The Examiner ran a story on Monday about Bloomingdale’s recent round of talks with the city regarding opening a new store in downtown D.C. Along with the recently approved development at the Old Convention Center site, sources in the Fenty administration told Michael Neibauer that the talks have included the controversial Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library at 9th and G Streets NW as a “possible option” for the store. The library, as you’ll recall,…

In most any public or private sector job, losing $31 million on your watch is a surefire way to get yourself fired. CFO Natwar Gandhi’s reputation for saving the city’s finances has thus far protected him from what is to date the District’s biggest corruption scandal. But his fortunes might be changing. Buried towards the end of an article from the Examiner today on an investigation into the tax refund scheme that milked the city…

The Washington Post has the news in the Friday afternoon dump that Mayor Adrian Fenty just fired D.C. Department of Health Director, Gregg A. Pane, along with two of Pane’s deputies. We noted back in January that Fenty had major plans to streamline the department in his first 100 days, starting with a consolidation of its eleven agencies into the current seven. Fenty eliminated many of the agency heads appointed by former Mayor Anthony Williams…

>> Runners at the Army Ten-miler are saying there wasn’t enough water on the race course. [WTOP] >> Former Mayor Anthony Williams hearts Jenna Bush’s new book. [Capital Comment] >> D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier speaks out to defend the records and reputations of the two officers involved in the killing of DeOnte Rawlings, while his father calls for their arrest. [WaPo and WJLA] >> Columbia Heights day was a bit of a bust….

Harry Jaffe: In writing something of a goodbye column to RFK Stadium, Jaffe recounts the many struggles the District overcame to attract a baseball team. And though plenty of people played important roles, he feels that one deserves extra attention — former Mayor Anthony Williams. “The hero of the piece has to be Williams, an unpopular mayor who — despite his wandering attention span — kept swinging away at an unpopular crusade to use public…

Well, this isn’t exactly what we were expecting. Rather than voting to endorse a change to meters, or keeping the existing zone system, or the third-option of those “zone meters” we talked about yesterday, the D.C. Taxicab Commission today decided to do … absolutely nothing. The Post has more, describing today’s meeting as being deadlocked, which led to the non-decision to recommend that Mayor Fenty make the call all on his own. This is just…

In case you missed the news yesterday, the Washington Post has devoted an extraordinary amount of front page column inches to the record breaking temperatures D.C. saw yesterday. At 12:05 p.m. on Wednesday, the temperature hit 102 degrees at Reagan National Airport, according to the National Weather Service, breaking the previous all time high record for Aug. 8, of 101 degrees, set in 1930. The oppressive heat also had a number of other newsworthy…

It only took two years, but now Cornelius Kerwin can finally drop the “acting” part of his title. The Post is reporting that Kerwin, who took the helm of American University after petty cash-abuser extraordinaire Ben Ladner was forced to step down in 2005, will formally become the university’s next president. The Board of Trustees had been engaged in a search since January — former Mayor Anthony Williams was even floated as a possible nominee…

The Post’s David Nakamura reports that Mayor Adrian Fenty plans to endorse Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination. An official announcement has yet to come, but the actions of Fenty adviser Jim Hudson, who organized a fundraiser for Obama, suggest the mayor looks set to get behind the Illinois senator’s campaign. Hudson collected $600,000 and endorsements from some of the mayor’s more loyal D.C. Council members: Yvette Alexander (D-Ward 7), Muriel Bowser (D-Ward 4)…

The Examiner reports that renovations are underway at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, the central branch of the D.C. Public Public system. The improvements come after former Mayor Anthony Williams’ proposal to replace the building with a new flagship library two blocks away on the site of the old convention center was first tabled by the D.C. Council and then shelved by the Fenty administration. Improvements to the outdated and long-neglected MLK Library…