A view of Greenleaf Gardens by the author.
Last November, the DC Housing Authority (DCHA) selected a co-developer for its planned redevelopment of Southwest’s Greenleaf Gardens community and embarked upon a precedent-setting approach to engaging Greenleaf Gardens residents.
Now, DCHA has brought that co-development team into its first meetings with residents and stakeholders to explain the proposal that so inspired confidence in DCHA’s selection committee. Here’s what that proposal entails and how it relates to what DCHA required in its request for proposals (RFP).
The winning proposal
The co-development team Greenleaf District Partners, led by Pennrose, EYA, and the Bozzuto Group, has put forth a preliminary vision for a four-phase, 1,400-plus unit development covering the existing Greenleaf Gardens development, roughly between Third Street and Delaware Avenue from Eye to M Streets SW, and between First Street and Delaware Avenue from M to N Streets SW. Of the new constru
In October, the DC Housing Authority (DCHA) Board of Commissioners voted 5-4 against the agency commencing negotiations with their preferred co-developer for Greenleaf Gardens. By that following month, however, the Board voted 5-4 in favor, enabling the agency to move forward with the Exclusive Right to Negotiate (ERN) with that co-developer. What made the difference?
Largely, the agency’s efforts in the interim to reengage the community and its stakeholders on the status of the project and the roadmap ahead, which represented a welcome pivot from how engagement has gone up to this point. Here’s how the redevelopment process went from conceptual to doable.