Evening Exchange; 2210; Child & Family Service Agency; Weekly News Analysis; Holiday Spending

Change and the nation's political landscape change and the D.C. Child and Family Services Agency changing the way you can spend your holidays and change in the way you can spend for your holidays. All next on evening Xchange. Hi I'm Kojo Nnamdi. Last week a D.C. superior court judge sentenced Teresa Blackman to one year in prison for the role she played in the murder of her daughter toddler Brianna Blackman. The news reports of the sentence served to bring back bitter memories of an incompetent D.C. Child and Family Services agency that failed to protect Brianna Blackman at a time the agency was responsible for her protection

from parental abuse and neglect. Subsequent media reports documented a variety of ways in which the agency was failing the children of the nation's capital. But when Olivia Golden was appointed director to that agency she promised that things would change. These were her remarks on an evening exchange on January of this year. One of the things that happened over the months before I took the job is that the city the mayor the city council the whole community came together to make some big changes so that when the agency came back from receivership it wasn't the same agency it had been before there were changes in the law and the budget. And I thought that the city had really come together to make it possible to succeed. And that moment of opportunity. It's really why I wanted to be here. We're going to change all of the institutional barriers that made it impossible to succeed. So the way I see it is that there were so many things

working against the agency that now the community has come together to fix those things and we have a chance to succeed since that interview in January there has indeed been some change. Olivia Golden rejoins us now. Welcome once again. Thank you very much. At least two significant things happened that the public does or should know about. One is that the court appointed monitor issued a report indicating that there had been sufficient improvement in the D.C. Child and Family Services Agency that she recommended that it be removed from court receivership is that correct that the probationary period and I didn't get it wrong but it's so exciting. Now she made that recommendation in October has the probationary period ended yes. Yes. The probationary period has ended and we are in the next stages which is thinking about our progress from here. The other thing that's happened is that the counsel for court excellence has conducted a study of its own and it also cited significant improvement in the fourth in the performance

of the agency. How important was that. Well both of those reports are very important to us because we're on a several year track. We're not going to solve everything right away but to see those markers and to see two very distinguished outside observers with a lot of in-depth look at the numbers say we've made real change for children in just a year. It's very exciting. The court monitors report looked all across agency operations and there are lots of different things that it highlighted where we've improved results for children. The counsel for court excellence focused more on how we work with the courts how children are moving more quickly through that system. They're both very important. Let's talk about some of the specifics of each report starting with the letter for us the Crown counsel for court excellent about the speed with which children are being removed from situations of neglect and abuse to permanent homes. They found that there was a reduction in that. It's still not satisfactory. But talk about what. Well the Council for court excellence report really looks at how long children linger

in the court system and how we're working with the courts and with our colleagues with the attorneys who represent us from the office of corporation counsel because when children come into care when they can't live safely at home because of abuse or neglect. One of the things that we know is that lingering in limbo without knowing who your permanent family is going to be is very hard for a child. And so the national legislation requires that all around the country we work harder at having children not stay forever in an in-between situation and foster care. But either go home or move to adoption. And the counsel for court Excellence said the system's doing better at some of the key steps like moving hearings along the court monitors report the other report. Give some other examples like that we're doing better on adoptions and doing those in a timely way. So that's the key picture and the counsel for court excellence also highlights how well we're we're doing working closely together. Let's talk about some numbers for a second because apparently the city has standards that says it should take a certain amount of time. We have been taking much longer than that. We're

not taking as long as we used to but we're not quite at where the standard is. That's right. The report essentially highlights the percentage of children who get the hearing that they are required to get by the federal law within the appropriate timeline and shows that there have been substantial improvements in that percentage. How about the court monitors report. What did the court monitor find. What areas had the agency improved. Well the court monitors report covers a whole lot of areas four of those I think are specially important to children. Adoptions First of all that we had about a 20 percent increase in how many adoptions became final meaning children could start being in limbo and move into a loving home. We went from about 270 to about 230 from one year to the next. A second area was very much about children's safety at the very beginning a child will come to our attention because somebody calls the hotline and is concerned about abuse or neglect. And we have to do it. Investigation that's prompt to do to protect that child's safety and we

drastically cut down the backlog more than cut in half the cases. How were you able to do that. We did a lot of ways we did it through the dedication of the FSA staff. I have to say that this year has been an incredible year of change and people really stepped up to it and instead we did hire more staff. Yes we're not all the way to where we need to be. But a long standing issue for this agency is not enough staff caseloads that are too high and we've made progress on that. We made progress also on having our computer information systems support our staff better so they could know much more have much more information at their fingertips to do the work. Bottom line is that the child and family services agency is now on the phone. District of Columbia control where underfill District of Columbia control we still we're not finished with the Court's involvement. The receivership ended the probationary period ended and the next step is for us to move to get even more successful so we can meet all the requirements of the original court order from 10 years ago. And right now that's what

we are planning to do over the coming couple of year. Court order stems from I think a 1989 lawsuit. That's right. That's right. Got the receivership got rid of the monitor. What is the nature of court supervision at this point. Well the monitor remains involved. She's remains the person who keeps informed about how we're doing. The nature of court supervision now is that we have the order that describes really a vision of what child welfare ought to look like in the district. And we're working on the plan to get there over the next two or three years and I really believe we can do it. Recent election return Mayor Williams to office I suspect therefore that there is not likely to be any significant effect of that election. I think that's right. I mean I I just think that Mayor Williams commitment has been enormously important. I do think that just like everybody else the national climate can make it harder for us to keep the resources we need. So that's very important that we need to stay the course in terms of the dollars that are important to pay foster

parents and staff and keep us going. But I know the mayor has a full commitment. Are you suggesting that the fact that both the House and the Senate now come under Republican control that the national climate might not be as well generous to the Child and Family Services Agency of the District of Columbia or the District of Columbia budget in general as you would like it to be. Well I think we don't really know yet. But I think that we have to be sure that we stay committed even in times that might be more challenging. I think we don't know very much yet about how it will work. What does the one judge one family approach. How does that work. How does that help your progress. Well Congress passed and the president signed it in January 2001 legislation that in 2002 just about a year that changed how how judges in the Family Court relate to our agency and to our children and what it does is it says that instead of our social workers having to deal with 50 or 60 different judges which is the way it's always

been you might have a few abuse neglect cases. A small number of judges with a lot of support and a lot of training would be committed to the family court and we'd be working with them and we're actually at a very exciting point now. The additional magistrate judges have been hired. The teams are being put together and we're right now working very closely with the court on how to have our social workers our attorneys the judge's team up in a way that will produce better quality outcomes for children from everything that I've been reading. There was a lot of competition in the area jurisdictions for good social workers. How do you compete with some of the more affluent area jurisdictions like Montgomery County. Well I'm glad you asked me because just today I was looking at our data about social worker recruitment. We focus on it all the time. We know that some of the things that make us appealing are that we do have competitive salaries especially for master's level social workers but even more than that the sense of mission and the sense of making a difference in the District in an urban community really matters to social workers that's often why people go to school to become social

workers. We also have something new that we think is attracting people which is a really excellent training process at the beginning. It's a mix of courses and of being in a unit with a specially chosen supervisor for training. So we have a lot more to do we need to recruit more people we need. We need bilingual staff. We need social workers who can meet some of our more particular needs but we are we believe a very exciting place to work. Besides social workers and that's what we all of us think of when we think of a Child and Family Services Agency What other kinds of support staff do you need. Well look we look for a lot of different talents. Our social workers are supported by paraprofessionals who work with them. And of course we need clerical and information systems staff. We also in the district because we have that unique situation where we're a state as well as a local agency. We also do things like license and monitor look at the quality of foster homes and group homes and that's been very controversial. Absolutely. Absolutely. And we've been working very

hard on it. We're recruiting in those areas. How does that how do you improve in those areas. When you say we're recruiting in those areas does this also mean that you have to recruit the kinds of people who are not just qualified but who are stringent about standards. Well what what they'll have I actually was thinking in the clip that you showed from my interview a year ago I talked about putting all the institutional pieces in place until October a year ago. There were no regulations in the district for the quality of group homes. So we're doing everything from the start there were they had to get a certificate of occupancy and nothing more about quality. So what we've done is put in place the rules bring together the people will be licensing all of our group homes by January 1st 2003. The staff are trying to figure out though what their time over the holidays will be like that's a very tight deadline. But it's really important. So we're bringing people on.

We've been training people working with people we have and doing this whole new process that the lack of regulation I can see in hindsight is what obviously was the source of a lot of problems in the group home. The fact that regulations didn't exist. I think it was one very big source. I also think the district just had a long history of using group homes too much. One of the one of the areas the court monitor said we've made progress is that we cut in half the number of young children in group settings because we believe that children thrive best in a family and foster family. So there was too much use of group homes providers didn't have the resources to hire and train qualified staff and there wasn't enough oversight. If you had an agency that by definition deals with troubled families how do you define success for such an agency. I mean the most successful thing for such an agency was would be not to have to exist at all. Well that's a wonderful question because we think about it a lot. And we think a lot about how do we measure our success. And we think about it in three parts in children's safety.

And part of that as you say is we'd like to prevent children from needing to come to us and we work with community agencies on that part of it. And this may be a little bit of a jargon word but permanency that children deserve to grow up in a permanent family either by going home or by being adopted. And so we look at that and how well we do. And the third is well-being. We look at our our children immunized for example when they're in our care. But I think for the social workers who work with us when I ask them what success I hear stories about parents who've put their lives back together again and brought their children home about adoptive families who've reached out to children who never thought they would have a home about children who are doing better in school because their lives stabilized. I think those keep us going even though we also see a lot of tragedy. I was about to say the other side of that coin is when you pick up the newspaper because we're not in the news business in the business of telling people good news you pick up the newspaper and you see that there's a dysfunction in some group home or some aspect of your agency. I guess what keeps you going

is the other news that there are some things that are improving. I think that's right. I think seeing the improvement keeps us going. And I think our commitment to make it right. I really believe that people who work in this field want to know if something's gone wrong so we can fix it. And when we had those sad incidents this summer in group homes we were already committed to quality in group homes and to having children be with families and we redoubled that. We did a lot of work. We visited all the children 12 and under in group homes we changed our rules more strict for reporting on what people saw. So we try to learn every time something isn't working to make it better. And if you go live once again thank you for joining us. Good luck to you. Thank you very very much. The Republicans now control both houses of Congress and the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission has called it quits. Our analysts join us when we come back. Welcome back. Three days after the midterm election here's what we know for sure. The Democrats

lost the Senate. The Republicans increased their margin in the house. And here's the real life and death issue that television networks can survive for a few hours of an election without exit polls. Now that we've made that discovery now that we don't have to analyze who called what first or who called what wrong. We can tell you that without the benefit of exit polls as long as a week ago and we champ of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation had this to say there is something else in the whole national campaign that I think is to the world we're looking here to and that is to the Democrats universally and all races have come up with a very very poor posture for the voters. I think if you look at the race as it stands right now the man who really likely will steal this whole thing as we see the figures right now is the president because it's entirely possible that he's weakest. You look at the polls now he'll get a status quo. What happens if he gets those few votes that will give him the senate he could turn out to be one of the great vote getters of our time and Minnesota because I don't think

it's necessarily a given that it will take. Well stones place successfully particularly since there is that little bit of a squabble about the event at the memorial for Wellstone. Anytime someone is batting 500 they get the bat often. So welcome back. A chap you do more. That's a new low to show champ It really is really Mark Plotkin of WTOP Radio Askia Muhammad of the Washington formen final call. And Ed Fouhy the executive director and editor of state line dot org. Thank you all for joining us. How did you do that. I like a lot of people saw that and I must say for a couple of days I was besieged everywhere particularly the national press building I was afraid to get in the elevator because people were Giorgi. I didn't think it was that tough call. I thought the polls were inching that way and I thought the Democrats were running a very poor campaign. That was in fact President Bush who pulled it off of the week but we will never know because we don't have the exit polls.

I'm serious. The exit poll is the only tool we've got. The that will give us the answer to that and we don't have it. We may get some paper exit polls next week but it's a it's a real problem. It's fun to make make fun of eggs and pulled in not calling but the terrific tool. And we'll never know except in the States. The Washington Post did something in Maryland and there were a few other spotty polls but there's really nothing there because we kept looking for what the African-American vote was like in various jurisdictions nor at the polls it's hard to find that Democratic losses. Let's start with Minnesota where Walter Mondale lost. He had high name recognition. He came in on the heels of a tragic event but it would appear as if making the funeral of a fallen senator into a virtual campaign event worked against them. But let me just say one thing about Walter Mondale I was surprised. I was shocked. But we do have to get in. The last time he won an election in Minnesota to the United States Senate was 1970. All right. That's the first thing. Second thing when you say wait a second he won two states the District of Columbia and Minnesota and then my Republican

friends I do have Republican friends remind me he barely won Minnesota in 84 by 4000 votes and between 84 and 2002 the state changes and Coleman. I thought in the debate that they had a mandate more than the memorial service handled himself perfectly. He was deferential. He was respect respectful to always called him the vice president. And he'd been running for two years. And let's not forget that Coleman was not was giving Wellstone a run for the money and that was that would have been a contest had Senator Wellstone been available to be elected in a Republican was when he was governor. Do you think that the the funeral ceremony for Senator Paul Wellstone tended to have to turn the public away from Walter Mondale. I accept the received wisdom of my journalistic colleagues on that. The only other thing I just want to stress is that maybe it energized Democrats but there's a whole group of people watching Democrats or Republicans they're called independents and it did

alienate independents who vote in greater and greater measure in state election and they haven't even they have an organized party in a comparable situation. Jean Carnahan got into the Senate of course when her husband died and was elected anyway and she got the seat couldn't hold onto it. No. And you know in this in this case you have a situation where again she was running not a picture perfect campaign and projected to be trailing. Was she was in trouble all along and did not distinguish herself in a way of service on the floor in the Senate. So she was likely doomed as well by George Bush's coattails even though it won't give George Bush coattails even though he wasn't on the ballot I'll give coattails in terms of fundraising. George Bush goes into the state as able to raise money like nobody else can. I thought Carnahan actually did better than I thought she would. You got to realize that talent just two years previous

had run for governor and lost. He had won as a congressman. People knew him. Yes they knew Carnahan but Carnahan had never won election in the state of Missouri. But it's more than just money. I think there is enough evidence around that where the president went too frequently. He did deliver the goods. The exception perhaps being South Dakota. But he soon argues and Arkansas that are going through the governor's races a big party. He campaigned for twenty two gubernatorial candidates and 11 of them last. No no. But I am saying though that in those targeted races for Congress seats because I think there is a difference. I think the president's coattails don't extend to governors because I think one of the things that's coming out of this race is that there are now we see at least I believe this is a strong point here that we see that the governors are separate from people running for congressional offices and one of the things this election may have taught us is that there is a real difference between Congress and the congressional record. But where the president was campaigning for congressional candidates in Iowa

for example they did well where they thought they might lose for congressional seats or have that potential. I think he did deliver his statistically edge should not be invited back. He's actually prepared for the show with state statistics. It's frightening. I hope that's not a trend. I just follow the races in the States but I think about how the House seats were the best seeded 22 of 2006. And that's where they were really concentrated. He did pretty well. I don't remember the Senate forgives but in terms of the House figures they really did do very well empirically. But this brings you back to the first point about the exit poll because we don't have those polls. We'll really never know. This is sheer speculation. The irony of Max Cleland going down in Georgia here is an Army veteran who had come on that. I can't even let you ask the question that to me is the most shameful thing in the world calling somebody who is a triple amputee soft on defense. That's what Saxby Chambliss did. But he won. I know he won and also the governor. They haven't elected a Republican governor since Reconstruction. Hundred seventy three years Sonny Perdue beat Roy Barnes who wanted to run for vice president or president or something. And Georgia they consider their greatest Republican the greatest call

at Cynthia McKinney's coattails. And the confederate flag coattails changing the flag. Absolutely right. Barnes and others who you know stood by it when Cynthia McKinney was taken on by a Democrat erstwhile favorite Thomas Clarence Thomas and might have voted for Bush in 2000. Find themselves the victims themselves of the juggernaut that they helped create themselves and of course the single most stunning upset to me was perdu beating Bourne's because birds was even being talked about as a potential presidential candidate. But you also have to remember that there were two open house seats and the Republicans won both of those so a long time. But when I first got the black Democrat and won there were two open seats. OK one in both the new seat the newly configured well there were all the reapportion seat 13 13 district which means there will be no Congressional Black Caucus. I know Koja won't like this but I'll say it anyway. Jean Carnahan and Max Cleland their

two final acts may be a profile of courage. They voted for the D.C. voting rights amendment D.C. voting rights bill in committee. It probably didn't help any other major surprises so narrowly. I think the fact that Davis against a really inept opponent also way overspent that opponent any any. Well you know five points is OK but that was a surprise and the opponent had a lot of ethical problems that the opponent had all kinds of problems. I think Marilyn was was a surprise stunning surprise in many eyes. But it also really became less and less of a surprise because of the election but with Republicans and even black Republicans black conservatives are saying this is a picture perfect campaign you had and then you had probably a terrible campaign on the part of and the end of the Kennedy dynasty. First Shriver and now Townsend But you had a picture perfect campaign put on like Arlott run by Ehrlich. You put a black person in a

conspicuous position. Democrats are afraid to do that to put blacks Democrats in high profile positions and then you appeal to black voters not necessarily to win them but to keep them from thinking that on a child you know they launched churlishly and in the end if you don't vote they don't start to just nullify that kind of sense into the black community so that people don't think Oh if I don't vote. Something terrible happened if I don't vote I can stay the Democrats will get black. This was the third time the Republicans have slated a black candidate for lieutenant governor. This was not making history. They tried it two other times. If you go to Annapolis you see Ehrenstein Allen that was the first one. I don't know who. I can't remember who he ran with but the real problem in in Maryland was Kathleen Kennedy Townsend got 77 percent of the vote in Prince George's she got great margins in Baltimore City she won 61 percent of. Yeah but in central Maryland like an a run Rundell the vote was not percentage it was

actually turned out white suburbanites you see largely white males white males putting putting the admiral didn't work and didn't last white females as well as white males. And very rarely any except the three that you just mentioned the Maryland campaign though may have been a sort of a look at all of the campaigns that we saw most of them. There was a lack of courage on the part of the Democrats especially toward the Republicans ran with a certain amount of courage and certainly a lot of courage established by the president who wasn't afraid to spend capital wasn't afraid to get out there and say his piece. And I think that a lot of that a lot of his courage and a lot of his campaigning came down into the grassroots when a cabinet position that I'm not seeking I a foreigner they know but you know something they do is they could learn something. You've got to look at the race and be honest. I know that the media is having a great deal of reluctance admitting that the president did take care of you. He did a good job.

You know Mark Plotkin ran for office several times I know and lost me as a Democrat. So you know where that goes. The eighth house districts the district house in Maryland Connie Morella has been holding for the past 16 years and that one must admit that with each recent election the Democrats have been slowly chipping her lead and then they reorganize the district and put part of Prince George's County in by Biocon. But but to Chris Van Hollen is credit and he really has to thank Mark Shriver. I now think the momentum of beating Shriver created some enthusiasm. He raised two and a half million dollars and he actually won without Prince George's County. If you just look at Montgomery County he wanted to learn and four years ago came within four points he wasn't that distinguish a candidate and that was a harbinger of things to come. They were ready to say goodbye. So you're saying that this was not a gift to Christopher Van Hollen from the Democratic Party. Of course it was it made it nicer. But. It turns out statistically he did need it. He won in the county the less and also two Democrats via the at the expense of Connie Morella is why should you vote for

a Republican that looks like a Democrat. When you get a real Democrat and this is the lesson the Democrats need to eat in this election why shouldn't they be for Republicans when voters would prefer real Republicans and how and really made exactly that affluent vote for me because I'll vote for a Democrat for speaker of the house. She won't tell you who she's going to vote for or vote for reply. Connie Morella is no longer around as chairman of a district subcommittee and she was generally considered to be a friend of the district. It's entirely possible that whoever that person ship this time is not necessarily likely to be offended by this. That's absolute right right now the guy next in line is a obscure congressman named Todd Platt's from central Pennsylvania. I don't know where he stands on the district. Hopefully Davis will be the chairman of the committee and maybe Tom Davis have some say over here in the District of Columbia the mayoral race was what I guess it was largely expected to be careless Swartz generally comes in somewhere between 30 and 40 percent. It happened again this time. Thirty four percent again this time she's implying that she's not likely to run for office.

Don't want to get enough time. Well and then she's going to just stop speaking to a lot of them for a while and then she is probably the one she really hit and run again. There was a referendum for an elected U.S. attorney for the district and that one I don't like that prosecutor for the district that won overwhelmingly. There was an initiative initiative 62 that argued for drug treatment in favor of incarceration. That one big time the Mira's already gone to court to stop the board of elections from certifying. That sounds like Bob Barr to you. Bob Barr the second and if he doesn't do that he'll violate home rule and I think he he has the potential to do that if the council won't overturn the initiative then he'll go to Congress and say why don't you do it. Which is exactly what a mayor shouldn't do. And don't let him off the hook on letting the district attorney because Tom DeLay of all people is a homeboy advocate. He feels that we should elect he told the Washington Post that we should elect our own district attorney. Doesn't go to both he and Eleanor are the axis of evil on referendum day and they even though 82 percent of the populace said yes we want to elect their own

district attorney they don't wanna work for it. So they're not going to even carry the ball in northern Virginia and Hampton Roads referenda for a sales tax to pay for transportation was voted down even though Governor Mark Warner campaigned in a spirited manner for this job. And they went down. Anybody got any ideas why. The irony. No Rose the Intercounty Connector is one of the things that was the albatross's that was tied around Kathleen Kennedy Townsend there roads in northern Virginia. Of course I guess if you have to pay for them that's another thing. It went down the tubes in Virginia. So you know maybe that will some bridge divides people along those lines in ways we didn't anticipate. I think the lesson is people don't like taxes when they have an opportunity to vote against them they're going to take it every time even if it means paying the price. In terms of getting into work and if you look all over the country anti-tax candidates won everywhere.

But this was an unusual coalition that did this in Northern Virginia. It was the had to tax people along with the environmental people the smart growth people to constituencies that don't generally agree on a whole lot of stuff. But Mark Warner is going to have to try to come up with some new way to try to move Northern Virginia's transportation I'd like to see maybe a slot machine here. I agree with that. We're going to work in Maryland isn't it I know Henry champ. But one of the few political predictions that I made right on that day was when it was raining very hard and they said there was a turnout. The the people that wanted the tax said will win if there's big turnout. I said No I don't think that there's a big turnout that means people are coming out not to tax themselves. They're coming out to stop the tax cuts. The Republican strategy hope for rain and black voters stay on where you are absolutely right on that one in terms of the taxes. We're going to talk about the new agenda in Congress. No I wanted to ask about the governorships. Can we say that the Democrats just lost everything here because no no no no. There were some bright spots but very very few. A couple of new faces Michigan Jennifer Granholm. Kansas will name Sebelius

daughter of the former governor of Ohio. Gilligan there is Linda Lingle a Republican came in in Hawaii. Rendell a Democrat and. RENDELL Rod Blagojevich in Illinois. But but what's really important is what I have not seen reported is how the Republicans have overturned the long held Democratic edge in state legislative means. There is a real barometer of public sentiment and in state after state the Democrats win down there are now fewer overall a there's just over 6000 total legislative seats and right now there are there are more Republicans than Democrats. For the first time anybody's memory somewhere in this John Conyers said on Friday there is a bright spot for Democrats if I can ever climb up out of my tears. The president he says look this is a man that I want my judicial

nominations. There were those that you said were rejected by committee right because well my position is that they never got out of committee. So I'm going to set you right. So some didn't even get a vote. Right. Didn't even get a vote. There's pretty good evidence that the election already paid off pretty quick dividend for the president and that was what happened at the United Nations. Nation after nation caved. Very quickly Russia France Syria. And Syria. But I don't think that was the factor. But France and Russia pretty quickly saw that he indeed can now say to the United Nations end of the world generally my country speaks with one voice and all of the questions about how the resolution was going forward pretty quickly dissipated it's true that there were concessions by the president but they were pretty limited. And you have to say that that election victory will really help him a lot of concessions or because obviously the U.N. inspectors are going to be there and they will report any violations or any obstruction to their work. Back to the Security Council even though the president is not necessarily limited by that but that's the point.

The president still has the option individually bilat unilaterally should he wish to take I mean to say right when you say though the president speaks with one voice I think the country speaks the country speaks with one voice. I think there is a large resistance to the war and the black community first and then among the Democrats in the Congress. You can be loyal. But then you have to be an opposition leader no question. I'm not going to join let's not let's not talk about as a leader let's talk about Nancy Pelosi. There are about 26 Democrats in the House who voted against Let's get a resolution let's get them like this and let's keep it just. And that's what the Democratic leader is going to be someone over the Internet or not not here for obviously not Martin Frost but the international allies we're looking at the pools over here that we're saying the American public would not. Support the president strongly unless he went with an international coalition. Well the fact of the matter is he continually throughout the campaign warned the voters very clearly he was going to potentially take unilateral action. They supported him. The international allies saw that.

And I think it was a big dividend on the deal at that election. Paid a big dividend. Can I go back to the judicial nominees. He's going to bring back on. He's going to bring back Pickering and I know he is he's going to bring those names back because Hatch thinks they have a majority in committee. No that's yours. Well that's my honest answer. No no it's not an absolute. And I think he's I think the press is right I don't think I've ever said that. I think the president's right. Let them vote on the Senate floor. We'll find out how many Republicans will vote up and no. And I think every now and then almost a Pickering filibuster. Well I think everybody deserves a vote on the floor. Then you find out how they really feel about the candidate about a nominee. The sniper suspects have been turned over to Virginia for trials. I'm not sure that was a great surprise to anyone because Virginia's death penalty statute has the reputation of being implemented swiftly and it does not bar minors from facing the death penalty. So it looks as if that's what the Justice Department was interested in. Clearly what the attorney general was interest.

Eighty three executions since 1977. Second only to Texas Texas and also a nice little something to Doug Gansler the Democrat very ambitious and democratic in Montgomery County. You're not going to try this case. Also much more experienced prosecutors people like her friend have been than prosecuting these trials of high profile cases for many years and there's no substitute for that kind of experience if they are indeed guilty. May God have mercy on their souls but thankfully for their sakes they can only be executed once. I agree. I think the only thing about it was worth much it was Ashcroft's press conference which the administration announced because he did look to be taking too much joy in the fact that they were going to an area where they could face the death penalty. But I agree with coacher. Did you expect anything different. Exactly. This was well and it is popular with residents in the area where these killings took place and of course they keep adding to the number of killings and it has as clear a point that there can only be

executed once in one wrong place. But the list keeps getting longer as prosecutors around the country keep finding all kinds of ballistic evidence that these are the dead bodies files. This has been absolutely no public sentiment that favors anything of a lenient nature for these two individuals. That's why this is where they'll get a jury that can be impartial. They will be anywhere near near Washington certainly. There's one example and I think it's the most isolated example. And I thought it took a lot of guts. Chris Van Hollen said he's not. He was running in that district. They asked him about capital punishment for these two individuals he said I'm against. I'm against it. What did Chief Ramsey say by the time that you were listening on the show. What show. Chief Ramsey criticized Roscoe Howard the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia who was also our local local prosecutor for not bringing any charges here in the district Columbia for the District resident who was killed and these guys Roscoe

Howard worked for a guy who works for the president the United States or for John Ashcroft thank you. If these defendants even confessed I think they would still get the death penalty. It would be that there would be no leniency there would be no mercy if they confessed perhaps Melville maybe for house. It depends on how this case is how your relationship between these two individuals evolved. I think that's going to be one of the most intriguing aspects of this case. The nature of the relation I think the watch Post is reporting on that particular relationship has been excellent and I envy the reporter who got to go to St. John's anti-that to cover a story. That's another story. One of the stories that we are particularly happy about here an evening exchange is that a few weeks ago we had a young man on this show when we were talking about young people in politics his name is Jarvis Houston he's a Howard University senior political science major You are looking at him right now and what he did on campus was organize a major debate here because he wanted students here to be interested in D.C. politics. He ran for advisory neighborhood commissioner

and they say be it and see what's there be one of the one be all things. And Jarvis one will go for him. He's from Chicago we need Chicago style politics in this city. We haven't gone anywhere. That's right. And when I found intriguing and the whole topper is that for some reason he knew what the vote was prior to the polls closing which is really Chicago got all these people in one the victory. We need a new generation that knows what to do and how to do it. Good for all us Houston. Good luck to you. Thank you all for joining us. Looking ahead to the holidays how to spend them and how to spend for them. When we come back. So finally this year you're trying to get a head start on the holidays. You've made a list

of every family member who will be around for Thanksgiving for Christmas for Kwanzaa for Hanukkah. And now it's time to figure out what you can do for them. We sent even exchanges and they want out to find out what other folks are planning to do. Lorraine Amadi will probably do more window shopping this holiday season than usual. This year. Money's tight they will be. More spiritual. Than. Probably before because in reflection and appreciation even though they might not have as much. As they may have had. At. Another time. We had seven in the last year for our has been difficult. She's a counselor who just started working again after a year of being unemployed. Well sometimes I make appointments to stand and sometimes have to rob Peter to pay Paul so you just do what you have to do.

Experts like Daniel Day-Lewis president of the networth financial group say Loraine's story is not an uncommon one. If jobs are being lost then obviously no job no income no spending. Very simply put. This doesn't mean the season will be an economic bust. A recent survey conducted by global market information company found 69 percent of American consumers plan to spend the same amount this holiday as last 20 percent say they plan to spend less. And you must check your economic health right now. If you're not in a position to go out and spend 200 on that one gift it's more on the lines of $20 and you should probably try to stick to the low weigh in. And if you just can't seem to cut your shopping list down. Experts say you better become familiar with signs like these. There's not too many individuals who are at that level economically speaking right now who will not go to a store and spend their money unless there's a S A L E.

Along with the attack. Amadi has a big family and traditionally She spared no expense. Most embarrassing say No money was spent about three in the time. But this year. Will be a little different. You want to give a lot of laughs. And try to be creative. And mindful. Of. What things which live and live and. Bonding issues. That. Essential to keep family. And community. Some say finding the perfect gift to go under the tree doesn't always mean opening your wallet. It could just be opening your heart. For even exchange. I'm Jane de world. So you're working on a limited budget and there are so many guests coming to your home that you can't figure out what to do this holiday season. And so in order to help you along with the financial aspects of that we have got Michelle Singletary.

Color of Money columnist for The Washington Post. Good to see you again. And also joining us is Julie dog Julie doors with Greater D.C. cares. What exactly is your position with greater D.C.. I'm the senior director of programs and a director of programs at greater D.C. cares. Michelle let's start with you. Just got this brand new credit card in the mail just a few days ago looking at having to buy a lot of gifts at Christmas. Should I be whipping out that credit card right now. You should be putting it away. I mean this time of year people lose their lose their everlasting mind. I mean I'm not kidding. I mean she talked about spending three thousand dollars here you've grown I could hear you flinch. Ouch. You know my heart was stopping. I mean this is ridiculous. The amount of money people spent and I understand that people want to treat their families right. They want to show their love but it's not necessary to go into debt to suspend this time of year it is just outrageous the amount of money particularly if you don't have it and you are really have debt on your credit card. If you have debt on your credit card that means that you're rolling it over months a month. You should not be spending a dime at Christmas.

But Michelle I love this. I'm broke. All going to be here for Christmas. They're expecting something from me and I can probably follow your advice for like another two or three weeks. But as the holiday gets closer and closer I'll start breaking down. You do and I do. Were you should have a plan for it you know just plan not to spend a week. I recommend everybody who's in debt and Christmas is coming up to get this book called A 100 dollar holiday year before last my husband joined this movement and basically the idea is that you spend just $100 for Christmas and yes that includes everybody including the Rugrats. Well I know a little bit about your finances and it seems to me that you overspent last year. I do. It was one hundred thirty nine shame. Why couldn't you get no extra. But you know it was it was a task for my family for me and my husband to show that we didn't need to spend a whole lot of money to show our love. When you that laying in a casket and you a big cry. Nobody said about me then though for Christmas you know. I mean love is not shown about what you buy. And some people really have to get that message specially

if you're dead. What do you do as if you don't have the money sit your family down. Call them up and say listen you know I need to get my finances straight let's not do this mad thing this year where we exchange all these expensive gifts that nobody can afford and nobody needs nor wants. Who needs a fish to things on their wall. You know do you need a George Foreman grill that tilt your meat so the grease ones day. No. You know tilt your frying pan yourself. The thing is. Think about what you're doing to your finances. I mean there are many more things that your family can do. You can volunteer you can make your gifts go to the dollar store spend $50 make your gifts. This is what we did. We painted wonderments and things like that. I mean you know really get a handle of this thing. I mean you need to be showing love all around and not trying to pile up your credit cards at this time of year. Speaking of volunteering Julie dog is voluntary. You think a good gift to give to someone. Volunteering is a great gift to give not just to someone but also to the whole world and to yourself. It's something that you can do with your family something you can do with your friends and

volunteering isn't just rolling up your sleeves and getting dirty. It's not just raking leaves and painting buildings and things like that around the holidays. You actually have the opportunity to do things differently in that. People always want to buy wrapped gifts for and give them to a nonprofit or given to a shelter. And the nonprofits are inundated with toys. What they really need any anymore what they really need are socks and toiletries. Those are the things that people need in the winter time. There will always be plenty of toys to go around when people really need is a way for them their very basic needs to be met. People kind of have parties if you have instead of having a tree trimming party have all of your friends bring a pair of socks to your house. Have all of your friends bring a can of soup to your house and then turn that into a donation is something you can do together. It's something that will put you in the holiday mood so patting yourself on the back because you're giving away all of your children's last year toys because naturally this year they've got a whole batch of new toys to replace the

toys that they did not play with you. So patting yourself on the back for doing that isn't really doing much for those who are needy. Well those things are still need. But volunteering is really something you should do year round. It's not it's not something that you simply do in order to get more. It's something that you do. It's the rent you pay to live on this planet. Let me explore this concept with you because I've been thinking about it. Can you give someone the gift of having them volunteer and that is can somebody discover by volunteering that that's the best gift they can give themselves for Christmas the feeling they would get from Deepak. Absolutely. You know in schools these days children have to volunteer in order to graduate. A lot of corporations actually pay places like us to set up volunteer events for their employees. Those are the kinds of things that build unity. You know they build team spirit. They actually a lot of time show people that they have other things to offer besides you know their identity as a parent or their identity as an

employee. They actually can do things that change people's lives. One of the things that staggers the imagination is the number of non-profits that greater DC care cares has and with some Bellah offering people such a wide variety of volunteering opportunities how can they access them in general around the holidays. All of our projects are open to the public. You can go to our Web site at DC hyphen care start and you can sign up to volunteer on November holiday projects or the week of the 21st to the twenty eighth and it's all kinds of things a lot of them are food oriented but it's still a lot of different things around the December holidays. We actually will provide referrals. We'll do them for individuals. We'll do them for groups. We do them for families and anybody can have access to that information on our Web site. And for the family that wants to volunteer together we have a program called family cares and all of our events are marked whether or not they are family friendly. You know we generally don't take little kids to soup kitchens with big knives. Sure but there are lots of other things that people need

help with that little kids can go and help as long as they have adult supervision and see this would be a great thing to do instead of spending endless amount of hours in the mall. Why don't you do this to take your kids to a project where they can appreciate what it is for other people not to have or to build character so rather than from eight to 10 you were at the mall dragging the kids around you know spending money all day because you got to feed them and buy things that people don't need. You could do something like that I mean the thing is this year. Try to think of the holidays in a different way. Less money more time. Your time is much more valuable than anything you can buy with your money that you don't have. How about those people who have money who have budgeted carefully saving every month of the year so that at Christmas time or Kwanzaa or time or whatever Hanukkah whatever they happen to celebrate that they have they feel enough money but they're still spending a lot of money. What would you say. Well you know I have a couple of categories of people people who you know really don't have money no more

money than God. And so who listen to me. You know do whatever you want with your money. And then there are people who have money but are still and living paycheck to paycheck that they may not have the kind of debt where people would call him on the phone and you know checking your caller ID. But yet they still don't have three to six months living expenses their kid's college fund is not being funded they're not adequate funding for their retirement. OK. That's a category of a lot of people who feel like they're comfortable and they can spend you know a thousand to $3000 at Christmas. I say they still have a problem because if they lose those nice cushy jobs with government jobs if they exist that they will be in trouble. And then there's that people who are just straight up in debt and you know that you should not be looking at a mall. You know no where near a mall for the next 10 years. And so if you fit into those last two categories those are the people that I talked to in my column too. You know all the time because anything could happen you could get sick your kid could get sick. Your husband could run off run off with a secretary you know just. But I mean you know you need to prepare for those things. And Christmas again people just they just lose their mind and they just

want to do so much with money that they don't have any really needs a plan set a budget and set it low. One of the reasons we wanted to do this this early was so that we could get to people before they actually start spending. What happens to people who will go ahead and spend anyway and find themselves in January heavily in debt. What do you say to them. You know there are people who will make a budget for Christmas and those people who make a budget end up spending pretty much what their budget and they end up spending on average about a hundred dollars. People who don't make it who don't make a budget and are spending anywhere from eleven hundred to twelve hundred dollars or more. So if you make a budget you tend to spend less if you don't make a budget you tend to spend more. And this is what happens when you spend so you put that eleven hundred or twelve hundred dollars on your credit card at 18 percent interest. It will take you 20 years to pay that debt off. If you make just the minimum payment and you will then have added on about twenty two hundred dollars in interest and this is typical. And the other thing is most people think that they're going to pay this bill off by

February or March. It takes people more than six months to pay off their Christmas bill. So by the next Christmas they are just paying off the bill from the following Christmas. And I think that's startling. Let me try another angle here. You go into the malls they go into stores they are surrounded by all kinds of attractive looking items that they want to buy. Does it make a difference if you decide to do your holiday shopping online. I think it does. Now if you're going to be hard headed because I know that's why you try to time if you won't be hard headed and not listen to me and stay away from the malls. OK so are you going to go online. Typically people do spend a little bit less if they go online because they don't shop at the mall. The fact of the matter is they still spend. So whether you're online in your house or you actually in the mall you're still spending money you don't have. But if you go online use one credit card and certainly look for bargains. Look for the sites that show you where you can buy the bargain things. But again have a budget and stick to it. I think the I think the best thing to do is get the cash out you're going to spend put it in an envelope. Of course you don't want to

take it all with you for safety reasons and then that and then don't use your credit cards at all. And then limit yourself to the cash that you've allocated for your Christmas budget. Julie same situation people have spent too much money over the holidays and now that it's January and they're broke they're looking for something to do to lift this downgraded this occurs off grid to be secure as we have year round volunteer opportunities. You can sign up to come to one of our volunteer orientations which basically is an hour out of your time once and you can find out just how to use our system that's really all it's for. But we have a model of episodic volunteer opportunities where you can spend three hours a month and every month you can do a different project sometimes you can bring your family sometimes you can do with a co-worker sometimes you can do with your friends sometimes if you're just in a miserable mood and you want to go you know make birthday cards at the senior home you can come do that by yourself. We're there to make it easy for nonprofits to get their needs met and for individuals groups families to give back to the world that

they live in. I know I have volunteered with greater D.C. care during Thanksgiving and it is an extremely rewarding experience. You feel really a lot better than if somebody just gave you a nice gift but since you're recommending spending $100 for the entire class must tell us a little bit about the reactions of relatives. Give me a trial on my falling out. Well if you're going to do this you must must alert your family members to get them down. Call them up and help them. Now that was the one part we neglected to add is Michelle again. And you know one of my relatives who shall remain nameless did not speak to us until Easter. So the reality is you will get resistance from people. But you know what I say I don't care. Knew he was going to call us because we want to talk to his grandbabies. But you know the thing is this is my money my life my financial well-being. And you need to look at it that way people are not going to be there when their monthly bill comes from the credit card company and again who needs another Heidi. You need another time. You just really nice but I'm sure you don't need another. I was

thinking back. George Foreman grill I don't know. Or another sweater that you're not going to wear. Or you know whatever. And so people need to really think about that. And as they go forward you know don't feel guilty about spending less. Again how to get in touch with the whole number and online WGL readers that DC cares that or or 2 or 2 2 8 9 7 3 7 8. And if you had zero someone will answer the phone and help you to the door thank you for joining us. Thank you. Michelle Singletary always a pleasure. I will try very hard to take a bit of advice you gave me this listen not having a credit card bill in January you will be so great you will be so happy you will definitely go and volunteer. Thank you very much. Our thanks indeed to all of our panelists for joining us and thanks to you for watching. Stay well. Goodnight