A Capital Offense

By Richard Lacayo

This is a tale of two cities that occupy one place but exist in two different worlds. One is Washington, the nation's capital, an enclave of sparkling white marble monuments and Government offices. The other is the District of Columbia, an overwhelmingly black city of 629,000, with an appalling crime rate, disintegrating schools and declining municipal services. That other Washington rarely steals the spotlight from the official one, but the scandal surrounding Mayor Marion S. Barry Jr. these days has focused belated attention on its mounting travails.

The beam shines mainly on the mayor. Police and federal prosecutors are investigating the latest in a string of embarrassing episodes involving women and drugs that has plagued Barry during his three terms. Three weeks ago, detectives looking into allegations that former District employee Charles | Lewis was selling drugs from his room in a downtown hotel were about to attempt an undercover drug purchase, but they abruptly departed after being informed that the mayor was visiting the suspect. A subsequent search by police of Lewis' room, which was billed to the credit card of a Barry aide, revealed traces of cocaine, though investigators could not determine how long the drugs had been there.

After news of the aborted bust leaked to the press, Barry held a series of self-pitying press conferences, blaming the press and political opponents for his problems. "There are lingering questions I'll never be able to convince a lot of people of," Barry said with a shrug. "They don't understand my complex, I suppose, personality." He added to the confusion by first offering to take a drug test "if it will help matters," then waffling on the offer.

To add to Barry's woes, a federal grand jury and the Department of the Interior, which oversees the affairs of the U.S. Virgin Islands, are sifting records of a $250,000 project in which Barry and other District employees were to provide the islands with personnel policy advice. Much of the money seems to have gone for luxury hotel rooms and meals. The manager of the project, until he was fired for suspected misuse of funds: Charles Lewis.

Barry is an unlikely choice as a personnel expert. Eleven of his former aides have gone to the slammer for various crimes, including stealing city funds. A dozen more have departed under a cloud. The District's municipal work force of 47,000 is among the nation's most oversize and inefficient. Its most egregious shortcoming is the shoddy service it provides to poor and working- class blacks, who constitute Barry's most solid base of political support.

Life in the other Washington has been getting tougher. Last summer Barry had to resolve a city ambulance crisis after several people died because poorly trained drivers got lost on the way to rescues. With a record 372 homicides last year, Washington has the nation's third highest murder rate. More than half the killings were related to the large quantities of drugs sold in some 200 street markets around town. Before declining slightly in 1987, the city's infant-mortality rate reached a Third World level of 21 deaths per 1,000 live births, more than twice the national average. Though its income and inheritance taxes are among the nation's highest and though some 17% of its $2 billion budget is provided by federal subsidy, the District faces a deficit this year of around $175 million.

Despite his regime's performance, Barry is still popular with black voters. "People are quick to forget all that he's done for us," says public- housing activist Kimi Gray. In racially divided Washington, white residents of comfortable neighborhoods in the city's northwest seldom stray into the areas where most black citizens dwell. Many blacks believe that whites are following a devious "plan" to regain political control of the District by embarrassing black officials. The mayor has survived by playing on that fear and, like any good political boss, distributing favors to his constituents.

Loyalty to Barry may be costing Washingtonians their long-cherished dream of gaining voting representation in Congress through a congressional amendment granting statehood to the District. Says Mark Plotkin, a member of the city's Democratic committee: "We ask members of Congress, 'What about statehood?' and they look at us and say, 'What about the mayor?' "

In 1978 Barry was elected to his first term with predominantly white support. In the city's overwhelmingly white Ward 3, for instance, he took 51% of the vote. That figure had dwindled to 15% by his second re-election in 1986. The dismay seems to be spreading across the city. In a recent Washington Post poll, 41% of the respondents believed Barry was doing a poor job. Only 20% gave him high marks. "Barry is his own worst enemy," says Lowell Duckett, head of the D.C. Black Police Caucus. "Black leadership is going to have to hold black elected officials accountable for their actions." Especially if the other Washington is ever to begin functioning effectively again.

With reporting by Jerome Cramer and Elaine Shannon/Washington