As part of his most recent budget, President Obama has cut federal funds for Metro by 10 percent—and local leaders are not happy. more ›

During a press conference held earlier today outside the Lincoln Theatre, the financially-strapped venue's board of directors unleashed several criticisms. Perhaps the loudest were about Mayor Vince Gray, who they claimed was refusing to take a meeting with them regarding the theater's funding situation. more ›

Representatives from the Lincoln Theatre's board of directors made their case in front of the historic theater this afternoon: without a $500,000 boost in operational funds from the city at the beginning of the 2012 fiscal year, they would likely be forced to close at the end of the year. more ›

Got a flight planned for Friday? Well, it could be a lot more interesting -- and we don't mean because the Transportation Security Administration might be taking a peek at your goolies. more ›

Yesterday, we reported on 28 D.C. women whose scheduled abortion procedures at a local clinic were in danger of being unexpectedly cancelled after D.C. Medicaid coverage of such procedures suddenly expired. Amanda Hess follows up today with the news that the fundraising effort spearheaded by the DC Abortion Fund -- which garnered support from Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington and an fund-match from the Eastern Massachusetts Abortion Fund -- enabled all 28 women to make their appointments. more ›

The compromise reached last week by President Barack Obama and Speaker of the House John Boehner to reinstate a ban on D.C.'s ability to fund abortions for low-income women has, so far, been enveloped inside a bubble of political rhetoric. But the very real effects of the ban have started to take hold: 28 women who were scheduled for abortion procedures in the District today were informed by a local clinic last night that, as of midnight, they would be unable to rely on D.C. Medicaid to pay for those procedures. more ›

We've noted that the congressional ban on the District's ability to spend funds on needle exchange programs -- which was lifted in 2007, only to be brought back to life by House Republicans in February -- can have a negative effect on the health of many around the District. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, however, isn't mincing words on the subject. more ›

We're still looking over the 2,400-plus-page budget released by President Barack Obama yesterday to figure out how it will affect the District, but a Republican resolution introduced in the House on Friday also warrants mentioning: the Continuting Resolution, HR 1, would slice federal payments to the District by approximately $80 million, and would reduce the amount of funding for WMATA to zero over the next eight months. more ›

Who will bail out Washington's azaleas? more ›

Yesterday afternoon, the District Department of Transportation released an updated version of its streetcar plan [PDF], the most detailed document to date about the plans of where D.C.'s streetcars will go and how the city is planning to pay for them. The plan also documents logistical alternatives for the routing of the streetcar line, options for maintenance facilities, discussion of the streetcars' power supply, the vehicles which will run on the tracks and provides a general status update for both the H Street/Benning Road and Anacostia projects. more ›

The Associated Press reports that the U.S. Department of Education has awarded the District a share of $3.4 billion in federal "Race to the Top" grant funds. It is the largest-ever federal investment in school reform. D.C. will share the funds with nine states, including Maryland; the exact amount that the District will receive (and what it will be used for) will be announced at a later date. The Department of Education judged applications for funding based on "ambitious yet achievable plans for implementing coherent, compelling, and comprehensive education reform." The District, with its new teacher evaluation system and the current administration's commitment to reform obviously made for a very strong application. It's a certainty that you'll also be hearing plenty of boasting about the award from Mayor Adrian Fenty as the primary election gets closer. UPDATE: D.C. will receive a $75 million share of the funds, according to a DCPS press release. more ›

Dr. Gridlock reports that House and Senate subcommittees have given the thumbs up to bills that will provide WMATA with $150 million in federal funds for making capital purchases and infrastructure repairs. (On a somewhat-related note, the House Appropriations Committee's approved bill also includes $1.8 billion to Amtrak for fleet and station upgrades.) After the busy July that Metro's maintenance crews have put in -- including Green and Blue line work this upcoming weekend -- we're sure that WMATA is thrilled that the money is smoothly winding its way through the legislative process. more ›

President Barack Obama has signed a disaster declaration that allows the District of Columbia to receive federal aid for cleanup costs incurred from December's winter storm. That storm dumped more than 23 inches of snow on the city between Dec. 18 and 20. The money will go to the District government and should cover most of what the city spent on snow removal for that storm. The declaration also allows D.C. and a number of non-profit organizations to receive funds for the repair of facilities that sustained damage during the storm. A later declaration may be made by the president regarding February's storms. more ›

Word coming down from the Hill is that the District's annual appropriations bill has made it through conference and will include provisions lifting long-standing prohibitions on spending city funds on medical marijuana, needle-exchange programs and abortion. more ›

The District Department of Transportation on Wednesday announced the ten projects that have been selected to receive funding through DDOT's Transportation Enhancement Program. The funding includes grants ranging from $50,000 to $579,500 that go toward making improvements on a variety of transportation related projects. Funding for the program is provided through the Federal Highway Administration. A full list of the selected projects from the DDOT announcement is after the jump. more ›

The Save WEAVE campaign may have allowed that domestic violence assistance non-profit to stay open, but with the start of the new fiscal year today, other local groups are facing similar financial problems. House of Ruth, the District's largest nonprofit aimed at helping homeless women and children, most of whom have been victims of domestic violence, this week found out that it has lost nearly $500,000 in city funding, as the Washington Post's Susan Kinzie reported today. more ›

We were all set to write off the Associated Press's latest attempt (via WTOP) to recycle the "National Mall is a National Disgrace" story template, which has been a favorite of the local media for years now (for examples, see last year's versions here and 2007's here). We all already know that the National Mall is looking pretty banged up, with cracked walkways, dead, trampled grass, dying trees and mud making what should be the country's pride and joy look shabby and depressing. We also already know that when President Obama tried to steer $200 million out of his stimulus package to renovate the National Mall, it was killed by the House. But the AP's Brian Westley and Brett Zongker have done a nice job of reporting out the story behind the story: that members of Congress routinely earmark money for national parks in their home states, while torpedoing such efforts for the Mall, which, by virtue of being located in the District, doesn't have any powerful members of Congress to fight for it. Here's the meat:

All told, Congress sent home more than $181 million in earmarks through the park service budget last year _ an election year _ according to data compiled by the group Taxpayers for Common Sense and analyzed by the AP. Nearly half that money was driven by lawmakers who were on the House and Senate appropriations committees. more ›

Writing in the Examiner, Hayley Peterson reports on a resurrected bill from D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton that would allow private companies to take over running the District’s three public golf courses in order to finance much needed improvements. The plan, presumably, would mean access to the historically cheap public courses would become more expensive. more ›

Yesterday's Post Metro section was all over the influx of federal stimulus funds making their way into the District, Maryland, and Virginia, and the jobs that said money is providing -- complete with all the colorful graphs and maps you'd expect. more ›

And so, the epic saga of the magical "$1.5 billion" dedicated Metro funding continues. more ›

The non-profit DC Appleseed issued a report today that calls on the federal government to provide the District of Columbia a minimum of $1 billion annually in general federal funding. The 120-page report [PDF] quantifies the amount of tax-based revenue the District perpetually lacks compared to other major American cities, what the GAO has termed the city's "structural deficit," and argues that Congress is obligated to make up the difference because it is responsible for the rules which create that deficit in the first place. (The Examiner and D.C. Wire both have more). more ›

Buried at the bottom of yesterday's WaPo story about the $1.5 billion funding package for Metro passed by the Senate is this juicy tidbit:

The bill also includes a provision to improve cellphone coverage in the subway system. Within one year, the 20 busiest underground Metro stations would be required to have cellphone access for all carriers. Currently, only Verizon or Sprint roaming customers can receive signals.

The long-delayed bill which includes a potential $1.5 billion in funding for Metrorail will finally be voted on in the Senate tomorrow, and it is expected to pass. Debate on the floor was officially closed by a 69-17 vote yesterday, and it would appear that the legislation has more than enough votes to make it's way to President Bush's desk. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) is probably finding the bill more difficult to roadblock these days, since the law's main purpose - improving rail safety across the country, with the recent Los Angeles commuter rail accident which killed 25 people fresh in the collective memory - is being credited for the bill's sudden resurgence. Of course, that didn't stop Coburn from trying. more ›

Metro brings word that yesterday, the House of Representatives approved an amended version of the Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008 and the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act of 2008, H.R. 2095. While the bill's main financial purpose is to allocate $13.06 billion in federal funds over the next five years to Amtrak, it also includes $1.5 billion in appropriations for Metro to make capital improvements in the next ten years - vital funds for WMATA. The bill, mended into one collective document after two attempts at passage in each legislative body stalled during last year's Congressional session, is expected to pass easily in the Senate after unanimous bipartisan approval in the House. more ›

The clock is ticking for Metro. The transit agency announced on Monday that it will require $11.3 billion to keep things moving smoothly, according to a recently completed inventory of estimated needs between 2010 and 2020. The figure doesn't include possible expansion, and only six percent would go to "customer-oriented improvements." more ›

The amount of miles logged by Maryland, Virginia, and District drivers fell sharply in May, contributing to a national drop of more than 9.6 billion miles, the third largest slide in the country's history. The decrease saw local drivers notching between 1.7 and 4.2 percent fewer turns of the odometer. So, you might ask, what's this got to do with Metro? more ›

Dr. No has struck again. more ›

If you're a press secretary for Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Ok.), today's a good day. Both the Post and the New York Times are running profiles on the senator, affably known as "Dr. No," for his persistent opposition to bills that fund government programs he considers wasteful. Coburn has held up some 80 bills during his tenure, and it's gotten so bad that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) felt compelled to introduce legislation last week that would fund 35 of the programs Coburn has successfully stalled, to the tune of $10 billion. The legislation, officially titled the Advancing America’s Priorities Act, is being called the "Tomnibus" bill. more ›

After last week's Metropocalypse, we all took in the reports as to how major loss of service happens, and the fallout after the fact. more ›