The following stories are brought to you by the fine folks on the News4 assignment desk.
NEXT STOP: STREETCARS OF WASHINGTON'S PAST
WAMU: "December 23, 2010 - In just about two years, streetcars will begin roaming the streets of Washington D.C. The D.C. City Council gave its final approval to the city's urban streetcar project earlier this month.
But this won't be the first time streetcars will have run on the city's streets. As Washingtonians of a certain age remember, D.C. used to have a thriving streetcar system in the first half of the 20th century. WAMU's David Schultz spoke about D.C.'s old streetcars with three of those Washingtonians, one of whom may sound very familiar."
$200M SUIT AFTER 1967 VIRGINIA KILLINGS
Washington Post: "A man wrongfully accused in the 1967 slaying of two women in Staunton is suing the city for $200 million, claiming officials failed to supervise a detective who was later accused of helping protect the real killer.
William Thomas was acquitted in the killing of Constance Hevener in 1968. In 2008 the city threw out a second charge for Carolyn Hevener Perry's death when a dying woman confessed to the slayings and said the city's lead detective knew she shot both women and helped her hide the murder weapon."
DEBUNKING THE 'DC'S DEAD LAST IN BUSINESS FRIENDLINESS' MEME
Washignton City Paper: "On a fairly regular basis, business leaders and certain councilmembers will cite studies that put D.C. at the bottom of the heap in terms of "business friendliness," usually as part of an argument that taxes are too high and regulations too onerous. Another of these studies was just released by the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council, a research and advocacy group that spends much of its time trashing regulation of things like fracking and greenhouse gases.
Now, I don't mean to brush off concerns that D.C. sometimes makes building, trying, and starting new things rather difficult. But let's not kid ourselves that these "studies" are objective rankings that our policymakers ought to take very seriously–this latest, at least, is based on an ideological free-market framework that represents only one dimension of what makes a place good for business. Let's take a look at the SBEC's methodology, shall we?"
LAUREL STUDENTS COMPETE TO CREATE HEALTHY LUNCHES
Gazette.net: "Eme Akonawe said the fries and Buffalo wings at Laurel High School just aren't cutting it anymore.
"Last year was horrible ... there's a bit more variety this year now that they have these new kind of fries that I think are roasted," said Akonawe, a senior. "But there's still a lot of work to be done to make the lunches healthier."
Akonawe is one of 54 students at Laurel High who soon will get the opportunity to help improve the dietary options in Prince George's County schools."
