Vincent C. Gray Hand Delivery and Emait April 8, 2010 The Honorable John Boehner Speaker of the House United States House of Representatives H-232 The U.S. Capitol Washington, D.C. 20515 The Honorable Harry Reid Majority Leader United States Senate 522 Hart Senate Office Bldg Washington, D.C. 20510 Dear Speaker Bochner and Majority Leader Reid: ‘On behalf of the mote than 600,000 citizens of this great city and the more than 14,000 District employees who, as matters presently appear, will be out of work by midnight tonight, | implore the Congress to exempt the District of Columbia from the impending federal shutdown and the unfair and inequitable implementation of the so-called Anti-Deficiency Act. Congress must make clear that the District has the right to spend its ‘own locally collected funds without micromanagement by Congress. It is simply intolerable for the Congress to treat the District’s government as a federal agency and our residents as second-class citizens. ‘The District of Columbia is the only state, city or local government in the entire nation which will not be able to use the tax revenues paid by its own citizens to serve those very citizens during the federal shutdown, {tis also the only jurisdiction in the country which has no representation in the process that led to this state of federal legislative paralysis or that will be needed to avert or minimize such a shutdown. The District collects ‘over $5 billion from its own citizens and has sufficient funds from its own locally collected resources to pay the salaries ofall of our employees and to provide all of the services needed to keep this city funetioning for the benefit not only of our residents, but also for the tens of thousands of commuters and tourists who travel to the Nation’s Capitol every day.‘The budget for the District of Columbia was approved by the District’s government nearly a year ago. Yet, as a result of the inability of the two houses of Congress, which you lead, and the President to reach agreement on an overall federal budget for Fiscal Year 2011 or at least a Continuing Resolution to keep the federal government operating, our citizens will be the only ones in the nation who will not have regular garbage collection and street sanitation, open libraries, operating recreation facilities and a functioning public university. Other essential, basic local services, such as health services, housing services, certain services to people with disabilities and consumer protection activities would be operating with skeletal staffs or only in response to emergencies. District residents will not be able to conduct something as routine and civic as renewing their driver's licenses, Our economy, which depends more heavily on federal workers than any in the nation, will suffer, and our already much too high unemployment rate will increase. Ultimately, the District may also be liable for unemployment benefits for the period of the furlough. A federal shutdown will cost the District an estimated $4.5 million a week in tax revenues. This crisis for the District could have been averted if Congress had passed the bill offered by our non-voting delegate, Eleanor Holmes Norton, which would have exempted all of our locally collected funds from the operation of the federal Anti-Deficiency Act. As you know. under that law as it currently stands, District government officials cannot expend any of our funds, including those the District collected from taxes imposed on its own citizens, without an appropriation from Congress. That is wrong. It is an insult to our hard-working citizens that the District government is treated like a federal agency. While that statute needs to be amended to solve long-term problems, in the short-term I am urging that prior to shutdown, Congress adopt a resolution permitting us, like every other state and local jurisdiction, to spend our locally collected funds for services during the federal shutdown, Ultimately, the District needs full representation in the Congress, full self-determination and recognition of our statehood, But for the immediate furure, we have a dire need of all of the services and benefits that every other local government will be providing its citizens during this unfortunate federal shutdown. All we are asking is to be allowed to set our own priorities, to meet the needs of our own citizens with our locally raised revenues and not be held hostage to the inability of your members to reach agreement on an overall federal budget as to which our citizens have no input. The members of your respective chambers, regardless of their political philosophies, should support this policy of local governance for the District of Columbia, | would be pleased to speak with you on an urgent basis any time today to discuss in further detail the plight our citizens face as a result of the impending shutdown and the temporary solutions that only the Congress can provide. uncut C. Vincent C. Gray ce: Honorable Eleanor Holmes Norton Honorable Kwame R. Brown All Members of the Council of the Distriet of Columbia