Bowser proposes to add over 1,500 new affordable housing units to "Rock Creek West"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My understanding is they have been offering above market rate vouchers for homeless to rent control landlords, effectively flipping the switch on these units from rent control status forevermore. In the short term, someone homeless gets housing and in the long term rent control lessened. Is this the case, or do I have the facts wrong?

This is correct. A particular problem, exemplified by Sedgwick Gardens bear Van Ness, is that DC is housing a concentration of voucher residents, many of whom have various mental health and substance abuse issues, without focusing DC social services on this population. There have been fights and incidents like feces being smeared in common areas. As a result, many longtime residents on fixed incomes in rent controlled apartments feel unsafe and are fleeing. The result is, between the vouchers and those who leave under some duress, the number of rent controlled units is being reduced. Does anyone doubt that in two or three years, the owner will be able to empty out Sedgwick Gardens and renovate it into luxury units? Thanks to Bowser.

[Anonymous]

By Van Ness

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know everyone is going to get fixated on the prospect of poor people moving into wealthy neighborhoods, but someone should ask how exactly this plan is going to result in affordable housing. It seems vague how that's going to work. Simply building more units is not going to change prices. (Yes, yes, yes, increasing supply puts downward pressure on prices. But lower prices attract more demand, which pushes prices back up).

She's planning on giving vouchers to low income District residents, which they can then use to compensate the landlords of large buildings in Wards 2 and 3. My guess is that the city will aggressively police and fine buildings that try to avoid accepting voucher holding residents.

With the debacle of Segwick Gardens, I think landlords may be hesitant to swap out those small number of below market long term tenants for tenants who are needing wrap-around services (but come armed with a reliable voucher from the city).

The City Council needs to start providing meaningful checks and balances against this Mayor. I pray that Racine primaries Bowser in the next Mayor race; we need a rational leader, not a bomb thrower.

Is she going to give them vouchers for food and services too? Everything is priced according to zip code around here. Food is more expensive, gas is more expensive, parking is more expensive, even Uber ups the rates in these neighborhoods, and let's not even talk about service providers. Child care is scarce and way, way, way more expensive. Also no public preK3 and preK4 is hard to get into. There is no Walmart, and so on. There are many reasons people can't afford these neighborhoods. It's not just about housing costs.

Being close to a grocery store you can't afford to shop in is no different than being in a food desert. She's going to need to address that too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know everyone is going to get fixated on the prospect of poor people moving into wealthy neighborhoods, but someone should ask how exactly this plan is going to result in affordable housing. It seems vague how that's going to work. Simply building more units is not going to change prices. (Yes, yes, yes, increasing supply puts downward pressure on prices. But lower prices attract more demand, which pushes prices back up).

She's planning on giving vouchers to low income District residents, which they can then use to compensate the landlords of large buildings in Wards 2 and 3. My guess is that the city will aggressively police and fine buildings that try to avoid accepting voucher holding residents.

With the debacle of Segwick Gardens, I think landlords may be hesitant to swap out those small number of below market long term tenants for tenants who are needing wrap-around services (but come armed with a reliable voucher from the city).

The City Council needs to start providing meaningful checks and balances against this Mayor. I pray that Racine primaries Bowser in the next Mayor race; we need a rational leader, not a bomb thrower.

Is she going to give them vouchers for food and services too? Everything is priced according to zip code around here. Food is more expensive, gas is more expensive, parking is more expensive, even Uber ups the rates in these neighborhoods, and let's not even talk about service providers. Child care is scarce and way, way, way more expensive. Also no public preK3 and preK4 is hard to get into. There is no Walmart, and so on. There are many reasons people can't afford these neighborhoods. It's not just about housing costs.

Being close to a grocery store you can't afford to shop in is no different than being in a food desert. She's going to need to address that too.

The above market voucher amount goes directly to the landlord who pockets it all. The voucher tenant does not get extra.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If Bowser was a Republican, Democrats would be in high dudgeon over her coziness with developers.

+1

Corruption is obvious...but I guess it's fine when "we" benefit from it

+1

[Anonymous]

We know someone who is criminally insane (this person constantly threatens very famous people in a schizoid manner) being housed with a homeless voucher in an upscale DC neighborhood with no treatment. Not actually from DC, originally. Meanwhile, rent control folk driven out?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My understanding is they have been offering above market rate vouchers for homeless to rent control landlords, effectively flipping the switch on these units from rent control status forevermore. In the short term, someone homeless gets housing and in the long term rent control lessened. Is this the case, or do I have the facts wrong?

And meanwhile, a pensioner on a fixed income is now having to navigate market-rate living after staying put for many years, as we saw at Sedgewick Gardens. One person gets housing, another person loses it. Bad news bears all around, save for the developers profiting from this new handout.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My understanding is they have been offering above market rate vouchers for homeless to rent control landlords, effectively flipping the switch on these units from rent control status forevermore. In the short term, someone homeless gets housing and in the long term rent control lessened. Is this the case, or do I have the facts wrong?

And meanwhile, a pensioner on a fixed income is now having to navigate market-rate living after staying put for many years, as we saw at Sedgewick Gardens. One person gets housing, another person loses it. Bad news bears all around, save for the developers profiting from this new handout.

Thanks, Bowser.

[Anonymous]

I can see some pote tial benefit to allowing and encouraging higher density buildings on Wisc. and Conn (and Ga. and 16th) but don't know how that can be done without substantial infrastructure improvements. All those roads are already jam packed at rush hour and the schools are overflowing. They'd have to center things on the metro stations and add another set of schools to avoid a complete cluster.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can see some pote tial benefit to allowing and encouraging higher density buildings on Wisc. and Conn (and Ga. and 16th) but don't know how that can be done without substantial infrastructure improvements. All those roads are already jam packed at rush hour and the schools are overflowing. They'd have to center things on the metro stations and add another set of schools to avoid a complete cluster.

I think that allowing folks to convert their garages into studio units was a more innovative solution.

[Anonymous]

Putting mixed use high rises around and between Van Ness and Tenleytown could work from a SimCity perspective but we'd have to, at a minimum, expand Hearst.

Otherwise just build a few apartment buildings near AU and UDC. College kids and grad students easily fit the income demographics targeted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Putting mixed use high rises around and between Van Ness and Tenleytown could work from a SimCity perspective but we'd have to, at a minimum, expand Hearst.

Otherwise just build a few apartment buildings near AU and UDC. College kids and grad students easily fit the income demographics targeted.

There have been quite a few apartment buildings put in on the way to friendship heights in the past decade, down Wisconsin to Georgetown as well, the new homeless shelter and hideous garage that blew threw all the variances with the Council's blessing, and the Fannie Mae redevelopment. Housing is coming in steadily. As to affordable housing, I'm not sure where the Mayor's proposal is coming from, when she is the one incentivizing the demise of rent-control. I'm sure some landlords are delighted though. Eventually, they will just flip these units to a higher rent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Putting mixed use high rises around and between Van Ness and Tenleytown could work from a SimCity perspective but we'd have to, at a minimum, expand Hearst.

Otherwise just build a few apartment buildings near AU and UDC. College kids and grad students easily fit the income demographics targeted.

There have been quite a few apartment buildings put in on the way to friendship heights in the past decade, down Wisconsin to Georgetown as well, the new homeless shelter and hideous garage that blew threw all the variances with the Council's blessing, and the Fannie Mae redevelopment. Housing is coming in steadily. As to affordable housing, I'm not sure where the Mayor's proposal is coming from, when she is the one incentivizing the demise of rent-control. I'm sure some landlords are delighted though. Eventually, they will just flip these units to a higher rent.

For Bowser it’s all about providing new lucrative opportunities to her developer cronies and contributors through her proposed upzoning of areas of Chevy Chase DC and Cleveland Park. Providing affordable housing is a pretext, pure and simple, to weaken existing neighborhood overlays and historic district protections. The trickle down impact of providing minimal “inclusionary zoning” units among an influx of luxury condos - and at a higher qualifying income point, no less — will be relatively negligible and won’t offset the rent controlled housing lost through upzoning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can see some pote tial benefit to allowing and encouraging higher density buildings on Wisc. and Conn (and Ga. and 16th) but don't know how that can be done without substantial infrastructure improvements. All those roads are already jam packed at rush hour and the schools are overflowing. They'd have to center things on the metro stations and add another set of schools to avoid a complete cluster.

They're jampacked with people driving in cars, by themselves, from their jobs in downtown DC to their homes outside of DC. DC needs policies to discourage this, like congestion charges or an end to "free" parking as an employee benefit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Rent controlled units do NOT provide afforable housing to the people who truly need. Rent control is not means tested, so someone making 200k a year can live in rent control forever. Its probably the most inefficient ways to deliver affordable housing.

That's probably less than 3% of rent controlled tenants in DC. I've lived in rent controlled apartment in DC - they are safe and habitable, put usually quite dated and ugly. No dishwashers, no in-unit washers and dryer. I left my rent controlled apartment for a nicer place once I made enough money.

The vast majority of people (80%+) who are in rent controlled apartments would probably be homeless or leave DC if you took away their homes. Further, rent controlled apartments in DC remain under the rent control system forever. I can go get a rent controlled apartment today, if I want. They are freely available. Ward 3 easily has 8,000+ rent controlled units.

The good thing about rent control in DC that it rewards long term residents who (1) work for a living and (2) make a moderate income. These are people who can stick to a budget and, since they have rent control, they stay put. They become pillars of their community because they are so invested in their neighborhood for the long run.

Thanks for your anecdotes based on nothing. I work in real estate and you have it backwards. The majority of rent units are not occupied living below poverty or even working poor. Unless
Rent control is means tested is does not deliver affordable housing to the people who need it most.