Results tagged “marksegraves”

Martin kinda buried this at the bottom of his Morning Roundup, but do make sure to tune in to WTOP at 10 a.m. to catch him and reporter Mark Segraves battle it out on the issue of Mayor Fenty's police-escorted cycling shenanigans on Mark Plotkin's Politics Program. Considering the epic comment thread Martin's last story on this topic produced, it should make for some excellent radio.

There's an obvious tension between the media and most elected officials. Journalists are a prying bunch, and even the best of our public servants like to keep things under wraps now and then. In public, things remain somewhat cordial. On the court, all bets are off.

City Desk reports that reporter Mark Segraves was unceremoniously booted from one of the council's administrative meetings yesterday, and by council Chair Vincent Gray no less. Gray claimed that the meeting was closed to press because it dealt with matters of the council's operations, including personnel matters. Segraves countered that several issues from the council's January 6 breakfast meeting—which was open to the press%mdash;were put off and were to be dealt with at yesterday's administrative gathering.

We hope a few current and former D.C. Council members didn't storm the WTOP newsroom with pitchforks today. Reporter Mark Segraves penned a sort of comedy post for his far too rarely updated Malcontent Minute blog/online column where he suggests casting choices for a movie about local D.C. politics. Naturally, the story would revolve around Marion Barry, and he picks Don Cheadle to play the flamboyant former mayor and current Council member, which sounds about right. But the ladies of the D.C. Council don't fare quite as well with Segraves in the casting chair. He chooses the not exactly well-liked (and not exactly an actress) Star Jones of The View to play Linda Cropp, even going so far as to mention that she'd need to get her gastric bypass reversed to pull off the role. Perhaps even more harsh is his suggestion that former Golden Girl Bea Arthur should play Carol Schwartz. Bea Arthur is 86 years old, while Schwartz is only 64. Brutal. Other, less totally mean casting suggestions include Russell Simmons as Anthony Williams, Hillary Swank as Cathy Lanier, and Morgan Freeman plus 50-pounds as Charles Ramsey.

D.C. Police Chief, Cathy Lanier was on WTOP's Ask the Chief program and said she's been told federal authorities will issue final approval to a firearms dealer in the District soon...Charles Sykes is the only licensed gun dealer in the city who is willing to facilitate the transfer of handguns from out-of-state dealers into the District. Sykes, who has been transferring handguns for security firms since 1994, is waiting for the ATF to approve his change of address before he can start doing business again. Sykes tells WTOP he met with ATF inspectors on Tuesday. "They inspected my office," Sykes says. "They say it should be only a few weeks now, then I'll get my license from the District police and I'll be back in business."

Don't expect Sykes to be opening up a brand new gun store/espresso bar down the street from your house, though. From the sound of it, he'll merely be facilitating the transfer of guns purchased outside of the District. As we've reported, local neighborhood gun shops are many a zoning battle away.

WTOP's Mark Segraves got a hold of a partial list of the folks who've been receiving tickets to use the city's free luxury box in the Verizon Center -- the one that the D.C. Council is so miffed they're being boxed out of -- and there's some fun tidbits he discovered.

Most of those invited to D.C.'s Luxury Suite at the Verizon Center by Fenty either contributed the maximum $2,000 to Fenty's campaign or worked on the campaign. The rest of the tickets, with only a few exceptions, went to friends, family and the mayor's senior staffers of the mayor.

Segraves linked to the list he received, which shows that City Administrator Dan Tangherlini, Ward 2 Council member Jack Evans, Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development Neil Albert and Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee all received tickets to the hotly sought after Hannah Montana concert.

Up until last year, the D.C. Council's weekly breakfast meetings were closed to the press and the public. The meetings, which then council Chair Linda Cropp claimed were merely social in nature, were thought of by local reporters as the place where city politicos hammered out sensitive deals -- and did so away from the prying eyes of the District's residents. Even though that has now changed, we've never really gotten much of a sense...

If there are two things most people know about WTOP Political Analyst Mark Plotkin, it's that one, he's not very tech-savvy, and two, he's passionate aboout District voting rights. So passionate, it seems, that he even got himself kicked out of the White House yesterday. According to fellow WTOP reporter Mark Segraves' account of the incident, Plotkin, along with the rest of the D.C. press corps and various local elected officials, attended an event at...

It's no wonder Congress doesn't take us seriously. Controversy has erupted in the District over -- of all things -- statues. As we have reported in the past, the District has been looking to place two statues in the U.S. Capitol's National Statuary Hall, a privilege granted to states with which they can recognize two of their most prominent residents. City officials went as far as to allow residents to choose the two Washingtonians that...

We've always somewhat hearted WTOP Investigative Reporter Mark Segraves. He's the guy who recently broke the story that District resources are used to cover the costs of the many motorcades that pass through the city -- $1.5 million last year alone, $10 million since 2000, and 40 D.C. police officers and 40 cruisers each time. Today he's back with more interesting investigative pieces.

Strange things can be found in the area's rivers, from frankenfish upstream and downstream, to things like USA Today distribution boxes and a Civil War-era sword (as recovered during the recent Capital River Relief clean-up.) Now add blue barrels.