Is the the breadth and depth Patch will be offering on last night's debate? Honestly, I'd like to see a little more reporting and analysis than a link to a twitter feed. The Washington Post is starting to place more emphasis on this type of "reporting" or social media content curation as well and frankly, this is the reason why many people in the DC, VA and MD are disappointed with where WaPo is heading and why sites such as DCist.com, Prince of Petworth, etc., are taking off. If Patch wants to compete in the hyper-local arena, we need it to provide real content, the type of coverage the Post has abandoned.

Some of the problem for anyone trying to summarize the evening is due to the format. It's an odd arrangement where you have 13 candidates in a row answering question after question. After the fourth or fifth response (on a particular topic), I'm not sure there was very much that each additional candidate could add for most of the issues. There wasn't as much as far as substance is concerned to show off the very real differences among the candidates as there might be in a true debate, even when I know there *are* differences from responses to the HOPE questionaire. Still, I suppose it was a useful exercise for someone trying to get a read on the different candidates' styles and that might be particularly difficult to convey in an overview since it's largely subjective. (to be contd. due to space constraints)

We were asked about whether the will of the constituents trumps the judgment of the council member, the pilot trash program, pros and cons of annexation, aging in place initiatives, how to get more people to volunteer on committees, how many City Council meetings we've been to/missed in the past 6 months (for newcomers/incumbents respectively). The Mayoral candidates were asked about the size of the Council. The answer in the future might be to have Ward/race specific candidate events. I'd certainly appreciate more time to see the Mayoral candidates spell out their differences. Still, I was encouraged by the turnout in the audience, easily three times what it was the last debate. And if my Facebook feed is any indication, it looks like a lot of people were watching from home.

Thanks for the reply and for the non-biased update. (Disclaimer - Shani is running for the Ward 2 council seat.)

Yes, I'm Shani Warner and I approve these comments. *grin*

BTW, Michael's photograph of Flawn is great. Thanks for adding some more content here. Between Patch, Michael's photos and Shani's recap, I think we managed to get a full news article, LOL