DC’s Greenleaf public housing complex is set for redevelopment. We will cover what happens.

In the 80-plus years since the American public housing system was established by the federal government, it has gone from serving as a safety net to establish living standards to something far more dysfunctional. Between federal disinvestment and local bureaucratic failures, public housing has since fallen into varying states of disrepair which, in most cases, has only accumulated over the years.

As the District has risen to become a model of fiscal solvency, it has also gained a reputation for being a glaring example of gentrification and displacement. Long-time residents earning less than 50% of area median income (the federal benchmark for “very low-income” households) have found their foothold in the city to be increasingly precarious.

More recently, amid methodical public- and private-sector investment in the city kicked off by Mayor Anthony Williams’s tenure, DC and the DC Housing Authority (DCHA) have attempted to revive the city’s public housing portfolio using various strategies, from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) HOPE IV program to the localized New Communities Initiative. However, most of these projects have served more as cautionary tales rather than success stories.

That brings us to Greenleaf Gardens.

Greenleaf is a 493-unit public housing development in Southwest, spanning five clusters across 15 acres from First to Third Streets between Eye and N Streets. In close proximity to a grocery store, a Metro stop away from Nationals Park, less than a mile from Audi Field, and a free shuttle ride away from the still-burgeoning Wharf, it sits on some of the city’s most prime real estate in one of its most rapidly-developing neighborhoods. And its residents have anxiously observed this development encroaching toward their doorsteps.

Unsurprisingly, there have been a few efforts in the past decade to jump-start redevelopment of this community, none of which got far off the ground. In the meantime, the property has deteriorated considerably since its construction amid Urban Renewal in 1959. Lead paint, poor air quality, and antiquated plumbing are among the persistent issues residents have been subjected to, along with the occasional violence that tends to simmer when neighborhood politics intersect with the frustrations of poverty and substandard living conditions.

Now, DCHA, under new leadership, is putting its muscle behind making Greenleaf’s redevelopment a top priority.

Since Executive Director Tyrone Garrett’s appointment in 2017, DCHA underwent an audit of each of the 41 sites and over 7,000 units under its purview. This process brought to light the impacts of years of patchwork maintenance and a nationwide decline in HUD funds for public housing, while creating a sense of urgency around turning the city’s public housing around.

DCHA released a Transformation Plan last summer which calls for a phased approach to make each of the Authority’s properties livable and self-sufficient. In total, the Agency estimates that repositioning will cost at least $1.3 billion over the next 10 years, or $2.2 billion over the next 17 years, requiring partnerships with the private sector and a greater financial commitment from the city.

Thus far, the city has allocated an additional $24.5 million to DCHA to enable updates at four properties, although the Council has remained skeptical leading up to this spring’s budget hearings.

The plans also culminated in the release of a request for proposals (RFP) last April in search of a co-developer to enable a mixed-use, mixed-income redevelopment of the Greenleaf site that integrates non-profit service providers and includes one-for-one replacement units for each of the existing households.

All applicant teams were asked to identify build-first site(s) for the redevelopment, enabling the replacement units to be constructed prior to demolition of the original site and minimizing displacement for the current residents. The replacement units would continue to be subsidized as public housing.

Best and final offers were requested from four finalist teams last fall, and the review panel is expected to select a co-developer towards the end of this summer. At a community meeting last July, Garrett and other DCHA personnel told Greenleaf residents that they expect the build-first portion of the redevelopment to take place within 3-5 years.

However, although residents of Greenleaf are unsurprised that their community is up for redevelopment, there remains an understandable amount of trepidation that they may experience the same disruption, displacement, and disregard experienced by former residents of other public housing communities citywide as far back as Arthur Capper/Carrollsburg and Temple Courts to as recently as Barry Farms and, potentially, Park Morton.

It is for this reason that Greater Greater Washington is endeavoring to dive deep on Greenleaf Gardens: how it came to be in its current state, what its residents have been through, and how redevelopment is expected to take place.

By spending the next six months closely examining the course of this community, it is our hope to help facilitate a more transparent process for this development and to highlight the importance of inclusive and responsible development in a community that exemplifies an ideal opportunity for DC to protect its most vulnerable residents.