04-22-2024: Testimony of Meg Maguire, Chair, NWOP CDC

FY 2025 DC Budget Oversight Hearing Committee on Housing

April 22, 2024

I am Meg Maguire, Chair of the NW Opportunity Partners CDC, an organization devoted to racial equity through affordable housing and minority business development within well-planned neighborhoods. We believe that if you work in Ward 3 you should be able to live in Ward 3.

The Mayor’s FY 2025 budget proposal cuts against this goal in many ways, providing extremely generous tax abatements and cash subsidies for downtown redevelopment while slashing programs that provide a safety net for those who live on the margins in other parts of the city – Emergency Rental Assistance (ERAP), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Permanent Supportive Housing (PSH), Rapid Re-housing. The dramatic reduction in the Housing Production Trust Fund will slow desperately needed affordable housing and cost the city far more in the future. We join with other advocates in urging Council to better balance these demands on the city’s budget.

As critical as downtown revitalization is to the future of our great city, it cannot distract from the tremendous opportunities in Ward 3 to lay a sound foundation for affordable housing beyond IZ. We call on DHCD and the Council to work together to accomplish the following four low-cost actions:

First, enact the Affordable Housing Property Acquisition Fund and authorize $50 million for each year from FY 2026-2030. In order for areas like Ward 3 that are deficient in public land, we must acquire land to develop permanently affordable housing. We are grateful to the Housing Committee staff for holding two exploratory meetings with housing experts on the best approach to this legislation. It appears that the Site Acquisition Financing Initiative, SAFI, a little-used program enacted in 2005, may be adapted to this purpose if updated through legislation. 

Second, allocate $300,000 to DHCD for an in-depth affordable housing supplement to the Wisconsin Ave. Development Framework. This disappointing document relies entirely on IZ+ to produce affordable housing, with no acknowledgment of the gross deficiency for the people who work in Ward 3 but cannot afford to live in Ward 3: cashiers; fast food cooks; grocery workers; parking attendants; home health and personal care aides; laundry and dry-cleaning workers; child care workers; ground maintenance workers; teaching assistants; some social security recipients; tellers; security guards; school bus drivers; opticians; secretaries and administrative assistants; roofers; welders, cutters, and braziers; payroll clerks; locksmiths; lab technicians; police and fire dispatchers; chefs and head cooks; hvac/refrigeration mechanics and installers; etc.

The Framework assumes 9,500 new residents along this corridor, but completely ignores comprehensive planning for schools, community recreation centers, water/sewer, roads, and bus lanes, etc. This gross omission is undermining public confidence that the proposed upzoning will produce good results.

Without substantial additional planning, Wisconsin Ave. will end up with the same old mix of market-rate and trickle down IZ that we have come to expect rather than an exciting new model of affordable rental, home ownership and social housing possible in this dynamic corridor.

Third, require WMATA to develop 2 Sites/1 Plan for the Lord and Taylor site and the current bus garage on Wisconsin Ave. as a condition of further public subsidy. In addition to a much larger state-of-the-art bus facility on the Lord and Taylor site, NW Opportunity Partners’ study of the housing potential on both sites can produce as many as 1222 apartments plus 14 home ownership units in 7 townhouses, as well as a range of much-needed community facilities. We are eager to work with DHCD and WMATA to develop a visionary plan.

Fourth, appropriate $200,000 requested by Councilmember Frumin for a small area plan (SAP) for the Homeland Security site. Transfer of this remarkable site to the city cannot begin until there is a credible development plan. Public engagement in this plan should include application of the dynamic ArcGIS planning tools, Urban and City Engine, rather than the outdated, static and non-interactive models OP continues to use. We strongly recommend that DMPED and DHCD engage an independent contractor to produce the SAP.

Opportunities abound to create dynamic new neighborhoods in Ward 3 that redress the segregation and inequities of the past. Let’s use these lean times to realize the goal that, if you work in Ward 3 you should be able to live in Ward 3.

Thank you for this opportunity to testify.