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Articles
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| Residents worry over development in Hill historic district |
VOICE writes, "BY BEN WEINSTEIN
Capitol Hill historic preservationists recently aired their concerns about massive redevelopment in Ward 6 and its potential impact on local neighborhoods and asked at-large D.C. Council member Kwame Brown how he plans to address those problems.
“There’s a lot going on here in Ward 6. I’d imagined development is on the top of a lot of your lists,” Brown said March 13 at a Capitol Hill Restoration Society meeting.
Residents questioned Brown, who is campaigning to retain his seat in November’s election, about the possibility of extending the boundaries of the Capitol Hill Historic District.
“We don’t want to do this because we thought it was a good idea to stomp all over people’s streets,” restoration society president Dick Wolf said of the efforts to survey Ward 6 neighborhoods north and east of the Capitol Hill Historic District. Wolf said Hill East and Northeast Capitol Hill residents have asked about either extending the Capitol Hill Historic District or creating new districts for their neighborhoods."
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Monte Edwards, second vice president of the restoration society and a member of the Stanton Park Neighborhood Association, said extending the district, or creating a new one, would help preserve the “integrity and character” of row-house communities outside current boundaries, and he asked Brown how he reconciles preservation with development.
Brown said he wants to strike a balance between development and preservation. The recently completed and upcoming projects in Ward 6 are key to the District’s economic revitalization, but preserving the qualities that make the city’s neighborhoods great places to live is also crucial, he added.
“You want to get development done,” Brown said. “But we need to do it in a very efficient way and in a very careful way.”
He cited the restoration society’s resolution on the Hine Middle School property, which will become available for redevelopment at the end of this school year. The restoration society and the Southeast Capitol Hill advisory neighborhood commission asked that the redeveloped site fit the scale and character of the surrounding Eastern Market neighborhood.
The restoration society also asked that the Hine site be redeveloped in coordination with The Hill Town Square plan for the Eastern Market Metro station plaza.
As for extending the historic district toward Florida Avenue and into Hill East, Brown said, “All I can do in my capacity is give everyone a voice,” and he commended area advisory neighborhood commissions and other civic associations for their work in protecting their neighborhoods.
One resident raised concerns about the qualifications of two recent mayoral nominees to the city’s Historic Preservation Review Board.
The restoration society attendees said that all professional members of the preservation board should demonstrate strong credentials in historic preservation. Some attendees had questions about the experience of two nominees. But the council confirmed both nominees the week after the restoration society meeting.
Several residents criticized the District Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, saying it does not enforce construction rules. Illegal construction is rampant on the Hill and throughout the city, they contended.
“Does the city council know this is going on on this scale?” restoration society board member Shauna Holmes asked Brown.
Wolf said that for the past three to five years, the restoration society has met often with regulatory officials to discuss illegal construction. The group has compiled a “doomsday book” of illegal-construction cases around the Hill, which, Wolf said, reveals agency failures from the inspections level to enforcement.
“You cannot penetrate that culture over there,” Wolf said of the regulatory agency.
“We really need to revamp DCRA,” Brown said, adding that council members have introduced legislation to address construction matters. “We need to overhaul that agency,” he said.
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Posted on Mar 27, 2008 20:54pm.
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