DC Residents LOVE “Social Housing” at 17th and U Street Site

Press Alert, Save DC Public Land
Feb 14 2024

“Social Housing” Brought Up Twenty Times at Fifth Hearing on 17th & U Street Luxury Upzoning

Commission Chair Anthony Hood Says He's “Talking to Councilmember Janeese Lewis-George” to “Institute” Social Housing at Zoning

Wards 1 & 2, Washington, DC — Monday, February 12, at the fifth hearing regarding the question to rezone 1617 U Street (2-acres of public land and current home of the 3D MPD station and Engine 9 fire department), the concept of “social housing” was brought up twenty times by numerous residents testifying in opposition to the Office of Planning's high-density rezoning proposal.

Hearing Video → https://www.youtube.com/live/5zHF116VGPY?feature=shared&t=663

Social housing or, as it is called in DC, the Green New Deal for Housing, was recently profiled by DCist's Morgan Baskin who put out a report on January 17, 2024 entitled, “There’s A Growing Push To Develop Social Housing In D.C. What Is It?” https://dcist.com/story/24/01/17/dc-social-housing-green-new-deal/

And the NY Times just covered how publicly subsidized housing could be welcoming, safe, and efficient in cost: “… [W]e also needed to change the conversation around architecture and subsidized housing. Architecture had come to be too focused on very high-end projects for museums and elite institutions and the wealthy, whereas it could play a more fundamental role in public welfare and equity.” Article, “Via Verde Was Built to Be a Model for Public Housing. Did It Succeed?” By James Barron in the New York Times on February 13, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/13/nyregion/via-verde-bronx-housing.html

At this Monday’s hearing, the Chair of the Zoning Commission, Anthony Hood made this point about social housing:

The Zoning Commission has already been having conversations … with Councilmember Janeese Lewis-George about social housing … I have been talking to her about that [and] I know there's some things in the Council she's working with and she and I have spoken on [social housing] on a number of occasions and how we can institute [it at zoning].

Video clip → https://www.youtube.com/live/5zHF116VGPY?feature=shared&t=5149

Despite the talk about social housing, Ward One Councilmember Nadeau and Ward Two Councilmember Brooke Pinto are seeking approval of the rezoning application to start the privatization and transfer of this public land to a yet-to-be-named developer who could then construct and profit from a very dense 10-story + penthouse building “by-right.”

The zoning hearings are set to continue on Monday February 26, 2024 at 4PM.

So far about twenty-five of the seventy-five residents in opposition to the high-density luxury rezoning have testified.

The public is invited to testify: www.SaveDCPublicLand.org/testify

###

Leave a Reply Cancel reply