Over the weekend, one of my new roommates was going through the utility bills. When he asked me to cut a check to WASA, I asked him if he would be interested in not paying out of protest. The only thing WASA has really accomplished is putting my life in danger. In the short term by not fixing, or alerting the Fire Department to, all of the broken hydrants. In the long term by first filling me with lead and then over chlorinating me. WASA should change its name to the Department of Fire and Cancer. They'd probably end up with a way cooler logo.
He told me that I could boycott WASA as long as I promised not to use the kitchen or the bathroom. I'm not quite that outraged yet.
Yesterday, I got an e-mail from this aforementioned roommate. First he alerted me that I was the second thing that popped up if you Google "fuck dc." (I love living in a city where it only takes two months before someone is Googling "fuck dc.")
The second alert was, wow, look at that, WASA fucked up again.
As you most certainly know by now, an apartment building was torched yesterday in a four-alarm blaze. The Fire Department showed up and couldn't find a hydrant that would give them enough water pressure to fight the conflagration. Apparently the water pipes are woefully out of date. Although it's WASA's job to modernize these pipes, I understand why it didn't get done. A lot of the city's pipes are out of date. These things take time.
But for all that is good and holy, HOW THE FUCK CAN YOU NOT INFORM THE FIRE DEPARTMENT OF THIS!?!?!? They had no fucking idea. They had to go to Calvert and Connecticut and 16th and Columbia to get water. That isn't a short trip. Lives were/are put at risk because of WASA's incompetence. Again.
(Also of note, Adams Morgan is apparently a fucking death trap. What if one of those shitty bars goes up in flames because someone throws a lit cigarette in a trashcan? What then? The population and buildings are so dense, we could have a 21st Century Cocoanut Grove on our hands.)
I can't tell you how much I look forward to cutting those motherfuckers another $20 check next month. Seriously, what the fuck will it take to get WASA GM Jerry N. Johnson fired? When does enough become enough?
10.02.2007
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You just HAD to make a Boston reference, didn't you.
ReplyDeleteAnd Rusty... don't you sorta think that maybe what this town really needs is a big fire? It would help cleanse our pallets of the shit this city feeds us daily.
Weren't they working on overhauling most of the fire hydrants in the near future? I remember one of the problems being that the city had some ridiculous number of models employed (close to 50) so that fire trucks had to carry all sorts of adapters.
ReplyDeleteOn the way to work a few months ago I noticed the hydrant on the corner of FL and NY ave spewing buckets of water. I called it in via 311 and it only took them 48 hours to send out a repair crew. I guess it's up to us to report the visibly non-functional and leaky hydrants...
Penn, I did exactly that once and I got hung up on for inventing an address. Fuck 311. If the city wants to burn itself to the ground, I am not getting in their way.
ReplyDeletelast week wasa told us that there was a pipe somewhere that we would run into with our construction. no such pipe. unconfirmed why wasa's city plans are wrong.
ReplyDeleteHow about we convince all the wackivists in the city to stop protesting for representation in Congress, which will never happen, and start protesting the council not firing the entire management team at WASA and bringing in people who know what the fuck they’re doing.
ReplyDeleteBut James, if all the people who who are so concerned over one measly vote in Congress turned their attention to important things, then DC Quasi-Government officials and departments would be, I don't know, held accountable for their actions?
ReplyDeleteAnd that totally goes against Mayor-for-Life Barry's 40-year plan.
On one hand, I feel bad for the utility companies and commissions, as they're often dealing with woefully out-of-date maps and surveys. But on the other, who decided that a densely-populated area in a city with an ungodly number of crack pipes and lighters next to a friggin' urban forest wasn't in need of an upgrade sooner?
You get lots of people you comment, Rusty, but I'm delurking at all the blogs I read as part of The Great Mofo Delurk. And I still love what you do, you hater, you. ;)
ReplyDelete"I love living in a city where it only takes two months before someone is Googling 'fuck dc.'"
ReplyDeleteOr two weeks. Whose idea was it to intern here in the first place??
Glad I found this blog, though. I will now be joining the ranks as a faithful reader, and hopefully it'll make me feel better.
i think he just got fired today.
ReplyDelete