The U.S. General Services Administration may remove 18 to 25 of the 62 designated historic buildings on St. Elizabeths Hospital’s west campus to make way for a new home for the Department of Homeland Security, according to recommendations the agency made in a recently released draft plan.
The plan, along with a draft environmental impact study the GSA released Friday, is being reviewed by the National Capital Planning Commission, the federal agency responsible for federally owned land in the District.
The Planning Commission is scheduled to hold a hearing on the plan in November.
The potential relocation of DHS, which is currently scattered in more than 50 D.C.-area locations, has stirred discontent among members of historic preservation organizations who view the move as a threat to the already endangered historic site.
Though the GSA consulted historic preservation organizations on the plan, the agency must overhaul parts of the site to accommodate an anticipated 14,000 DHS employees.
“We have not reached an agreement with them yet,” spokesman Mike McGill said about the organizations, which include the National Trust for Historic Preservation. “We’re trying to move the process forward by issuing these drafts.”
Once the site of a famously cruel federal insane asylum, St. Elizabeths’ east campus remains the city’s care center for the mentally ill.
But since the Department of Health and Human Services abandoned the west campus in 2002, many of the buildings have fallen into disrepair.
The site has been unattractive to private developers because of the high cost of repairing and maintaining historic buildings. The GSA took control of the site in 2004 and began advocating it as a headquarters for DHS.
The GSA will present final drafts of its master plan and environmental impact study to the Planning Commission in January, after seeking further input from interested parties.
