Last week, at a forum in Adams Morgan, Council chairman Vincent Gray was asked—as he often is—how he would solve unemployment in the District. On top of the usual answers about job training and construction projects, Gray had one most audience members hadn’t heard before: Making D.C. a tax shelter for insurance companies.
Here’s what he [...]

Mayor Adrian Fenty gets three appointments to the five-person Zoning Commission. All three of his latest picks have been developers—and on account of their professional homogeneity, the Council is likely to only confirm one of the two nominations currently pending.
Stan Wall, whom the Mayor nominated to replace menschy chairman Anthony Hood, has already run into [...]

So there's an election on, obviously, and councilmembers are in high gear campaigning to keep their jobs. There's a tricky balance to strike, though, between stocking a war chest while avoiding the perception of influence–especially when it comes to awarding construction contracts. Mayor Adrian Fenty has built up a reputation for being too cozy with [...]

Since early this year, the Rental Housing Commission, the appellate panel charged with enforcing the Rental Housing Act of 1985, has been essentially defunct. The terms of its three members expired on January 17th, and one staff member has been logging cases as they are appealed from the Office of Administrative Hearings, with no action [...]

Campaign finance reports due last night show that First Cash Financial Services, which is fighting legislation that would cap fees and interest rates on payday lenders check cashers and pawnbrokers in the District, has made some strategic investments in this year's political races: At least $8,000 to sitting councilmembers, all in the ten days after [...]

A long-decrepit apartment complex was formally reborn yesterday, as top D.C. housing officials welcomed 28 families to the Williston Apartments just south of Howard University, an area still pockmarked with falling-down buildings.
The 1940s-era structures had gone into serious disrepair through the 1990s, when the belonged to a non-profit tax credit partnership called the Capitol City [...]

When Council Chairman Vince Gray let it be known he would run for mayor, the athletes of the city rallied to Mayor Adrian Fenty's side. Today, hours after the National Capital Planning Commission approved the transfer of a chunk of Fort Dupont Park from National Park Service to District ownership, his office blasted out a [...]

White House gate-crasher Carlos Allen has found a new publicity stunt: Running for mayor of the District of Columbia.
At a three-ring circus of a mayoral forum last night, complete with a voting rights song and a lady in a red cat suit, Allen squared off against seven other minor candidates before members of the D.C. [...]

If you're applying for any sort of permit or license right now, you're going to wish you hadn't procrastinated so long: Yesterday a host of new fees went into effect that will make everything from throwing a "lawn fête" to starting a bowling alley a little bit more expensive. You can read through the list [...]

If D.C.'s executive offices are feeling a little empty lately, it's because a few of our leaders are off in Las Vegas, attending the International Council of Shopping Centers' RECon retail real estate convention. Mayor Adrian Fenty, Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Valerie Santos, and Councilmembers Jack Evans and Muriel Bowser–not to mention would-be council [...]