As you may have realized, people in Ward 6—especially those east of 17th Street SE, which looks like the proposed dividing line—really, really do not want to be redistricted into another ward. So much so, in fact, that a number of them wondered why D.C. couldn’t just buck the constitutional principle of one man, one [...]
UPDATED BELOW Saturday, 11:20 a.m.
As a Census-mandated vote on redistricting the city's ward boundaries vote looms, Tommy Wells has a PR strategy for keeping his territory intact in the face of an attempted land grab by Marion Barry. The important part: Don't make it about Marion Barry.
“With Ward 6, with how well it’s working, the [...]
It is by now a familiar pattern in gentrifying District neighborhoods: A brutal, unprovoked attack prompts neighborhood outrage and an examination of what might have caused the violence.
In eastern Capitol Hill, those periodic cycles often center around Potomac Gardens, the 352-unit public housing complex that occupies a full city block between 12th and 13th streets [...]
Each of the four sites slated to receive Walmarts has a long and convoluted history—which makes sense, considering the retailer was able to swoop in and grab them after other plans fell through. The 801 New Jersey Avenue location, however, is more interesting than most, involving what amounts to a two-decade-old community benefits agreement with [...]
My column this week is about a few of the issues affecting H Street NE real estate, which is the kind of story that requires a conversation with nightlife impresario Joe Englert. Last week, I found him munching on a sandwich at the Star and Shamrock with Toki Underground owner Erik Yang, and pestered them [...]
Trying to pin down funding for solar energy in the District is like wrestling a slippery fish: You think you have it, and then it jumps out of your hands again, forcing another round of pursuit.
Along with incentives from the federal government, a $3-per-kilowatt subsidy has brought rooftop solar energy systems within the reach of [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
A couple weeks ago, Ward 6 Councilmember Tommy Wells shared the discovery that ten percent of people who come to District homeless shelters aren't District residents (or at least, their last address was somewhere else). Being a good sport in the face of a $175 million budget shortfall, he promised to introduce legislation that would [...]
