Stephen Trachtenberg’s announcement that he is stepping down next year as president of The George Washington University was sweet for Foggy Bottom residents. For years, they have defended their community against his boundless ambition.
Under his tenure, the school masqueraded as an educational institution but behaved like an insatiable real estate developer, swallowing whole parts of the West End, including hotels, businesses and once-private apartment buildings.
Now, it wants the D.C. Zoning Commission to approve a new campus plan, which includes 1.73 million square feet of commercial development — office buildings and retail outlets — at 23rd Street and Washington Circle NW.
The university stands guilty of one of the seven deadly sins: gluttony.
The District government appears complicit. The Office of Planning is recommending that the Zoning Commission schedule a public hearing on the proposal; the office helped craft parts of the plan and the three-phase strategy for its approval. The Zoning Commission is refusing to hear residents’ concerns at tonight’s meeting on the request.
The Committee of 100 on the Federal City, the Federation of Citizens Associations and several other groups decry the Zoning Commission’s decision.
Ellen McCarthy, acting director for the Planning Office, says it would be “unprecedented” to have the community testify at a “set down,” at which members vote on whether to hold a public hearing. She also defends her office’s involvement, arguing that this new proposal is “head and shoulders” above the current plan.
“We negotiated on behalf of the community,” says McCarthy, adding that with the “planned unit of development” process, the university must specifically indicate what it wants on each site to be developed.
The Foggy Bottom Association intends to file a lawsuit Friday if it isn’t allowed to testify tonight.
Joy Howell, the group’s president, says GWU is violating its current plan, which limits its student population to 20,000; the school also is short 3,000 dormitory beds. And the agreement “explicitly provides that no permit may be issued while GWU is in violation of any condition of the campus plan.”
GWU pleads innocent. Tracy Schario, director of media relations, says there is a “core group of 10 or 15 people who dislike the university” and anything it does. She says the school has tried to work collaboratively with the community and that it has corrected its past sin of insensitivity.
That mea culpa should be viewed through a historical prism: In 2001, just after GWU agreed to its current campus plan, it filed a series of challenges in D.C. Superior Court, claiming the District didn’t have the authority to enforce the agreement. The city ultimately won the fight, but not before spending tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars.
Foggy Bottom residents are smart to take counsel in the “fool me twice” axiom.
Jonetta Rose Barras is the political analyst for WAMU radio’s “D.C. Politics Hour with Kojo and Jonetta.” She can be reached at [email protected].
