Drivers and allies outside the Prince George's County Council, May 24, 2011
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Tonight, in addition to examining what’s going on in the District of Columbia, we turn our attention to two neighboring jurisdictions struggling with taxicab issues.
In Prince George’s, the County Council recently passed a bill which overturned last year’s unanimous vote on CB-36, which provided medallions directly to independent drivers, instead of to the few big players that dominate the county’s taxicab industry.
In a July 3 op-ed in the Sunday Washington Post, Prince George’s County Councilmember Mary Lehman wrote, “This is a classic David vs. Goliath struggle… In Prince George’s County, what has stood between independent drivers and economic security is a system that is reminiscent of the sharecropper system in the Old South in which poor white and black farmers could never get ahead. While cab companies pay the county $200 per year per licensed vehicle, drivers who affiliate with those companies pay a staggering $335 per week – or about 50 percent of their earnings – to essentially rent the license from the corporate holder.”
Lehman was one of three councilmembers who voted against the recent anti-driver legislation, known as CB-3. In an extended interview last week, that we’ll be airing later in the program, Lehman described Prince George’s County’s taxi industry as being “like a system of indentured servitude.” Here’s a clip from our interview.
[Councilmember Mary Lehman]
Later in the program we’ll play an extended interview with her and Henock Wogderse, one of the lead organizers of the Prince George’s County Taxi Workers Alliance. The Taxi Workers Alliance needs to collect 10,000 signatures in less than 90 days in order to place the recently passed anti-driver legislation, CB-3, on the November 2012 ballot as a referendum. Last week, Wogderse discussed the issue.
[Henock Wogderse]
In Arlington, a taxicab drivers’ organization is making waves. The group is called AUTO, or Arlington United Taxi Operators. One of AUTO’s main concerns is that drivers are being left out of the political process, and in particular, left out of the writing of the county’s Taxi Code. Berhane Michaels is one of the group’s lead organizers. Last week, when I asked Michaels how many members AUTO had, he declined to say, citing fears of potential retribution from fleet owners.
In fact, according to Michaels, drivers were retaliated against by owners for participating in last month’s sit-in of the office of Arlington Director of Transportation Dennis Leach. Here is some of what Michaels had to say.
[Berhane Michaels]
In D.C., Mayor Vincent Gray is facing scrutiny over campaign contributions. Nikita Stewart of the Washington Post reported that the paper found “several instances of cash donations that exceeded the city’s $25 limit. Gray campaign workers then improperly exchanged that cash for money orders, which carry a higher donation limit. The campaign officially reported the money-order donations and not the cash, The Post found. Money-order donations totaled more than $56,000 – primarily from the city’s taxi industry.” That’s from a July 19 Washington Post article.
Mayor Gray responded by issuing a press release which read, in part, “The story published in [the] Post raises questions about my mayoral campaign. I regret that unresolved issues from the campaign continue to surface. The campaign has been under investigation – an investigation for which I called as soon as allegations of improprieties were made several months ago – and I cannot comment on specific matters. Last year, we mounted a grass-roots mayoral campaign and won within a six-month time frame. The schedule was very tight, and I had to trust people to properly carry out the duties for which they were responsible. But obviously, if mistakes were made, the campaign should be held accountable.”
Fox 5’s Paul Wagner followed up the Washington Post piece with this news story:
[Fox 5]
July 20, the day after Nikita Stewart’s report in the Post, the paper followed up with an editorial entitled “More questions for Mr. Gray: Did the mayor’s campaign break fundraising rules?” The editorial stated that former D.C. Taxicab Commission Chair Leon Swain was someone “whom drivers reviled because he helped engineer the switch from zones to meters. Never mind that Leon J. Swain Jr. had proven his integrity by cooperating with a federal probe into cab corruption.”
[Phone conversation with Haimanot Bizuayehu: issues discussed include Freeman Klopott’s recent article in The Examiner entitled “Gray campaign failed to report free taxi rides for voters]
We now turn to an extended interview with Prince George’s County Councilmember Mary Lehman and Henock Wogderse, a lead organizer with the Prince George’s County Taxi Workers Alliance. The Taxi Workers Alliance is attempting to gather 10,000 signatures to overturn the recently passed anti-driver legislation known as CB-3. CB-3 undoes legislation unanimously passed by the Council just a year ago which provided 390 medallions directly to independent drivers, instead of to the few big companies that dominate the county’s taxicab industry.
I began by asking Councilmember Lehman about the recently passed CB-3 and the driver-friendly legislation it undid, known as CB-36.
[Councilmember Mary Lehman and Henock Wogderse]
We now turn to an interview with Berhane Michaels, a lead organizer with AUTO, Arlington United Taxi Operators. AUTO is concerned that drivers have been left out of the political process, and in particular, left out of the writing of county’s Taxi Code.
[Berhane Michaels]
Special thanks to Mark Taylor for doing an excellent job engineering today’s show.
Past Shows:
- A Discussion on Service Animals in Cabs; Wells Removed as Chair of Transportation Committee, July 17, 2011
- A Debate on the Future of the D.C. Taxicab Commission, July 10, 2011
- P.G. County Pushes Forward with Anti-Taxi Driver Legislation, July 3, 2011
- Journalists Arrested at Public Meeting of Taxicab Commission, June 26, 2011
- Wells Calls Off Hearing on Medallion Bill, June 19, 2011
- John Ray Continues His Private Meetings on the Medallion Bill, June 12, 2011
- The Freedom Plaza Rally, June 5, 2011
- DCTC Locks Drivers Out, May 29, 2011