A little older, and a little wiser, where is GGWash going in 2021?

A few weeks ago, the GGWash publication quietly had its 13th birthday. Like most quarantine birthdays it passed without much fanfare, but it marks the end of a really important year for us, and we wanted to take some time to let you know what we’ve been up to, and how you can help us succeed this year.

We are small, but our community makes us mighty

In 2020, despite incredibly challenging circumstances, you all contributed nearly $100,000 to support our fight for a greater Washington region. Thank you! These contributions made so much possible, including the hiring of Libby Solomon, our new full-time writer and editor.

Your donations directly support the publication and overall organizational management, but our policy and advocacy team accomplished some amazing things too. It’s always hard to summarize a year’s worth of work into a few blog posts, but here are some of Greater Greater Washington’s accomplishments last year that our staff were particularly proud of and wanted to highlight.

• We published nearly 1,000 articles (including Breakfast links) about regional public policy and the built environment that were viewed over 3 million times. Some highlights from the year are here. In 2020, 115 of you all wrote for the publication and almost a quarter of you contributed for the first time!
• Last fall, our Elections Committee made endorsements in 112 local races, including elections for advisory neighborhood commissioners and councilmembers in the District, as well as the Arlington County Board. 68% of our endorsed candidates were elected into office. We are building real power for better urbanism in the Washington region, and we are excited to support newly elected leaders to advance frequent, reliable transportation and more housing, and more affordable housing, in their neighborhoods.
• Our policy team coordinated the convening and launch of a new coalition of direct service and advocacy groups, the DC Transportation Equity Network, that will work to establish an organized voice for transportation equity in DC. We also mobilized over 100 residents to participate in the process of amending the District’s Comprehensive Plan, to support more housing and more affordable housing, particularly in affluent neighborhoods.
• Despite the overwhelming churn of the news cycle last year, our publication found a great niche as we pivoted to address the pandemic. All year we focused on connections between urbanism and the challenges we’ve all been facing in our daily lives. This led to great articles about the complexities of social distancing, and how the pandemic hit some communities harder, which drew out the connections between urbanist issues, COVID-19, and equity for all people.

Last fall we also bid a fond farewell to our incredible founder, David Alpert. We’ve been focusing internally on setting future leadership up for success, and are in the midst of wrapping up interviews to determine who will help guide GGWash through the next chapter of our organizational journey. We will have more information on what’s next soon. For now, we’ve got a big year ahead of us, and we hope you’ll join us in our fight for the future of the Washington region.

Can we count on your support?

There are big challenges and opportunities ahead in 2021

It’s a new year, and though we are all still living through a pandemic, there are so many exciting things happening across the region that we want to write about.

Regionally, we want to publish more content on housing and housing affordability, keep tabs on how different jurisdictions continue to respond to the challenges of the pandemic and economic recovery, and cover how transportation planning continues to evolve.

In Arlington, the county is conducting a missing middle housing study, which has important ramifications for the future racial and economic inclusivity of Arlington, and our region.

In Tysons, officials and developers are trying to tackle how to build out a vibrant multi-use community as the pandemic accelerates changes in how people live and work.

In Montgomery County, local activists have been instrumental in making changes to how street space is allocated. How will these spaces fair in the coming months and how can they support equitable economic recovery? What’s next for the county now that the council has overturned the housing moratorium?

In DC, beyond all of our usual interests in land-use, zoning, historic preservation, parking, bus lanes, and other fascinating aspects of the built environment. We are looking at an unexpected budget surplus. How will the city choose to spend it?

Additionally, we are continuing to grapple with the fallout from the attempted insurrection at the Capitol last month. What we witnessed raises many questions about the nature of public space, the purpose of security theater, DC’s lack of federal representation, and of course, the role of police in our society.

Federally, we have a new pro-transit administration in the White House, but what will that mean for urbanism? Can increased federal funding save our struggling transit systems and aid in the national struggle to reallocate street space? How can the administration’s proposal to address the racist legacy of highway construction actually ensure equitable outcomes?

We want to be able to write about all this and more in the publication, but we are going to need your support. Will you join our fight for a more equitable and sustainable future for our region?

Will you join the GGWash Neighborhood?

Our Neighbors are critical to our success.

Last year, you all helped us thrive through an incredibly difficult time, and this year we need your support more than ever.

If you’ve donated to support our work before, thank you so much. This year, will you increase your impact by setting up a recurring monthly donation? Monthly donations give us a predictable, stable source of revenue throughout the year, and this year we need 130 new monthly donors to set the publication up for success.

If you’ve never given before, please make this your year to start actively supporting our push for a more sustainable and equitable Washington region. We’re counting on the support of 200 new Neighbors and we hope you’ll be one of them!

The average GGWash Neighbor gives $10 a month, but we hope you’ll give what you can afford. Thank you so much for reading our publication!