Stabbing at The Brandywine in 4500 block Connecticut Ave. NW DC

[Anonymous]

Start recall campaigns on Jan. 1. Stop complaining and do something.

[Anonymous]

In DC landlords cannot consider past criminal convictions if more than 7 years old, no matter how heinous. So if someone served 8 years for the rape of a child, then gets out, landlord can't consider that when renting a unit in a building filled with families. They also cannot consider credit if rent is paid with a voucher or past evictions even if for grounds other than non-payment.

SO at least are often on a registry. Murderers are being moved into buildings and there is no way to know. One recently was moved into a building in Chevy Chase DC that is full of the unsuspecting and vulnerable elderly and families of modest means eager to get their kids into Lafayette, Deal, JR.

There have been issues in condo buildings too, where individual landlords are eager to get in on the $$$ that they city pays over market rate for vouchers. Any multifamily housing may have unanticipated safety risks. If not from the voucher holder, then their associates. Over time, many buildings tip and become de facto, overpriced, private public housing.

This is exactly what is happening while DHCD is sitting on THOUSANDS of units that are uninhabitable and have not been maintained. Private landlords should not be forced to be the default public housing providers in the city. There is a misconception that the owners of these building are making bank off the voucher tenants. They are not. The costs of increased security, increased damage to units, and common areas are not made up for by the voucher rents. Yes, there may have been a small subset of landlords who once thought that vouchers were a way to make up revenue. They have now learned their lesson but are in a death spiral of buildings becoming de facto public housing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you seem to be implying that it was ok when this behavior was confined to "those neighborhoods".

Stop trolling and attempting to derail. Obviously, unsafe people need to be removed from the community, in any Ward. DC rarely does that. Dispersing them more widely solves nothing but greatly enriches the landlords paid well over market rate and whoever they kick back to. And law abiding voucher recipients, many elderly, also deserve a safe and orderly environment, many have moved OUT of Connecticut House and The Brandywine due to safety concerns. This was documented way back in the series the WP did on Sedgewick Gardens. What about those people?

In the 90s, DC did not target the tax base that is Ward 3 in this fashion. Given the looming CRE implosion, anyone have a sense of what the strategy seems to be here?

Strategy? Bowser??? Hah

DP. The passed a law to allow landlords out of rent control if they allow voucher recipients in units. Removing units from rent control provides significant long term value for RE owners.

In addition, if you have a building with a significant enough number of voucher recipients, it basically moots TOPA issues.

As a result, RE owners can receive market rate rent while allowing their buildings to depreciate without need for costly O&M, while removing rental control and mooting TOPA.

It seems like a perfect medium term strategy to create depreciated, vacant buildings ripe for redevelopment and I am sure this is by design.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some of you seem to be implying that it was ok when this behavior was confined to "those neighborhoods".

Nope. But don't let it spread and arrest crimibals wherever they live.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you seem to be implying that it was ok when this behavior was confined to "those neighborhoods".

Stop trolling and attempting to derail. Obviously, unsafe people need to be removed from the community, in any Ward. DC rarely does that. Dispersing them more widely solves nothing but greatly enriches the landlords paid well over market rate and whoever they kick back to. And law abiding voucher recipients, many elderly, also deserve a safe and orderly environment, many have moved OUT of Connecticut House and The Brandywine due to safety concerns. This was documented way back in the series the WP did on Sedgewick Gardens. What about those people?

In the 90s, DC did not target the tax base that is Ward 3 in this fashion. Given the looming CRE implosion, anyone have a sense of what the strategy seems to be here?

Strategy? Bowser??? Hah

DP. The passed a law to allow landlords out of rent control if they allow voucher recipients in units. Removing units from rent control provides significant long term value for RE owners.

In addition, if you have a building with a significant enough number of voucher recipients, it basically moots TOPA issues.

As a result, RE owners can receive market rate rent while allowing their buildings to depreciate without need for costly O&M, while removing rental control and mooting TOPA.

It seems like a perfect medium term strategy to create depreciated, vacant buildings ripe for redevelopment and I am sure this is by design.

But nobody will want to pay non-rent control rates to live in these unsafe buildings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have contacted Ward 3 CM Frumin re the safety issues at the Brandywine and other buildings on Connecticut Ave several times with no response from him. Criminals and severely mentally ill people are being given carte blanche to wreak havoc in an area filled with kids and elderly people, the most vulnerable among us.
Frumin hides his head in the sand, as does the mayor. Shame on them.

Same, I e-mailed him about safety concerns and didn’t receive a single response.

Goulet said that the voucher program had numerous problems and needed to be revamped. Frumin made bringing in more voucher holders on of his top priorities (“Ward 3 for all” was his slogan).

I have no clue why Ward 3 voters picked the voucher champion over the voucher skeptic. But even if voters do wake up, the next election is still years away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you seem to be implying that it was ok when this behavior was confined to "those neighborhoods".

Stop trolling and attempting to derail. Obviously, unsafe people need to be removed from the community, in any Ward. DC rarely does that. Dispersing them more widely solves nothing but greatly enriches the landlords paid well over market rate and whoever they kick back to. And law abiding voucher recipients, many elderly, also deserve a safe and orderly environment, many have moved OUT of Connecticut House and The Brandywine due to safety concerns. This was documented way back in the series the WP did on Sedgewick Gardens. What about those people?

In the 90s, DC did not target the tax base that is Ward 3 in this fashion. Given the looming CRE implosion, anyone have a sense of what the strategy seems to be here?

Strategy? Bowser??? Hah

DP. The passed a law to allow landlords out of rent control if they allow voucher recipients in units. Removing units from rent control provides significant long term value for RE owners.

In addition, if you have a building with a significant enough number of voucher recipients, it basically moots TOPA issues.

As a result, RE owners can receive market rate rent while allowing their buildings to depreciate without need for costly O&M, while removing rental control and mooting TOPA.

It seems like a perfect medium term strategy to create depreciated, vacant buildings ripe for redevelopment and I am sure this is by design.

But nobody will want to pay non-rent control rates to live in these unsafe buildings.

+1. Who would pay market rate to live in these buildings?? I'm only going to live there if I get a voucher for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bowser has ruined this city.

It wasn’t explicitly Bowser’s campaign pledge but she has certainly delivered on spreading “Crime to All!”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have contacted Ward 3 CM Frumin re the safety issues at the Brandywine and other buildings on Connecticut Ave several times with no response from him. Criminals and severely mentally ill people are being given carte blanche to wreak havoc in an area filled with kids and elderly people, the most vulnerable among us.
Frumin hides his head in the sand, as does the mayor. Shame on them.

Please continue to email him; I have done the same with no response. Also can we start calling him out publicly on Twitter?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is very visible drug dealing now in Forest Hills, it was even noted on a thread on DCUM a while ago by a mom who waits for her kid's speech therapy to finish sitting in a car on the corner of Connecticut and Brandywine (right by where the 3pm Saturday shooting happened, in fact).

Many violent released offenders "returning citizens" are getting vouchers to live in buildings up and down the Wisconsin and Connecticut Ave. corridors, including for offenses like rape and murder. The DBH also provides PSH vouchers to the seriously mentally ill, who are under no requirement to comply with treatment or even to open the door to a monthly social worker visit.

DC has no requirements re: CSA offenders living at a distance from children or even schools, do a search for the area surrounding Murch before renting nearby. There are over 3,000 PSH vouchers just in those 2 corridors, tax paying residents and law abiding voucher recipients deserve safety and public order. The city does not remove vouchers even for egregious conduct, that needs to change.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/08/08/dc-paid-housing-chronic-homelessness/

Wow, why would a taxpayer want to live anywhere in this area? It does not appear safe for tax paying families or single people or the elderly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you seem to be implying that it was ok when this behavior was confined to "those neighborhoods".

Stop trolling and attempting to derail. Obviously, unsafe people need to be removed from the community, in any Ward. DC rarely does that. Dispersing them more widely solves nothing but greatly enriches the landlords paid well over market rate and whoever they kick back to. And law abiding voucher recipients, many elderly, also deserve a safe and orderly environment, many have moved OUT of Connecticut House and The Brandywine due to safety concerns. This was documented way back in the series the WP did on Sedgewick Gardens. What about those people?

In the 90s, DC did not target the tax base that is Ward 3 in this fashion. Given the looming CRE implosion, anyone have a sense of what the strategy seems to be here?

Strategy? Bowser??? Hah

DP. The passed a law to allow landlords out of rent control if they allow voucher recipients in units. Removing units from rent control provides significant long term value for RE owners.

In addition, if you have a building with a significant enough number of voucher recipients, it basically moots TOPA issues.

As a result, RE owners can receive market rate rent while allowing their buildings to depreciate without need for costly O&M, while removing rental control and mooting TOPA.

It seems like a perfect medium term strategy to create depreciated, vacant buildings ripe for redevelopment and I am sure this is by design.

But nobody will want to pay non-rent control rates to live in these unsafe buildings.

+1. Who would pay market rate to live in these buildings?? I'm only going to live there if I get a voucher for it.

The worst of it is that Bowser’s voucher program has set affordability backward in areas like Ward 3. Despite its overall high cost, that Ward has had a lot of rent controlled housing and value-priced housing in older but still nice buildings in places like Connecticut Avenue. This has been a source of workforce housing and apartments for many, including older residents, on fixed incomes. The crime and other social problems around concentrations of voucher units in these same buildings have meant that longterm stable tenants feel unsafe and are moving out. Not to mention, every time a building owner or management company accepts a voucher for a rent controlled unit it takes the unit out of rent control going forward (and sets the rent at a premium to market). The idea behind vouchers was well intentioned but in design and practice DC’s program is counterproductive.

[Anonymous]

How can I learn more about this voucher program? I live in a building that has not been overrun by a criminal class, but how can I know if it might be?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you seem to be implying that it was ok when this behavior was confined to "those neighborhoods".

Stop trolling and attempting to derail. Obviously, unsafe people need to be removed from the community, in any Ward. DC rarely does that. Dispersing them more widely solves nothing but greatly enriches the landlords paid well over market rate and whoever they kick back to. And law abiding voucher recipients, many elderly, also deserve a safe and orderly environment, many have moved OUT of Connecticut House and The Brandywine due to safety concerns. This was documented way back in the series the WP did on Sedgewick Gardens. What about those people?

In the 90s, DC did not target the tax base that is Ward 3 in this fashion. Given the looming CRE implosion, anyone have a sense of what the strategy seems to be here?

Strategy? Bowser??? Hah

DP. The passed a law to allow landlords out of rent control if they allow voucher recipients in units. Removing units from rent control provides significant long term value for RE owners.

In addition, if you have a building with a significant enough number of voucher recipients, it basically moots TOPA issues.

As a result, RE owners can receive market rate rent while allowing their buildings to depreciate without need for costly O&M, while removing rental control and mooting TOPA.

It seems like a perfect medium term strategy to create depreciated, vacant buildings ripe for redevelopment and I am sure this is by design.

For about the millionth time whenever this subject comes up, the Council didn't pass a law allowing such landlords to get out of rent control. It *repealed* the loophole that allowed this, in 2019. Yet people keep insisting it's fact all these years later. It's become the "here's why Georgetown doesn't have a Metro station" myth of DC housing policy, parroted constantly and incorrectly.

https://thedcline.org/2019/05/31/a-connecticut-avenue-apartment-complex-shows-effects-of-a-legal-loophole-and-cracks-in-city-housing-subsidy-programs/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have contacted Ward 3 CM Frumin re the safety issues at the Brandywine and other buildings on Connecticut Ave several times with no response from him. Criminals and severely mentally ill people are being given carte blanche to wreak havoc in an area filled with kids and elderly people, the most vulnerable among us.
Frumin hides his head in the sand, as does the mayor. Shame on them.

Shame on them both

[Anonymous]

It’s pretty awesome how every ANC commissioner along Connecticut Ave. has spent every waking minute of the past three years on . . . bike lanes. Great job guys.