Monthly Archives: February 2015

February 25 ANC 5A Meeting Wrapup

Posted by nextstoprp in ANC 5A

The February 25, 2015, ANC 5A meeting was a long one.

  • ANC business
  • Police report
  • Verizon
  • ANC Budget
  • Potomac Charter presentation
  • Transition plan for CAPCS

The commission voted to approve the 2015 budget pending certain changes and agreed to post the budget to its website.

Police report

The commission decided to combine the PSA 405 meeting with the ANC meeting because people rarely attend PSA meetings. Lieutenant Michelle Ridlehoover attended with Officer Lucas. Lt. Ridlehoover mentioned the crew-related homicide on 12th Street and Emerson Street NE, but did not share too much information because the shooting was not random and involved suspects known to Fourth District police.

The officers also shared news of the new marijuana law in effect in the District. They did not pretend to know all of the nuances of the law and we will not either, but the big things to know from Lt. Ridlehoover: no retail buying or selling, no smoking in public, and definitely no smoking on federal property.  That includes Fort Totten and Fort Circle Parks.

One interesting point the officers raised when discussing burglaries in Brookland is that property managers of multi-unit buildings can share keys with officers so that they can patrol the building if there is concern about an outbreak in crime.

Verizon report

Mario Acosta-Velez, Director of Government Affairs for Verizon, attended to address the widespread phone outage that occurred in late 2014. He also shared that Verizon is in the middle of its 10 year, three-phase FIOS deployment plan. Deployment is based on central office service area. This neighborhood is served by the Brookland central office, with deployment scheduled for the final phase to be completed by 2019. He also noted that multi-unit buildings require a separate agreement. Even after FIOS service is deployed to an area, a resident in a multi-unit building cannot call Verizon for FIOS service unless that building has a FIOS agreement with Verizon. If residents have any issues they would like Verizon to address, he can assist at (202) 515-2580.

Introduction of Director of African-American Affairs

Rahman Branch, the newly appointed Director of African-American Affairs, introduced himself to the community. Branch is a former principal of Ballou High School. He shared that the purpose of this newly created office is to advocate on behalf of concerns of African-American residents in the District.  He highlighted the mayor’s budget transparency initiative, inviting residents to participate in the budget engagement forums.

Potomac Preparatory Public Charter School

Melody Giles, Parent Engagement Events Coordinator for Potomac Preparatory Public Charter School (4401 8th Street NE), invited commissioners to the school as part of the conditions for the school to obtain its new charter.  Giles shared that the school (formerly Potomac Lighthouse) has new management and changed its curriculum from arts and fusion to STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and math).

Report from Councilmember McDuffie’s Office

Councilmember McDuffie recently hired another constituent services coordinator, Wesley Dawson. For any concerns, he can be reached at (202) 727-8274 or wdawson@dccouncil.us.

Councilmember McDuffie’s Deputy Chief of Staff Ronan Gulstone shared a number of opportunities to testify before the council regarding metro safety issues.  Find out more on the councilmember’s website.

Gulstone also shared the transition plan for the Dorothy I Height Community Academy Public Charter School (CAPCS), which had its charter revoked by the DC Public Charter School Board. CAPCS has four schools, one located at 33 Riggs Road NE (Keene campus). According to a letter from the Deputy Mayor for Education (DME), DC Bilingual Public Charter School will relocate to the Keene campus and accept a limited number of Keene students. That announcement set off a protracted discussion of the District’s process for handling traditional public school buildings and charter schools and the perceived lack of communication to or consideration for the affected ANC. Commissioner Sandi Washington noted DC Bilingual was one of the charter schools vying for the Mamie D. Lee school building (110 Gallatin Street NE), which was awarded by the outgoing DME to Bridges and Briya Public Charter School in December 2014. ANC 5A formally opposed that selection. Gulstone stated Councilmember McDuffie has worked with the commission to have its concerns articulated to the DME.

Miscellaneous items

Arcadia Food will have a mobile market at Providence Hospital every Friday, 11:00 am – 2:00 pm, during the months of May to October to provide healthy food for residents at an affordable price.

The commissioners briefly mentioned that WMATA presented on the joint development proposal for the park-and-ride lot at Fort Totten metro station at ANC 5A’s executive committee meeting. Two proposals were submitted for the joint development; a developer will be selected soon.

March 21: Save the date for public open house on the MBT

Posted by nextstoprp in Transportation and tagged with

We anticipate there will be a meeting in ANC 5A, but in the meantime save the date for March 21 in ANC 4B.  The meeting will be open to everyone.

A message from the MBT Facebook page:

DDOT and ANC4B will host a public open house on Saturday, March 21 to discuss the preliminary design trail from Ft. Totten to Takoma. 1:00 to 4:00 pm at the 4th District police station at Georgia and Peabody, NW. More details to come.

 

Update on Fort Totten section of the MBT

Posted by nextstoprp in Transportation and tagged with

WashCycle provides an update on the Fort Totten section of the MBT:

DDOT is planning to have a public meeting some time this spring at which they will present the preliminary design of the Metropolitan Branch Trail’s Fort Totten Section. This is the section in the Takoma and Brookland neighborhoods, from Bates Road at the trash transfer station to the Maryland boundary at Eastern Avenue. They hope to have a draft 30% design completed by this summer and a final version of that completed by the end of the year. That would allow for a final design to be funded in FY 2016 and construction in 2017.

Speaking of clearing sidewalks

Posted by nextstoprp in Transportation

Developers are not the only offenders when it comes to not clearing sidewalks after wintry weather.  District government tends to be a big offender.  See this picture we took on Monday evening of the sidewalk in front of the DOES building on Hamilton Street.

Hamilton Street sidewalk in front of DOES building

Hamilton Street sidewalk in front of DOES building

Around the corner on South Dakota Avenue, the sidewalk has been cleared in front of UDC-CC, but for some strange reason, the sidewalk on Hamilton is a problem.

Absentee property owners are also offenders.  There is a corner house being renovated on Hamilton Street and the owner never clears the sidewalk. Further up Hamilton Street is a group house with one diligent tenant who clears the walk when he is around, but if he is not, the others in the house do not do so. It might be too much to ask neighbors to clear the sidewalk for an absentee owner, but maybe that is the neighborly thing to do.

Generally though, people have been pretty good about clearing the sidewalks and helping each other out.

Something needs to be done about sidewalks on Galloway Street near Fort Totten metro station

Posted by nextstoprp in Cafritz Art Place at Fort Totten and tagged with , ,
Feb 23 Galloway path 5

This is the ice covered path on Galloway Street pedestrians are supposed to use

Once again, we are writing about the sidewalk path on Galloway Street by the Art Place at Fort Totten construction site. The north sidewalk on Galloway Street between South Dakota Avenue and 4th Street NE was closed for construction and jersey barriers were placed in the road to create a sidewalk path for pedestrians because there is not another sidewalk on the opposite side (south side) of the street.

The problem is that after winter storms, this path is not cleared in a timely manner. Because there is not another sidewalk, pedestrians either have to traverse an icy path or walk in the street. Doing either is dangerous. We had this same problem after January’s wintry weather and wrote about it then. We took pictures of the ice covered path around 6:05 pm Monday evening.  Also notice in the pictures that several jersey barriers have been knocked down.

We submitted a 311 request yesterday to have the path cleared of ice, just as we did last month.

It strikes us that there might be a bigger problem requiring a better solution.

(1) On a broader level, perhaps the transportation management plan that developers are required to submit should also include plans for inclement weather if they are not already required to do so. DDOT has rules about closures of sidewalks for construction, which is why these jersey barriers were erected in the first place. Even in cases in which the sidewalk remains open during construction, there should still be something in the transportation management plan to ensure that developers clear the sidewalk in front of their projects.

With respect to this specific project, maybe a complete sidewalk structure needs to be constructed on the north side of Galloway rather than just having the jersey barriers in place since it appears they can be knocked down easily and the construction team has made no effort to upright them to form a complete path, nor has the construction team made efforts to diligently clear the path after winter storms. We emailed the construction team and developers both last month and yesterday evening regarding the condition of the path after submitting 311 requests.

If this is something that needs to be worked out between the developers and the District in terms of who is responsible for clearing the path and making sure the jersey barriers actually form a complete barrier, we hope that there is a mechanism to do so. We do not know the best solution; we are just thinking out loud about what might help.

(2) DDOT, WMATA, and the National Park Service should work together to implement the recommendations in the Fort Totten metro accessibility study (pdf) completed in 2011. One of the recommendations was constructing a sidewalk on the south side of Galloway Street between South Dakota Avenue and 4th Street. We know there have been conversations between DDOT and the Park Service to figure out how much land belongs to the District in order to construct a sidewalk. We do not know the status of that project or this study as a whole, as we understand funding is always an issue, but this should certainly be a priority for the District as Galloway is a primary access route to a metro station with three lines and several buses.

Construction is anticipated to last another three years. We really should not have to deal with this issue every winter.  We hope that the mayor’s office, DDOT, and the developers together can find a workable solution to this problem.

 

Comment on proposed metro path by February 19

Posted by nextstoprp in North Michigan PArk, Transportation and tagged with ,

There is one week left to comment on the National Park Service’s environmental assessment of construction of a formal path between Gallatin and Galloway Street NE to improve access to Fort Totten metro station. Currently, no funding plan exists to construct a path. However, it is an easier sell if 100 comments are received as opposed to 25.  Let neighbors who do not use computers know how they can comment or invite them over to use yours. Comments do not have to be elaborate. Just let the Park Service know where you stand on having a formal path to get to the metro station.

Ways to comment:

Rock Creek Park
Attn: Fort Totten-North Michigan Park Pedestrian Access Improvements EA
3545 Williamsburg Lane, NW
Washington, D.C. 20008

Comments must be submitted or postmarked by February 19, 2015.

Ward 4 Council Special Election

Posted by nextstoprp in Council, Ward 4 and tagged with ,

On April 28, 2015, Ward 4 residents will elect a new councilmember in a special election. As of February 6, slightly more than a dozen candidates are listed on the DC Board of Elections’ website. February 9 marked the end of the challenge period to petitions submitted by candidates to appear on the ballot. One challenge to candidate Brandon Todd’s petitions was submitted.  The DC Board of Elections has until March 2 to decide the validity of the challenge.

A Petworth resident has set up a “Ward 4 Candidates Information” website that is not affiliated with any particular campaign. There you can find information submitted by the candidates as well as a calendar of events related to the election, such as meet and greets and forums.  You can also submit questions that you would like the candidates to answer.

Save the Date for March 2:  The Lamond-Riggs Citizens Association plans to hold a candidate forum with all of the candidates at the LaSalle-Backus Education Campus.