Category: Massachusetts
Stimulus Bill Would Aid Local School Budgets
Education
The New Bedford Standard-Times
Cristian Hernandez
Boston University Washington News Service
02/05/09
WASHINGTON— President Barack Obama’s stimulus package could give more then $100 billion in education aid to the country’s 15,000 school districts over the next two years, including $19.2 million for New Bedford Public Schools by the end of 2010, according to estimates made public by the House Appropriations Committee.
The massive $825 billion stimulus bill passed the House last week and is being considered in the Senate this week.
New Bedford Public Schools Superintendent Portia Bonner said the stimulus money would keep teachers on the job, help maintain small class sizes and avoid elimination of special reading, music and arts programs.
“The help will be more then welcomed,” Bonner said.
Most Massachusetts school districts have been dealing with shrinking funds triggered by the economic fallout and were hit hard after Gov. Deval Patrick slashed the state budget.
“We believe that the stimulus package can have a significant dent in the impact of the recession and be well used to fill the gap in stalled construction projects,” said Glenn Koocher, executive director of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees.
Although optimism surrounding the much-needed federal aid is high, some school officials are wary.
“When you look in the dictionary under the word uncertainty what you are going to see is this proposal,” said Dartmouth Public Schools Superintendent Stephen Russell. “We appreciate the effort, but it’s much too early to pin our hopes on it.”
Under the estimated district–by-district allocations, Dartmouth schools could potentially receive $2.2 million in federal funds over two years. Like most schools in the commonwealth, Dartmouth schools are operating at the minimum required spending level as mandated by the state. Russell said that funding was extremely limited and that Dartmouth schools have already started to cut staff and charge students fees for sports, music programs and clubs.
Other public school communities that would benefit from the stimulus cash include Fall River, with an estimated two-year boost of $16.4 million; Wareham, with $2.2 million; and Freetown-Lakeview, with $839,200.
The rough estimates on individual district allocations come from the Congressional Research Service and are based on enrollment numbers and existing federal education grant standards, according to a spokeswoman for the House Education and Labor Committee.
Wareham Public Schools Superintendent Barry Rabinovitch said his district has been slashing costs for the last five years.
“Budget cuts have affected instructional materials the most. As well as not being able to hire new staff, that’s where I will be looking at using the money,” Rabinovitch said.
The aid would come in three categories and be distributed to school districts over two years. There would be an increase for Title I grants, which go to school districts to assist low-achieving students in high-poverty schools. There would be money for construction projects and modernization of infrastructure. And there would be increased funds under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, which provides federal aid to programs for children with special needs.
Students in higher education also would receive a boost; the legislation would increase the maximum Pell grant by at least $400 a year as well as increase the limits on federally subsidized loans.
“I know in these tough economic times the priorities in which we place our money are very important,” Bonner said. She said she hopes the money will come because investing in strong schools should be a priority.
School officials said they are hopeful but have to look at the future while concentrating on what’s directly ahead. Rabinovitch said that if they do get the money it is guaranteed for only two years. “You have to look at using it so that it saves you money down the road,” he said.
Russell said that he is treating the proposals as preliminary and well intentioned but that his first priority is with challenges directly ahead. “If I have to worry about the lights turning off I’m not worried about redesigning the lighting systems,” he said.
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Stimulus Bill Includes Money to Help Computerize Health Records
Healthrecords
The New Bedford Standard-Times
Cristian Hernandez
Boston University Washington New Service
01/29/09
WASHINGTON – Nestled inside Barack Obama’s $819 billion economic recovery package are provisions that challenge the country’s hospitals and doctors to adopt electronic medical records. The stimulus package, which the House passed on Wednesday, provides $20 billion to spur the complete digitization of health records by 2014.
Christopher Baldwin, Southcoast Health System’s vice president of information services, applauds the president’s efforts. Southcoast hospitals are already on their way to being paperless with a $20 million health information technology investment approved in 2005, Baldwin said.
“We expect the conversion to take an additional five years, and the support of the Obama administration will assist us in moving this process along faster,” he said.
Baldwin said Southcoast is facing shrinking funds because of changes in the national economy and prospective cutbacks in reimbursements from MassHealth. “The support of the Obama administration will assist us in moving further and faster through this transitional process,” he said.
Lawmakers are unsure about how to go about implementing a national electronic records initiative. At a hearing Tuesday of the Senate Judiciary Committee, the members talked about creation of a federal body that would create regulations and standards to guide the process. The $20 billion would be distributed to doctors and hospitals in the form of grants and tax breaks.
Jane Horowitz, the chief operating officer for the National Alliance for Health Information Technology, said that hospitals all over the country are grappling with the nation’s financial crisis and are delaying information technology projects.
Supporters of the health technology provisions say the national system of electronic records will allow for better health care and be more cost-effective. Research points in that direction; according to a study last November by the Archives of Internal Medicine, Massachusetts doctors who have electronic records systems pay fewer malpractice claims then those who don’t.
But public doubts about privacy and safety threaten to hinder the move to digitized records. During the Judiciary Committee hearing, lawmakers were told that without the public’s trust the initiative would fail.
“The ability to easily access this information electronically can be very useful in providing more cost-effective health care,” Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., chairman of the committee, said during the hearing. “But the use of advancing technologies to access and share health information can also lead to a loss of personal privacy.”.
The public is fearful that personal health records will be easily accessible to employers, sold or made available to health insurers, according to privacy advocates.
Ashley Katz, executive director of Patient Privacy Rights, a non-profit working to secure patient privacy, said in a telephone interview that provisions in the House and Senate bills that ban the sale of personal information are a good first step toward ensuring security.
“Privacy is the key to getting health IT going,” Katz said. “If you don’t do it right we are never going to get there.”
Baldwin said Southcoast will double its efforts to ensure privacy within its system, calling it a high-priority issue as the hospital system moves to a 100 percent paperless system.
The provisions have received broad support from members of Congress, including Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., who has been a longtime supporter of electronic medical records. In a written statement, Kennedy said that tens of thousands of Americans die every year because of preventable medical errors. Electronic records allow patients to carry their health records from doctor to doctor, giving new doctors a complete picture of the patients’ medical history.
“Information technology can reduce errors significantly, yet the gap is widening each year in implementing it,” Kennedy said. “It now costs a physician’s office $40,000 to install a new IT system. Increasingly, our public hospitals and community health centers remain in the dark ages.”
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For Local Women, Equal Pay Law is the Beginning
LEDBETTER
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Sarah Gantz
Boston University Washington News Service
Jan. 29, 2009
WASHINGTON —In 1964, the Civil Rights Act demanded equal pay for women. But decades later, with women earning only 78 cents for every dollar men earn, wage discrimination remains an issue.
President Barack Obama Thursday signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act into law, the first of his administration. For many women, the law, which reverses a 2007 Supreme Court decision that required lawsuits for wage discrimination based on sex, race and other factors to be filed within 180 days of the first unequal paycheck, represents a step toward workplace equality.
“I think they felt their hands were tied and they didn’t know exactly what to do about it,” Carrie Johnson, 56, of Framingham, said of female friends who dealt with workplace discrimination years ago. “There’s the piece about not knowing for sure. It’s not down in black and white.”
Lilly Ledbetter, now 70, worked for Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. in Gadsden, Ala., for 19 years before being tipped off that her male co-workers had been receiving higher pay during her entire career at the company. In 2007, the Supreme Court threw out Ms. Ledbetter’s case, saying she should have filed charges within the first 180 days of the initial act of discrimination in 1979.
“This Supreme Court case ranks up there with some of the most egregious cases of all time,” said Lauren Stiller Rikleen, a law partner of Bowditch & Dewey in Framingham and executive director of the Bowditch Institute for Women’s Success.
The law signed Thursday allows wage discrimination charges to be filed within 180 days of the most recent unequal paycheck.
The law has been heralded as a milestone victory by women’s activists nationwide, but many women say the law’s legal significance is overshadowed by how it will thaw conversation about wage discrimination, a topic long coated in icy taboo.
“I don’t expect that as of tomorrow we’re going to have fair wages across the board and everything is going to be fabulous,” said Shelley Errington Nicholson, the director of women’s programs at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. “But there’s going to be more dialogue.”
Ms. Errington Nicholson raises awareness of wage discrimination at WPI by helping women prepare to negotiate salaries and stand up for themselves in predominately male science and technology workforces. But 10 years ago, when she accepted her first job out of graduate school, unequal pay was not part of the conversation.
A year into the job, she said, she realized that a man with the same education, qualifications and experience who had been hired at the same time she was for the same position had received a starting annual salary of $10,000 more.
“It was kind of like that dirty little secret that everyone knew,” she said of the sex-based pay discrepancies tainting the entire company, which were brought to light when Ms. Errington Nicholson approached her boss, a woman who found herself in a similar situation.
The new law, Ms. Stiller Rikleen said, “doesn’t make an equal workplace.”
Women still make only about 78 cents for every dollar men make. And, while 60 percent of two-parent families depend on the income of both the husband and wife, women’s earnings constitute less than 40 percent of the average family income, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau.
More important than how effective the legislation will be in diminishing the wage gap between men and women is that the issue of wage discrimination is back in the limelight, some women say.
Linda Cavaioli, a member of the Massachusetts Commission on the Status of Women, said she thinks fighting wage discrimination on a national stage will raise public awareness about the issue. “It gives it more teeth,” she said.
Ms. Cavaioli, of Worcester, said she hopes the national attention will help advance the legislation she has been working on with State Sen. Harriette L. Chandler, D-Worcester, to address wage discrimination on a state level, now that the topic is open for discussion.
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Millions Turn Out for Moment in History
COLOR
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Sarah Gantz
Boston University Washington News Service
Jan. 20, 2009
WASHINGTON – Vincent Bates had been standing outside, in the cold, smack-dab in the middle of more than a million people crowded onto the National Mall, for more than five hours by the time Barack Obama was sworn-in as the 44th President of the United States And Mr. Bates said he wouldn’t have had it any other way.
“Every type of American you could imagine was there,” said Mr. Bates, a dean at Mount Wachusett Community College. “They were just so happy to be there. They could not wait for the moment…they couldn’t wait for a better tomorrow.”
It took only minutes to make history. As Barack Obama solemnly swore to protect the Constitution, the throngs of people who had waited months, years, lifetimes for that moment burst into a celebration—hugging, jumping up and down, snapping photos of everything in sight.
“I looked over and my wife was crying and I was sort of welling up,” said Eric DeMeulenaere, a professor at Clark University, who watched the ceremony from the Rayburn House Office Building. Listening to President Obama’s speech, he said he felt “this sense of accomplishment that we've done something amazing in this country and yet a sense of beginning.”
Mr. DeMeulenaere said it was important for him and his wife, who is black, to bring their two daughters, Mykah, 7, and Tyla, 5, who are biracial, to the inauguration because, “I want them to see they are also part of making history.”
Mykah and Tyla have been reading children’s books about their new president since the election campaign, and have been campaigning hard for a dog of their own since hearing about the pup Sasha and Malia Obama are getting, Mr. DeMeulenaere said.
Tim Concannon, 23, of Wrentham, was among the thousands of people who thought they had it made with a ticket for the Capitol grounds standing area. But instead of watching the musical performers that preceded the swearing-in ceremony, Mr. Concannon and his friend, Sam Raymond, 23, of Wrentham, stood packed in a line hundreds of yards from the gate, while the ethereal choir voices from the Capitol stage floated over the crowd.
The gates were not scheduled to open until 9 a.m., but Mr. Concannon was in line before 8 a.m. The line inched forward—like a colony of emperor penguins huddled together for warmth, as one voice in the crowd mused—and, three hours later, Mr. Concannon was still in line. But he had no intention of leaving.
Dozens of people did not make it into their ticketed areas, as the sections filled to capacity. Before the inaugural ceremony began, the National Mall closed, as well, too full to admit more people.
“I guess I could come down for the next time the first black president is elected, but I just don’t know when that’s going to be,” Mr. Concannon joked. He, like most people enduring the cold weather and crowds, were in good spirits.
“They were filled with such a calmness and a peace,” was how Mr. Bates described the crowd inside the L’Enfant Plaza Metro Station, where crowds were so thick they stood still.
The Metro stations along the National Mall closed periodically until the platforms emptied. While people waited to filter out of the Capitol South station early in the morning, they responded with a thrice-pulsed “Obama” chant to a Metro worker’s megaphone call to “keep on moving.”
“Tremendous!” and “Amazing!” were among the exclamations with which Mr. Bates described his experience. Hours after the ceremony, words flush with ecstasy flooded from him, but he recalled a humbling feeling of disbelief while listening to Mr. Obama speak.
“It’s really happening, that was my thought. It’s really happening—a black man is going to lead this country,” said Mr. Bates. “It was a moment of exaltation and joy that maybe, maybe for the first time this country can turn the corner from an ugly past.”
“Hopeful,” said Mr. Bates, reflecting on how he felt walking away from the ceremony yesterday. “Hopeful was all I felt.”
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Witnessing History, Whatever the Price
Cost
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Sarah Gantz
Boston University Washington News Service
Jan. 19, 2009
WASHINGTON — Carrie and Caitlin Howland, of Shrewsbury didn’t think they would be able to attend the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama but on Friday they got a call from Rep. James McGovern’s office informing them that there were two tickets available. Luckily, they had made a hotel reservation in Baltimore the day after the election.
The Howlands, like hundreds of others, had put their names into a lottery for tickets and were informed in December that they were being put on a waiting list. But they turned out to be some of the lucky few who managed to score tickets to the nation’s biggest event.
Americans from across the country have flocked to the nation’s capital to witness Obama being sworn-in as the first black president. If they weren’t able to get tickets like the Howlands, they can watch the ceremony from the National Mall with binoculars. Both options are free, but to get here, people have negotiated difficult to find and expensive hotel reservations, long restaurant waits, deadlocked traffic, and suffocating crowds. However, many people say, the financially and emotionally taxing logistics are all worthwhile to see history in the making.
Ms. Howland and 10-year-old Caitlin stood in line outside the Cannon House Office Building Monday for more than an hour, waiting to pick up their tickets from Rep. McGovern’s office. They were still hundreds deep in line at noon, but the door was in sight and they showed no sign of discomfort, aside from their red noses, exposed to the 36 degree air.
“It was a 95 percent chance that we would not get the tickets,” said Caitlin, nodding her head, nearly immobilized by her puffy jacket and ski cap, to emphasize the unlikelihood. With odds like that, a long wait in near-freezing temperatures is a small price to pay. Besides, Ms. Howland said, they got a great deal on their hotel in Baltimore, 40 miles away, by booking in advance.
As of Sunday night, 10 of the 15 Holiday Inn hotels within 10 miles of Washington, D.C. were completely booked, according to the company's online Reservation Desk. Among those that still had vacancies, the Holiday Inn Rosslyn at Key Bridge in Arlington, V.A., seven minutes from the inaugural festivities, offered a standard room for about $590 online. On January 21, the room is available for $168.
Rather than shell out hundreds of dollars for a hotel room, many people set on attending the inauguration said they are staying with relatives and friends living in the area, even if they will have to travel further to get to the ceremony Tuesday.
Eric DeMeulenaere, his wife and two daughters decided to stay with a friend who lives in Silver Spring, Md., about 10 miles outside Washington. "We're somewhat concerned, but we’re figuring it out," Mr. DeMeulenaere, an assistant professor at Clark University, said about the predicted sardine-can crowds forecasted at the National Mall, where the public can watch the inauguration without a ticket.
But for some, the price is worth being in the middle of the city. “So we’re shelling out $800 on the hotel,” said Richard Lesavoy, of Merrimac, who reserved two nights at a Doubletree Hotel for himself and his wife, Liz. “We’ll be eating on the cheap.”
Restaurants will undoubtedly be packed, once the millions of people crowded on the National Mall become hungry after standing for hours, but restaurateurs are prepared, according to Lynn Breaux, president of the Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington. Overstocking supplies, increased security, extending hours, and asking staff to spend the night are among the preparatory measures restaurant owners are taking, Ms. Breaux said, adding that "a lot of air mattresses have been purchased."
Chris Jarvis, 50, and his wife Linda Gross reserved tickets for the train into Washington Tuesday from a relative’s home in Baltimore, said Jarvis, of Leyden, a professor at Hampshire College who is formerly of Worcester. Typically, Mr. Jarvis avoids crowds, he said, but is willing to brave them Tuesday. “This is too big a historic event to miss,” he said.
Ms. Howland said she and Caitlin planned to leave their Baltimore hotel at 4 a.m. in order to catch the Metro into the city this morning before it gets crowded and to fit in as much sight-seeing as possible after the inauguration, Ms. Howland said.
“My mom and I believe this is a once in a lifetime experience,” said Caitlin. “I’m going to tell my grandchildren’s grandchildren about it.”
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54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Makes History Again
Photos by Caroline Bridges
SOLDIER
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Sarah Gantz
Boston University Washington News Service
Jan. 19, 2009
WASHINGTON — Eli Biddle lied about his age. He was 16 in 1863, not 17, as he told the recruiters he met on the street. Mr. Biddle had been booted out of class for refusing to sing “My Country ‘Tis of Thee.” While wandering around Boston, he decided to join the army, even though he was one year shy of the age requirement.
Until those days following the Emancipation Proclamation, Mr. Biddle's race would have been a more formidable barrier to enlisting. But the unit he joined was the newly formed 54th Massachusetts Voluntary Infantry, one of the first all-black army regiments.
“These people were fighting just to be called American. Now, we’re electing an African American president,” said Mr. Biddle’s great-grandson, Michael Coblyn, of Amherst, who is a member of a reenactment group of his great-grandfather’s regiment. “It’s something that was beyond their dreams.”
Tuesday, the Boston-based honorary unit will march in the inaugural parade in honor of the nation’s first black commander in chief and the men of the original 54th Infantry who, they say, helped make Barack Obama’s election possible.
“Way back when the 54th was fighting for freedom, they were also fighting for him to be in this position,” said Bobby Berry, 79, of Boston, during a break from drill practice at the African American Civil War Museum Sunday. “It was not all glory, and peaches and cream,” Mr. Berry, who plays a sergeant major, said of the infantry’s role in the Civil War and the civil rights movement.
The 54th was among the first official all-black regiments and is remembered for spearheading the Battle of Fort Wagner, in which the regiment suffered heavy casualties, but also demonstrated its dedication to the Union. “It opened America’s eyes to equality,” said Emmett Bell-Sykes, 35, who plays a second sergeant. “In that way, they were pioneers.”
Named the 54th Massachusetts Glory Brigade, after the movie “Glory,” which chronicles the regiment from its formation to the attack on Fort Wagner, the Boston group of enactors has been performing for schools and marching in parades since its founding in 1992.
Their main event is marching in the parade Tuesday, but since arriving in Washington Saturday, the brigade has been busy with a schedule of demonstrations, squeezing drill practice in between.
Sunday, the soldiers practiced standing at attention (heads up, shoulders back, heels together in a V, musket perpendicular to the right hip), while an officer adjusted the position of a man’s canteen and knapsack slung across his brass-buttoned wool jacket.
The brigade is a family tradition for Mr. Coblyn. His three sons are also members. His father, George, founded the group with Benny White, the current lieutenant. Mr. Coblyn’s oldest son, Christopher, 25, said being part of the brigade a responsibility that comes with the honor of being a descendent of a member of the historic group.
Richard Massey is also proud of his connection to the 54th Infantry. Mr. Massey, a 74-year-old who grew up in Worcester, is the great-grandson of Alexander H. Johnson, the regiment’s teenage drummer.
Mr. Massey has spent hours researching his great-grandfather—a romantic poet with admirable penmanship. An advocate of civil rights “long before all that came about,” Mr. Massey said, Mr. Johnson had dreamed of starting an African American veteran’s group in Worcester, but was unsuccessful.
Now, he said, “They’d be rolling over in their graves if they saw.”
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Burncoat Choir Does DC
Photos by Caroline Bridges
CHOIR
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Sarah Gantz
Boston University Washington News Service
Jan. 17, 2009
WASHINGTON — In one gulp, Rachael Brown swallowed the mint she had popped in her mouth to stave off hunger just in time for the opening line of the Star Spangled Banner. Ms. Brown, 17, is a self-proclaimed “very loud soprano” for the Burncoat High School Select Choir, which gave an impromptu performance on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives Saturday morning.
“We do that now and then,” said Casey Evans, a 17-year-old tenor, who explained that the 23-member choir often bursts into song unexpectedly.
The group is in town for the Presidential Inaugural Heritage Music Festival, a competition for student ensembles scheduled to coincide with the inauguration of Barack Obama. They have been seeing the sights, including the nooks and crannies of the U.S. Capitol on a tour guided by Rep. James McGovern (D-Worcester).
Mr. McGovern and his 7-year-old daughter Molly led the group, a parade of swishing matching windbreaker jackets and camera flashes, through the Capitol’s ornate halls to the House chamber, where few visitors venture and even fewer sing.
“There’s not a lot of singing going on on the House floor,” said Mr. McGovern, who described their a cappella rendition of the national anthem as “absolutely beautiful.”
Seated in a cluster of House member’s chairs, the choir listened as Mr. McGovern explained the building’s history and gazed up at the bullet hole in the ceiling left by an attack by Puerto Rican nationalists who fired into the chamber from the gallery in 1954.
“It’s kind of like the cafeteria,” Mr. McGovern said of where the members sit in the chamber, explaining that, although there are no assigned seats, he and the other representatives migrate to the same general vicinity every session.
It was after filling the lavish staircases with their echoing “wow”s but before peeking into the chamber’s couch-filled cloakroom—“Where we hang out,” said the congressman—that David J. Twiss, the director, called for an E-flat and the choir began to sing the national anthem.
The group has spent the past five months, including four rehearsals when school was closed in December because of the ice storm, perfecting a three-song a cappella set they are to perform Sunday night.
Last April, they placed first in the chamber chorus division and second over-all at a similar competition in Williamsburg, Va.,, but awards are not the group’s priority, Mr. Twiss said. “Our goal is to do our personal best.”
“I don’t think they have any idea how important it was to have done that,” Mr. Twiss said of their House chamber performance. “But someday they will.”
Rose Murphy understood. The 17-year-old said she was so excited to get on the bus Friday morning when the group left Worcester that she woke up early and triple-checked that she had everything.
“It’s one of those things I’ll never forget,” said Ms. Murphy. “Every time I see C-SPAN I’ll think of it.”
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Former New Bedford School Principals Await Inauguration
Photo by Caroline Bridges
RIVET
The New Bedford Standard-Times
Cristian Hernandez
Boston University Washington New Service
01/16/09
WASHINGTON – Roberta Rivet spent 15 years serving as the E.C. Brooks Elementary School principal. Her husband, Leonard Rivet was principal of Roosevelt Middle School. They spent their careers telling students of all backgrounds that they could be and do anything they wanted when they grew up and now they see that dream becoming a reality with the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama.
After retiring the Rivets moved from New Bedford to the Washington area in 2001. Mr. Rivet, who retired in 2005 from the Navy Reserve after 38 years, now works for the Defense Intelligence Agency.
“Every now and then we look at each other and think who would have thought we would end up here,” said Mrs. Rivet. They still own a home in Dartmouth and are registered Massachusetts voters. Mrs. Rivet flies back every month to visit her mother and the couple returns to the area for summer vacations.
The couple shies away from politics and said that the inauguration of Barack Obama transcends politics. They said they have never been loyal to any political party nor do they always agree. In November Mr. Rivet said he voted for Barack Obama and Mrs. Rivet said she voted for John McCain.
Nonetheless, Mrs. Rivet is looking forward to the new administration, “We wish him the very best,” she said. “He’s there for all of us – those who voted for him and those who didn’t.”
She considers the events on Tuesday historical and emotional. “When you work with kids you don’t see black and white. They are just kids,” said Mrs. Rivet.
Choking back tears, she recalled her experiences as a college student during the civil rights movement. A moment in history she said she will never forget was when civil rights leader Medgar Evers was shot in the back of the head in the driveway of his home in Mississippi in 1963.
“I often think to myself, look how far we’ve come,” said Mrs. Rivet.
In his work, Mr. Rivet said he trains hundreds of civilian employees who are coming to work for the Department of Defense.
He said that the new federal workforce he is training is young and understands the politics of Barack Obama.
“Things have really changed. There’s a difference in the way people relate to each other in the federal government,” Mr. Rivet said. “Politics have nothing to do with the way things have changed but the fact that the country has chosen an African American president has changed things already. People are more willing to work with other groups.”
Even though the Rivets are excited about Obama’s inauguration, they plan to watch the ceremony on television in the comfort of their apartment in Arlington, Va., which has a view of the Capitol.
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New U.S. Capitol Visitor Center Makes Trip Easier for Tourists
VISITORS SHORT
Rachel Kolokoff
Boston University Washington News Service
December 12, 2008
WASHINTON - For millions of annual visitors who have stood in line for hours waiting to tour the U.S. Capitol, convenience has finally arrived with the opening of the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center.
The 580,000-square-foot underground addition, which took seven years and $621 million of taxpayer money to construct, opened in early December.
The idea of a visitor center dates back to the 1960s but was thrust forward in 1998 when a gunman breached Capitol security, opening fire and killing two Capitol police officers.
In 2002, construction began with a cost estimated at close to $360 million.
Tom Fontana, spokesman for the center, said the facility, built almost entirely underground on the east side of the Capitol, improves security by establishing a buffer zone between the Capitol and its visitors.
But the center, which is protected by the U.S. Capitol Police, does much more than shield the Capitol building, according to Mr. Fontana. At roughly three-quarters the size of the Capitol building itself, the center can hold up to 4,000 people and includes additional congressional office space, two theaters, exhibits, gift shops, a cafeteria and 26 restrooms.
Until the new center opened, tourists were forced to wait outside in hot and cold weather to go through security and were allowed to enter only in controlled numbers.
“People are now waiting minutes outside where it would have been hours before,” Fontana said.
People waiting for tours now can enjoy the center’s displays about the history of the Capitol and Congress in the new 16,500-square-foot exhibition space. Designed by Ralph Appelbaum Associates, the dimly lit exhibition hall, in which photography is barred, has an 11-foot-tall model of the Capitol’s rotunda and dome, interactive, touch-screen kiosks with panoramic virtual tours of the Capitol and more.
Displayed artifacts on loan from the National Archives include the trowel used by President Washington to lay the Capitol cornerstone in 1793 and the American flag that was flying over the House on Sept. 11, 2001.
Also on display are the original 19-foot-tall, white plaster Statue of Freedom, cast in bronze in 1861, and more than 20 other statues from the National Statuary Hall Collection.
While waiting to tour the Capitol, visitors not admiring priceless artifacts and statues might watch a 13-minute orientation film on the history of Congress in one of two theaters accessible from Emancipation Hall.
But with the center’s advance reservation system in place, most visitors will not find themselves waiting for long, Fontana said. Using the center’s Web site, visitthecapitol.gov, visitors can book a tour with the Capitol Guide Service days or weeks in advance and plan accordingly. Tours led by congressional office staff members are still available and visitors can contact their member of Congress directly or through the Web site.
It costs nothing to enter or to reserve tickets for the theaters and tours. A limited number of tickets are available daily for people who have not made reservations.
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New U.S. Capitol Visitor Center Makes Trip Easier for Tourists
VISITORS
Worcester Telegram and Gazette
Rachel Kolokoff
Boston University Washington News Service
December 10, 2008
WASHINGTON -- After 18 years as a history teacher at Forest Grove Middle School in Worcester, Fred King is no stranger to the U. S. Capitol building.
As a chaperone on the annual class trip to Washington, he has accompanied his students as they have toured its halls about a dozen times, witnessing history firsthand in the legislative chambers and viewing the paintings and sculptures as grand as the national ideals they reflect.
But despite his best efforts, Mr. King said, there is one thing he has yet to discover beneath the cast-iron Capitol dome, something his students have always, inevitably, needed – a bathroom. In fact, throughout the building, there are only five public bathrooms.
But for Mr. King, his students, and millions of annual visitors who have stood in line for hours waiting to tour the Capitol, convenience has finally arrived with the opening of the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center. The 580,000-square-foot underground addition, which took seven years and $621 million of taxpayer money to construct, opened in early December. And it has 26 restrooms.
The idea of a visitor center dates back to the 1960s but was thrust forward in 1986 when a legislative committee began planning its construction and again in 1998 when a gunman breached Capitol security, opening fire and killing two Capitol police officers.
In 2002, after the Sept. 11 attacks in New York City, construction began with a cost estimated at close to $360 million.
Tom Fontana, spokesman for the center, said the facility, built almost entirely underground on the east side of the Capitol, improves security by establishing a buffer zone between the Capitol and its visitors.
Truck services to the Capitol now also take place underground in a tunnel, the construction of which was partly responsible for the center’s delays and cost overrun. Previously all delivery trucks pulled up to the east front of the building.
“All that activity occurred right near the face of the building in the morning hours,” Mr. Fontana said, “and that’s not appropriate for any building, let alone the nation’s Capitol.”
But the center, which is protected by the U.S. Capitol Police, does much more than shield the Capitol building, according to Mr. Fontana. At roughly three-quarters the size of the Capitol building itself, the center can hold up to 4,000 people and includes additional congressional office space, two theaters, exhibits, gift shops, a cafeteria and the 26 restrooms.
More than 2,000 people per hour can be screened through the center’s entrance, a descending stairway on the Capitol’s east lawn, which some say mars a once unobstructed view of the Capitol building itself.
“People are now waiting minutes outside where it would have been hours before,” Fontana said.
U.S. Rep. James P. McGovern, D-Worcester, said that the more efficient entrance is a welcome way to keep people out of long lines and bad weather.
“People get heat stroke waiting to get into the Capitol in lines with hundreds and hundreds of people,” Mr. McGovern said. Until the new center opened, tourists would wait in line outside to go through security and were allowed to enter only in controlled numbers.
For people like Mr. King and David J. Twiss, a chorus director at Burncoat High School in Worcester who is taking his select chorus to Washington in January, the center offers not only shelter from the weather but also the chance for a hassle-free educational experience.
“Certainly when you’re trying to get on a bus with a time schedule, you’re going to appreciate 26 bathrooms,” Mr. Twiss said.
Mr. Twiss said he expects his students to enjoy the center’s displays about the history of the Capitol and Congress in the new 16,500-square-foot exhibition space. Designed by Ralph Appelbaum Associates, the dimly lit exhibition hall, in which photography is barred, has an 11-foot-tall model of the Capitol’s rotunda and dome; models of Capitol Hill’s evolution from 1814 to present times; interactive, touch-screen kiosks with panoramic virtual tours of the Capitol and more.
Displayed artifacts on loan from the National Archives include the trowel used by President Washington to lay the Capitol cornerstone in 1793, the gavel used in the 1941 declaration of war against Germany and Italy and the American flag that was flying over the House on Sept. 11, 2001.
U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal, D-Springfield, said the exhibitions are important because they offer people a chance to better understand America’s history.
“I think the obligation here is clear,” Mr. Neal said, “and that’s to remind and better acquaint the citizenry with the marvel of the documents that help produce our democracy.”
Also on display are the original 19-foot-tall, white plaster Statue of Freedom, cast in bronze in 1861, and more than 20 other statues chosen carefully from the National Statuary Hall Collection to “represent the diversity of the country equitably,” according to Mr. Fontana.
“In the entire national statuary hall collection there are 100 statues, but only eight are women,” Mr. Fontana said. “We have five of those in our Emancipation Hall.”
Mr. Fontana said each statue was placed meticulously throughout the vast sandstone and marble-walled showroom, which boasts a 36-foot ceiling, two massive skylights and floor space large enough to contain five football fields.
The statue of King Kamehameha, who has an elevated status in Hawaii, must out of respect rest in a place where no one walks over his head, Mr. Fontana said. Sacagawea must face the West in honor of her westward journey with Lewis and Clark.
While waiting to tour the Capitol, visitors not admiring priceless artifacts and statues might watch a 13-minute orientation film on the history of Congress in one of two theaters accessible from Emancipation Hall.
But with the center’s advance reservation system in place, most visitors will not find themselves waiting for long, Fontana said. Using the center’s Web site, visitthecapitol.gov, visitors can book a tour with the Capitol Guide Service days or weeks in advance and plan accordingly. Tours led by congressional office staff members are still available and visitors can contact their member of Congress directly or through the Web site.
It costs nothing to enter or to reserve tickets for the theaters and tours. A limited number of tickets are available daily for people who have not made reservations.
Mr. McGovern said he thinks visitors will not be disappointed by the center, which he called a magnificent addition to the Capitol campus.
“From some vantage points, when you look up through the glass ceiling, you see that incredible view of the Capitol dome,” he said, “It’s breathtaking.”
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