DC Buys Bronze Bobbleheads for Billionaires

As part of its economic recovery effort, the DC Government commissioned $700,000 worth of sculpture for billionaire Theodore Lerner and his family. DC already built $611 million Nationals Park for the Lerners, who own the local Major League Baseball franchise, and the government wants to decorate it to suit the wealthy tenants. Who knows, this might even encourage the Lerners to actually pay rent on the stadium.

You can admire the artistic gifts your tax dollars bought for the Lerners at 11:00 AM on Wednesday, April 8th, when the sculptures will be dedicated. RSVP to Deirdre Ehlen at the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities (DCCAH) by email or phone (202-724-5613). The event is free, so go see the art you paid for before you have to buy Nationals tickets to do it.

Forbes estimates the personal wealth of Theodore  N. Lerner at $2.5 billion, but why spend your own money on art when the taxpayers will commission it for you?  The DC Government dead- panned that the baseball art belongs to DC and is only on loan to the Lerners, an assertion worthy of a Larry Neal Award for fiction.  The sculpture  is site-specific, so saying the art is on loan is like saying you don’t own the fillings in your teeth, you only rent them.

Nader 1, Post 0

In case you missed it, here’s a season highlight from Politico‘s Alexander Burns:

[Ralph] Nader recounted a recent meeting with editors at The Washington Post, who he said told him the paper wasn’t covering his campaign because he had no chance of winning. According to Nader, he replied: “Then why are you covering the Nationals?” a reference to Washington’s long-suffering baseball team.

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Thanks to XMsportsradio

Big Bronze Bobbleheads?

The Washington Nationals nearly caused a riot yesterday. Not on the field, but on the line to enter RFK Stadium, where the team gave away bobblehead dolls. The promotion was so successful, and such a credit to the city, Mayor Fenty just put $700,000 in the District budget to buy the team’s millionaire owners giant bronze bobbleheads for the new Nationals Stadium.

Seriously, Mr. Fenty reprogrammed $700,000 to buy custom-made art work at the stadium for the team’s millionaire owners. How many times does this bad policy have to strike out before it is removed from the batting order? The Council in its wisdom has rejected this move twice before, and  Councilmember Kwame Brown, who chairs the Economic Development Committee, has called a “time out” on this attempt. Public art of this sort of is usually funded by the developer or tenant, and government arts agencies provide technical assistance. Well-known local examples include the Washington Convention Center and Reagan National Airport.

The claim that the stadium sculpture will be owned by the District and eventually moved elsewhere is absurd. The application for this one-of-a-kind, site-specific art includes architectural drawings of the stadium. Claiming this art is just on loan is like saying you don’t own your own dental work but have merely borrowed it.

Construction of lighting and maintenance of the stadium art works, also provided by the District, are not included in the $700K. There goes your Stadium Budget Cap. Councilmembers: use this $700,000 to fund a competitive, peer-reviewed Capital Arts Grant Program for DC community arts organizations.