Alexandria and the Pentagon are in yet another financial dispute, this time over the city’s request for up to $14 million in compensation for the loss of open space at the site of the Defense Department’s new office building. Alexandria officials argue that the original site permit for the Mark Center, approved as a private development in 2004, required 2.5 additional acres of open space than the site now has after the construction of office space for more than 6,400 defense workers.
The additional green space was used for two parking garages and a remote inspection facility at the site at the intersection of Interstate 395 and Seminary Road, according to City Manager James Hartmann.
City officials said it would cost $7.9 million to $14.3 million to replace the open space lost at the site, likely by acquiring an equivalent amount of land elsewhere in the city’s west end. The Defense Department offered the city $1.5 million.
However, in a memo to City Council, Hartmann acknowledges that DOD is “under no legal obligation to make such a payment to the city,” and the Pentagon is unlikely to budge from its original offer. Vice Mayor Kerry Donley said Alexandria simply lacks the muscle to get DOD to agree to what the council feels are reasonable, logical requests.
“While there’s a big gap there, I’m not real hopeful that we’re going to get beyond that because we don’t have any leverage,” he said. “I don’t know how much further we can get.”
The request is yet another stumbling block for Alexandria, which has been unsuccessful in squeezing money out of the Pentagon for a host of transportation improvements needed to accommodate the Mark Center, including $600,000 to expand the city’s DASH bus service between the King Street Metro station and the office complex, and $20 million for short-term road improvements that Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., is trying to secure in the federal budget.
The City Council plans to ask Moran to lean on Pentagon officials to speed up their review of the city’s request. Meanwhile, Alexandria should continue to exert as much pressure as it can on its own, councilman Rob Krupicka said.
“It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t keep pushing for them, because we are right on the grounds of the impact to our community,” Krupicka said. “We may not be right in terms of where our leverage is, but we will keep pushing.”
