Our Nation's Capital

Who We Are

Board Of Directors -- Officers

Richard Suisman, Chair

Michael Steinman, President

Ellen Opper-Weiner, Treasurer

Steve Weitz, Secretary

Board Of Directors -- Members

George Beaty

Bernard Demczuk

Robert Ebel

Arnold Goldberger

Carol Mitten

Rick Rybeck

Katie Wells

Joslyn Williams

Richard Suisman

Richard Suisman moved to Washington, DC from Hartford, CT in 1993 after a successful career in business, government and nonprofits. 

He served on the Hartford City Council for eight years, as its majority leader for several years. 

He chaired the Capital Region Council of Governments (29 towns) from 1976 - 1978.  He also chaired and served on several non-profit boards in housing and economic development and philanthropy.   He founded Hartford's first non-profit economic development corporation and the city's urban research commission.

He joined the Clinton administration in a senior position at the U.S. Department of Transportation.  Later he joined Congressman Sam Gejdenson's (D-CT) professional staff.  He was consultant to the Anthony A. Williams administration on transportation and economic development issues.

In 2003, he founded Our Nation's Capital (ONC).

Michael Steinman

Michael Steinman served as an associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln and, at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, as dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and associate provost.  He was Provost, Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor of Government at John Jay College.

His degrees are in Political Science: a B.A. from George Washington University and an M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.  His areas of interest are American government and public administration.  He coauthored six hardcover editions of  the introductory text American Government and three softcover editions of Understanding American Government.  Three hardcover editions won the American Government Textbook Award from the Women’s Caucus for Political Science for their treatment of gender issues in an introductory American government text.  His research appears in books on administrative reform, environmental policy, and domestic violence and in such journals as the Criminal Justice Review, Law and Psychology Review, Publius, Journal of Police Science and Administration, Public Personnel Management, Urban Affairs Quarterly, State and Local Government Review, and Social Science Quarterly.  He also served on the Lincoln, Nebraska City Council and chaired various state and local government committees and the Nebraska Commission for the Protection of Children.  He received the Commissioner’s Award for Outstanding Leadership and Service in the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect from the US Administration on Children, Youth and Families in 1998.

Ellen Opper-Weiner, Treasurer

Ms. Opper-Weiner is a Washington attorney and co-founder and Vice Chair of the Southeast Citizens for Smart Development (SCSD).

Steve Weitz

Steve grew up in Des Moines, Iowa and was educated at Yale (B.A., architecture major, 1957) and the University of Washington (Master of Urban Planning, 1963).  He worked as an urban planner for two years for the City of Des Moines and for four years with Wilbur Smith & Associates, a traffic engineering and urban planning firm.  In 1967, he came to Washington, DC to work for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, where he stayed until year 2000. 

For his first 25 years at HUD, Steve administered a planning grant program, developed reports on national urban growth policy, and conceived and sponsored policy-related research on, among other things, the effects of alternative metropolitan growth patterns, the effects of land-use regulations and impact fees on housing costs, the condition of HUD-insured multifamily housing, and the extent of lead-based paint in housing in the United States.  In 1992, he joined a new HUD office concerned with reducing childhood lead poisoning stemming from lead-based paint in housing.  There he supervised research, program evaluation, and the development of regulations and guidelines.

After retiring in 2000, Steve worked part time for about seven years as a consultant primarily on lead poisoning prevention. 

George Beatty

A pro bono tax and legal attorney since 1987, Beatty is publishing a novel, exploring remote fly-fishing rivers from northern Russia to southern Chile and New Zealand, and traveling with family.

From 1975-1987, he served as Managing Partner of Lee, Toomey & Kent, a Washington tax firm representing over 40 major multinational corporations on federal and state tax matters. His work included working with staff and senior management of clients on structuring worldwide business transactions to make them more tax-efficient;  negotiating settlements of major tax controversies involving transfers of technology, pricing practices, and a wide variety of other issues; briefing and arguing the taxpayer's case in Asarco v. Idaho State Tax  Commission, 458 US 307 (1982), in which the Supreme Court held Idaho's corporate income tax unconstitutional as applied to the taxpayer; working with IRS, Treasury, congressional staff, and members of Congress on tax rulings, regulations, and legislation; shaping and implementing policies of the law firm regarding financial, administrative, and business practice matters; developing and maintaining client relationships; and speaking frequently at professional conferences in the U.S. and abroad, and participating in numerous professional associations.

From 1959 to 1975 he was an Associate and partner of Lee, Toomey & Kent (which is now part of McDermott, Will & Emery).  Prior to that, from 1957-1959 he served as an attorney in the Appellate Section of the Tax Division, U.S. Department of Justice, under the Attorney General's Honors Program.

Bernard Demczuk

Mr. Demczuk has served as Assistant Vice President for District of Columbia Affairs for the Office of Government, International & Corporate Affairs of George Washington University since 1998. Previously, he served two terms in the cabinet of both Mayor Sharon Pratt Kelly and Mayor Marion Barry as Director of Intergovernmental Relations. Mr. Demczuk has spent 30 years in the areas of civil rights, labor rights and human rights. He has been involved with extensive international travel working for social justice, trade unions and civil right movement. He was senior staff member for Jesse Jackson's "Rainbow Coalition" and his two Presidential Campaigns. Mr. Demczuk is currently researching his Ph.D. dissertation on African American History for The George Washington University entitled, "Unionville: A Community of Remembrance,” analyzing the history and culture of an all-black township in Talbot County, MD, founded in 1867 by 18 ex-slaves and veterans of the United States Colored Troops. He is a long time resident of the historically black community of Shaw. 

Robert Ebel

Robert D. Ebel is Chair of the Steering Committee of the Local Government and Public Sector Service Initiative (Open Society Institute/Budapest) and Professor of Public Administration at the University of the District of Columbia. For the period 2006-2009 he served a three year term as Deputy Chief Economist/Office of the Chief Financial Officer, for the Washington, DC government. Prior to joining the Office of the Chief Financial Officer, he was a Senior Fellow at joint Urban Institute/Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center (TPC) and Lead Economist for the World Bank Institute’s (WBI) Capacity Building programs on Public Finance, Intergovernmental Relations and Local Financial Management. Recent publications include: with Richard M. Bird, Fiscal Fragmentation in Decentralized Countries: Subsidiarity, Solidarity and Asymmetry (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2007)’ with Gabor Peteri, Kosovo Decentralization Briefing Notes (Prishtina: Forum 2015 and the Kosovo Forum for an Open Society, October 2006). and Co-Editor with Joseph Cordes and Jane Gravelle, The Encyclopedia of Taxation and Tax Policy (Washington: Urban Institute Press, 2005), 2nd Ed.

Arnold Goldberger

For over 35 years, Arnold Goldberger has been engaged in security projects, both domestic and foreign.  He holds a B.S. in Physics from Pennsylvania State University.  His professional activities in the private and public sectors have ranged from the design, specification and installation of complex security and communication systems in new construction projects to the rehabilitation and upgrading of existing facilities.

He has advised architects, space planners, construction organizations, and equipment designers on the effective application of security systems, equipment and techniques.

He currently resides in the Meridian Hill section of the District of Columbia.

Carol Mitten

Rick Rybeck

Rick Rybeck is an attorney with a Master’s degree in real estate and urban development.  He has worked on issues related to state and local government for 30 years.  He is director of Just Economics, LLC, which advises clients about restructuring taxes, fees and regulations so that the economic incentives embedded within them are harmonious with public policy objectives such as job creation, affordable housingm transportation efficiency and sustainable economic development. 

He spent 12 years as the deputy associate director for Transportation Policy and Planning at the District of Columbia Department of Transportation.

Katie Wells

Joslyn Williams

Mr. Williams has served as president of the Metropolitan Washington Council, AFLCIO since 1982. The council includes 175 local unions representing 150,000 members from the transportation, telecommunications, health care and construction industries as well as the hospitality, entertainment, public utility and federal and public sectors in the nation's capital as well as suburban Maryland. Mr. Williams oversaw the formation of the council's charitable United Way -funded arm, the Community Services Agency, in 1991, and serves as president of its Board of Trustees. From 1972-1978, he was Executive Director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Council 26, which represented approximately 5,000 federal workers. Previous to this position, he was first a shop steward and later president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 1826. He is an original member of the Central Labor Council Advisory Committee which advises the President of the AFL-CIO about local labor council needs, activities and structure, and currently serves as 2nd Vice-President of the Maryland State and DC AFL-CIO, the state labor federation. A native of Jamaica, he received a B.A. degree from Howard University.

Advisory Board

Dr. Michael Fauntroy, Advisory Council Member

A fourth-generation Washingtonian, Dr. Fauntroy is an assistant professor at the George Mason School of Public Policy. He is the author of Home Rule or House Rule? Congress and the Erosion of Local Governance in the District of Columbia 2003). Prior to joining the faculty in GMU, he was an analyst in American national government at the Congressional Research Service (CRS), where he focused on District of Columbia governance and authored or co-authored numerous reports and memoranda on a wide range of issues concerning the District. From 1993 to 1996, was a civil rights analyst at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, conducting research on major civil rights issues and developments in areas such as voting rights and redistricting, and employment barriers to minorities and women at the highest levels of business. He has published extensively in Urban Affairs Review and Civil Rights Journal: Journal of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. Dr. Fauntroy has taught numerous institutions including Howard University, the University of the District of Columbia, Trinity College, and American University. He taught the first course ever offered at Trinity College on the politics and governance of the District of Columbia.

Stanley Newman, Advisory Board Chair

Dr. Rivlin is a Visiting Professor at the Public Policy Institute of Georgetown University and a Senior Fellow in the Economic Studies program at the Brookings Institution and the Director Brookings’ Greater Washington Research Program. From 1998-2001, she chaired the District of Columbia Financial Management Assistance Authority. Previously, she has held senior government positions including Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve Board from 1996 to 1999, Director of the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) from 1994 to 1996 and OMB Deputy Director from 1993 to 94. Dr. Rivlin was the founding Director of the Congressional Budget Office (1975-1983). She was director of the Economic Studies Program at Brookings (1983- 1987). She also served at the Department of Health, Education and Welfare as Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (1968-69).

Dr. Alice Rivlin, Advisory Board Chair

Dr. Rivlin is a Visiting Professor at the Public Policy Institute of Georgetown University and a Senior Fellow in the Economic Studies program at the Brookings Institution and the Director Brookings’ Greater Washington Research Program. From 1998-2001, she chaired the District of Columbia Financial Management Assistance Authority. Previously, she has held senior government positions including Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve Board from 1996 to 1999, Director of the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) from 1994 to 1996 and OMB Deputy Director from 1993 to 94. Dr. Rivlin was the founding Director of the Congressional Budget Office (1975-1983). She was director of the Economic Studies Program at Brookings (1983- 1987). She also served at the Department of Health, Education and Welfare as Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (1968-69).

Dr. Rivlin received a MacArthur Foundation Prize Fellowship, taught at Harvard, George Mason, and The New School Universities, has served on several corporate Boards of Directors and as President of the American Economic Association. She is currently a member of the Board of Directors of BearingPoint, the New York Stock Exchange and the Washington Post Company. A frequent media commentator, she has authored numerous books including Systematic Thinking for Social Action (l971), Reviving the American Dream (1992), and Beyond the Dot.coms (with Robert Litan, 2001), as well as co-editing Restoring Fiscal Sanity: How to Balance the Budget (2004), Restoring Fiscal Sanity 2005: Meeting the Long-Run Challenges, and The Economic Payoff from the Internet Revolution (2001). Dr. Rivlin received a B.A. in economics from Bryn Mawr College in 1952 and a Ph.D. from Radcliffe College (Harvard University) in economics in 1958.

About Us

Our Nation’s Capital was founded by concerned citizens on July 4, 2003 to advocate for fiscal fairness for the District of Columbia and is based on the belief that we are all responsible for our country’s capital city. ONC seeks to raise public awareness of the unique challenges the capital city faces in meeting critical needs, disseminate information on the real life impacts of the District’s lack of representation and promote dialogue with the press, the public and policymakers to find sustainable solutions to make our nation’s capital one that adequately serves residents and commuters and of which all Americans can be proud.

Staff & Consultants

Richard Suisman, Chairman

Robert Baskin, Executive Director

Jill Diskan, Assistant To The Chairman

Eron Shosteck, Media Advisor