Chairman Phil Mendelson

DC Council Backs Expanding Youth Jobs Program, but with Qualms – “It’s troubling,” [Mendelson] said, regarding the need for a retroactive vote. “It makes it harder for the council to say ‘No.’ And that’s why we were struggling here,” he added.  [The Washington Post]

House Committee Votes to Upend First DC Law in 23 Years – Some conservatives have interpreted the bill to mean that employers in the District, including churches and anti-abortion groups like March for Life, could eventually be required to provide coverage for contraception and abortions.  The council passed a temporary fix to the bill to make clear that religious organizations would not be responsible for such medical care, and Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) reiterated that Tuesday in a letter to Chaffetz, but the Republican chairman said the fix was insufficient.  [The Washington Post]

House Votes to Strike Down DC Law Banning Reproductive Discrimination – In a letter last week to Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) just before his oversight committee voted to overturn the bill, Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) pleaded for members of Congress to leave the matter up to the city.  “The fundamental issue is whether individuals or organizations have the right to discriminate,” he wrote. “It is our view that they should not with regard to personal health choices.”  [The Washington Post]

House Votes to Block DC Law – “The Human Rights Act is … a protection for an individual. It’s not a government program,” Mendelson said in a Thursday phone interview. “John Doe doesn’t have the right to discriminate against you. So if Congress says we can’t spend any money to implement that, what does that mean? … It’s not clear how Congress could stop that.”  [Roll Call]

House Votes to Strike Down DC Reproductive Rights Law – Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D), the District’s non-voting member of Congress, issued a statement Friday declaring victory because the measure is on track to become law. But after a fierce debate on the House floor late Thursday, neither side felt like cheering.  “I feel rather battered around, beat up, by the whole thing,” DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) said.  [The Washington Post]

DC Council to Vote on Controversial Proposal for Prison’s Health Services – To Mendelson, the matter is simple. People who are focused on the independence of the procurement process are “elevating process above the merits,” he said. “And in the area of correctional health care, the merits are too important to put the process above it.”  [The Washington Post]

DC Council Picks at Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Budget, Questions Spending Cuts and Tax Hikes – Mr. Mendelson questioned whether paying $5 million to include 24-year-olds in the District’s Summer Youth Employment Program, which provides jobs for teenagers and young adults over the summer, is a good trade off for reducing funding to the city’s only public university.  “We would be cutting opportunities to get training that, in turn, leads to middle wage, middle-class jobs in favor of paying 24-year-olds minimum wage for eight weeks,” Mr. Mendelson said. “I question that policy choice.”  [The Washington Times]

DC Council Rejects $66M Contract proposal for Prison’s Health Care – Council Chairman Phil Mendelson said payouts from lawsuits filed against the District in regard to healthcare issues at the jail have seen “a breathtaking drop” during the time Unity has had the contract with the city. From 2006 through the present, he said there have been $59,000 in judgments against the District on account of lawsuits regarding healthcare at the jail compared to $1.2 million in judgments from 2002 through 2006 under a different provider, he said.  [The Washington Times]
DC Shadow Senator Feuds with DC Council Over Affordable Housing Plan – “The reason why it is worth moving forward with this now is that this has every mark of a shakedown. Let me put it that simply. That’s how it comes across to me,” Mendelson said, referring to Strauss’s effort to gather signatures on a petition to oppose the redevelopment.  [The Washington Post]

DC Bill Would Raise Age to Purchase Cigarettes to 21 – McDuffie unsuccessfully introduced similar legislation in 2013. At the time, Council Chairman Phil Mendelson said, according to NBCWashington, that the city should leave the legal age where it is and “continue to step up efforts to discourage smoking.” Brian Moore, Mendelson’s chief of staff, said Monday, the chairman’s position hasn’t changed.  [The Washington Post]

DC Mayor Poised to Win Again at the Ballot Box, Gaining Allies on Council – Asked about the potential of having two pro-Bowser colleagues on the council, Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) cautioned that neither Bowser, Todd nor May should expect much of the arrangement should they win.  “To the extent that a patron like the mayor expects that she can pull strings, they are working against the dynamic needed in any legislature: consensus,” he said. “And if the person elected intends to do only what the mayor wants — equally, he or she is quickly going to find that they will be marginalized.”  [The Washington Post]

DC’s Attorney General Seeks Bigger Budget – Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) said he would like to see the District’s attorney general become a leading advocate for consumer protection, on par with state attorneys general from New York and California. But he said the council may have to find another way to help fund the effort. The council last year earmarked most of the money expected from a potential settlement with Expedia and Priceline to go to future Metro capital costs, he said.  “It’s not completely on him” to find the funding, Mendelson said of Racine. “I hope the mayor will fund it, and I’m sure if she doesn’t, the council will take a look at it.”  [The Washington Post]

Big Challenges in DC Mayor Bowser’s Vow to Activate, Expand Streetcar Line – “Mayor [Vincent C.] Gray said we had essentially killed the program by leaving it with over a half-billion dollars, which did not make any sense to me,” Mendelson said.  Mendelson said he supports extending the line to the Benning Road Metro, and making initial investments over the next year or two on planning the K Street extension to Georgetown. But he said he wants to see how the H Street and Benning Road line works in practice “before we spend significant bucks on extending the system further.”  [The Washington Post]

DC Mayor Muriel Bowser Offers $13B Budget with Sales and Parking Tax Increases –  Despite the good intentions for the revenue, DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson expressed displeasure with the proposal to increase the sales tax.  “You don’t need to raise taxes when revenues are growing,” said Mr. Mendelson, at-large Democrat.  [The Washington Times]

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