Now the mediation is over, and the question is, why did the center terminate it? All parties had indicated they were willing to participate in the next session. Macedonia Baptist Church, which is the only remnant of the historic African-American community along River Road besides the cemetery, was not consulted by the center prior to the termination announcement. "Who authorized this decision, and why? County officials?" asked Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, Social Justice Director at the church.
Whoever did has set County elected officials up for yet another public relations disaster in the case. Public protests and marches had to be put on the back burner during mediation. Previous such protests were met with outsize police and security responses at the Planning Board and County Council, further indicating the institutional racism of Montgomery County government.
Now, cemetery advocates will be looking at protests - and any number of other new strategies - to save the burial ground from being desecrated for a second time (the first having occurred when Westwood Tower was built in the late 1960s).
Why would it be in the County's best interest to terminate the mediation? Very simple. Developer Regency Centers has sued the County to remove the delay on redeveloping the cemetery site. HOC's delays, and now the termination of mediation, could allow a judge to decide the fate of the cemetery before the questions about it can be resolved through other means.
In a statement, Macedonia Baptist Church said this is merely the latest case of the County looking the other way as developers take advantage of the River Road African-American community and its descendants. Black landowners were defrauded of their properties there in the mid-1950s, forced off homesites that would be worth around $1 million apiece today. Now even the earliest members of the community, who were among the first freed slaves in Maryland, could find their bodies being bought and controlled by $4 billion, out-of-state development firm Regency Centers and the HOC.
"Our ancestors should never have been sold," the church said in its statement. "We will not have them be sold again."
66 comments:
Did you ask?
Those lots were very small. Even if they replaced the original houses with McMansions, I doubt that their value would be anywhere near $1 million.
The center isn't affiliated with Montgomery county, is it? The title of the article is misleading, implying a county entity.
7:04 AM - as is Robert Dyer's statement "unilaterally terminated".
The irony of a corporation claiming to literally own the bodies of freed slaves is amazing.
The irony of "Skippy" thinking that no one realizes that he is #UnsignedDyer is amazing.
7:51am I'm not Dyer. Who are you? Reveal yourself.
"Colma[, California] became the site for numerous cemeteries after San Francisco, in 1900 outlawed new interments within city limits, then in 1912 evicted all existing cemeteries (though the actual process of removal was delayed until after World War II).
"The San Francisco de Asís cemetery, which adjoins the property [of the church] on the south side, was originally much larger than its present boundaries, running west almost to Church Street and north into what is today 16th Street. It was reduced in various stages, starting with the extension of 16th Street through the former mission grounds in 1889, and later by the construction of the Mission Dolores Basilica Center and the Chancery Building of the Archdiocese of San Francisco in the 1950s. Some remains were reburied on-site in a mass grave, while others were relocated to various Bay Area cemeteries. Today, most of the former cemetery grounds are covered by a paved playground behind the Mission Dolores School."
JUSTICE TUESDAYS ARE BACK!!!
I heard Maloney Concrete was the subcontractor that poured the bad cement at the Silver Spring Transit Center.
"Skippy", I am willing to bet that is not the name shown on your birth certificate, driver's license or passport.
"In 1999, a group of Montgomery County citizens came together to create a nonprofit that would enable people having neighborhood or community disputes to talk it out rather than fight it out, without the need to go to court. The Conflict Resolution Center of Montgomery County (CRCMC) officially opened on July 1, 2001, in the Executive Director‘s home. Since then, CRCMC has grown to include programs in the public schools, the district court, local correctional facilities, and more. We continue to look for new opportunities to strengthen our communities peace by peace."
And three out of the four Directors are in the private or non-profit sector.
http://crcmc.org/aboutus/
Can we all agree that we shouldn't build a parking garage over the graves of these freed slaves?
Let's start with agreement there.
Citizen Dyer already has the script for his big movie of a blogger taking on capitalism and winning...
I'm holding out hope for a museum. Would be a superb addition to the New Westwood neighborhood plan.
Who knew there was so much history in the Westbard area? The museum could explore the original sin of Westbard and celebrate the original community.
Can we all agree to see if there actually ARE graves with remains?
That's the most basic place to start.
Until that's determined as fact, it's all speculation.
You know what they say about that. It makes a speck out of you and some guy named Lation.
9:19: If there are no graves, then where did all the bodies they found excavating for Westwood Tower come from? And those were just the ones within the footprint of the building.
It is highly suspicious that the Conflict Resolution Center of Montgomery County unilaterally canceled additional mediation sessions on the cemetery. Only two sessions had been held, hardly sufficient to declare negotiations at an impasse. If Macedonia Baptist Church is correct, none of the parties have been unwilling to continue.
If the County is acting in good faith, it will engage another mediator immediately.
Re 9:19 and 9:33:
1. The bulk of the historic evidence indicates that a cemetery was located on the Westbard site. I agree that a cemetery delineation study should be performed to establish if human remains are present. The delineation study should be completed before the developer's plans are approved by the County.
2. The Offutt history is not definitive. It might be that the Westbard graves were moved, but this is contradicted by the childhood recollections of the owner of the Westbard Citgo station (repeating reports of construction workers that human remains were found during the construction of Westwood Towers-- now the HOC apartment building) and the childhood recollections of Arnold d'Epagnier, son of the Westwood Towers architect (remains were present; project design had to be changed to prevent bodies emerging during rainstorms; Westwood Towers developer, Laszlo Tauber, felt remains would be best kept safe by burying them with fill and paving them over with asphalt.). The recollections of the Citgo station owner were reported by the Washington Post in February 2017. The recollections of Arnold d'Epagnier were recorded in notes by Parks Department staff in December 2015 and uncovered in discovery for the Westbard lawsuit. After initially confirming his recollections, d'Epagnier recanted in mid-2017, saying that he could not confirm the reliability of his childhood memories.
In addition, the 2017 history of the Westbard cemetery, developed by David Kathan and other researchers affiliated with the Little Falls Watershed Alliance (which admittedly wants the site to be converted to greenbelt), uncovered no evidence that human remains had been removed from the site. Specifically, no records were found concerning the removal of human remains to the Lincoln Park site or anywhere else. In sum, the preponderancebof the evidence suggests that:
1)The Westwood site was a burial ground.
2)Human remains were kept on site when Westwood Towers (now the HOC building) was built.
If the Church cared so much about the graves, why didn't they protest when they land was sold 50 years ago? How about we make a deal that any graves found will be transferred to the church's parking lot? They can configure the cemetery _on their own land_ any way they like then.
When was the last time Robbie went south of Western Avenue or east of 355 in Gaithersburg?
12:31 - The Resolution Center of Montgomery County is not a County government agency. They are a non-profit group.
Oh, Lyin' Bobby....are you back to talking about dead people and 60,000 zombies that voted for Hans. I gotta get some of whatever you're drinking...
Wait isn't the resolution center a 3rd party not affiliated with the county?
Can we all agree that we shouldn't build a parking garage over the graves of these freed slaves?
What occupies the site presently?
So Robert Dyer wants to leave the cemetery in its desecrated state under the existing building?
What's the difference if it is under the building now or a different building?
Because the difference is Dyer is here to stop it from happening again.
Just because the graves were desecrated in the past doesn't mean it's ok to do it again. Any suggestion of desecrating the graves again offends the conscience of Bethesda residents.
It proves we need the museum complex to educate folks and change hearts and minds.
Hey Dyer - Looks like your beloved Fredericksburg has two of the 25 worst traffic bottlenecks in the country.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/heres-the-worst-traffic-hot-spot-in-the-us-according-to-a-new-study/2017/09/26/16a8e00e-a2d0-11e7-8cfe-d5b912fabc99_story.html?utm_term=.00aa6fc8792f
I must be popular if a man is posting as me :)
Dyer is telling the story, but we need MoCo to stop this insane plan.
12:43 I agree. The move to their property is the compromise that makes sense.
Again, until it's known for sure if there are still graves located there, everything is speculation. The End.
4:37: With all of the actual physical evidence showing the graves are still there, and none indicating they were removed, this is just The Beginning, not The End.
11:43: You seem to have underestimated how many graves there are, and overestimated how much land the church has. Hundreds are buried in the cemetery, and the church has no available land for a cemetery on their property. What's more, not every person buried there was a member of the church.
5:30: The cemetery is not just "under the building," but under the parking lot and the hill alongside the parking lot, and across on the other side of the Willett Branch, which runs through the cemetery. And until a real delineation is done, we won't know just how far out the graves may be spread.
Can you address your misleading title? It is not Montgomery County mediators ending arbitration. The dispute center has no affiliation with the county. They are the ones that ended it, not the county. This is click bait and deceptive.
You can say there are graves wherever you want, it's merely "talk". The "actual physical evidence" would be the graves themselves. The stories/accounts, written and oral, are circumstantial.
It's all speculation until they are proved to still be there.
You are putting the cart before the horse.
I see you spitefully deleted the comments agreeing with my 9:19 post. Petty.
5:16: That's not a misleading title - the center was endorsed and brought into this battle by Montgomery County elected officials. They indeed have the imprimatur of the County as good-faith arbitrators, and have strangely acted in a way that benefits Montgomery County government by canceling the mediation!
5:33: So you figure the people there at the time at Citgo, who are highly-trustworthy members of our community, AND the architect's son who was a witness to actual bodies being desecrated during the construction of Westwood Tower, all just happen to be lying? All the paper records - you know, the stuff a judge would rely on in court - back up that no graves were relocated from this cemetery. Your position is the one that is just "talk." You have NO legal records or eyewitness accounts to support your position.
5:39: No clue what you're talking about. I deleted a racist comment, no legitimate arguments. If I did, I would be deleting 5:16, 5:33 too.
The highs have been around 90 degrees for the past several days. Why are those demonstrators all wearing heavy coats?
Oh, I see it's a recycled stock photo from February.
6:18 AM
Nice try old sport, can't accept the fact that Robert is a ground breaking news reporter who is out and about with the people.
Dyer, you keep using the term "physical evidence". None of what you describe falls into that category. Why can't you ever use terminology correctly?
Who talks like that except Dyer's family members?
Circumstantial. Look it up.
All the records support my position.
My position btw is that you cannot say for certain the graves are still there. They may be. They may not be. Theoretically, both statements are true, but I fear that discussion is beyond your capabilities to not insert opinion into logic.
Solutions may change upon the facts.
Dyer, did you ask the CRCMC why they cancelled the mediation? That's what a good reporter would do.
"Public protests and marches had to be put on the back burner during mediation."
How come you never mentioned this to your readers, until now? Lots of them were asking about Justice Tuesdays, and why you didn't seem to be covering them.
6:36: The land records and burial announcements are on paper, and therefore physical evidence. Those asserting there are no graves have no such paper trail, or any other physical evidence. They also do not even have two oral accounts that corroborate each other - from opposing sides! - that indicate bodies were found in the late 1960s during excavation.
We've been over this 1000 times, and you are in Saul Alinsky territory at this point.
"If each letter requires a response, send 30000 letters." - Saul Alinsky
7:27: It's just a statement of fact. Parties in the mediation were not permitted to discuss what was said at those sessions.
6:55: They claimed no one could agree on a time to meet, which all parties agree was not true.
"6:55: They claimed no one could agree on a time to meet, which all parties agree was not true."
So you're claiming that the MoCo Cartel disagrees with the CRCMC? So it would seem that the two are independent of each other.
Robert, if you were in office, please tell me you would protect these sacred grounds and not let developers keep encroaching on Westbard.
Hey, Dyer, why did you delete the comment that noted that you've only published two detailed crime reports in the past three months? (One of which was about a sign at an elementary school which was defaced to insult Trump.)
Why no coverage of that deadly fire on Danbury Road? The deads that keep popping up in local parks and parking lots?
8:18: No, because the CRCMC's arbitrary decision to terminate greatly helps the County, Regency and HOC.
8:22: There would be no question that developing the cemetery would be out of the question if I were on the Council. You can be sure many residents have "voter's regret" from November 2014!
@ 8:22 AM - "Sacred ground" and "Westbard" are redundant.
"No, because the CRCMC's arbitrary decision to terminate greatly helps the County, Regency and HOC."
Is that "physical evidence"?
"There would be no question that developing the cemetery would be out of the question if I were on the Council."
How? You would be, at most, one out of nine on the Council. There is no such thing as a majority of one.
P.S.: Your Captcha is F-ed up. It thinks that two guitars and a violin are "cellos".
A Ficker Dyer duo on the council would go a long way to changing things for the better for Montgomery County. We need to shake up this council badly.
I cringe at the thought of those two in charge.
I delight at the thought of Reimer going back to California.
Bizarre that the mediation has been canceled due to alleged scheduling issues after just two sessions. There is something very wrong here.
@ 9:19 AM said "the original sin of Westbard".
That phrase was used six times previously - by Robert Dyer, "Friends of Woodmont Triangle", "Charlottesville_Cav" and "Roald".
@ 6:44 PM - Funny how "Charlottesville_Cav" was here for a while, then disappeared completely after that nasty alt-right rally and murder in his namesake city on August 12.
Dyer, this is 9.33. Why did you delete my comment?
My god you're dense as a brick.
The papers are not physical evidence. Yes, they are phyical pieces of paper, but their contents are circumstantial.
I'm not denying there are graves. I'm not agreeing there are graves.
I'm talking the truth. No one knows for sure if there are still occupied graves on that site.
You are talking opinion or possibilities.
Your Saul Alinsky comment doesn't apply. Disagreeing with someone and asking questions is completely different than the methods proposed by community organizer Alinsky. In fact, you employ many of his methods in this here little blog of yours.
5:52: Saul would be proud of my work, but just try telling a landlord or bank that the rental agreement or contract you signed has no legal merit in a dispute.
Of course no one can go to the site today and prove this hour there are bodies there without digging on private property and being arrested. That's why a judge and (in theory) Montgomery County government must proceed as if they are there, because all of the legal documents support that. The position of the developer, HOC and the Montgomery County Council and Planning Board, in contrast, was, "We don't know what's there."
Well, actually we do. All physical and legal evidence tells us the bodies are there. No physical or legal evidence exists to indicate any removal of graves. Therefore, we must proceed with the greatest caution, as if the graves are there.
No one has to "believe" the graves are there, but they must legally proceed as if they were, because that's what all the actual evidence shows us. Personally, I would bet my life that there are bodies there, because I know it to be true. The people who have testified to it, in addition, are highly trustworthy and in a position to know.
100’s of graves is ludicrous. Prove it, and make it fact. and, for the record, the church does have the land. You can bury 100’s of stacked graves. I guess you have not visited a cemetery where they have “lockers” as i call them, stacked. The graves can be moved, buried underground, and they can give up the parking for the sake of peace for these souls. (Or, they can park on top of them).
Nope, not falling for your distraction.
A contract (like a lease) is different than a "written account" of an activity.
A contract is a legally enforceable agreement for doing or not doing an act.
8:02: Land records on file are as much legal documents as a contract.
And the land records were true at the time of filing.
But that was before the parking lot was built. Before the land was disturbed.
I stand by my original statement:
"Can we all agree to see if there actually ARE graves with remains still there?
That's the most basic place to start.
Until that's determined as fact, it's all speculation."
8.41am is right and no response has been received. There are now multiple scientific way to find whether bodies are buried somewhere. Use those methods, find the bodies. Otherwise, it’s a red herring. Also I will now be screenshotting my comments to rebut your absurd charges of racism.
Robert, do you understand whether the church can get involved in the litigation you reference in some fashion? This stinks to high heaven.
All of you with your "how can you PROOOOOVE it" sound ridiculous, you realize. There is plenty of evidence that there are bodies there, and in any event there are technologies that can be used to confirm. But no, the county and the developer just want all systems go, never mind we desecrated before, let's keep doing it. If these potential graves contained white bodies we would not be having this conversation. As a resident, taxpayer, voter and parent -- as well as decent human being -- I'm not interested in having people continue to treat people with less respect because of the color of their skin. It makes me sick to see such blatant racism in my own community, "Anonymous."
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