Photo by volcanojw

Good morning, Washington. How’s this for a pair of headlines: “Job market shrinking for college grads,” from the Washington Business Journal, combined with “Consumers more positive, but still not spending,” from WTOP. Makes us feel more than just a tad guilty for wasting time worrying about the area’s commencement speakers of late; probably, we should have been out buying new iPods and eating in local restaurants and figuring out some way to offer paid internships instead. Thinking back to the sheer panic that naturally goes with the six months surrounding college graduation and imagining it happening when there are literally zero jobs available … shudder. If you’ve got a graduating senior in your life, give them a hug today. Also, a couple hundred bucks.

Council Set to Adopt Budget: Speaking of cash, the D.C. Council is expected to go ahead and adopt the FY 2010 budget today when it convenes for its regular session. The Examiner plays up the included earmarks: “That includes $1.5 million for the CityMarket at O Street project in Shaw, money that the economic development committee yanked from the Howard Theater rehabilitation. There’s $1 million each to the National Council of Negro Women, the Washington Ballet and the Phillips Collection for capital projects. And then there’s a list of some 120 community-based social service groups and arts-based organizations, from the Kennedy Center and the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival to the Crystal Meth Working Group, Keely’s Boxing and Woodland Tigers Youth Sports, which all receive their share — in most cases, $250,000 or less.”

Six D.C. Schools Ordered to Make Dramatic Staff Changes: Over at the Post, Bill Turque reports on six D.C. schools failing to meet NCLB standards, which will force the staffs there to reapply for their jobs. The schools are Dunbar and Anacostia high schools, the H.D. Woodson ninth-grade academy at Ron Brown Middle School, Hart and MacFarland middle schools and Ferebee-Hope Elementary School. Teachers and staff members at the six schools who are not rehired or who decide not to return will be reassigned; they will not lose their jobs.

Briefly Noted: City releases final pedestrian master plan … Intruder touches Fairfax County girl, flees … Virginia revenue drop will mean more cuts … Three new swine flu cases in D.C.
… Court hears appeal from D.C. sniper.

This Day in DCist: Last year, we recounted the great Radiohead rainstorm, and two years before that, Marion Barry got into a car accident.