Fat Dog’s Hot Dog Bistro, a restaurant that has been searching for a home east of the Anacostia River for more than a year, may be the first step toward revitalizing some of the District’s most underserved Southeast neighborhoods, economic development experts said Tuesday.
Fat Dog’s “vision is right on,” said Stanley Jackson, deputy mayor for planning and economic development, at the Neighborhood Retail Summit, a semi-annual meeting sponsored by the Washington, D.C., Economic Partnership. “There is disposable income in every market in the city. We’ve just got to know how to go get it.”
The restaurant, which is slated to open in spring 2007 in an Anacostia-adjacent neighborhood of either Deanwood or Marshall Heights, will be the area’s first sit-down, family-oriented restaurant. The vision for Fat Dog’s, said co-owner Roz Moore, is to give residents in Anacostia-area neighborhoods a place to meet and form a community.
“People seem to forget there are people with jobs and lives east of the river and right now they’re spending a lot of time driving over the bridge. We want to change that. Right now there’s a dearth of services and retail here.”
While much of the recent retail and mixed-use developments have been focused in affluent areas of the District, city officials said retailers have an opportunity to pump up D.C.’s low-income neighborhoods by opening small businesses in places national chain stores have shied away from — and the as-yet unopened Fat Dog’s has become the poster child for Southeast’s potential.
But it’s been an uphill battle to establish a full-service restaurant in a neighborhood that has a reputation for high crime, Moore said.
“I really think it’s fear,” said Moore, of why so few retailers have ventured into Anacostia. “And someone has to be willing to take the first step.”
But the bottom line, Moore said, is whether it’s possible to make money — and there’s a market for retail and restaurants in Southeast. For example, there are more than 28,000 residents living within a one-mile radius of Deanwood. The neighborhood’s average household income is nearly $42,000. In addition, the planned Anacostia Waterfront development and the Nationals stadium will bring thousands of new customers across the river.
Retailers that set up shop in less crowded Southeast also have a better opportunity to make a name for themselves.
“A small retailer going in where’s there’s already a lot of established stores can get lost,” Moore said. “But a small retailer going in somewhere where there’s nothing can really be a driver for change. We prefer that.”
