The additions come amid concerns surrounding the Zika virus.

>> Still unable to identify the oily substance that was found on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial earlier this month, the U.S. Park Police today said that it was in fact vandalism that put it there. Clean-up is expected to be slow in an effort to avoid permanent damage to the memorial. [WaPo] >> Senate Minority Leader McConnell: “My opposition to this bill rests instead on a single all-important fact: it is clearly and unambiguously…

Good morning, Washington. We hope you had a relaxing weekend, and weren’t one of the people inconvenienced by the brief closing of a number of Metro stations on Sunday. The story goes that a contractor mistakenly spread commercial-grade rat poisoning in the middle of the day around several stations in D.C. and Maryland. When dozens of birds started dropping dead at the Greenbelt, Anacostia, Naylor Road and Branch Avenue stations on the Green line…

The District has changed dramatically over the last few years, spurred in part by policies implemented by D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams. But what was once considered a trend that would help lift all boats is now seen as doing just the opposite, writes the Post. According to a poll they conducted, some 61 percent of voters see the city’s many development projects as “mainly bad” for the poor, a dramatic shift from a similar poll…

Maryland Lt. Governor and candidate for the U.S. Senate Michael Steele must be red in the face these days — after calling an association with the Republican Party and President George W. Bush “a scarlet letter” in an anonymous interview with the Post’s Dana Milbank, Steele is now trying to limit the damage of his surprisingly honest comments. “I’m not trying to dis the president,” he was quoted as saying by the Washington Times….

Good morning, Washington. Today will be sunny with highs in the upper 80s, so you can leave that umbrella at home. We were happy to read that the steamy hot temps will ease all week with highs expected in the 80s and evening lows in the 60s. While we were cruising Flickr to find today’s photo, taken by Aziz Gökdemir of the ever-photogenic interior of the National Building Museum, we came across an interesting…

Good news, Washington — the heat is over. For the time being, anyway. The Weather Channel promises temperatures in the 80s for the foreseeable future, and we would desperately like to believe them. The recent weather wasn’t only sticky and unpleasant; it was also chaotic. D.C. public pools stayed open late, then had to close early after swimmers got a minor electrical shock; President Bush’s trip to the Boy Scout Jamboree was cancelled due to…

When DCist was out for Sunday brunch at the Fort Meyer Officer’s Club, we picked up a copy of the Pentagram, the base’s newspaper. We often forget about all the news that happens on the area’s military bases, partially because base-life is relatively closed off and isolated from the general public. (DCist had trouble finding our way onto the base, with the Wright Gate, adjacent to the Iwo Jima Memorial, closed; we had to enter…