The D.C. General Hospital building, which is now used as a homeless shelter. Photo via Google Street View.

The D.C. Council unanimously passed a homeless shelter plan designed to close the dilapidated family shelter at D.C. General on a second vote today. Unlike the contentious first vote, this one came with the mayor’s blessing and much less drama.

“Today marks a milestone in our shared commitment to provide homeless families clean, safe, and dignified housing,” Mayor Muriel Bowser said in a statement. “With the debate now behind us, I look forward to working with neighbors across the District to build replacement facilities that we can all be proud of, and that reflect the best of who we are as a society.”

The Council first voted on a revised plan two weeks ago, which was a significant departure from Bowser’s proposal. It sought to relocate the facilities proposed in Wards 3, 5, and 6 to city-owned land, and purchase rather than lease the sites in Wards 1 and 4.

Today’s bill made a handful of changes to that plan, the most significant of which was changing the location of the Ward 6 site.

Bowser originally proposed leasing land for the Ward 6 site adjacent to the Blind Whino event space at 700 Delaware Avenue SW. After neighbors blasted it as an ‘unholy match’, the Council proposed a city-owned plot at 2nd and K Street NW. That, too, came under fire because of a complicated zoning situation (essentially it would take approval from several federal agencies). The final plan the Council passed today relocates the Ward 6 site to 850 Delaware Avenue SW, a District-owned parcel that is just up the road from the original site. It is currently home to a Unity Health Care clinic, which the city plans to rebuild.

The Council’s original plan proposed two alternatives to a Ward 5 site that residents decried as totally unfit for children, settling today on the former MPD Youth Division at 1700 Rhode Island Avenue NE. “While the location is not perfect, I am confident that given our continued investment in the neighborhood and the Rhode Island Avenue corridor, it will be a welcoming home for our homeless families,” Ward 5 Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie said on the dais. The other site, the Penn Center in Eckington, is slated to be used as “swing space” for the Martin Luther King Jr. Library renovation, according to McDuffie.

Those changes, as well as other language to allow for more flexibility for the number of units built in Wards 3 and 5, “reflect discussions that have taken place between the executive, my office, and the ward members for the appropriate sites,” said Council Chairman Phil Mendelson, adding that it represents a “collaborative process.”

Indeed, after all the back and forth, the administration seems to have made peace with the plan, which would replace D.C. General with six new shelters and another temporary shelter (at 1433 and 1435 Spring Road NW) with a seventh facility.

These are the final sites, and the departure from Bowser’s original plan:

• Ward 1: 2105 10th Street NW (to be purchased rather than leased)
• Ward 3: 3320 Idaho Avenue NW (moved from a private site to city-owned land)
• Ward 4: 5505 Fifth Street NW (to be purchased rather than leased)
• Ward 5: 1700 Rhode Island Avenue NE (moved from a private site to city-owned land)
• Ward 6: 850 Delaware Avenue SW (moved from a private site to city-owned land)
• Ward 7: 5004 D Street SE
• Ward 8: 4200 6th Street SE