For most of my professional career, one consistent societal issue has been gentrification. Even in the depths of the Great Recession, when housing prices were collapsing, gentrification seemed unstoppable. And while there has been a lot to like about the urban renaissance that has occurred as affluent young professionals have poured into urban centers, there has been nothing good about the displacement, the very visible inequalities between old-timers and newcomers, or the racial and ethnic tensions this has exacerbated.
Washington, D.C
Opinion | Gentrification is a problem for cities — especially when it ends
So politicians, policy wonks and pundits have all spent a lot of time agonizing over what to do about gentrification. They have called for reforms to permitting and zoning rules to make it easier for developers to build new housing, or for subsidies to the people being priced out, or both. In hindsight, we spent surprisingly little time worrying about what would happen to cities without gentrification.
Yet here we are in 2024, and I’m much less worried about gentrification than I am about what you might call gentrification whiplash: the uncomfortable conditions that result when a headlong rush into urban real estate suddenly stops, or even goes into reverse.
This now seems like a real possibility in many places, including my own beloved D.C., which is beset with three major issues at once. Demand for office space has cratered thanks to remote work. Demand for residential real estate has shifted outward to the suburbs, as proximity to the office has become less valuable. And crime keeps soaring to new heights; in 2023, homicide hit 20-year highs in D.C., while car theft reached levels not seen since 2007.
If this trend continues, people who have money and options will do what they did in the middle of the 20th century: decamp for places where they don’t have to spend so much time worrying about being robbed or shot.
Yet the response of my local officials has been curiously lackadaisical. Although violence has been a growing problem since 2020, arrests in 2022 were down by almost half from 2019, prosecutions had fallen even further, the D.C. police’s operating budget shrank by almost 13 percent and the number of officers was falling toward its lowest in about 50 years. Only this past fall did Mayor Muriel E. Bowser finally push through a package of reforms aimed at reducing crime.
So let us add a fourth problem to my city’s woes: city officials who have for years been collecting a sort of hidden subsidy from gentrification, which made their jobs easier in many ways — and stands to make the whiplash worse. We are facing the biggest urban crisis in 50 years with politicians who are used to playing on Easy Mode, which is the policy equivalent of driving without a seat belt.
For the past two decades, if you were overseeing a reasonably successful city like Washington, your tax base kept improving no matter what you did, as richer people replaced poorer ones. In 2006, when I moved to D.C., total tax revenue, net of dedicated taxes, was $4.2 billion (about $6.3 billion in today’s dollars). In 2022, the city collected approximately $8.6 billion ($8.8 billion in 2023 dollars). Of course, the population has increased since 2006 — but not by 40 percent.
Meanwhile, the people who were moving in needed less from the government than the people who were being forced out. The newcomers didn’t need subsidized health care or child care, or the city to arrange a tutor for their kid struggling with math. They were also much less likely to suffer from difficulties associated with poverty, including substance abuse and untreated mental illness — or to generate associated problems such as crime and child abuse.
We frequently talk about the government learning to do more with less, but gentrifying cities got to do less with more: It doesn’t take as much money and ingenuity to educate or police the prosperous middle class as it does to provide those services to a marginalized community, so government didn’t have to be nearly as good at many of its jobs. Yet because the population was less needy, it actually looked as if those services were improving rapidly, if you scanned crime statistics or test scores.
Of course, gentrification didn’t actually solve many of those problems; it just displaced them, while tipping some of the most vulnerable onto the streets. But politicians appeared to be solving them, creating an illusion of competence that might have fooled even the politicians themselves.
This went on for so long that people took it for granted, voters and politicians alike. We got progressive mayors, progressive district attorneys and progressive council members who pursued their laudable goals on the assumption that no matter what they did, crime would keep falling and public coffers would keep overflowing.
Now this illusion is punctured. Ever-increasing urban housing demand cannot be taken for granted, nor can any of the benefits that come with it. City officials can no longer count on gentrification to export their problems to another Zip code; they will have to get better at actually solving them.
Washington, D.C
How much snow to expect ahead of Sunday’s winter storm
WASHINGTON (7News) — An approaching winter storm will bring significant impacts from the Mid-Atlantic to New England Sunday through Monday morning.
Heaviest snow will favor areas north and east of DC
The good news is, the worst of the storm looks to miss most of the DMV.
The system will intensify as it pulls away from the D.C. metro, with the heaviest snowfall rates developing as the storm exits.
Snowfall model comparison
This means we could see 2 to 5 inches of snow across most of the Capital Beltway, with higher amounts the farther north and east you go.
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A potentially historic blizzard is shaping up right on our doorstep, with snowfall totals of 1 to 2 feet from Philadelphia to southern New England by Monday morning.
Blizzard conditions amounting to 1 to 2 feet are possible from Philly to Boston
Washington, D.C
Vietnam Veterans sue to block proposed ‘Independence Arch’ near Arlington National Cemetery
Memorial Circle, the proposed plot of land near Memorial Bridge where the Independence Arch could be built is seen in Washington, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2026.
Nathan Howard/AP
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Nathan Howard/AP
A group of Vietnam War veterans and a retired architectural historian have filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block construction of a proposed monument near Arlington National Cemetery.
The lawsuit, filed Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, challenges President Trump’s plans for “Independence Arch,” a 250-foot structure proposed for Memorial Circle.
The plaintiffs, represented by Public Citizen Litigation Group, call the proposed plan a “vanity project” that would disrupt one of Washington’s most symbolically charged sightlines between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington House, a view designed to evoke national unity after the Civil War.

Vietnam veterans Michael Lemmon, Shaun Byrnes and Jon Gundersen believe the structure would “dishonor their military and foreign service” by intruding on a solemn view they visit regularly, according to the complaint.
The arch could also “pose a hazard to air travel at nearby Reagan National Airport,” the plaintiffs argue. At 250 feet, the proposed arch would stand more than twice the height of the Lincoln Memorial and sit directly on the ceremonial axis that anchors the capital’s monumental core.
The lawsuit names Trump, senior White House officials and the National Park Service (NPS) as defendants. It alleges the plan violates multiple federal laws, including the Commemorative Works Act, the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act.
NPR reached out to the White House and NPS for comment about the lawsuit but have not received a response.
Administration officials have framed the proposal as part of a broader effort to commemorate the country’s 250th anniversary with new monuments and public works projects highlighting American history and military service.
White House spokesman Davis Ingle said in a statement to The Washington Post the arch “will enhance the visitor experience at Arlington National Cemetery for veterans, the families of the fallen, and all Americans alike, serving as a visual reminder of the noble sacrifices borne by so many American heroes throughout our 250-year history.”
Ingle also said Trump “will continue to honor our veterans and give the greatest Nation on earth America the glory it deserves.”
The plaintiffs also argue that approval has not been granted and that required environmental and historic preservation reviews have not been completed. Under the Commemorative Works Act, memorials built on federal land in Washington generally require authorization from Congress.
Legal opposition to the project follows a separate lawsuit by the National Trust for Historic Preservation over plans for a privately funded ballroom in place of the White House East Wing.
Washington, D.C
Who foots the $20M bill of the Potomac River sewage cleanup, repairs? – WTOP News
The cost of cleaning up and making repairs after a sewer line failure sent hundreds of millions of gallons of sewage into the Potomac River will total around $20 million.
The cost of cleaning up and making repairs after a sewer line failure sent hundreds of millions of gallons of sewage into the Potomac River will total about $20 million, the CEO of D.C. Water said Friday.
David Gadis provided the estimate during a briefing on the Jan. 19 failure of the Potomac Interceptor, a roughly 60-year-old, 54-mile long sewer line. The pipe failed in Cabin John, Maryland.
It’s not entirely clear how the cost will be covered.
Earlier this week, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser submitted a Presidential Emergency Disaster Declaration request, seeking full reimbursement for costs incurred by both D.C. and D.C. Water.
“We expect 100% reimbursement,” Bowser said.
But D.C. Water’s facilities, including the Potomac Interceptor, are funded through an intermunicipal agreement, or IMA. Maryland and Virginia would be on the hook for more than 50% of the cost, per the agreement.
So will the federal government approve D.C.’s request? And if so, will Maryland and Virginia’s share be covered too?
“If the president wants to help Americans who deserve to know that the Potomac River is safe, it doesn’t matter, in my estimation, if it comes through D.C. to D.C. Water, because D.C. Water serves D.C., Maryland and Virginia. It’s kind of hard to parse it out,” Bowser said. “We are happy to be the conduit for the region.”
President Donald Trump also weighed in this week on social media, saying the three jurisdictions needed to work collaboratively. He called out Maryland Gov. Wes Moore by name.
“If they can’t do the job, they have to call me and ask, politely, to get it fixed,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social, adding the federal government “can fix it.”
According to D.C. Water, the utility’s customers will not face any additional financial strain as a result of the sewage spill. Gadis said there would be no rate increase tied to the incident, and that the utility had already submitted planned rate increases for the future.
Officials also stressed during Friday’s briefing that drinking water was not affected, but said people should avoid recreational contact with the river as a precaution.
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