The Historic Preservation Review Board has rejected the landmark application for the National Permanent Building at 1775 Pennsylvania Ave NW, according to Dupont ANC Commissioner Jack Jacobson. In doing so, they have gone against their staff recommendation and sided with the Dupont ANC, which passed a resolution opposing the landmarking.

HPRB has several new members appointed by Mayor Fenty, several of whom generated opposition from preservation groups. Many predicted that HPRB would take a more development-friendly turn as a result. Previously, HPRB almost never overruled its staff recommendations and rarely agreed with the ANC.

However, we should avoid drawing too many conclusions from this case. The owners of the building already began their renovation before the landmark application was filed, and several of the elements important to the application are already gone. The renovation will make the building LEED Silver compliant, a high standard of efficiency, and the ANC argued that any remaining historic value of the building should not trump the importance of energy conservation. I don’t yet know the Board members’ stated reasons for their votes or even who voted which way (I was out of town and unable to go to the meeting) but I’ll post more as I find out.

Update: I’m told that the Board’s reasons centered primarily around the already-in-progress changes that removed many historic elements, as I suspected.

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Tagged: anc, dc, downtown dc, government, historic preservation, preservation

David Alpert created Greater Greater Washington in 2008 and was its executive director until 2020. He formerly worked in tech and has lived in the Boston, San Francisco Bay, and New York metro areas in addition to Washington, DC. He lives with his wife and two children in Dupont Circle.