Axios Power Players: 14 influential people in D.C., including Taylor Heinicke, Carla Hayden, Hany Hassan

Everybody’s an influence participant in Washington, proper?

Sure, however: We’re highlighting the 14 we predict had the most important impression round city this 12 months.  

What’s occurring: The brains behind I-82 — the poll measure that may change how we dine and tip — prime our inaugural record.

The way it works: We mirrored on the previous 12 months’s headlines, thought of what’s coming in 2023 and polled our most plugged-in sources about who they imagine has formed Washington essentially the most. 

• Our unscientific record is produced totally by our editorial workforce and isn’t influenced by promoting in any method.
• Individuals who made the ability record weren’t notified of their choice till publication.

Adam Eidinger, Ryan O’Leary and Aparna Raj 

Initiative 82 organizers

Adam Eidinger runs a political consultancy agency known as Mintwood Methods that helped get marijuana and magic mushrooms legalized in D.C. Ryan O’Leary is a former restaurant server. Aparna Raj is an organizer with the native chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America. 

Why we picked them: They had been the architects of D.C.’s Initiative 82 marketing campaign to overtake how tipped employees receives a commission, and it handed in November by over 74%.

• Eidinger was the marketing campaign’s mastermind and helped with native fundraising for the $438,000 effort. O’Leary filed the poll petition and spoke out on the problem, whereas Raj labored on the bottom recreation. 
• Collectively they beat again among the native restaurant world’s heaviest hitters together with José Andrés and the Restaurant Affiliation of Metropolitan Washington, in addition to quite a few servers who most popular the established order.

What we’re watching: Eidinger specifically has an actual monitor document of getting liberal priorities on the poll and handed. What is going to he suggest subsequent?

Taylor Heinicke

Commanders’ new beginning quarterback

Two years in the past, when Washington known as Taylor Heinicke to be their backup quarterback, he was taking on-line lessons. Right now he’s making us root for our soccer workforce once more.

Why we picked him: Heinicke (say it with us: Hein-ick-EE, not Heineken) got here off the bench in late October for injured ex-starter Carson Wentz. The workforce was 2-4. Since then, the 29-year-old has accomplished the unthinkable: slot the Commanders into playoff competition after a four-game undefeated streak.

D.C.’s soccer trustworthy have not had this a lot enjoyable in years! And it’s because of him.

Carla Hayden

Librarian of Congress

Carla Hayden grew to become the 14th librarian of Congress in 2016 — the primary lady and first Black individual to carry the place. This 12 months, she made the library cool.

Why we picked her: On Sept. 23, Hayden tweeted in regards to the Library of Congress’ flute assortment, tagging music famous person Lizzo and writing “we might love so that you can come see it and even play a pair when you’re in DC subsequent week.” Lizzo’s response: “IM COMING CARLA!”

• Days later, James Madison’s 200-year-old crystal flute — which Lizzo performed at Capital One Enviornment — was the speak of the web.

What we’re watching: Hayden has made it her mission to modernize the Library, launching a cellular app and upping the tech savvy of the Nationwide E-book Pageant. She plans to develop an open supply IT platform to make LOC’s collections extra accessible, another step in making historical past rock.

Ian Callender and Kevin “Scooty” Hallums

Entrepreneurs

Ian Callender, proprietor of occasion design agency Suite Nation, and Kevin “Scooty” Hallums, co-founder of occasions company Rock Creek Social Membership, are native creatives who performed on the identical PG County church basketball workforce as children.

Why we picked them: The enterprise companions are creating among the coolest new spots to hang around: gathering spots in renovated transport containers that they name Sandlots.

• This 12 months, along with extra non permanent areas in Georgetown, Tysons and Navy Yard, the duo transplanted Sandlots to a high-end leisure desert — Anacostia — and opened their first everlasting location.

Japanese Excessive Faculty marching band

Dubbed the “satisfaction of Capitol Hill,” Japanese Excessive Faculty’s marching band has introduced music to neighborhood streets for years. They’ve even carried out at NFL halftime exhibits and in parades for presidents.

Why we picked them: The band stole native hearts after being spotlighted within the Washington Put up, which netted them $115,000 in donations for brand spanking new gear and actions, as properly a $30,000 GoFundMe to buy a brand new automotive for band director James Perry.

• It’s onerous to think about a extra superior tribute to a bunch whose energy comes from sparking pure pleasure.

Monty Hoffman

Developer of the Wharf

Monty Hoffman, a longtime D.C. developer, is lauded for reviving the Southwest waterfront along with his Wharf challenge, which debuted in 2017. 

Why we picked him: Hoffman simply accomplished the Wharf’s closing part. The enterprise introduced luxurious condos and superstar cooks to the neighborhood, constructed a mile-long walkable waterfront between the fish market and Fort McNair, and cemented Southwest D.C. as a sizzling spot. 

What we’re watching: Hoffman’s new challenge is a mixed-use growth within the metropolis’s subsequent up-and-coming waterfront neighborhood, Buzzard Level.

Alana Eichner and Antonia Surco

Administrators of the D.C. chapter of the Nationwide Home Employees Alliance

Alana Eichner and Antonia Surco have spent years organizing home employees within the District, internet hosting city halls and looking for out nannies at playgrounds to tell them of their rights, or lack thereof.

Why we picked them: Eichner and Surco, a former home employee herself, are the drive behind transformative laws pending earlier than town that will grant caretakers, cooks, cleaners and different family employees the identical employment protections afforded to others.

What we’re watching: The invoice is more likely to cross this month, and the activists inform Axios they’ll be watching implementation carefully to make sure each employers and employees know the regulation.

Hany Hassan

Architect

Hany Hassan is the director of Beyer Blinder Belle’s D.C. workplace, and the architectural icon behind a few of our space’s most outstanding historic constructing overhauls, together with the enlargement of Arlington Nationwide Cemetery and the Washington Monument’s new customer’s middle.

Why we picked him: Hassan was the hidden hand behind one of many 12 months’s buzziest cultural happenings: the Rubell Museum opening. In his imaginative and prescient, the dilapidated Randall school-turned-home for modern artwork retains its authentic exterior however advantages from accessibility upgrades and a light-drenche glass pavilion.

What we’re watching: Hassan’s work on this nook of Southwest D.C. isn’t accomplished. He’s additionally designing an adjoining condominium constructing that may embrace reasonably priced items.

Latrena Owens

Director of D.C.’s St. Elizabeths East Campus redevelopment

Latrena Owens is answerable for the 183-acre redevelopment of the St. Elizabeths East Campus, overseeing the constructing of lots of of houses, a large hospital and new companies. She beforehand helped steer completion of the I-395 freeway by the center of D.C. and managed town’s financial growth portfolio value over $3 billion.

Why we picked her: Saint Elizabeths is not simply the District’s largest building challenge. These are hallowed grounds: Historic buildings on the grassy web site had been house to a outstanding nineteenth century psychiatric hospital, and Civil Conflict troopers relaxation in surrounding cemeteries.

• This 12 months town broke floor on a $375 million GW-run hospital, a very long time coming for the underserved neighborhood.

What we’re watching: On faucet are mixed-use developments throughout 18 parcels subsequent to the Congress Heights Metro station and the world the place the Mystics play.

Daniel Adler

“Bike Man”

Daniel Adler is a Dupont resident, an environmental lawyer — and metropolis liberals’ hero of the 12 months.

Why we picked him: Adler introduced the right-winger trucker convoy to a near-halt on seventeenth Road downtown final March after the group had spent weeks jamming up the Beltway and making drivers’ lives depressing.

• His gradual pedaling, even because the truckers laid into their horns, earned him free native beer, a shoutout from Jimmy Kimmel and a spot within the historical past books because the “Bike Man” who avenged D.C.

Go deeper: See all 200 of Axios Native’s Energy Gamers in 2022