2024 Office of Planning & Office of Zoning Performance Oversight Highlights

OP/OZ Performance Oversight Highlights

Feb 22 2024

Some things to ask yourself about participating in these types of hearings:
  • Did OP/OZ's agency responses get at your problems and concerns, how? If not, why do you believe they didn't? And what's your follow up with these agencies or with the Committee to pursue the answers?

  • Do you think we moved the needle in any way at these hearings for the people and for our interests in the city? How or why?  

For me, the agencies and the city have no answers for (see attached print testimonials below for links to sources):

  • 60,000 Black residents displaced in twenty years of #BuildingAsUsual
  • Conservatively, there are 40,000 empty Class A housing units around the city right now — there is no luxury housing crisis (as if there ever was).  We need affordable housing, social housing not luxury housing especially on public land.
  • DC's definition of affordable housing IS NOT affordable for most people especially due to the immense racial wealth gap in DC.

Testimonials (some highlights):


Colby King

Colby King on Black Displacement from Washington D.C.

“The most destructive force to strike my native District of Columbia in my lifetime has been displacement: the forced removal of Black families and their community-binding activities and institutions from areas such as the Foggy Bottom and West End neighborhoods of Northwest D.C. and the southwest side of town. Displacement of thousands from places they had lived for generations to make room for new housing, better buildings and ultimately more affluent and privileged people.”  

Opinion, “D.C. shoved Black neighborhoods aside. It’s still paying the price” by Colbert I. King, published in the Washington Post on January 19, 2024, https://archive.ph/5gxwK

The city's “poor folk [are being forced] out of their neighborhoods” by the city's “active role in development, selling or leasing publicly owned land, changing zoning laws, closing alleys and providing developers with inducements to construct new — or refurbish old — buildings … with resultant racial and class tensions.”

Opinion, “Quit the posturing in the Banneker-Shaw school dispute” by Colbert I. King on May 24, 2019 in the Washington Post, https://archive.ph/OSHig

“The city's growing tax base of middle-class couples and singles makes D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams giddy. The sight of “undesirable” neighborhoods being rapidly transformed into places where wealthier folks want to live makes Williams go weak in the knees. These changes are just what the mayor, his economic planners and his business friends ordered. Besides, there's no time for the displaced. The mayor's too busy with the National League of Cities and, when he's home, being wined and dined in glitzy downtown restaurants, Georgetown salons and the homes of folks he never thought he would meet when he was laboring as an Agriculture Department bureaucrat. The whole thing has turned his head. So what if booming property values and a richer downtown cultural life aren't doing much for renters or the evicted?”  

Opinion, “Turning a Deaf Ear to the Displaced” by Colby King dated January 8, 2005, published by the Washington Post,  https://archive.ph/ps8ft#selection-949.33-949.846




Sources:

Press Alert: DC Neighbors Want Proper Notice Abt Controversial Rezoning Project (1617 U Street NW — Police & Fire Stations)

Press Alert, Contact: Chris Otten 202-810-2768
January 5, 2024
Neighbors Around Controversial High-Density Rezoning Project Left Off Mailing Lists (1617 U Street); Mayor's Office of Planning and the Zoning Commission Ignored Attorney General's Advice About Wider and More Engaging Public Notice

Wards 1 & 2, Washington, DC — The Mayor has applied to rezone 2-acres of public land at 1617 U Street NW to allow 10+ story buildings at the public site in an area surrounded by two- and three-story historic districts with rowhomes dating back to the 1800's.


The rezoning is controversial in the community garnering more than 1,000 signatures of nearby neighbors largely because after rezoning a new high-density building could be built & introduce hundreds of new unaffordable market-rate units (luxury units on public land) and displace (temporarily or perhaps permanently) the current home of the Third District Police station and Engine 9 fire station and disrupting the community's life safety services increasing emergency response time.

Despite the clamoring of opposition and desire for more engagement on the future of 1617 U Street, according to a neighbor's letter to the DC Council and a party's motion sent to the DC Zoning Commission showing that the Mayor's Office of Planning and DC Office of Zoning have chosen to use outdated mailing lists that has left off numerous neighbors and properties from engagement, eliminating their opportunity to part of the zoning case and hearing this coming Monday, January 8, 2024.

A motion filed with the Zoning Commission by neighbors says:

In all more than 40 different Property Owners within 200 feet of this site were not provided the legally required notice of the January 8, 2024 Hearing required under 11 DCMR, Subtitle Z, §402.1(d) nor did this Commission inform these 40+ Property Owners of “The requirements for participation as a party” and the importance of that status in a contested case, as required by 11 DCMR, Subtitle Z, §402.2. This upzoning is the prelude to DMPED’s attempt to have a massive 11 story, 650 unit apartment building constructed on this site. Failure to grant Property Owners their due process rights under the Subtitle Z in this contested case, is not only fundamentally wrong but will likely cause extensive and unnecessary future litigation.


In a hearing before the Zoning Commission last summer, the DC Attorney General's Office advised the Zoning Commission and the Mayor's Office of Planning that more informative and wider notice was needed for zoning cases, not less but this advice seems to have been ignored.

Neighbors are asking the Zoning Commission to rule on the motion asking for postponement until proper and full notice is sent to all affected neighbors per the zoning regulations. 


The zoning hearing is scheduled for this Monday, January 8, 2024 and can be watched here >> https://dcoz.dc.gov/service/watch-live-virtual-zcbza-hearingsmeetings

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ATTACHMENTS:
* Letter to Councilmember from Neighbors
* Motion asking for proper notice to the Zoning Commission


———- Forwarded message ———
From: Arlene Feskanich <feskanicha@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Jan 5, 2024 at 1:20 PM
Subject: Office of Zoning Case 23-02: Joint Motion to Continue January 8, 2024 Hearing Due to Failure to Properly Notify All Property Owners Within 200 Feet & Mailing List Used to Serve Property Owners Was from 2022 (or Earlier)
To: <abonds@dccouncil.gov>, bnadeau@dccouncil.gov <bnadeau@dccouncil.gov>, <bpinto@dccouncil.gov>, <callen@dccouncil.gov>, <chenderson@dccouncil.gov>, <jlewisgeorge@dccouncil.gov>, <kmcduffie@dccouncil.gov>, mfrumin@dccouncil.gov <mfrumin@dccouncil.gov>, <pmendelson@dccouncil.gov>, <rwhite@dccouncil.gov>, <twhite@dccouncil.gov>, <vgray@dccouncil.gov>, <zparker@dccouncil.gov>
CC: Arlene Feskanich <feskanicha@gmail.com>, Edward Hanlon <ed.hanlon.3@gmail.com>, Gregory Adams <adams.gregory1@yahoo.com>, Randy Jones <rjj0302@gmail.com>, Schellin, Sharon (DCOZ) <sharon.schellin@dc.gov>
Dear DC Council Members:
I am writing to you today because there is an important rezoning decision currently before the Zoning Commission  that will have long-lasting and transformative consequences if approved, and yet the contested hearing regarding this site was never properly noticed by the Office of Zoning.
The site in question is 1620 V St NW / 1617 U St NW.
This is publicly owned property that currently is home to the Third District Police Station and Fire Engine Co. 9 — both essential services that serve not only the immediate community but also the District at large.  The Third District Police Station is a hub for police activities whenever there is a large event or demonstration taking place in the District.
The site is also surrounded by two historic-designated districts and neighborhood conservation areas.
The future of this site is, therefore, important to all DC residents.
Yet, the proposed rezoning of this site was never properly noticed to residents, either by mail or by on-site placards.
The Office of Attorney General on June 2, 2023 gave very specific testimony about improving notices and making notification even wider, with far more information on the notice.  https://app.dcoz.dc.gov/CaseReport/ViewExhibit.aspx?exhibitId=312391   Yet the Office of Zoning failed to take note and implement these comments to bring greater clarity and transparency to the zoning approval process.

We, the Parties in Opposition in rezoning Case 23-02, therefore, want to bring to your attention this distressing lack of notification and transparency on the part of the Office of Zoning, and make you aware of this problem within the District’s zoning process at large.
We have filed the attached Motion with the Office of Zoning, detailing this lack of proper notification, and request that you review it and give it great consideration in your own deliberations regarding the zoning process within the District of Columbia.
Respectfully,
Arlene Feskanich
Representative of the Homeowners Within 200 Feet of Lots 826 and 827 party
OZ Case 23-02

From: ed.hanlon.3@gmail.com <ed.hanlon.3@gmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, January 4, 2024 4:01 PM
To: 'Daniel.Lyons@dc.gov' <Daniel.Lyons@dc.gov>; 'Jennifer.Steingasser@dc.gov' <Jennifer.Steingasser@dc.gov>; 'Joel.Lawson@dc.gov' <Joel.Lawson@dc.gov>; 'dcoz@dc.gov' <dcoz@dc.gov>; 'Brian (OAG' <Brian.Schwalb@dc.gov>; 'oag@dc.gov' <oag@dc.gov>; 'Alexandra (OAG' <Alexandra.Cain@dc.gov>; 'Lily (OAG' <lily.bullitt@dc.gov>; 'Maximilian.Tondro@dc.gov' <Maximilian.Tondro@dc.gov>; 'Niquelle.Allen@dc.gov' <Niquelle.Allen@dc.gov>; 'Johnnie.Barton2@dc.gov' <Johnnie.Barton2@dc.gov>; 'ashley.cooks@dc.gov' <ashley.cooks@dc.gov>; 'odca.mail@dc.gov' <odca.mail@dc.gov>; 'jlewisgeorge@dccouncil.gov' <jlewisgeorge@dccouncil.gov>; 'oca.eom@dc.gov' <oca.eom@dc.gov>; 'dmped.eom@dc.gov' <dmped.eom@dc.gov>; 'planning@dc.gov' <planning@dc.gov>; 'sharon.schellin@dc.gov' <sharon.schellin@dc.gov>; 'DCOZ – ZC Submissions (DCOZ' <DCOZ-ZCSubmissions@dc.gov>; '1b@anc.dc.gov' <1b@anc.dc.gov>; '2B@anc.dc.gov' <2B@anc.dc.gov>
Subject: Joint Motion to Continue January 8, 2024 Hearing Due to Failure to Properly Notify All Property Owners Within 200 Feet & Mailing List Used to Serve Property Owners Was from 2022 (or Earlier)

 

JOINT MOTION OF DUPONT CIRCLE CITIZENS ASSOCIATION,

HOMEOWNERS WITHIN 200 FEET OF LOTS 826 AND 827 AND RANDALL JONES

REQUESTING THE COMMISSION CONTINUE THE JANUARY 8, 2024  HEARING DUE TO

FAILURE TO PROPERLY NOTIFY ALL PROPERTY OWNERS WITHIN 200 FEET

 

—- continued on the record —-

———– click link above ——–

Interesting comparison… Community Surveys

Community surveys: A comparison of potential effort and result 

Recently a group of unpaid community volunteers conducted a survey about the future of the Chevy Chase Commons.

The ANC engaged with nearly 3,000 Ward 3 & 4 folks.
As a point of contrast, a large well funded government agency — the DC Office of Planning (under the auspices of the Deputy Mayors Office of Planning and Economic Development) — conducted a citywide survey in 2019 about the critically important DC Comprehensive Plan.  The DC Comp Plan is DC's central guiding document. 
Despite the paid staff, massive PR budget, and significant resources, certainly far greater potential in comparison to ANC's, the Office of Planning got about the same number of people citywide to take a survey about the changes to the Comp Plan, ~3000 people.
Just a point of comparison of potential effort and result.

DC for Reasonable Development
(202) 854-8327‬
www.dc4reason.org



Fwd: News Alert: DC Zoning Commission Waives Notice Requirements & Forges Ahead to a “Rulemaking” Hearing (in 2024) About The Future of the Chevy Chase Commons

News Alert: SAVEDCPUBLICLAND.org  (202) 854-1822
 
 

DC Zoning Commission Waives Notice Requirements & Forges Ahead to a “Rulemaking” Hearing (in 2024) About The Future of the Chevy Chase Commons

Ward 3, Washington, DC, Nov. 9, 2023 – In a stunning rebuke to written public comments asking for postponement, including a letter from three Chevy Chase ANC Commissioners asserting that setdown of the Office of Planning's proposed new zones should not proceed “without the expressed view of ANC3/4G,” the DC Zoning Commission chose to waive notice requirements and to set down ZC Case No. 23-25 as “rulemaking.”  

This decision by the Zoning Commission inches the mayor closer to privatizing public property currently occupied by the community center, library, and outdoor recreation facilities, even as ANC 3/4G continues to seek feedback from the community about the future of the site, via an ANC-devised survey. The majority of the members of the Zoning Commission are appointed by the mayor; and the Commission generally hews to the directives of the mayor's Office of Planning.  
 
November 9, 2023 — Zoning Commission Meeting setting down the Map Amendment for the Chevy Chase Commons, Video link: https://www.youtube.com/live/8A0ZQjAbjYs?feature=shared&t=6276
 

DC Zoning Commission Chairperson Anthony Hood opened the discussion of Case No. 23-25 by acknowledging that notice requirements had not been properly executed yet he proposed to waive them.
 
The Office of Planning said they were not aware that notice should come from them, as applicant for up-zoning the Chevy Chase Commons and other Connecticut Avenue-facing lots between Livingston and Chevy Chase Circle.  OP representative Maxine Brown-Roberts referenced an acknowledgement email she received from ANC 3/4G Chair Lisa Gore on October 20, 2023, as sufficient to indicate notice.

Zoning Commissioner and Vice Chair Robert Miller acknowledged “technical defects” but averred that “people know about this case going forward”. Chair Hood won unanimous approval from his fellow commissioners to waive the Commission's noticing requirements and procedures. 


Chair Hood explained he was aware of ANC3/4G's community survey, to close on November 12, and stated that the Zoning Commission would take into account what the ANC drew from the survey.
 
Then without discussion the Commission voted unanimously to set down OP's zoning application for the miscellany of map amendments, covering public and private properties, as a “rulemaking” case.
 
The Office of Planning is seeking to create a specific & unique zone for the Chevy Chase Commons — “NMU-4/CC2” (see images below).
 
The application will come up for a public hearing sometime in 2024; the significance of the Commission deeming this case a rulemaking is that the designation reduces public participation at the hearing.
 

Stills from the zoning meeting last night:



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Click here for Zoning Regulations on “Map Amendments.”

 
 
###
 
Viewpoint: 

The two custom zones for which OP is seeking approval (one for the site of the Chevy Chase Commons; and the second for the other Connecticut Avenue-facing lots between Livingston and Chevy Chase Circle) enable any projects that meet that custom zone criteria to proceed directly to permitting, thus eliminating future zoning hearings for developers and community members to engage in negotiations.  Similarly, a “rulemaking” case is not subject to the vigorous public input that can take place with a “contested” case. These preemptive zoning actions are consistent with far-reaching text amendments proposed by the Office of Planning that squelch public participation in the zoning process (pending Zoning Case 22-25). — Andrea Rosen

Homelessness Grows At Record Pace Even As Oversupply Plagues High-End Multifamily Market

The rising cost of housing is putting more Americans on the street than ever before.

The homeless population in the U.S. has increased by 11% this year compared to 2022, according to a preliminary data analysis by The Wall Street Journal. Though the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development plans to release finalized data later this year, anything close to the WSJ's preliminary figure would represent a record since HUD began its current method of data collection in 2007.

The previous biggest single-year jump in homelessness was 2.7% from 2018 to 2019, excluding the 2022 increase driven by a pandemic-affected undercount in 2021, the WSJ reports. The data collection method used by the WSJ and HUD, called a point-in-time count, routinely undercounts the true homeless population, but this year's preliminary figure counted at least 577,000 unhoused persons.

The single biggest driver of homelessness in the U.S. is rising housing costs, which persist even as inflation recedes from the rest of the economy. Shelter accounted for 90% of total inflation in July's consumer price index. Despite increased attention on the risk of homelessness for vulnerable populations, funding for support programs remains low.

Unhoused populations cluster in U.S. cities, but at varying rates. Denver's point-in-time count showed a 32% increase in homelessness, while Los Angeles recorded a 10% jump this year, the WSJ reports. New Orleans showed a 15% increase in homelessness, reversing improvements made in the first two years of the pandemic.

Despite affordable housing's scarcity, the overall supply of rental housing is increasing at a record pace, suppressing rent growth and imperiling some landlords that took out loans when the market was at its hottest. But that increased supply is vastly overweighted to the most expensive units, CoStar reports.

For at least seven consecutive quarters, over 70% of new U.S. apartment deliveries have been in the two most expensive rent tiers, CoStar reports. That trend is poised to continue this year, when over 500,000 more apartments are expected to deliver.

In those two most expensive tiers, rents decreased in the second quarter and vacancy rose to 9.1% after hitting a low of 6.5% in 2021, CoStar reports. In the Sun Belt, the reversal has been the most dramatic, with rents in the two most expensive tiers decreasing 4.5% in Austin, Texas, in Q2.

Contact Matthew Rothstein at matt.rothstein@bisnow.com

The Feds Want More Housing! But what type of housing? Videos.

Marcia L. Fudge, Secretary of HUD on MSNBC, July 27, 2023, https://www.hud.gov/about/leadership/marcia_fudge,

Fudge: “Everybody in the country knows we have a crisis of affordable housing. But the only way to get costs down is to assist developers and builders in building more homes. If we don't put more supply on  the market the prices are not going to go down. …  Help us find ways to deal with our zoning and our restrictions, so we can streamline the process.”

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Questions:

  1. How does Ms. Fudge define “affordable” housing?  Doesn't HUD say that folks making  120% of the AMI could qualify for an “affordable” unit? In DC, an individual making more than $120k/yr could qualify for an “affordable” unit under HUD's definition. Why is this acceptable? 
  2.  Is it true that the ONLY way to get costs down is to build MORE housing? What kinds of housing? Housing for whom? How about decommodifying alternatives: Social Housing, CLT's, etc.
  3. When she says, “If we don’t put more supply on the market, the prices are not going to go down” what parts of the housing market is she talking about – Do we need more single family homes, or more of the steady increase in studios/one bedrooms?
  4. Her statement about finding “ways to deal with our zoning … restrictions” … Is that a euphemism of ending community input and just allowing “developers and builders” to just keep building whatever they want wherever they want per the status quo without any basic planning protocols in place?

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Contrast the above video, with this Adams Curtis video:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAwH7R5ljo8

“This is the normal world. You go to work in a city. All around you are enormous new buildings. They look alike. You will never be able to afford to live in them because they are not really homes. They are blocks of money bought by global investors whose money has nowhere else to go.”

And, consider these points/analysis posts about housing production in DC:

    • How does DC Define “Affordable” Housing

      http://www.dc4reality.org/updates/687
     
    • Compare and Contrast: Growth & Displacement

    • YIMBY’s: D.C. “Desperately & Urgently” Needs More Housing
      http://www.dc4reality.org/updates/612
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Finally, please consider watching this telling video from DC Zoning Chairman, Anthony Hood: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTFXDTg8KPg
“I can tell you, some of the concerns that I've had, not just with this case, I hear all this about affordable housing and we talk about it all the time and don't get me started. [I'm] really getting on this because from my standpoint, I've said this previously, [on] affordable housing, it seems like the more housing we get the more the price goes up.  I hear the argument Mr. Dettman, that if you increase the supply, [let me] make sure I got my economics right, if you increase the supply the cost comes down. [But] we increase the supply and [the price of housing] goes up. That's Anthony Hood's opinion. I'm a realist. I'm going about what I see, not what I hear, because if I go by what I hear, yea everything is affordable.”


The eclectic reality of development, racism, displacement, and dogma in DC: Supply & Demand Ain’t It

Take a look at this brief list of DC stories on housing costs, rents, development, and displacement. 
 It's an eclectic list of information showing how dynamic the housing costs/displacement story in DC really is and how disconnected from these dynamics is the simple “supply & demand” dogma being projected by the #buildmore (without race and class analysis) troop.

DC for Reasonable Development
(202) 854-8327‬
www.dc4reason.org

#BuildMore :: Without Any Race or Class Analysis

We find it kinda funny, We find it kinda sad . . . that the people piping up in support of giving away public land for more (vacant) luxury housing are those affiliated with bankers, the banking industry, and cohorts in real estate or of similar interests.
In the past ten years of #buildmore championing, Ward One has lost another 25% of our Black friends, neighbors, and families (~~19k people). This level of gentrification is brought on by the luxury over development that drives up land values, taxes, and thus housing costs.

Source: US Census, DC, Ward Level analysis
Why do we continue to accept DC officials defining “affordable” housing as an Inclusionary housing unit available for those making $50/yr, when the living wage in DC is about $35k/yr?  And, why is it acceptable that someone making $80k/yr can qualify for an IZ unit?
Why is it any surprise to anyone given the huge wealth inequalities and structural income disparities in this city, that most working class people of color cannot afford the so-called “affordable” housing in DC.

How is any of this acceptable to you Greg or for anyone holding any of the levers of power to change things immediately, why isn’t it getting done?  Meanwhile the harm persists and you want to rail against those pointing it out and trying to find solutions.  Make it make sense. Please.

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