John D. Harden

Mar 2, 2025 | washingtonpost.com | Marissa Lang |John D. Harden

If you live in an American city, chances are you have seen this house:Its exterior is gray with monochromatic accents. Maybe there’s a pop of color — a red, blue or yellow door. The landscaping is restrained, all clean lines and neat minimalism. Sleek metal address numbers appear crisp in a modern sans-serif font. Some might call it elegant, others boring. The look itself is purposely unremarkable. Real estate agents and paint companies use words such as “quiet,” “calm” and “neutral” to describe it.

Feb 23, 2025 | washingtonpost.com | John D. Harden |Rachel Weiner |Jasmine Hilton

Pedestrians are now twice as likely to be killed in the D.C. area as they were a decade ago, even as more local leaders promise safer streets. For the third consecutive year in 2024, the Washington region recorded more than 100 pedestrian deaths. The rise, fueled by an increasing number of people being hit at night and by drunk drivers, parallels national trends that accelerated during the covid-19 pandemic.

Dec 31, 2024 | washingtonpost.com | Peter Hermann |Olivia George |Emily Davies |Keith L. Alexander |John D. Harden

Violent crime in D.C. receded this year, reversing a generational spike in killings and robberies in 2023 that rendered the nation's capital one of America's deadliest cities and thrust it into a presidential election cycle as an avatar for dysfunction. Documented killings and shootings each were down roughly 30 percent, District data shows, part of an across-the-board drop in crime categories that brought D.C. in line with other major urban centers after a year spent as an outlier.

Dec 18, 2024 | washingtonpost.com | Jessica Contrera |Jenn Abelson |John D. Harden

What steps can be taken to prevent these crimes? Return to menu After two years of reporting, we know that there is still much to uncover about this entrenched problem. Sex crimes are widely believed to be underreported, and the roughly 1,800 cases we studied only included those in which the investigation ended in arrest and the arrestwas reported in the media or court documents.

Jul 31, 2024 | washingtonpost.com | Reis Thebault |John D. Harden

Edward Escobar of the Coalition for Community Engagement leads a chant during a protest outside City Hall on June 23 in reaction to Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao’s absence since the FBI raided her home. (Scott Strazzante/AP)By Reis Thebault and John D. HardenJuly 31, 2024 at 6:00 a.m. EDTOAKLAND, Calif. — Just when things were looking especially dire for the leadership of this proud Bay Area city, they got worse. And worse. First, angry voters pushed a recall of Mayor Sheng Thao.