Faster, better, cheaper.
That was the rationale offered today by the administration of Mayor Adrian M. Fenty for why at least $120 million in city money has been sent to the D.C. Housing Authority and, in turn, handed to politically connected contractors with the faintest whiff of oversight.
The revelations at the D.C. Council hearing today shocked [...]

After some last minute stonewalling by the Office of the Attorney General, Pershing Park plaintiffs were finally allowed to depose a District employee concerning the vast discovery abuses in this mess of a case. Backed up by a court order, the employee was deposed on October 23. According to a filing submitted in U.S. District [...]

Georgia Avenue, October 26

The Issue: The owner of the Takoma Theatre is planning a five-story apartment building for the historic spot. The theater has occupied the corner of Fourth and Butternut Streets NW since 1923; Milton McGinty bought the building in 1983. But the low-density neighborhood of Takoma has not been kind to a privately owned arts building [...]

From Kojo:

Ugh.

Today's the last day to enter Dan Snyder's Cheerleader Pride Giveaway Contest! Tomorrow, folks at Snyder's sportstalker, WTEM, will hold the drawing to find out the five 25-to-54-year-old males who've won the right to have Redskins cheerleaders — armed with sponges and buckets and zero self-esteem — come over and scrub down their cars.
Come on, [...]

The Issue: Bloomingdale Eckington residents can now find pizza instead of hot wings at the intersection of North Capitol Street and Florida Avenue NE—but they still have to order through bulletproof glass. New York Pizza recently decided to retain the glass after taking over the building from Kentucky Fried Chicken. But some residents are tired of [...]

"The mayor had nothing to do with the contract."—Peter Nickles on Kojo concerning questions related to the parks contracts to Fenty's frat brothers. Then why is there a hearing going on? Maybe Nickles needs to read LL's latest column.
And this from Nickles: "I think Mary Cheh is great....Mary Cheh is a great councilmember."

Thanks to its cable and education businesses, the third-quarter profit of the Washington Post Co. jumped 69 percent.
The good news would have been better if not for the fortunes of the newspaper division, which includes the flagship Washington Post plus some lesser-known papers.

The D.C. Council has just gaveled to order a hearing on parks contracts transferred by Mayor Adrian M. Fenty in such a way as to evade council oversight.
The issue goes beyond the $82 million in parks spending already identified. According to figures obtained by LL, the Fenty administration has authorized $120.7 million in spending to [...]

As much local politics as humanly possible. Send your tips, releases, stories, events, etc. to lips@washingtoncitypaper.com. And get LL Daily sent straight to your inbox every morning!
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT—"Liveblog: D.C. Council Grills Michelle Rhee on Teacher Layoffs"; "District Homeless Shelters Are Already At Capacity"; "Pershing Park Case: OAG Reverts Back To Stonewalling"
Morning all. [...]

Good morning, City Desk readers, and welcome to Freedom Friday! Today's topic: Chuck Lane, former editor of the The New Republic and promoter of the conventional wisdom on the editorial pages of the Washington Post. For those of you who missed last week's FF, I said some not nice things to Chuck. Why did I [...]

Arnold Schwarzenegger is speaking at Georgetown University's business school tonight, which seems like enough of an excuse to bring up the California governor's recent memo to state legislators informing them that he was vetoing a certain bill authored by a guy who reportedly once told him to "kiss my gay ass." The memo has gotten [...]