Results are in for races to serve on the District’s Advisory Neighborhood commissions, the D.C. government’s lowest level of elected office.
The vote tallies, which are still unofficial, cover dozens of ANC contests in or near the Borderstan coverage area.
As of 12:26 a.m. today, the winners (in bold) are:
(Updated at 12:55 p.m.) More than 100 locals who live in or near the Borderstan coverage area are running for the lowest level of elected office in the D.C. government today.
In contested Advisory Neighborhood Commission races, we’re curious who got or will get your vote. You can weigh in through the polls below and in the comments.
(Updated at 5 p.m.) Community leaders in Adams Morgan have shot down a development team’s revised proposal to bring a nine-story residential building to a historic property just west of Meridian Hill Park.
Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C last night voted 6-1, with one abstention, to urge the District’s Historic Preservation Review Board to oppose a plan to redevelop the Meridian International Center grounds on 16th Street NW between Belmont Street and Crescent Place NW. The site includes the Meridian and White-Meyer houses, which were built between 1912 and 1919.
Designed by Jefferson Memorial architect John Russell Pope, the mansions won’t disappear under the proposal by Streetscape Partners and Westbrook Partners. Rather, a 110-unit residential complex would take over a parking area and other open land on the property.
The development team presented the plan at an ANC 1C meeting yesterday after more than a year working on alterations to a previous proposal that failed to win the commission’s approval and drew concerns from HPRB and locals over its size, among other issues.
(Updated at 4:25 p.m.) A developer has cleared a major hurdle in its quest to bring a seven-story, mixed-use building to the heart of Adams Morgan.
The District’s Historic Preservation Review Board this afternoon approved PN Hoffman’s plan to build on the SunTrust plaza and the rest of 1800 Columbia Road NW, despite significant opposition from community leaders on Adams Morgan’s Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C.
The developer, which needed the support of HPRB in order to begin construction, can’t start demolition on the bank property right away, however. HPRB gave its endorsement under the condition that PN Hoffman works with the panel to address its design critiques, including members’ calls to create a more exciting building for such a prominent location.
“It’s so compatible [with buildings in the neighborhood’s historic district] that it almost disappears,” HPRB member Rauzia Ally said at the meeting. “I just feel like this building deserves something that stands out a lot more than what is presented here. I feel like the design of it is lackluster.”
(Updated at 8:40 a.m. Oct. 14) Elected officials representing Adams Morgan this week unanimously approved a non-binding resolution that opposes the most recent attempt by a developer to construct a mixed-use building in the heart of the neighborhood.
Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C’s 6-0 vote on the measure Wednesday night came after a meeting in which almost all the locals in attendance criticized PN Hoffman’s plan to build on the SunTrust plaza and the rest of 1800 Columbia Road NW. D.C. agencies reviewing the developer’s proposal are mandated to give “great weight” to the resolution.
In an effort to address previous concerns from ANC 1C, the developer’s representatives at the meeting showed off new renderings that lowered sections of the building on 18th Street to five stories, reduced the development’s height by five feet and bulked up the front of the structure, cutting the size of its proposed plaza by five feet.
“It’s just too damn big for 18th Street,” ANC 1C chairman Ted Guthrie said.
A Borderstan story about the vote drew several comments that were supportive of PN Hoffman.
“[T]his is a very divided issue and at worst, the NIMBYS against this are an actual minority,” one commenter wrote under the alias “A.”
(Updated at 10:35 a.m. Friday) A developer looking to put in a new mixed-use building in the heart of Adams Morgan has failed again to pick up the support of a group of local officials representing the neighborhood.
In a 6-0 vote on a non-binding resolution last night, Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C for a second time opposed a PN Hoffman plan to build on the SunTrust plaza and the rest of 1800 Columbia Road NW. ANC 1C officially noted its anxieties with the project for the first time this past spring.
The unanimous vote came after the panel’s planning and zoning committee last month recommended that the full ANC continue its fight against PN Hoffman. Planning and zoning committee members said at the time they weren’t satisfied with revisions the developer made to the building’s aesthetic and size since the full ANC opposed the project in May and members of the District’s Historic Preservation Review Board expressed concerns about it in June.
A developer once again has failed to win over community leaders in its bid to put a new mixed-use building in the heart of Adams Morgan.
In a 2-1 vote last night, Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C’s planning and zoning committee recommended that the full ANC continue its fight against PN Hoffman’s plans to redevelop the SunTrust property at 1800 Columbia Road NW.
The panel’s decision came amid the developer’s campaign to garner the support of the District’s Historic Preservation Review Board, which must sign off on the project before construction can begin. Echoing concerns the ANC had about a previous version of the proposed building, HPRB members in June expressed dissatisfaction with the structure’s aesthetic and size.
PN Hoffman then revised its plans. But ANC members said yesterday they still weren’t satisfied.
A key Adams Morgan community leader told Borderstan today he is “heartened” by a developer’s decision to revamp its plans for a controversial mixed-use building in the heart of the neighborhood.
PN Hoffman last week withdrew a zoning application for the redevelopment of the SunTrust property (1800 Columbia Road NW), which the Adams Morgan Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C said had problems with height and scale. The developer, which has released new renderings for the project, is taking a “step in the right direction,” said ANC 1C commissioner JonMarc Buffa, who leads the commission’s planning and zoning committee.
“This is a huge win for the neighbors,” said Buffa, who called the developer’s previous proposal illegal. “As I have always said, I will support a project on this site if it complies with the law and addresses community concerns.”
To address concerns about its former plans for the SunTrust site, PN Hoffman lowered sections of the building on 18th Street to five stories, reduced the development’s height by five feet and bulked up the front of the structure, cutting the size of its proposed plaza by five feet, according to the developer.
PN Hoffman CEO Monty Hoffman said in a statement that his company works to bring a “balanced mix of thoughtful design and sensitivity to the neighborhoods.”
“We have done our very best to listen to all parties and optimize this site for the neighborhood accordingly, within the limits of regulations and commercial viability,” he said. “We believe our plans are a substantial improvement over what exists there today. We are honored to continue to be part of this community’s future.”
Buffa declined to comment on the specifics of PN Hoffman’s changes. But the ANC commissioner said he intends to share his opinions on them at his panel’s public meeting Wednesday night. Representatives of the developer are expected to attend.
“We need more details to fully understand this new iteration of the plans,” Buffa said.
Image via ANC 1C/PN Hoffman
Adams Morgan community leaders last night urged District transportation officials to consider whether two residential roads in the heart of the neighborhood could transform into one-way streets or benefit from other changes in the area to ease traffic congestion.
Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C unanimously approved a resolution that asks the District Department of Transportation to study the effects of ending two-way car travel or making other alterations to traffic on or near the 1800 blocks of Belmont and Kalorama roads NW.
The streets have “significant traffic volume, cut-through traffic, traffic noise, traffic accidents and dangerous conditions for pedestrians and cyclists,” according to the resolution. Drivers often side-swipe cars parked on the roads and “honk and engage in verbal and/or physical confrontations in their attempt to proceed through the blocks, disturbing residents at all hours of the night and early morning hours,” the measure notes.
Borderstan periodically publishes opinion pieces from our readers. Have something you want to share with Borderstan’s readers? Email us at [email protected].
by JonMarc Buffa
The proposed SunTrust plaza redevelopment by PN Hoffman is one of the most significant and consequential developments in Adams Morgan. However, the project clearly violates the law — both zoning regulations and historic preservation guidelines — and so must be significantly redesigned.
The project will forever transform the prominent corner of 18th Street and Columbia Road NW — the gateway to Adams Morgan. The project has rightly garnered significant media coverage and has energized neighbors unlike any project in memory. Many commentators have been very vocal when debating the merits of the SunTrust plaza’s public space. Undoubtedly, the SunTrust plaza is an important space and deserves protection. Yet, the debate over the future of the plaza has overshadowed the other important legal issues at stake here.
As one of the members of the Advisory Neighborhood Commission representing Adams Morgan (ANC 1C), I strongly support thriving development and economic growth in Adams Morgan. I am committed to ensuring that any development project is undertaken in a thoughtful manner that respects the special character of our community, which the citizens of Adams Morgan have strived so hard to build.
(Updated at 5:55 p.m. Aug. 21) The 2016 ballot for the lowest level of elected office in the D.C. government is now almost final.
More than 100 locals who live in or near the Borderstan coverage area have submitted nominating petitions to serve as members of the District’s Advisory Neighborhood commissions. They had until yesterday to collect the signatures of 25 of their neighbors in their single member districts and bring the paperwork to the D.C. Board of Elections.
But before the ANC candidates officially can get on the ballot, they must make it through a petition challenge period, which lasts until Aug. 22.
The candidates for the Nov. 8 general election for now include:
Locals are meeting at the SunTrust plaza in Adams Morgan this weekend as part of a campaign to “save” the site for the community, according to an organizer.
Adams Morgan residents with the “Save Our Plaza” group are set to host a public forum on the spot at 1800 Columbia Road NW tomorrow to share information about PN Hoffman’s plan for it, 39-year-old organizer Vikram Surya Chiruvolu told Borderstan. The developer is looking to build a mixed-use building on the site and eliminate at least some of the open space currently there, angering some locals.
The gathering will come on the heels of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C’s votes against the developer’s proposal in May and Historic Preservation Review Board members’ vocal frustration about the plan last month. Members of both panels expressed concern about the aesthetics and size of the proposed building, which some of them said was too large for the property.
“After the recent ANC & HPRB victories opposing this development, we felt the time was right to hold space to bring together community and to each share what we know to this point,” Chiruvolu said in an email. “It’s not going to be fancy — just neighbors gathering and sharing and connecting in a public space.”
The newest proposal to redevelop a building and pedestrian plaza in the heart of Adams Morgan has failed to win over a key community leader.
Billy Simpson, a member of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C, told Borderstan yesterday that he still was unsatisfied with property developer PN Hoffman’s plan to build a mixed-use building on the SunTrust site at 1800 Columbia Road NW. Updated construction plans PN Hoffman released this week do not address his concerns about the size of the building and the space set aside for a plaza, among other issues, he said.
Simpson in May joined other ANC commissioners in approving three non-binding resolutions that detailed “significant issues” with height and scale, noted that the proposed building “significantly undermines the long-established set-back and the plaza” and raised other concerns about the project.
“The revised plans fail to address the core issues articulated in ANC 1C’s resolutions,” he said.
Redevelopment plans for the SunTrust building and its plaza in the heart of Adams Morgan are set to change again, following criticism from neighborhood leaders.
Developer PN Hoffman is looking to revise “some of the exterior design elements” for its proposed six-story, mixed-use building at 1800 Columbia Road NW, Commissioner Billy Simpson of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C said in an email to locals yesterday.
Simpson in his email didn’t elaborate on what would change. But he said PN Hoffman intends to release its updated plans before the D.C. Historic Preservation Review Board holds a meeting on the developer’s proposal June 23.
Jon Amar, a PN Hoffman spokesman, confirmed that the developer is making revisions. But he declined to discuss the changes at this time.
ANC 1C backed three resolutions that opposed the project earlier this month. The non-binding resolutions detailed “significant issues” with height and scale and noted that the proposed building “significantly undermines the long-established set-back and the plaza,” among other problems.
The opposition came despite changes PN Hoffman announced in April to make a revamped plaza for the property bigger than the developer initially intended and to address other concerns from locals.
(Updated at 6:25 a.m. Friday) A group of local officials representing Adams Morgan has refused to get behind a property developer’s proposal to construct a mixed-use building that takes away part of a plaza in the heart of the neighborhood.
In a series of votes late last night, Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1C backed three resolutions opposing PN Hoffman’s plan to build on the SunTrust plaza and the rest of 1800 Columbia Road NW.
The non-binding resolutions, to which D.C. agencies are mandated to give “great weight,” say the proposed six-story building has “significant issues” with height and scale and “significantly undermines the long-established set-back and the plaza,” among other problems.
