No, Councilmember Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) isn't on Twitter, and he wants you to know it. more ›

A bill that would make it easier for residents to register handguns moved through a D.C. Council committee today, and if it passes the full council hopeful gun owners will no longer have to complete a five-hour training class, submit to a vision test or give up their gun for a ballistics test. The law would also allow the District's mayor to act as a federally licensed firearms dealer if the sole dealer in the District goes out of business, as happened briefly last year. more ›

For as much as some of our commenters gripe, there's a reason DCist and other news organizations keep tabs on the Twitter accounts of our elected officials here. Mayor Vince Gray and most members of the D.C. Council are fond of the micro-blogging service, and they use it well. more ›

After four months, Emily Miller finally got her gun. But the Washington Times scribe and D.C. resident isn't content just basking in her newfound status as a gun owner -- she wants to make the process easier for everyone else. more ›

Emily Miller is finally going to get her gun, and she wants to tell the D.C. Council how difficult the whole process was. more ›

Even though Internet gambling has been legal in the District since early 2011, it remains but an idea that hasn't yet become reality. Ongoing controversy over how it came to be has led its proponents to hold off on implementing it, and tomorrow a D.C. Council committee will hold a hearing on legislation that would repeal it altogether. more ›

Councilmember Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) showed up to work today in a brand new Ford Focus, having finally traded in his old Mercury Mystique after 15 years and more than 175,000 miles. more ›

Marylanders may be hoping to get same-sex marriage this year, but one member of the D.C. Council wants to make it easier for same-sex marriages performed here to be ended. more ›

Despite "flash robs" not being much of a problem in the District, Councilmember Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) doesn't want to take any chances. more ›

Just as Councilmember Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) proposed in October that restrictions on gun stores be eased, today he introduced legislation that would make the process of buying and registering a gun simpler for District residents. more ›

Until yesterday, I was unaware that the District's firefighters work eight 24-hour shifts a month, and that 40 percent of them live over 30 miles away from the city. These may seem like disconnected little factoids, but they're playing into what could well be a nasty battle between firefighters and the District over how much they should work. more ›

During a D.C. Council hearing on Friday, D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier cited new police radio scanning technologies and constantly emerging threats as reasons underpinning MPD's recent decision to encrypt radio communications. more ›

Can you legislate a culture shift, using the law to change the way drivers perceive cyclists? That was was one of the questions that a D.C. Council committee pondered yesterday. more ›

Councilmember Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) has concerns about a proposed law that would increase civil actions available to cyclists who claim to have been assaulted or intimidated by drivers. more ›

After a rash of incidents in which drivers were arrested by D.C. police for having lapsed registrations, pretty much everyone seems to think that a solution is necessary. The problem is that no one seems to be clear on where that solution will be coming from. more ›

If you want to open a gun store in the District these days, you'd be limited to locations that were 300 feet away from schools, churches, recreation centers or playgrounds. One member of the D.C. Council wants that to change. more ›

As I type this, the D.C. Council has officially been back to work for about an hour and a half. And already, it appears as if the summer recess didn't do anything to cool the fiery relationships between many of the members. more ›

Last week, the D.C. GOP filed a complaint with the D.C. Office of Campaign Finance claiming that 10 of the 13 members of the D.C. Council had broken city regulations by steering money from their Constituent Service Funds to partisan organizations. It looks like some of the accused may be off the hook, though. more ›

The Washington Examiner’s Freeman Klopott reports that At-Large D.C. Councilmember Phil Mendelson is pushing a new bill that would turn a third simple assault conviction into a felony assault, which carries harsher penalties. more ›

The Washington Examiner reports that D.C. and Virginia will lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal law enforcement grant money, because they failed to meet a key deadline to comply with a controversial federal law related to sex offender registries. more ›

For all the apologizing going around, it seems clear that even the Councilmembers that cast the votes to move Tommy Wells (D-Ward 6) off the Transportation and Public Works Committee aren't so sure of themselves. more ›

Boy, this story by Freeman Klopott in the Examiner sure starts bad, doesn't it? more ›

Ever since the District's sole licensed gun dealer went out of business earlier this year, residents have been unable to purchase handguns. Two different proposals offered today seek to remedy that. more ›

The District's redistricting plan, which was rolled out yesterday, received the initial endorsement of the D.C. Council subcommittee that drafted it, despite protests from a number of councilmembers about how new ward boundaries are being drawn and repeated calls for respect amidst a process that has proved predictably rancorous. more ›

This morning, At-Large D.C. Councilmember Phil Mendelson introduced a bill which would slightly alter the waiting period for residents wishing to register a handgun inside the District. Under current regulations, Washingtonians seeking to register a handgun must wait 10 days after applying for registration; Mendelson's bill, in effect for the next 90 days, changes that requirement to a 10-day waiting period after the point of purchase. Mendelson introduced the bill after the city's lone operating federal registrar, Charles Sykes, lost his lease, rendering him currently unable to process new registrations. more ›

During this morning's legislative meeting of the D.C. Council, Councilmembers Phil Mendelson and Michael A. Brown introduced legislation -- the District of Columbia Flag Amendment Act of 2011 -- which would allow the city to fly, on Flag Day, an alternate version of the District's flag with the words "No Taxation Without Representation" emblazoned on it. more ›

A bill that would revive a school voucher program in the District will likely come to a vote in the House of Representatives today, where it is expected to pass. The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, which would provide $7,500 to qualifying students to put towards private-school tuition and has been pushed by Speaker of the House John Boehner, was passed by a House panel earlier this month. It's chances in the Senate, where the Democratic leadership opposes the program, are less clear. more ›

It's one of my favorite pieces of toothless regulation in this city, one which I often break out at that point during parties when people have already had a couple of beers and far more interesting and topical conversational topics have already been extinguished: D.C. law requires most people "domiciled in the city for 30 days or more" who operate a vehicle "in public space" to obtain a driver's license. It's just another one of those legislations, like the snow shoveling fine, which is all gums. Of course, it's significantly less humorous for people living in the city who don't have a Social Security number -- because without one, it's impossible to follow that law. more ›

Officially, police still aren't talking much about why Assistant Chief Diane Groomes was placed on administrative leave, but the District's Councilmembers -- flooded with calls and emails in support of the popular commander -- sure are spilling the beans. At-Large Councilmember Phil Mendelson, who chairs the Council's Public Safety and Judiciary Committee, told the Post this morning that the test which Groomes is alleged to have helped officers cheat on was an open-book assessment. (Go ahead, get that natural reaction -- why would police officers need to cheat on an open-book exam? -- out of your system.) But it sounds like the actual problem was that the officers were overdue on the test, not that they were incapable of completing it without Groomes' assistance. Mendelson told the Post that Groomes said to the cops: "'Hey, you have to get this done, you are overdue. Here, here's the answers. Just get this in." The Fraternal Order of Police is using the incident to question the force's professionalism -- for her part, Groomes, who apologized on Friday, has quite the groundswell of support going for her. more ›

There has been a lot of talk over the past week about how the racial divide in the District led to Vincent Gray's victory. We've seen vitriol spewed from both sides, the talk of the "old guard" restoring the legacy of Marion Barry, or how the influx of "myopic twits" have pushed aside hardworking blacks. The Washington Post has used a lot of ink to talk up these arguments. Thankfully Colbert King managed to bring some rational discourse to the paper this weekend with his column. King posits that the racial divide is not always a driving force in D.C. politics, and points to Phil Mendelson's win as a key example. more ›