Kathy Henderson Calls Cops Over Community Clean-Up Dispute

Tweet from Commissioner Adam Roberts (5D03), who replaced Commissioner Kathy Henderson (5D05) as Chair of ANC 5D in January

I think I can safely say that most of us regard community clean-ups as generally a good thing. Trash gets picked up, the streets, sidewalks, and treeboxes look a little nicer, and neighbors get to meet and catch up on local news. A clean-up in the Carver Terrace neighborhood took an ugly turn Sunday afternoon. Kathy Henderson, the former Chair of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 5D, called the cops during a community clean-up lead by the current Chair Adam Roberts. Six volunteers turned out for a community clean up of both sides of the 1700-1900 blocks of L Street. They were reportedly working their way around in a u-shaped pattern that brought them to the sidewalk in front of Henderson's house (Roberts and Henderson both live in the 1800 block of L Street, just on opposite sides). Henderson was out gardening in her yard, and allegedly made a sarcastic comment along the lines of "Thank you for finally doing something good for the community." That sort comment and its tone will strike as familiar anyone who has either read Henderson's emails about Roberts to the Ward 5 Yahoo group, or attended an ANC 5D meeting.

Henderson and Eddie Milton (Roberts' partner),
who regularly videotapes ANC 5D meetings and posts them on YouTube, then traded verbal barbs. According to Commissioner Roberts this verbal dueling included Henderson saying the following while holding a handful of garden soil: "shut up...just shut up ...you're disgusting...I so badly want to hit..." Roberts told me another neighbor who was present at the clean-up says she saw Henderson fling dirt at Milton, but it was apparently after Milton had turned around.

Video courtesy of Eddie Milton 

Commissioner Roberts declined to give specifics of what Milton said, but stated that it was "Nothing threatening." Henderson called MPD to report that Milton was "in front of [her] house antagonizing [her] and throwing things at [her]." She continued, saying "something is wrong with him," and describing Milton as "an African-American male. He's wearing blue jeans, a striped hoodie, and some gray sneakers." No fewer than four Metropolitan Police Officers arrived promptly complete with blaring sirens and flashing lights. No arrests were made.

An uninvolved resident mentioned on Twitter that Kathy Henderson was present at a community clean-up he attended only the day before. As far as he knew, no one called the police on the cleaning residents. All I can say is that Carver Terrace must be absolutely spotless at this point.