later than 10 calendar days from the date such formulations are published in at least one newspaper of general circulation, stating objections and requesting appropriate changes.

“Registered qualified electors may also file objections regarding the referendum with the court on other grounds during this period, including the Board’s determination that the proposed measure presents a proper subject for referendum,” continued the announcement.

The only newspaper where the board said it has published that information is The Washington Times. Raise your hand if you subscribe or read it.

From the DC Register to a conservative publication. I dare say most District residents, many of whom are registered Democrats, have never read and will never read the Times. (I say this as a former employee of the newspaper, which at the time had expansive local coverage.)

Call this the year of flawed thinking, wholesale violation or indifference to local laws, and plain old-fashioned government dysfunction. 

The council’s Committee on Executive Administration and Labor, chaired by Anita Bonds, has jurisdiction over DC’s election laws but has been mostly missing in action. In fact, it has sat on legislation introduced more than a year ago by Phil Mendelson, the leader of the legislature, that would address one of the board’s controversial rulings — adding the “not for appropriations” loophole that has greatly expanded the scope of permissible ballot measures.

I suppose I should be satisfied that the Elections Board has at least issued an early notice for the DC Housing Modernization and Accessibility Act of 2026. The public hearing on that initiative is scheduled for Dec. 3. As proposed, it “would freeze rents for two years, immediately upon enactment,” as well as in the future when inflation is high. The measure also would change eligibility criteria for “affordable housing” units and revise the requirements for disposing of DC land.

The Elections Board has not yet posted advisory opinions from the attorney general and the council’s general counsel on whether they think it’s a proper subject for the ballot. 

There are plenty of reasons to be less than sanguine about the potential conclusion. One would have to be blind not to see the pattern in the board’s behavior. Evidence of a rogue agency abounds.

Consider the Prohibiting Force-Feeding of Birds initiative. It would make it illegal to use various methods and devices to fatten the livers of ducks and geese for the ultimate production of foie gras — an indisputably cruel practice. The initiative would also ban the sale or distribution of products developed as a result of that process.

There are no poultry farms in DC. There is no known individual or company within the city limits engaged in such a process. Even the proponents of the measure admit that foie gras is a “niche luxury item with minimal economic footprint in DC restaurants.”

Wait, wait, if there isn’t any real abuse of animals in DC and not a whole lot of people are eating foie gras, why should taxpayers’ money be used to set up an inspection and enforcement system replete with penalties? The fact that those protocols are presented in the proposed language of the measure suggests funds would have to be appropriated for its implementation.

Make it make sense.

At the public hearing earlier this month, the only people testifying were proponents of the measure. It’s likely that, as with the tipped wage referendum, limited notice and a lack of outreach disenfranchised District residents. 

In the attorney general’s legal opinion provided to the board, Schwalb mentioned three serious reasons the measure might not be an appropriate subject for the ballot. He twisted and turned the law to minimize each. And he also suggested his catch-all phrase “subject to appropriations” as a technical amendment the board might want to consider if it decided to approve the anti-force-feeding initiative for the ballot.

That phrasing is what raised Mendelson’s ire more than a year ago, sparking the introduction of the legislation that now languishes in Bonds’ committee. 

Streeter, the council’s general counsel, essentially dodged her responsibility, failing to state outright that the measure is not an appropriate subject because it would force the allocation of funds. Instead, she put the responsibility at the door of the city’s chief financial officer, who by law must provide fiscal impact statements for these citizen ballot proposals. 

Don’t ask me why the CFO’s role comes last — after the board has made its decision and after residents or businesses have been invited to spend their time and money to challenge that decision in court. 

In the case of the fattened liver, none of that mattered. The Elections Board had made up its mind. To justify its position, it did what it has done for the past several years: ignored the law.

The board’s general counsel, Terri Stroud, noted in her administrative order that “the potential prospects for a budgetary impact lie in the enforcement” protocols, including required inspections, penalty regime and creation of a database. 

Then she wrote that, “No evidence has been presented on this record that demonstrates that the enforcement program will have any cost. We have no idea where foie gras or other offending products are sold in the District, if anywhere, and no clue as to the likely enforcement needs. 

“No evidence was presented that these products are on the menu in any restaurant,” Stroud continued. “Indeed, the proponents … did not make representations as to any notable level of would-be prohibited conduct in D.C.”

Despite the “enforcement authorities” created by the initiative, Stroud wrote, “We have no information showing that those authorities would ever likely be exercised or that a web page covering the tracking of penalties would trigger any cost beyond the trivial expense of its creation.”

On its face, she wrote, the initiative “does not expressly block the expenditure of funds requested or appropriated, directly appropriate funds, require the allocation of revenues to new or existing purposes, establish a special fund, create an entitlement that is enforceable by private right of action or directly address and eliminate a source of revenue.”

Therefore, the Elections Board “declined to reject” an initiative “where an alleged budgetary impact is speculative.”

Is your head spinning? I need a chair to keep from falling.

Let’s also call this the year of magical thinking. Stroud and the Elections Board are surely among its top practitioners.

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