Welcome to Wednesday, Washingtonians: The sky is gray, next year’s budget is set, and D.C.’s about to get its own professional rugby team. 

LEADING THE MORNING NEWS:

• D.C.’s fiscal year 2019 budget includes new taxes to fund Metro and the arts, while targeting ride-hailing services like Uber, Lyft, and Via for tax revenue. Uber is decidedly not happy about it.

• But local transport is getting (slowly) better: Most of D.C.’s Circulator buses now have free wifi. Per DDOT, the service will be standard on all future bus purchases.

• Fourteen-term Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton faces a challenger from the left, 37-year-old former Obama administration official Kim Ford. Ford is talking about Norton’s record on pushing for D.C. statehood, and arguing that it’s time for new blood to represent the District in Congress.

• A federal appeals court put the kibosh on Dominion Energy’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline, a 600-mile natural gas project that would run through West Virginia, Virginia, and North Carolina.

LOOSE LIPS LINKS, by Andrew Giambrone (tips? agiambrone@washingtoncitypaper.com)

• Church leaders interrupt Council session to protest water bills. [Times, Post, FOX5]

• Qatar ponies up $100,000 to keep Metro open late for Capitals playoff game. [Post]

• D.C. police say off-duty officer and late gunman fired “almost simultaneously.” [Post]

• Deputy mayor admits D.C. did not prioritize stop-and-frisk data collection. [WUSA9]

• Leftist advocates are planning an Amazon HQ2 town hall in D.C. next week. [Twitter]

ARTS LINKS, by Matt Cohen (tips? mcohen@washingtoncitypaper.com)

• It’s that time of year again: Fort Reno has announced its lineup! is seeking money to help keep going. [DC Music Download]

• Photos from this year’s Helen Hayes Awards. [DC Theatre Scene]

• And read the full list of this year’s Helen Hayes Awards winners. (Spoiler alert: There was a lot of In The Heights love). [theatreWashington]

• D.C. museum guides, volunteers, and staffers share the weirdest questions they’ve heard at one of D.C.’s many museums. [Washingtonian]

YOUNG & HUNGRY LINKS, by Laura Hayes (tips? lhayes@washingtoncitypaper.com)

• Young & Hungry is away from her desk this week.

HOUSING COMPLEX LINKS, by Morgan Baskin (tips? mbaskin@washingtoncitypaper.com)

• Work can continue, at least temporarily, on Dupont’s St. Thomas Parish. [Urban Turf]

• GGWash’s summer book club pick: Matthew Desmond’s Evicted. [GGW]

• It’s uncool to argue about the relative coolness of D.C. [City Lab]

HAPPENING TODAY

• R&B singer-songwriters BJ The Chicago Kid and Ro James perform at U Street Music Hall. 7 p.m. at 1115 U St. NW. $25.

• The Dizzy Gillespie Afro-Cuban Experience, a five-piece ensemble led by Gillespie’s bassist John Lee, performs the Afro-Cuban rhythms and melodies of Gillespie’s work at Kennedy Center Millennium Stage. 6 p.m. at 2700 F St. NW. Free.

• Tony Lewis: Anthology 2014-2016, an installation of 34 original collage-poems by Chicago artist Tony Lewisexhibited for the first time in the collection’s entirety, nears the end of its run at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. at Independence Avenue at 7th Street SW. Free.

• ANC 5C meets at 7:00 p.m. 1805 Bladensburg Rd. NE.

• ANC 2A also meets at 7:00 p.m. 2301 L St. NW.

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