Jan 30, 2004  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO JR.  | COMMENTS     

The city’s gay political groups are expected to oppose or ignore separate efforts announced on Jan. 20 to unseat D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams (D) and gay D.C. Council member Jim Graham (D-Ward 1) through proposed voter recall elections, according to local gay leaders.

A group called Save Our City filed papers with the D.C. Board of Elections & Ethics to begin the process of gathering more than 37,000 signatures needed place a recall measure on the ballot in November to oust Williams from office.

The group — led by members of the city’s Democratic, Republican and Statehood Green parties — claims to have 600 volunteers committed to gathering petition signatures for the recall effort.

In a separate development, Ward 1 political activist Linwood Johnson, who ran and lost a bid for the Ward 1 Council seat against Graham in 1998, filed recall papers against Graham on the same day that organizers filed recall papers against Williams.

It would take about 3,800 valid signatures from Ward 1 residents to force a vote to recall Graham. Most political observers familiar with Ward 1 say Johnson appears to be acting largely on his own and has little support for recalling Graham, who is considered popular in the ward.

Graham recall a ‘one-person act’?
Gay Democratic activist Brad Lewis, who serves on the D.C. Democratic State Committee, called Johnson’s recall effort a “one-person act” and predicted it would go “absolutely nowhere.”

Johnson told the Blade this week that his decision to seek a Graham recall has nothing to do with Graham’s sexual orientation. In papers filed with the election board, Johnson cited a series of actions and positions by Graham as the basis for the recall, including Graham’s vote to raise Metro fares, his support for banning the sale of single containers of beer in certain neighborhoods, and Graham’s support for closing a bar on Georgia Avenue that featured nude female dancers. Police and civic activists have cited the bar as being prone to violence and neighborhood disturbances.

Graham called Johnson’s stated reasons for the recall either mischaracterizations or “outright lies.”

Graham, noting that Johnson has filed seven recall petitions against various elected officials in recent years, called him an “attention seeker” engaging in “petty harassment.”

Although Williams remains popular with large numbers of voters, his actions on a number of controversial issues during his six years in office have drawn sharp criticism from various constituencies. Both supporters and critics say gathering the required number of signatures to trigger a Williams recall will be difficult, but they acknowledge that opponents could capitalize on the successful recall campaign in California last year. That effort led to the removal of Democratic Gov. Gray Davis and the election of Republican movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger to replace him.

Supporters of the mayoral recall have cited Williams’s decision to close D.C. General Hospital and the mayor’s support for a controversial school voucher program as among their reasons for seeking Williams’s ouster.

Some gay and AIDS activists joined in the chorus of opposition to closing D.C. General, saying the city-run hospital was needed for the treatment of low-income people with HIV. Many gay activists have also expressed opposition to Williams’ support for a school voucher program for city schools that was initiated by President Bush and Republican members of Congress.

Both gay and AIDS activists complained that the voucher program would take away funds from public schools to send kids to private, religious schools that often ban HIV prevention programs, bar a fair portrayal of homosexuality in sex education classes and may discriminate against gay students.

“A recall isn’t warranted, and we’re just bringing unnecessary negative publicity to our city,” Williams said at a news conference last week. “With every fiber of my being, I will use every effort at my disposal, legal and ethical, to crush the recall,” he said.

Wayne Turner, the D.C. gay and AIDS activist involved with the group ACT UP D.C., and David Barrows, a gay activist who has organized protests against Williams over the mayor’s decision to close D.C. General Hospital, have emerged as the only prominent gays involved in the mayoral recall effort so far. Barrows is serving as treasurer of the Save Our City group.

Many gay groups oppose recall
The District’s four most prominent gay political organizations will either actively oppose a mayoral recall or decline to back such an effort, members and officials with those groups said.

Lewis, the gay member of the Democratic State Committee, also serves as vice president of the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, a group representing ...