Rachel Sadon
Proposed short term housing at 700 Delaware Avenue SW in Ward 6 (Courtesy of D.C. government)
Mayor Muriel Bowser has pledged to make closing the dilapidated family shelter at D.C. General a priority for her administration, and she released a plan today that could accomplish that feat by 2018.
Homelessness in D.C. is up 11 percent since 2011, with families hit particularly hard; family homelessness rose 29 percent in that four-year period. Conditions at D.C.’s family shelter attracted widespread criticism after the disappearance of 8-year-old Relisha Rudd two years ago. Starting in the spring, the administration began offering year-round shelter to families to lessen the backlog during the winter. But the city has long been stymied in its goal to replace D.C. General with smaller shelters.
Amid a debate over the necessity of private bathrooms, the D.C. Council approved a plan to close D.C. General in November. Now, the mayor will submit legislation this week that proposes seven family shelters and one women’s shelter spread out across all eight wards.
Currently, there are more than 250 families (including 400 children) at D.C. General. The proposed family shelters are significantly smaller, accommodating between 30 and 50 families. With the goal of D.C. General closing entirely by the fall/winter of 2018, the new shelters are slated to be completed between January and September of that year.
The exception is in Ward 2, where a women’s shelter is in the process of being developed. That facility, which will accommodate up to 213 women at a time, is scheduled to open this year.
D.C. Councilmembers expressed widespread support for the general plan at a meeting this morning, though they raised some specific concerns. Most notably, Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie requested the administration choose a different site for the shelter proposed for Ward 5. “I think the approach and strategy is a good one, but in terms of the location, it presents a host of challenges for Langdon Park and Woodridge South,” he said, citing the “over-concentration” of services already there (which include a men’s shelter on New York Avenue, the Adams Place shelter, and the Virginia Williams Center). In a statement later, he added: “The saturation of services in any one ward, let alone a few neighborhoods, is unfair to the communities that surround those facilities.
Others asked about how the dispersal of sites would affect schoolchildren and employment opportunities. “Some sites are more challenged in terms of transportation getting to work, some are close to Metro, some are not. Some are only on one bus line, some are on multiple,” said At-large Councilmember Elissa Silverman.
Director of the Department of Human Services Laura Zeilinger responded that employment services are a focus of their plan, but said that the challenges (and expense) of ensuring that all sites would be near a Metro station were too difficult to overcome. “If we were making sure they’re all close to a Metro, we would not be sitting here with a real plan,” she said. While it costs $17 million annually to operate D.C. General, it will cost $22 million a year to replace it, according to the administration’s estimates.
Still, the overarching sentiment of the Council was cautious optimism that this plan would finally be the one to work. “Altogether, this is the most hopeful I have ever been,” Ward 3’s Mary Cheh said, before noting that this is just one aspect of issues surrounding homelessness.
Others commended the plan’s focus on ensuring that each neighborhood plays a role. “My constituents were like, ‘Oh we’ll definitely get one, plus probably two or three more in Ward 7,'” Councilmember Yvette Alexander said about fears when the plan was initially being discussed. “I commend you for equally distributing the shelters throughout the city. Everyone has to play their part.”
Leaders from the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness and the National Alliance to End Homelessness also expressed support, as did Julián Castro, the secretary of US Housing & Urban Development Department.
Community meetings are planned in each ward on Thursday from 6:30-8:30 p.m. to discuss the proposals.
“When our most vulnerable experience homelessness, we all suffer,” Bowser said. “That is why we focused on an all-eight-Wards solution. By opening up dignified, safe and effective facilities across the city, we all get to play a role in lifting our neighbors out of homelessness—and helping them get back to a place they can call home.”
