Almost a month into the District's crime emergency, a stricter curfew is in place, surveillance cameras are being installed, and more police are working longer hours on city streets. But is the additional show of force being efficiently applied? Maybe not. One resident explained their grief with the beefed up police presence in today's edition of D.C. Watch's online newsletter, The Mail. Describing a recent experience on U Street, she wrote: By now, if you... more ›

Pretty much everyone in New York and Washington were in a tizzy last week over the announcement that both cities would be receiving less federal counter-terrorism dollars than last year. Responding to news that the District's allocation would drop from $77 million to $46 million, police chief Charles Ramsey angrily stated, "It doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure out these are two cities still at risk." D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams was similarly unhappy, stating... more ›

D.C. Watch's twice-weekly online newsletter The Mail has long been a source of news, opinion, and analysis on District politics. Since 1995, founders and main contributors Dorothy Brizill and Gary Imhoff have used the newsletter to root out government waste and take on political shenanigans, both left and right. And while much of The Mail's content spawns response after response, one recent non-political announcement has drawn some debate -- should The Mail become a blog?... more ›

Carpetbaggers are carpetbaggers, no matter how good their intentions may be. At least that's what NBC 4's Tom Sherwood wrote yesterday in a submission to The Mail, D.C. Watch's bi-weekly email newsletter: Did we miss Mr. Nader’s becoming a legal resident of the District? The issue came up in 1998 when the national consumer advocate endorsed Anthony Williams for mayor. More recently, Nader has attempted to join the public debate on the baseball stadium. At... more ›