A chat with DC Council candidate Robert White

Robert White, previous counsel to congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, is challenging at-large incumbent Vincent Orange for his seat on the DC Council in the democratic primary this June. He has some “out of the box” ideas on housing affordability, economic opportunity and transportation for DC.

White joined the at-large race in late 2015, months after opponent David Garber announced his campaign. In a recent interview with Greater Greater Washington, he points to his legislative and work experience, and the support network he built during his at-large campaign in 2014 when he finished fourth in a pack of 15.

“Our campaign in 2014 left people with, I think, a positive feeling about me and so we have a very good start this time around,” he says.

White has a self-described out-of-the-box approach to many of DC’s challenges, including housing affordability, economic opportunity, and transportation.

On housing affordability: it’s personal

”[My father] stretched every dollar to send me to a Catholic school to give me opportunities that he didn’t have but, as DC got more and more expensive, he couldn’t afford to hang in there,” says White. “Now my father, who is the proudest Washingtonian you would ever meet, looks at DC from his balcony in Prince George’s County.”

While it may not get his father back into the District, White presents a three-facet approach to addressing the issue of affordability: enforcing inclusionary zoning requirements, studying additional residential development in underperforming commercial corridors, and transforming underutilized downtown commercial space into housing.

“I’m going to enforce the inclusionary units for new developments,” he says on the first point. “We can’t keep letting people off the hook and not building affordable housing when we do these developments.”

Asked for examples of developments that skirted the requirements, White says there are “many” and points to the “massive new buildings” that are going up in booming neighborhoods like Navy Yard and NoMa.

“I don’t think that there is a percentage of affordable housing that is sufficient for the size of those developments,” he says.

On his second point, White says underperforming corridors along sections of Georgia Avenue NW and Martin Luther King Jr Avenue SE, for example, could benefit from added housing, both new development and additional dwelling units on existing properties.

“We have to look at all ways to increase housing options in order to push down the cost of housing,” he says, emphasising that any additional housing in these areas would be dependent on neighborhood support.

Councilmember Orange sponsored a bill that would prohibit pop-ups or other accessory dwelling units in April 2015. More recently, he proposed building 1,000 600 square foot houses across DC for young buyers, which has been criticized by many.

“The incumbent is running around talking about a gimmick solution to affordable housing, while real people are losing their house by the day for developments that they won’t realistically be a part of when they’re done,” says White. “I think that it’s time we start to take these issues with the seriousness that they deserve.”

To his third point, White sees underutilized commercial buildings in downtown as opportunities to build more transit-oriented housing in the center of the District.

In addition to his three-pronged plan to add housing in the District, White also believes in preserving existing affordable housing. He says it’s more difficult to to build new affordable units than keep them.

On economic opportunity: local business

White wants to see more opportunities for local residents through encouraging and supporting local business rather than big corporations like Walmart.

“I’d like to see a more targeted approach, where we are tying DC tax dollars to local businesses that can provide the amenities and services that neighborhoods need specifically, and always contingent on hiring DC residents and serving those communities,” he says.

This complements his idea to add housing in underperforming corridors around the District. More residents could generate more economic activity for local businesses in these areas.

White criticizes the DC government’s deal with Walmart to build two stores east of the Anacostia that fell apart in January.

“A large part of how Walmart got support in this city was by promising fresh food options in an area of the city that was starved for it,” he says. “But I don’t think we needed Walmart in order to accomplish that. If we incentivise businesses to go where they are not necessarily going organically, we can accomplish that same goal using local businesses.”

“There are plenty of people, residents in Wards 7 and 8, that would jump at the chance to be a business owner and part of the solution in their own communities,” says White.

On transportation: prioritize a reliable, multimodal network

Metro’s poor reliability, fixing potholes and creating a unified bike lane network are tenets of White’s transportation vision for the District.

“The capital city, I think, can do much better than an increasingly unreliable rail system, congested streets that are full of potholes and fragmented bike lanes,” he says. “All reliable modes of transportation have to be prioritized.”

Returning to his support for local business, White uses his neighborhood of Brightwood Park as an example of an area that could benefit from more reliable transit, like a Circulator bus line, for both residents and to bring more potential customers to the section of upper Georgia Avenue.

“We have an opportunity to both attack our transportation infrastructure needs to solve, not only our transportation problem, but also as a job training and career programme,” he says. “We have a win-win if we’re willing to prioritize it.”

While White talks about a unified bike lane network, he skirts the controversy over the proposed north-south protected bike lane between 5th Street NW and 9th Street NW. A number of churches along 6th Street NW have come out against the lane, elevating the issue to one of affordability, gentrification, and changing neighborhoods.

“I think we can build a safe and reliable bike network without displacing people or making them feel like they’re not part of the city’s priorities,” he says when asked about the controversy. “So we have to keep working.”