Sent January 16, 2009
Dear Councilmembers Cheh and Brown:
We are writing to point out a number of misrepresentations made by Deputy Mayor Neil Albert in his January 12th letter regarding the proposed public-private partnership involving the Tenley-Friendship Library and Bernard T. Janney Elementary School. As you both know, we have been actively engaged in work related to this project for the past 20 months and, in the course of our efforts, have met repeatedly with community members, developers, and government officials.
First and foremost, we want you to realize that there have been no serious re-design efforts on LCOR’s part over the past six months. In fact, whenever community stakeholders point out a problem with LCOR’s plans, the response has been to manipulate the data and/or images rather than to try to solve the problem. So, for example, we’re still seeing a soccer field where one goal would be somewhere between 9 and 12 feet higher than the other, as well as a driveway on Wisconsin Avenue that will never make it through the PUD process, given the volume of traffic associated with the 200+ car garage it serves. In short, LCOR, with DMPED’s aid and encouragement, is deliberately presenting unrealistic scenarios in an attempt to sell the project to the Council and the community. Neither DMPED nor LCOR seems to have any interest in making this a better project – they just want to seal this deal, secure in the knowledge that, once they have a deal, all of these problems will be someone else’s responsibility.
It’s ironic to hear DM Albert “hope that the members of the community will engage constructively” when his office has ignored every constructive suggestion the community has made throughout this process. The wisdom of some of those suggestions – e.g. to include community/school representatives on the selection panel; to do ed specs for the Janney campus and a concept plan showing how all of the required educational facilities for an elementary school of 550 can be provided onsite before making any decision about whether/how much/what land should be devoted to private use – has already been vindicated. Other suggestions – such as ANC’s request that the RFP require the private partner to come to the table with financing in hand – anticipate (and would have helped avert) problems likely to emerge in the near future if this project moves forward.
Secondly, we want to point out that DM Albert’s claims about the advantages of this project are largely specious. The statement that “preliminary estimates show that DC Public Library will save approximately half of its construction budget under this mixed-use scenario” (or 5 million dollars) flatly contradicts LCOR’s estimate in September of 2008 that the library could save about $800,000 in construction costs as a result of mixed-use. Even that figure was an overestimation because LCOR acknowledged that it hadn’t offset the savings by taking into account increased costs associated with redesign and construction delays. Given that the private/profit-making component of the project may have gotten slightly smaller since September, it seems unlikely that the construction cost savings for the library could have more than sextupled since then.
Even less persuasive, is DMPED’s claim that LCOR’s proposal will provide a means for moving Janney up in DCPS’s modernization queue. In fact, as FOIA’d documents demonstrate, a last-minute political intervention was made to move Janney from its rightful place near the front of DCPS’s facilities modernization line to the tail end. This intervention was apparently designed to accommodate a public-private partnership. As DCPS’s own facilities expert immediately pointed out, relegating Janney to the end of the modernization queue “contradicts the guiding principles” of the Master Facilities Plan.
Janney’s place in DCPS’s facilities queue is not yet fixed. The MFP released last September was a draft and Janney’s position has been controverted both within DCPS and in public testimony before the Council. There is absolutely no reason why Janney cannot be renovated and expanded more quickly without a public-private partnership. The money is available. Post-closures, DCPS desperately needs to expand capacity at high-performing schools that can serve as receivers under NCLB standards. And Janney remains one of DCPS’s most over-crowded campuses with a waiting list of over 150 students.
By contrast, if the PPP moves forward, LCOR’s need for Council approval of the deal, as well as a PUD for the project, necessarily puts Janney’s addition on hold. And without a new addition, the only way to renovate the existing building, would be to send the students off campus. So either the renovations wait for the addition or they wait for swing space to become available. The bottom line is that, at this point, the PPP can only delay Janney’s modernization.
Finally, DMPED still doesn’t seem to understand the facilities issues involved. “No net loss of green space” has never been an appropriate criterion for evaluating this project’s impact on Janney. Given the anticipated expansion in its capacity, as well as the doubling of the amount of its built space, the challenge involved in modernizing Janney will be to enable its outdoor educational facilities to expand in order to keep pace with its indoor facilities. “Green space” per se isn’t what’s at issue. Janney needs programmable outdoor space that can be used to provide the field needed for PE instruction as well as the various age-differentiated hard- and soft-scape play areas mandated by DCPS’s current educational specifications for an elementary school campus of 550 students.
While a mixed-use project at this site may have appeared promising in theory, a year’s worth of attempts to translate that theory into practice have not borne fruit. Three different development teams, each of whom has had the opportunity to present revised or alternative designs, have tackled this project. We’ve seen lots of site plans over the past year, but no one has been able come up with a concrete proposal that has garnered the support of even one local stakeholder group. In fact, at this point, a strong consensus has emerged that our community will be better served by devoting all of the publicly-owned land at the Wisconsin and Albemarle site to school and library use and entrusting these two construction projects to DCPL and OPEFM rather than involving a private developer. ANC 3E, the Janney SIT, the Friends of the Tenley-Friendship Library, as well as a number of other civic associations and neighboring property-owners have all espoused this position.
And it’s not just the community that has reached this conclusion. The Library’s Board of Trustees announced at its November 19th meeting (and apparently affirmed earlier this week, after seeing DM Albert’s letter) that it has instructed Ginnie Cooper to move forward with the already-funded and designed standalone reconstruction of the Tenley-Friendship branch. And the Janney design and construction project itself has already been handed back to DCPS. LCOR isn’t building anything for the school at this point – it’s just delaying the school’s modernization (by first stalling and then extending construction at the library site) and depriving Janney of a part of its campus.
Frankly, LCOR and DMPED seem to be the only parties that want this deal – yet six months into negotiations, even they do not seem to have managed to reach agreement on something as basic as a term sheet. As DMPED’s website indicates, no such agreement had been reached as of December 31, 2008.
The bottom line is that, after two years of work on this project, DMPED has no agency buy-in and no community support. That’s because Neil Albert’s office seems inclined to get this deal “by any means necessary” –- including sacrificing public facilities needs to subsidize private development. In a tight credit market, even if Albert ultimately offers LCOR a deal so enticing that it signs on the dotted line, there’s no guarantee that LCOR will have the financing to move forward once it clears the political and regulatory hurdles that the project still faces (in part because DMPED failed to seek a timely decision regarding whether the public land in question was actually surplus). By contrast, DCPL has both construction financing and necessary design approval in hand.
It has become increasingly clear that continued negotiations over a public-private partnership at this site are setting us back rather than moving us forward toward the broadly-shared goals of providing improved public school facilities and reinvigorating the dead space created by the premature closing of our branch library. Already, our library’s reconstruction has been delayed an additional 6 months by these discussions. And that’s after a delay which has already extended four years. Each of the other four neighborhood libraries shuttered at the end of 2004 broke ground last December. There’s a big hole where our library used to be -– and while other CMs are cutting ribbons in 2010, we’ll be lucky if ground has been broken on this project before the next election cycle is over.
It is time for the Council to step in and pull the plug on this project. Apparently the opposition of individual Councilmembers to LCOR’s proposal has not deterred DM Albert from moving forward with it. The Council as a whole needs to step in and reassert its role as a co-equal branch and a custodian of public land. Your colleagues will follow your lead on this matter – as Ward CM, as Committee Chairs, and as early proponents of exploring a mixed-use project at this site, it is up to you to let them know that DMPED’s efforts have failed and that, conversely, DCPL and OPEFM seem ready, willing, and able to rebuild our library and modernize our school.
Sincerely,
Sue Hemberger, Anne Sullivan, Daniel Carozza, and Amy McVey
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
See how little LCOR's site plans have changed since September
Last week, I sent the following note to CMs Cheh and Brown, along with the three images provided below:
I've attached a pdf including images of LCOR's site plans for the PPP as they were presented to community members (and published on DMPED's website) in October, November, and December. I think they bear out the claim that very little substantive revision -- and no attempt at problem-solving --has taken place over the course of the past four months.
The September plan (which we saw on boards but never had a printout of) was essentially the same as October's. To my knowledge, that was the first design community members saw after the Mayor's July 10th selection announcement. The major changes from LCOR 's original proposal (presented February 28th) have been to shift the base of the mixed use-building south and east (up to the property line in each case) and to move the driveway from Albemarle to Wisconsin Avenue. The building's footprint and overall square footage seem to have remained constant throughout.
And, of course, somewhere between February and September the decision was made that Allen Lew rather than LCOR would modernize Janney's campus. Once that decision was made, LCOR relocated the school's addition and dramatically shrunk its footprint in all of its "Proposed Conceptual Site Plan" images. Whether the "potential" locations and dimensions depicted are realistic or bear any resemblance to what DCPS would actually build has not been established.
[[click image to enlarge]]
No response (yet?) from either Cheh or Brown to our letter or this follow-up. But given that they characterized the first plan as "fatally flawed," it's hard to see why the third suddenly shows "promise of meeting the[ir] essential requirements." Not much has changed and the "green space" reclaimed by cutting out the southwest corner of the residential building doesn't really benefit Janney in any way. It's too small, awkwardly-shaped, and badly-located to be used as a playground or built on.
I've attached a pdf including images of LCOR's site plans for the PPP as they were presented to community members (and published on DMPED's website) in October, November, and December. I think they bear out the claim that very little substantive revision -- and no attempt at problem-solving --has taken place over the course of the past four months.
The September plan (which we saw on boards but never had a printout of) was essentially the same as October's. To my knowledge, that was the first design community members saw after the Mayor's July 10th selection announcement. The major changes from LCOR 's original proposal (presented February 28th) have been to shift the base of the mixed use-building south and east (up to the property line in each case) and to move the driveway from Albemarle to Wisconsin Avenue. The building's footprint and overall square footage seem to have remained constant throughout.
And, of course, somewhere between February and September the decision was made that Allen Lew rather than LCOR would modernize Janney's campus. Once that decision was made, LCOR relocated the school's addition and dramatically shrunk its footprint in all of its "Proposed Conceptual Site Plan" images. Whether the "potential" locations and dimensions depicted are realistic or bear any resemblance to what DCPS would actually build has not been established.
[[click image to enlarge]]
No response (yet?) from either Cheh or Brown to our letter or this follow-up. But given that they characterized the first plan as "fatally flawed," it's hard to see why the third suddenly shows "promise of meeting the[ir] essential requirements." Not much has changed and the "green space" reclaimed by cutting out the southwest corner of the residential building doesn't really benefit Janney in any way. It's too small, awkwardly-shaped, and badly-located to be used as a playground or built on.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Special Committee's Status Report on the Janney Elementary/Tenley-Friendship Library PPP
Presented at ANC 3E’s November 13, 2008 Public Meeting
CHEH-BROWN LETTER #4
On October 29th, Councilmembers Mary Cheh and Kwame Brown (chair of the Committee on Economic Development) wrote to Mayor Adrian Fenty asking him to terminate negotiations with LCOR and allow the reconstruction of the Tenley-Friendship branch to move forward. Their letter requested a response from the Mayor by November 7th. It is our understanding that no such response has been forthcoming.
That said, the day after the Cheh-Brown letter was released, Deputy Mayor Neil Albert indicated to the media that his office plans to move forward with the project. And DMPED refused ANC 3E’s request to cancel or postpone a previously-scheduled meeting with LCOR until after November 7th. Full speed ahead seems to be the Administration's stance.
MEETINGS WITH LCOR/DMPED
Since our last report, ANC Commissioners and Special Committee Members have met twice with LCOR at DMPED’s request. These meetings were held on October 17th (attended by Matt Frumin and Sue Hemberger) and November 3rd (attended by Anne Sullivan, Danny Carozza, and Sue Hemberger). The site plans shown at those meetings included a number of changes from the plans viewed in September.
CHANGES:
1. The underground garage now extends 50 feet beyond the edge of the residential building. This means that the edge of excavation/construction will be no more than 30 feet from the eastern façade of Janney’s historic building. Longer-term, it probably also means that the remains of the soccer field will be land that is of very limited utility to the school. Presumably, it can’t be built on, nor can it be used as a playing field. About all that it could be used for is a playground and it’s not a great location for a playground, given proximity to both classroom and residential windows as well as the presence of a stairwell providing teachers with access to the garage.
2. At this point, DMPED is talking about 1:1 replacement of Janney’s parking spaces – “approximately 50 spaces, give or take a few” was the way they put it. Janney will not gain parking; its parking will simply be inconveniently relocated, as will the library’s (which will now have 9 spots in the underground structure rather than surface parking along the southern edge of the building's first floor).
3. The mixed use library/residential building has now been shifted at least 10 feet toward St. Ann’s. It will be built up to the property line, covering what used to be the driveway for the library. The building’s southern façade appears to be about 20-30 feet from St. Ann’s Academy.
4. Most of the library will now be covered with and surrounded by apartments. Except for a 20 foot edge along Wisconsin and a 10 foot sliver on the eastern edge of Albemarle, the library will be located underneath residences. As a result, the airy interiors of the previous design must now be riddled with columns to provide structural support for the interior walls of the apartments above. And the roof terrace option no longer seems possible. The design images aren’t detailed enough to indicate how incorporation of the library into a mixed-use building will affect the number and location of library windows. Ceiling heights are being preserved; two library floors will be equivalent to three residential floors.
Special Committee Members pointed out that the site plans appeared to be sales tools rather than realistic attempts to solve problems or even to show that the school's needs could be met once the residential/library building was constructed. We pointed out three crucial fictions that seemed to underlie these representations.
FICTIONS:
1. LCOR, relying on dated images, substantially overestimated the amount of land on Janney’s campus currently devoted to parking. Its site plan claimed that the parking lot was 17,450 SF when, in fact, it was including land that is used as hardtop play space and for a demountable. The plan also indicated that the footprint of LCOR’s building would consume 14,800 SF of Janney’s soccer field.
While the Special Committee has always pointed out that “no net loss of green space” is the wrong standard – the issue is athletic/playground facilities (not green space) and these facilities need to be increased (not simply preserved) to accommodate an increase in Janney’s student population – even this standard is clearly not being met.
Previously, LCOR had always acknowledged the fact that its building would consume a few thousand more square feet of Janney's land than it would replace by providing underground parking. The footprint of LCOR's residential building hasn’t changed, and the amount of parking LCOR will provide to Janney seems to be shrinking. Yet now LCOR is producing images which suggest that the project will produce a net gain in green space. The project certainly hasn't been modified to produce that result; LCOR (at DMPED's behest?) has simply changed its rhetoric.
Since our last meeting, yet another set of images have been posted on the web. LCOR responded to the revelation that it was overestimating the land currently devoted to parking at Janney by downwardly revising its already lowball estimate of how much of Janney’s land it will consume (without changing the footprint of its building). The same area previously represented as 14,800 SF is now labelled 14,500 SF. Then it reconfigured the outline of Janney's current parking lot to exclude some hardtop playspace but it still seems to include the land around and under the demountable. Given that the demountable is not going to be located in the underground garage, the inclusion seems to be motivated by the need to assert that Janney is getting more than it gives up.
This is symptomatic of what we’re dealing with at this point. The only material change in LCOR’s project since January is that LCOR will no longer be renovating the school or building its addition. In each new site plan, LCOR just moves massing in its building around (a few stories cut off on this corner and pushed over toward the center). LCOR hasn’t budged on the residential building’s footprint or on the number of units. We’re being treated to endless spinning and re-spinning of essentially the same universally-condemned project. And the response to any critique is not to solve the problem but to find a better way to obscure it.
2. The second fiction we pointed out was that LCOR’s “optional soccer field locations” were located on land with steep changes of grade and thus were costly and unrealistic options (and, of course, held out a promise LCOR itself wouldn’t be keeping. Allen Lew would be saddled with these unrealistic expectations.) One layout had a height differential of 9 feet between the two goals; another looked closer to 12 feet. Since LCOR’s own image had contour lines, this information was available to them. This was an intentional attempt to mislead – not a mistake based on ignorance.
The newest site plans show the soccer field relocated to a flatter area bordering Bon Secours where a swing set and play equipment are now located.
3. LCOR’s current site plans are premised on the assumption that the library’s driveway (which provided access to fewer than 10 parking spaces) will now serve as the sole vehicular access (for both entry and exit) to a 200+ car garage and loading dock area for a 174 unit apartment building. Given the facts that this curb cut is located on Wisconsin Avenue just south of the Wisconsin and Albemarle intersection and that it abuts St. Ann’s driveway, it seems unfathomable that DDOT would allow such an arrangement. More likely, the driveway would be relocated to the site LCOR previously proposed – the “green space” between Janney and the residential building. But such realism would interfere with the “no net loss of green space” claim and so it’s been excised.
LCOR’s claim that the pre-existence of this curb cut shields the project from DDOT’s oversight is specious. This project will require a PUD and the Zoning Commission will not allow the requisite upzoning without working out a different traffic plan.
FOIA RESULTS
We are in the midst of receiving and reviewing documents from DCPS that are belatedly being produced in response to a July 18th FOIA request. What we’ve learned thus far is that on September 8th, two days before the release of the MFP, Janney’s addition was moved to the end of the modernization queue and scheduled for 2014, a year after its classrooms were to be renovated.
Prior to September 8th, Anthony DeGuzman (DCPS/OOC) and Eric Lerum (DME) had recommended a 2010 date for Janney’s addition, with classroom renovations to follow in 2012 or 2013. These dates are consistent with the March 31st consultant’s draft of the MFP, and the proposed sequencing was a crucial element of the swing in place strategy. The addition would need to be available before the classrooms in the old building could be vacated for renovation.
On September 9th, once DeGuzman saw what happened to Janney, he pointed out that the school’s new place at the end of the queue violated the fundamental principles (e.g. rightsizing) articulated in this MFP: “Schools with lesser space needs have leapfrogged them. This contradicts the guiding principles.” He was told that the change was made “per DME.” We suspect that this means Reinoso personally, given that Lerum, Reinoso’s chief of staff, had been arguing for 2010 just a few days previously.
To put it bluntly, there is clear evidence that the decision to move Janney to the end of the queue was based on politics rather than principle and that the move was designed to accommodate the PPP. Michelle Rhee indicated on September 3rd that “Allen Lew is modifying the plan assuming a PPP for Janney.” There is no indication that prior plans made such an assumption.
The documents also show that DCPS (including Rhee’s office, Lew’s office, and Reinoso’s office) were unfamiliar with LCOR’s proposal when Mayor Fenty made his July 10th developer selection announcement. Yet DCPS reassured the Janney SIT that everything was under control and the school’s needs were being protected even as it scrambled internally to figure out who knew what, if anything, about the proposal.
We have not yet found any documents explaining when or why the decision was made to sever Janney’s modernization from the rest of the PPP. In late July, DMPED contemplated an arrangement in which LCOR would be a “fee developer” for the school.
And, once again, we see no evidence of any planning regarding facilities needs, land use, campus design, logistics, or swing space related to this project.
Once all of the documents have been delivered and analyzed, we will post the most significant ones and an explanatory timeline on the ANC website and on the listservs.
ACTION ITEMS:
1. AUDITOR – The Special Committee plans to renew its request to the DC Auditor to investigate DMPED’s decisionmaking regarding the disposition of public lands. Last Spring, in response to our submission, the Auditor acknowledged the importance of the issue, but said she lacked the resources to investigate because of her office’s heavy workload during the Council’s annual agency Oversight Hearings. We believe that new events and new evidence underline the increasingly urgent need for a comprehensive evaluation of deal-making involving public land. No Commission action is required on this item; any citizen has the right to request an audit.
2. ANC RESOLUTION ADDRESSED TO THE COUNCIL – The Special Committee suggests that the Commissioners adopt a resolution urging the Council to reassert its status as a co-equal branch of government and a steward of public lands by supporting CM Cheh and Brown’s call to abandon public-private partnership negotiations and to enable DCPL to commence rebuilding the Tenley-Friendship Branch and by moving legislation to reform Title X out of committee.
CHEH-BROWN LETTER #4
On October 29th, Councilmembers Mary Cheh and Kwame Brown (chair of the Committee on Economic Development) wrote to Mayor Adrian Fenty asking him to terminate negotiations with LCOR and allow the reconstruction of the Tenley-Friendship branch to move forward. Their letter requested a response from the Mayor by November 7th. It is our understanding that no such response has been forthcoming.
That said, the day after the Cheh-Brown letter was released, Deputy Mayor Neil Albert indicated to the media that his office plans to move forward with the project. And DMPED refused ANC 3E’s request to cancel or postpone a previously-scheduled meeting with LCOR until after November 7th. Full speed ahead seems to be the Administration's stance.
MEETINGS WITH LCOR/DMPED
Since our last report, ANC Commissioners and Special Committee Members have met twice with LCOR at DMPED’s request. These meetings were held on October 17th (attended by Matt Frumin and Sue Hemberger) and November 3rd (attended by Anne Sullivan, Danny Carozza, and Sue Hemberger). The site plans shown at those meetings included a number of changes from the plans viewed in September.
CHANGES:
1. The underground garage now extends 50 feet beyond the edge of the residential building. This means that the edge of excavation/construction will be no more than 30 feet from the eastern façade of Janney’s historic building. Longer-term, it probably also means that the remains of the soccer field will be land that is of very limited utility to the school. Presumably, it can’t be built on, nor can it be used as a playing field. About all that it could be used for is a playground and it’s not a great location for a playground, given proximity to both classroom and residential windows as well as the presence of a stairwell providing teachers with access to the garage.
2. At this point, DMPED is talking about 1:1 replacement of Janney’s parking spaces – “approximately 50 spaces, give or take a few” was the way they put it. Janney will not gain parking; its parking will simply be inconveniently relocated, as will the library’s (which will now have 9 spots in the underground structure rather than surface parking along the southern edge of the building's first floor).
3. The mixed use library/residential building has now been shifted at least 10 feet toward St. Ann’s. It will be built up to the property line, covering what used to be the driveway for the library. The building’s southern façade appears to be about 20-30 feet from St. Ann’s Academy.
4. Most of the library will now be covered with and surrounded by apartments. Except for a 20 foot edge along Wisconsin and a 10 foot sliver on the eastern edge of Albemarle, the library will be located underneath residences. As a result, the airy interiors of the previous design must now be riddled with columns to provide structural support for the interior walls of the apartments above. And the roof terrace option no longer seems possible. The design images aren’t detailed enough to indicate how incorporation of the library into a mixed-use building will affect the number and location of library windows. Ceiling heights are being preserved; two library floors will be equivalent to three residential floors.
Special Committee Members pointed out that the site plans appeared to be sales tools rather than realistic attempts to solve problems or even to show that the school's needs could be met once the residential/library building was constructed. We pointed out three crucial fictions that seemed to underlie these representations.
FICTIONS:
1. LCOR, relying on dated images, substantially overestimated the amount of land on Janney’s campus currently devoted to parking. Its site plan claimed that the parking lot was 17,450 SF when, in fact, it was including land that is used as hardtop play space and for a demountable. The plan also indicated that the footprint of LCOR’s building would consume 14,800 SF of Janney’s soccer field.
While the Special Committee has always pointed out that “no net loss of green space” is the wrong standard – the issue is athletic/playground facilities (not green space) and these facilities need to be increased (not simply preserved) to accommodate an increase in Janney’s student population – even this standard is clearly not being met.
Previously, LCOR had always acknowledged the fact that its building would consume a few thousand more square feet of Janney's land than it would replace by providing underground parking. The footprint of LCOR's residential building hasn’t changed, and the amount of parking LCOR will provide to Janney seems to be shrinking. Yet now LCOR is producing images which suggest that the project will produce a net gain in green space. The project certainly hasn't been modified to produce that result; LCOR (at DMPED's behest?) has simply changed its rhetoric.
Since our last meeting, yet another set of images have been posted on the web. LCOR responded to the revelation that it was overestimating the land currently devoted to parking at Janney by downwardly revising its already lowball estimate of how much of Janney’s land it will consume (without changing the footprint of its building). The same area previously represented as 14,800 SF is now labelled 14,500 SF. Then it reconfigured the outline of Janney's current parking lot to exclude some hardtop playspace but it still seems to include the land around and under the demountable. Given that the demountable is not going to be located in the underground garage, the inclusion seems to be motivated by the need to assert that Janney is getting more than it gives up.
This is symptomatic of what we’re dealing with at this point. The only material change in LCOR’s project since January is that LCOR will no longer be renovating the school or building its addition. In each new site plan, LCOR just moves massing in its building around (a few stories cut off on this corner and pushed over toward the center). LCOR hasn’t budged on the residential building’s footprint or on the number of units. We’re being treated to endless spinning and re-spinning of essentially the same universally-condemned project. And the response to any critique is not to solve the problem but to find a better way to obscure it.
2. The second fiction we pointed out was that LCOR’s “optional soccer field locations” were located on land with steep changes of grade and thus were costly and unrealistic options (and, of course, held out a promise LCOR itself wouldn’t be keeping. Allen Lew would be saddled with these unrealistic expectations.) One layout had a height differential of 9 feet between the two goals; another looked closer to 12 feet. Since LCOR’s own image had contour lines, this information was available to them. This was an intentional attempt to mislead – not a mistake based on ignorance.
The newest site plans show the soccer field relocated to a flatter area bordering Bon Secours where a swing set and play equipment are now located.
3. LCOR’s current site plans are premised on the assumption that the library’s driveway (which provided access to fewer than 10 parking spaces) will now serve as the sole vehicular access (for both entry and exit) to a 200+ car garage and loading dock area for a 174 unit apartment building. Given the facts that this curb cut is located on Wisconsin Avenue just south of the Wisconsin and Albemarle intersection and that it abuts St. Ann’s driveway, it seems unfathomable that DDOT would allow such an arrangement. More likely, the driveway would be relocated to the site LCOR previously proposed – the “green space” between Janney and the residential building. But such realism would interfere with the “no net loss of green space” claim and so it’s been excised.
LCOR’s claim that the pre-existence of this curb cut shields the project from DDOT’s oversight is specious. This project will require a PUD and the Zoning Commission will not allow the requisite upzoning without working out a different traffic plan.
FOIA RESULTS
We are in the midst of receiving and reviewing documents from DCPS that are belatedly being produced in response to a July 18th FOIA request. What we’ve learned thus far is that on September 8th, two days before the release of the MFP, Janney’s addition was moved to the end of the modernization queue and scheduled for 2014, a year after its classrooms were to be renovated.
Prior to September 8th, Anthony DeGuzman (DCPS/OOC) and Eric Lerum (DME) had recommended a 2010 date for Janney’s addition, with classroom renovations to follow in 2012 or 2013. These dates are consistent with the March 31st consultant’s draft of the MFP, and the proposed sequencing was a crucial element of the swing in place strategy. The addition would need to be available before the classrooms in the old building could be vacated for renovation.
On September 9th, once DeGuzman saw what happened to Janney, he pointed out that the school’s new place at the end of the queue violated the fundamental principles (e.g. rightsizing) articulated in this MFP: “Schools with lesser space needs have leapfrogged them. This contradicts the guiding principles.” He was told that the change was made “per DME.” We suspect that this means Reinoso personally, given that Lerum, Reinoso’s chief of staff, had been arguing for 2010 just a few days previously.
To put it bluntly, there is clear evidence that the decision to move Janney to the end of the queue was based on politics rather than principle and that the move was designed to accommodate the PPP. Michelle Rhee indicated on September 3rd that “Allen Lew is modifying the plan assuming a PPP for Janney.” There is no indication that prior plans made such an assumption.
The documents also show that DCPS (including Rhee’s office, Lew’s office, and Reinoso’s office) were unfamiliar with LCOR’s proposal when Mayor Fenty made his July 10th developer selection announcement. Yet DCPS reassured the Janney SIT that everything was under control and the school’s needs were being protected even as it scrambled internally to figure out who knew what, if anything, about the proposal.
We have not yet found any documents explaining when or why the decision was made to sever Janney’s modernization from the rest of the PPP. In late July, DMPED contemplated an arrangement in which LCOR would be a “fee developer” for the school.
And, once again, we see no evidence of any planning regarding facilities needs, land use, campus design, logistics, or swing space related to this project.
Once all of the documents have been delivered and analyzed, we will post the most significant ones and an explanatory timeline on the ANC website and on the listservs.
ACTION ITEMS:
1. AUDITOR – The Special Committee plans to renew its request to the DC Auditor to investigate DMPED’s decisionmaking regarding the disposition of public lands. Last Spring, in response to our submission, the Auditor acknowledged the importance of the issue, but said she lacked the resources to investigate because of her office’s heavy workload during the Council’s annual agency Oversight Hearings. We believe that new events and new evidence underline the increasingly urgent need for a comprehensive evaluation of deal-making involving public land. No Commission action is required on this item; any citizen has the right to request an audit.
2. ANC RESOLUTION ADDRESSED TO THE COUNCIL – The Special Committee suggests that the Commissioners adopt a resolution urging the Council to reassert its status as a co-equal branch of government and a steward of public lands by supporting CM Cheh and Brown’s call to abandon public-private partnership negotiations and to enable DCPL to commence rebuilding the Tenley-Friendship Branch and by moving legislation to reform Title X out of committee.
ANC 3E's Resolution Regarding the Tenley-Friendship Library and the Janney Elementary School Proposed Public-Private Development Project
WHEREAS, Council Members Kwame Brown and Mary Cheh have written a letter to the Mayor asking for the library rebuild to move forward immediately and the private development proposal for the site be dropped, yet have not received a response by their due date of November 7, 2008, and
WHEREAS, the Council Members’ lack of impact on the project signals that the Council’s status as a co-equal branch of the government is threatened, and
WHEREAS, the failure of the Mayor to end this extremely unpopular project has resulted in real harm to the community by causing a prolonged delay of the library rebuild,
THEREFORE, be it resolved that ANC 3E urges the Mayor to end negotiations for a public-private development project at this site and to authorize DCPL to move forward with its plans to rebuild the Tenley-Friendship, and
THEREFORE, be it resolved that ANC 3E urges the Council to re-establish its role as an effective steward of public lands by instructing the Mayor to stop wasting time and money on this project that is opposed by both the community and the Council Members who initially supported it, and
THEREFORE, be it resolved that ANC 3E further urges the Council to complete the work it has begun to reform Title X by moving a bill out of committee and passing legislation this term to ensure that surplussing decisions must be made by the Council before the Mayor and his agents are authorized to offer public land for sale or long-term lease.
Approved this day of November 13, 2008 by a vote of 3-1 with a proper quorum present of Commissioners.
Signed,
Amy McVey, Chairperson of the ANC 3E
WHEREAS, the Council Members’ lack of impact on the project signals that the Council’s status as a co-equal branch of the government is threatened, and
WHEREAS, the failure of the Mayor to end this extremely unpopular project has resulted in real harm to the community by causing a prolonged delay of the library rebuild,
THEREFORE, be it resolved that ANC 3E urges the Mayor to end negotiations for a public-private development project at this site and to authorize DCPL to move forward with its plans to rebuild the Tenley-Friendship, and
THEREFORE, be it resolved that ANC 3E urges the Council to re-establish its role as an effective steward of public lands by instructing the Mayor to stop wasting time and money on this project that is opposed by both the community and the Council Members who initially supported it, and
THEREFORE, be it resolved that ANC 3E further urges the Council to complete the work it has begun to reform Title X by moving a bill out of committee and passing legislation this term to ensure that surplussing decisions must be made by the Council before the Mayor and his agents are authorized to offer public land for sale or long-term lease.
Approved this day of November 13, 2008 by a vote of 3-1 with a proper quorum present of Commissioners.
Signed,
Amy McVey, Chairperson of the ANC 3E
What’s Up with the Tenleytown Public/Private Project?
originally published in the November 2nd edition of dcwatch's The Mail
In Thursday’s Examiner, Ward 3 Councilmember Cheh claims “It’s finished.” But in Friday’s Washington Business Journal, Deputy Mayor Neil Albert and LCOR both say the project is “moving forward.” Loose Lips declares that it’s now “officially a pissing match.” For those who haven’t been following the story, Mayor Fenty pulled the plug on DCPL’s long-delayed reconstruction of the Tenley-Friendship branch library last July. At that point, DCPL had already spent a year (and about $1 million dollars) for demolition, design, and approvals and was on track (and within budget) to break ground in three months and reopen the library by early 2010.
So why did Fenty, essentially, yank the shovel out of Ginnie Cooper’s hands as she was finally ready to rebuild our library? To enter into exclusive negotiations with LCOR that would enable private residential development on the parcel of public land that houses both the branch library and Janney Elementary School.
Ostensibly/originally, the rationale for this project was that it would speed Janney’s modernization. It was always clear that there was nothing in the deal for the library, whose airy design will be riddled with columns to support the apartments above and whose reopening will most likely be delayed until 2013 (it was closed in 2004). Janney was supposed to get new and better facilities sooner, yet none of the proposals that emerged from the competitive bidding process were able to effect that outcome. At this point, it looks as if all that the LCOR proposal will do for Janney is take away some of its campus and delay its modernization. As a result, the Janney SIT (which includes the school’s principal) has called for an end to PPP discussions. And Councilmembers Cheh and Brown (Chair of the Council’s Committee on Economic Development) have written a letter asking the mayor to let the library reconstruction move forward independently of any public-private deal.
So what’s it going to be? Will Mayor Fenty sacrifice our public facilities’ needs to line developers’ pockets? Councilmember Cheh’s odds of reelection hinge on his decision. After all, if she can’t protect a fully-funded branch library project and an award-winning but severely overcrowded elementary school from Neil Albert’s depredations, what good is she to Ward 3 residents? Cheh may have proven prescient last spring when, after receiving an award from the Humane Society, she said “if cats and dogs could vote, I’d be in great shape.” Pets don’t vote, but taxpayers, library patrons, and the parents of schoolchildren do. And it’s not just Cheh’s future that’s at stake. If the rest of the council fails to back up Cheh and Brown in this fight, all of the councilmembers are likely to see their power reduced to that of glorified ANC commissioners (albeit with six-figure salaries!).
Already the pattern is establishing itself. Fenty listens to the council when its members tell him what he wants to hear. So Cheh and Brown’s first letter on this project, which endorsed putting this piece of public land on the auction block, was embraced. Their second letter, pointing out that none of the submissions received in response to the RFP was acceptable, was ignored. Fenty chose one of those proposals anyway. When they reiterated that LCOR’s proposal was unacceptable, Albert ignored them once again. And when they asked the mayor to pull the plug on the deal, Albert went to the media to trumpet his refusal.
Long story short, unless there’s a real backlash from the council, the moral of this story is that the council can and will be ignored with impunity. Thus far, the only prerogative I’ve seen this council stand up for is their baseball tickets. It’s time — way past time — for councilmembers to reclaim their role as stewards of public land.
In Thursday’s Examiner, Ward 3 Councilmember Cheh claims “It’s finished.” But in Friday’s Washington Business Journal, Deputy Mayor Neil Albert and LCOR both say the project is “moving forward.” Loose Lips declares that it’s now “officially a pissing match.” For those who haven’t been following the story, Mayor Fenty pulled the plug on DCPL’s long-delayed reconstruction of the Tenley-Friendship branch library last July. At that point, DCPL had already spent a year (and about $1 million dollars) for demolition, design, and approvals and was on track (and within budget) to break ground in three months and reopen the library by early 2010.
So why did Fenty, essentially, yank the shovel out of Ginnie Cooper’s hands as she was finally ready to rebuild our library? To enter into exclusive negotiations with LCOR that would enable private residential development on the parcel of public land that houses both the branch library and Janney Elementary School.
Ostensibly/originally, the rationale for this project was that it would speed Janney’s modernization. It was always clear that there was nothing in the deal for the library, whose airy design will be riddled with columns to support the apartments above and whose reopening will most likely be delayed until 2013 (it was closed in 2004). Janney was supposed to get new and better facilities sooner, yet none of the proposals that emerged from the competitive bidding process were able to effect that outcome. At this point, it looks as if all that the LCOR proposal will do for Janney is take away some of its campus and delay its modernization. As a result, the Janney SIT (which includes the school’s principal) has called for an end to PPP discussions. And Councilmembers Cheh and Brown (Chair of the Council’s Committee on Economic Development) have written a letter asking the mayor to let the library reconstruction move forward independently of any public-private deal.
So what’s it going to be? Will Mayor Fenty sacrifice our public facilities’ needs to line developers’ pockets? Councilmember Cheh’s odds of reelection hinge on his decision. After all, if she can’t protect a fully-funded branch library project and an award-winning but severely overcrowded elementary school from Neil Albert’s depredations, what good is she to Ward 3 residents? Cheh may have proven prescient last spring when, after receiving an award from the Humane Society, she said “if cats and dogs could vote, I’d be in great shape.” Pets don’t vote, but taxpayers, library patrons, and the parents of schoolchildren do. And it’s not just Cheh’s future that’s at stake. If the rest of the council fails to back up Cheh and Brown in this fight, all of the councilmembers are likely to see their power reduced to that of glorified ANC commissioners (albeit with six-figure salaries!).
Already the pattern is establishing itself. Fenty listens to the council when its members tell him what he wants to hear. So Cheh and Brown’s first letter on this project, which endorsed putting this piece of public land on the auction block, was embraced. Their second letter, pointing out that none of the submissions received in response to the RFP was acceptable, was ignored. Fenty chose one of those proposals anyway. When they reiterated that LCOR’s proposal was unacceptable, Albert ignored them once again. And when they asked the mayor to pull the plug on the deal, Albert went to the media to trumpet his refusal.
Long story short, unless there’s a real backlash from the council, the moral of this story is that the council can and will be ignored with impunity. Thus far, the only prerogative I’ve seen this council stand up for is their baseball tickets. It’s time — way past time — for councilmembers to reclaim their role as stewards of public land.
CMs Cheh and Brown ask Mayor to abandon PPP
COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
1350 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE, N.W.
WASHINGTON, DC 20004
MARY M. CHEH
Councilmember, Ward 3
Council Committee on Public Sercies and Consumer Affairs
Office: 202-7244-8062
Fax: 202-724-8413
mcheh@dccouncil.us
Mayor Adrian M. Fenty
Government of the District of Columbia
John A. Wilson Building
1350 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20004
October 29, 2008
Dear Mayor Fenty:
Based upon all of the information presented to us and the views of the community, involved groups,, the developers, and District and ANC officials, we write to ask that you permit the Tenley Library to be build now and separate it from any possible mixed use, or public/private, development on the site.
At the same time, however, we ask that the Library's design be amended to include the structural supports necessary to permit development on top of the Library at a future date. That development could be residential, mixed-use, or even an increase in the size of the library. Our preliminary assessment is that such a modification would not be difficult and, although it will involve additional cost, that cost should be modest and manageable. In any event, the cost should be viewed as an investment in the future.
This approach will allow the library to move forward now, on its own timetable, with its design intact, and with monies already allocated.
As for the current LCOR proposal, we believe that it is fatally flawed; we cannot and will not support it. There are many reasons why we have reached this unsatisfactory place, but our lack of support relates to the LCOR proposal alone.
We still believe, as we have throughout, that the public interest lies in the comprehensive development of this site. There is an urgent need to have vibrant, mixed-use development along our main corridors and the Tenley site, which is located across the street from the subway, ought to be a key part of such development. We need energy and life along our corridors, and we need to make transit oriented development a priority.
Please let us know by next Friday, November 7, 2008, of your decision on allowing the library to go forward now, as modified with appropriate structural supports for future development. Thank you.
Best regards,
Mary M. Cheh
Councilmember, Ward 3
Kwame Brown
Councilmember, At-Large
cc: Neil Albert, Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development
Ginnie Cooper, Chief Libraries for the District of Columbia Public Library
LCOR
ANC 3E Commissioners
Kirk Rankin, Janney Elementary School SIT Chair
Dr. Karen Crews, Janney Elemenary School Principal
John Hill, DC Board of Library Trustees President
A signed copy of their October 29th letter is available at http://www.marycheh.com/Press%20Releases/Tenley-Janney.pdf
1350 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE, N.W.
WASHINGTON, DC 20004
MARY M. CHEH
Councilmember, Ward 3
Council Committee on Public Sercies and Consumer Affairs
Office: 202-7244-8062
Fax: 202-724-8413
mcheh@dccouncil.us
Mayor Adrian M. Fenty
Government of the District of Columbia
John A. Wilson Building
1350 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20004
October 29, 2008
Dear Mayor Fenty:
Based upon all of the information presented to us and the views of the community, involved groups,, the developers, and District and ANC officials, we write to ask that you permit the Tenley Library to be build now and separate it from any possible mixed use, or public/private, development on the site.
At the same time, however, we ask that the Library's design be amended to include the structural supports necessary to permit development on top of the Library at a future date. That development could be residential, mixed-use, or even an increase in the size of the library. Our preliminary assessment is that such a modification would not be difficult and, although it will involve additional cost, that cost should be modest and manageable. In any event, the cost should be viewed as an investment in the future.
This approach will allow the library to move forward now, on its own timetable, with its design intact, and with monies already allocated.
As for the current LCOR proposal, we believe that it is fatally flawed; we cannot and will not support it. There are many reasons why we have reached this unsatisfactory place, but our lack of support relates to the LCOR proposal alone.
We still believe, as we have throughout, that the public interest lies in the comprehensive development of this site. There is an urgent need to have vibrant, mixed-use development along our main corridors and the Tenley site, which is located across the street from the subway, ought to be a key part of such development. We need energy and life along our corridors, and we need to make transit oriented development a priority.
Please let us know by next Friday, November 7, 2008, of your decision on allowing the library to go forward now, as modified with appropriate structural supports for future development. Thank you.
Best regards,
Mary M. Cheh
Councilmember, Ward 3
Kwame Brown
Councilmember, At-Large
cc: Neil Albert, Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development
Ginnie Cooper, Chief Libraries for the District of Columbia Public Library
LCOR
ANC 3E Commissioners
Kirk Rankin, Janney Elementary School SIT Chair
Dr. Karen Crews, Janney Elemenary School Principal
John Hill, DC Board of Library Trustees President
A signed copy of their October 29th letter is available at http://www.marycheh.com/Press%20Releases/Tenley-Janney.pdf
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