Police Districts and PSAs Changing in Borderstan Area

From Matty Rhoades

Police Chief Cathy Lanier’s June 9 presentation at the MPD’s Third District headquarters gave area residents a first chance to comment on the city’s plans for revised police districts.

The proposed new Second and Third District maps show changes for the Dupont, Logan and U Street neighborhoods. There will be some shifting of territory between the districts, but the bigger changes are in Police Service Areas (PSAs) within the districts.

“The district boundaries are set. We are working on the PSA boundaries,” Lanier told the attendees at the Third District meeting on V Street NW. She said they hoped the changes would be in place by the end of the year.

The Second District meeting is scheduled for Wednesday night, June 22.

What’s Changing?

Close to home, there are changes in the boundaries of the Second and Third Districts. A bit of history is in order. In 2007 MPD took what used to be known as PSA 306 and put it in the Second District as PSA 208. The Second District is headquartered in upper Northwest at 3320 Idaho Avenue NW while the Third District is at 1620 V Street NW. With the changes, much of this area will go back to the Third District.

Here is how the proposed PSAs look as of now:

• MPD is creating several news PSAs in the area so that there are no more “Super PSAs,” such as the current 208.
• The most noticeable change is the creation of PSA 301, which runs from Q Street north to Florida Avenue and from 14th Street west to 18th Street NW. This PSA incorporates a big chunk of PSA 208 plus pieces of PSAs 303, 305 and 307.

• PSA 301 divides the 17th Street commercial strip into two districts and thus two PSAs. North of Q Street is in PSA 301 while south of Q is in PSA 208.
• PSA 305 is smaller and is now truly a U Street corridor service area. The eastern/northeastern chunk with Howard University is put into the new PSA 306. The new district runs from 7th to 14th Streets and from S Street on the south north to Florida Avenue/Barry Place NW.
• An additional chunk of PSA 307 (Logan Circle) is moved to PSA 208 (and the Second District). This territory runs from 14th Street west to 15th Street and from L Street north to Q Street. However, most of the territory in PSA 208 south of M Street NW goes to PSA 207.
• The change along 14th Street NW will not, according to Lanier, affect the addresses on the west side of 14th Street that are south of Q Street NW. This means that this part of the 14th Street commercial corridor south of Q will remain in PSA 307 — but the commercial corridor on the 1400 block of P Street will move to PSA 208.
• A fairly large chunk on the northern side of the Third District, north of Harvard and Monroe Streets NW is slated to go to the Fourth District.

Behind the Changes

Lanier said that shifting crime patterns and explosive development and population growth in areas close to downtown — including the Borderstan area — made it necessary to redraw the seven district boundaries and shift resources. The goal is to even out the workload between districts and to create new boundaries that reflect current population and development trends, she said.

“Within the last five years, D.C. has added 15,000 new residents and 26,000 more office workers within three miles of downtown,” Lanier said. She said that when drawing the new boundaries they took into account project growth in the city so that the boundaries could, hopefully, stay the same for five to seven years.