Potomac Gardens

During my first five years in the District, I lived near the Potomac Avenue Metro station in a neighborhood known as Hill East. Though more modest than Eastern Market, which was only blocks away, the area had a nice mix of new and longtime residents, young and old, and black and white.

But like many other “transitional” neighborhoods, Hill East saw its fair share of crime, much of which was discussed, debated and dissected on two extremely active local listservs. The discussions ranged from mere warnings to frustrated demands for more police activity — and, as I reported here two years ago, even a somewhat outlandish demand that residents march on Potomac Gardens, a housing project located at 13th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue SE, where many local criminals were said to live or seek temporary refuge.

A recent series of crimes in the neighborhood has again placed residents on edge, and many are pointing their fingers at Potomac Gardens. In the last two weeks, there have been two unprovoked assaults and a shooting within a block of the housing project, and witnesses claim that suspects from each of the incidents escaped into the bleak confines of the project’s buildings. Earlier this summer, a large drug ring operating out of the project was broken up. (Full disclosure: I was robbed at gunpoint a few years back by four kids who ducked into Potomac Gardens; only one was caught, though charges were never brought.) So much concern was raised in the wake of the recent incidents that D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier posted a response to one listserv yesterday, promising to dedicate more resources to making area residents safer. The Hill is Home and Prince of Petworth both focus on the crimes and the outcry in recent posts.

But while additional police officers may tamp down on crime temporarily, some residents remain concerned that unless Potomac Gardens is made a focus of the city’s efforts, incidents like those over the past two weeks will simply keep happening.