UPDATE, Tuesday, 2:45 p.m. – A couple weeks ago, the Council was actually able to put a total of $3 million in the Streetscape Survival Fund. This time, though, it's for no-interest loans, not grants. No money has been dispensed yet, but regulations were finally issued, so nothing is left standing in the way.
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You'd think [...]
Since there's a pile of budget information coming today, I'll just go piece by piece, hitting things in the Housing Complex world. Up first: The report from Councilmember Jim Graham's Committee on Human Services.
The committee outright disapproved of the Department of Human Services budget, which it says "will devastate the city and further spending pressures [...]
On April 14, the D.C. Superior Court handed down a decision in a case that has taken seven years to resolve. Tenant associations at two buildings came out on top—but four of them went through all those layers of appeal for nothing.
Here's the backstory: In early 2004, Harold and Maxine Bernstein decided to sell 11 [...]
It's that time of year again: When various interest groups cycle through the Wilson Building to justify their spending priorities, especially if they're being cut in this year's budget. Most of them actually got off okay, given that Mayor Vince Gray decided to raise some taxes (or "revenue enhancements") rather than taking the entire $322 [...]
The Washington Business Journal writes up a press release out today about an imminent groundbreaking at Park Morton, the big New Communities project on Georgia Avenue just below the Petworth metro. That's for one piece of the project–the building at 3512 Georgia Avenue, previously bought by Central Union Mission, which had been in limbo until [...]
A few months ago, Councilmember Jim Graham started pushing for forgiveness of about $400,000 in tax debt incurred by Central Union Mission on a property they owned on Georgia Avenue. Since he and community members had torpedoed plans to relocate its homeless shelter there from 14th and R Streets NW, the Mission didn't get the [...]
In a climactic vote just now in the Wilson Building, the City Council passed Councilmember Tommy Wells' proposal to require that homeless shelters turn away people who can't demonstrate District residency during the coldest part of the year. By my count of the 30-day Congressional review period, the bill will go into effect on March [...]
After a four hours of public comment and deliberation, Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C passed a resolution in favor of a property tax abatement worth $46 million for a luxury hotel in Adams Morgan, setting it up for final approval by the D.C. Council next Tuesday.
But they didn't give it away for free. In his last [...]
Every real protest movement needs a decent website, and now the opposition to an almost-approved $46 million tax abatement for the Marriott's Edition hotel in our little corner of Adams Morgan has joined the anti-Walmart people in setting up an internet soapbox. It's all in preparation for a forum on the issue put on by [...]
Today is gap-closing day at the Wilson Building, where Councilmembers are grappling with the question of how to find $188 million–the difference between revenues and expenses in the FY 2011 budget. The Fenty administration came up with a few suggestions for how that should happen, but since the Council can basically throw them out the [...]
