Concerns that redistricting would shift a popular high school, and the middle school that feeds, into Ward 7 from Ward 6 appear to have been heard by a D.C. Council committee that’s redrawing city lines to reflect the District’s shifting population.
Ward 6 Councilman Tommy Wells and residents of the Hill East neighborhood marched Tuesday night to protest what appeared to be the imminent shifting of part of their Ward 6 neighborhood, including Eastern Senior High School and Eliot-Hine Middle School, to Ward 7. Wells told The Washington Examiner such a move would be “disastrous” to the schools plan he and his ward’s parent teachers association had worked on for nearly a decade.
Ward 7 Councilwoman Yvette Alexander said she’d welcome the neighborhood with open arms.
A draft of the redistricting plan released by the committee Wednesday night showed that Alexander will get some of the neighborhood, but not the two schools.
Much of Alexander’s ward sits on the east side of the Anacostia River. The ward’s population, however, has fallen according to the 2000 and 2010 U.S. Census. As a result, Ward 7 was extended across the river into Ward 6 in 2000, and appears set to expand further.
