02-13-2023: Testimony of Carol Aten, NW Opportunity Partner Community Development Corporation

Oversite Hearing on the Department of Housing and Community Development

02-13-2023

TO: DC Council Committee on Housing

Good morning, Chairman White and members of the Housing Committee. 

My name is Carol Aten, and I am representing the NW Opportunity Partners Community Development Corporation.  We are working to get more affordable housing in Ward 3 and expand economic opportunities by bringing Black and brown businesses into NW DC.  In short, we seek to make NW DC and Ward 3 an economically and racially inclusive community.

We are fighting an uphill battle to overcome the historic discrimination and segregation in Ward 3.  Ward 3 is not an economically distressed area which is where so many Federal and local programs are targeted.  Racial equity most often focuses on displacement or negative consequences on surrounding Black communities; criteria not easily applied here.  However, the intentional actions that barred Black people from living in NW, now require intentional actions to reverse that outcome.

To that end, having observed that the high cost of property in Ward 3 makes the economics of developing affordable housing prohibitive, we have suggested the creation of a fund—the Affordable Housing Property Acquisition Fund—to acquire non-residential land for affordable housing.  Non-residential because we don’t want to reduce the amount of existing housing and because we see substantial, imminent redevelopment happening soon along the commercial corridors of Wisconsin Avenue and Connecticut Avenue due the up-FLUMing in the recent amendments to the Comprehensive Plan.  Because Ward 3 has no publicly owned, unused land which could be used for affordable housing, we are advocating for the acquisition of “publicly purposed” land for that use.  This need became evident when looking at the failed attempt to convert the Wardman Hotel to housing and was reinforced when looking at the financials for the only HPTF project in Ward 3 at the Lisner Home—a project that only worked economically, even with the assistance of HPTF and other funding assistance, because the Lisner already owned the land.

We believe that an affordable housing property acquisition fund is an important tool to add to the affordable housing toolbox in DC, particularly in Ward 3.

The Mayor has set a laudatory goal for each planning area.  In Rock Creek West (RCW) (which is essentially concentric with Ward 3), the goal is 1990 new units of affordable housing by 2025.  Despite substantial new developments like City Ridge at the former Fannie Mae site, the current city “dashboard” shows 71 IZ units and 11 covenanted units since 2015 and while there are likely more in the pipeline, the fact is we are not going to come close to meeting the 1990 unit goal in RCW by 2025.

Something needs to change, and a couple of recent land use actions have suggested that a major re-think on collaboration, applying available tools, and doing more strategic, intentional community planning is needed.  Two current examples in Ward 3 are the Chevy Chase Civic Core and Friendship Heights bus garage.  In a recent letter Council Member Frumin (who was instrumental in the Lisner Home project) sent to Deputy Mayor Falcicchio regarding the Chevy Chase Civic Core which is being proposed for surplusing, CM Frumin said:

Additionally, I will look for the RFP to include an affirmative willingness to entertain proposals that incorporate adjacent properties on Connecticut Avenue – Wells Fargo to the north and Safeway to the south.  One concern the community has conveyed repeatedly is whether the Civic Core, on its limited site, can reasonably support important civic uses and sufficient housing, while still retaining the qualities that have made it an important hub of community life.  Engaging adjacent commercial properties could meaningfully contribute toward realizing a project that provides significant affordable housing where none has existed before, modernizes key civic institutions, and does so in a scale and design that enhances the commercial corridor.

This is the kind of vision we need to have and to be able to execute.

A similar vision could be articulated for the former Lord & Taylor site and the home plate lot (a vacant lot formerly used for parking) in Friendship Heights.  Instead of letting WMATA take the largest piece of it for a bus garage (that will directly abut a neighborhood), a more comprehensive community plan could combine the two sites with planning for affordable housing, community amenities, and a bus garage that would be designed to tie into the existing neighborhoods with high quality design and maybe even some equity housing.

Maybe we need more tools, the flexibility to apply tools in concert, a bigger vision, intentional will, different expertise, and/or the ability to partner effectively.  Whatever is needed, if we are going to meet the goals of affordable housing and community engagement, we need to do things differently in NW DC.

Earlier, I emphasized the term “community planning” because all our planning needs to be more comprehensive, taking into consideration affordable housing, parks, schools, transportation, grocery stores, and amenities that make places desirable and functional places to live, i.e., communities.  Parenthetically, our current planning is essentially zoning and development – specifying the size of development and classifying areas principally as residential, commercial or mixed use and simply recognizing schools, parks, etc. where they are, but not planning for additional places to meet community needs.  This is not comprehensive land use planning; it’s development planning for zoning.

The bottom line here is:  we believe that the people who work in Ward 3—teachers, restaurant workers, grocery clerks, and others—should be able to live in Ward 3, and we need the city’s help to make that happen.  The Department of Housing and Community Development is critical to achieving that vision.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify.