{"id":350,"date":"2019-06-29T03:10:01","date_gmt":"2019-06-29T03:10:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/?p=350"},"modified":"2019-06-29T04:36:54","modified_gmt":"2019-06-29T04:36:54","slug":"william-jordan-analysis-a-racial-equity-lens-the-entertainment-and-sports-arena-at-st-elizabeths-east","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/350\/","title":{"rendered":"William Jordan Analysis: A Racial Equity Lens?: The Entertainment and Sports Arena at St. Elizabeth’s East"},"content":{"rendered":"

This was originally posted to the Adams Morgan Listserv on April 28, 2019, as message #51000, groups.yahoo.com\/neo\/groups\/AdamsMorgan\/conversations\/messages\/51000<\/a>
\n The Washington Business Journal recently announced its Best Real Estate Deals awardees. DC’s Entertainment and Sports Area or “Wizard’s Practice Facility” in Ward 8 was awarded the “Game Changer Award”. So, taking a cue from CM McDuffie’s Racial Equity bill B23-38, what if we took a stab at Racial Equity analysis at the Arena Deal? The Arena cost about $68.8M to build, of that amount $63.8M was funded publicly.
\nThe primary beneficiary of the Arena is Monumental Sports Entertainment. In other words the deal is optimized to spend $63.8M in public dollars to protect Monumental Sports’ equity. So, what might a deal to spend $63.8M to protect Ward 8 residents’ equity look like?
\nIn 2015 according to Zillow, the median cost of a home in Congress Heights was $230K. With no leveraging the city could have built 278 single family homes selling them to residents for $10 each to stimulate Ward 8’s economy, plus the jobs needed to build those homes. By today in 2019, according to Zillow, those homes would be worth $345K each, making each families’ net worth in those 279 homes at least $115K. The net worth of a typical DC Black family is $3,500 (the number for Ward 8 is less). A typical DC White family’s net worth is $284,000. This hypothetical investment in Congress Heights would have significantly closed the racial wealth gap. Instead, DC chose to invest those tax dollars to secure Ted Lenosis’ net wealth which is estimated to currently sit at $1.1B. Ted Lenosis to my knowledge is not classified as Black nor as best as I can tell does he live in DC.
\nLet’s say DC instead chose to better leverage its $63.8M investment in Congress Heights’ predominately Black residents and offered each resident a 20% down payment on building a $230K home back in 2015. If Instead paying out right for 273 new homes, the city invested down payments the results would be 1,390 new Black home owners, plus the jobs it takes to build those 1,390 single family homes. Yes, each families’ equity in 2019 would still be at least $115K or a total of $160M in new wealth created for Congress Height’s Black residents.
\nIf Black Congress Heights residents got the same deal from the city as Ted Lenosis, a $68.8M arena tax free on a $5M or 7.3% investment, Black residents would have gotten 3,809 new built homes plus the jobs required to build those homes. And the collective net worth in Congress Heights would be at least 3,809 multiplied by 115K, or $438M. If instead we chose to sell 2-bedroom homes to Congress Heights Black residents at the Lenosis deal rate, that would be 5,138 new homeowners with a collective net worth of at least $514M, plus the jobs it takes to built 5,138 homes.
\nFor perspective: There are currently only 2,833 owner occupied homes in Congress Heights today and only 572 built since 2010. 11,794 are rentals for a total of 14,627 occupied units.
\nAccording to the Monumental Sports website there are about 20 owner\/partners in the company. As best as I can tell 2 are Black, both wealthy, they seem like great people, but neither seem to live in DC. So from one racial equity perspective the Arena deal created 0 wealth for Black Congress Heights residents, the hypothetical baseline 5,138 Black families gain $514M from that $63.8M investment.
\nFrom a Racial Equity stand point the Arena deal it would not seem to be a game changer, but the same old game? But then again, my math is overly simplified and the Mayor and Council know best how to stimulate economic development in Ward 8.
\nI wonder what a similar equity view(lens) of the numbers would look like in Ward 1 neighborhoods such as Columbia Heights and Lower Georgia Avenue. Or how we view our City’s Comprehensive Plan.
\nWilliam<\/p>\n

Project Start 2015
\nTotal Construction Costs: $68.8M
\nPublic Funding: $63.8 (92.7%)
\nBillionaire Costs: $5M (7.3%)
\nIn 2015 Median Single Family $230K
\nIn 2019 Median Single Family $345K
\n2-Bedroom 2015 $170K
\n2-Bedroom 2019 $270K
\nNumber of homes $63.8 could have bought\/built 2015: 278
\nNumber of 2-bedroom bought\/built 2015: 375
\nHome bought\/built leveraged 20% down, 5*278 = 1,390
\n2-Bedroom bought\/built leveraged 20% down, 5 * 375 = 1,875
\nHome bought\/built Billionaire leverage 7.3% down, 13.7*278 = 3,809
\n2-Bedroom bought\/built Billionaire leverage 7.3% down, 13.7 * 375 = 5,138
\n Game Changer Award: The Entertainment and Sports Arena at St. Elizabeths East
\nBy Katishi Maake \u2013 Digital Producer, Washington Business Journal
\nApr 25, 2019, 9:48pm EDT Updated Apr 26, 2019, 2:02pm EDT
\nIn 2014, Monumental Sports & Entertainment CEO Ted Leonsis narrowed his choice for a new Washington Wizards practice facility to three locations: Howard University, a Silver Spring parking garage and the St. Elizabeths East campus.
\nSt. Elizabeths stood out for one reason: The surrounding area needed it the most.
\nProponents of the St. Elizabeths East Entertainment and Sports Arena hope the new facility will jump-start development in wards 7 and 8, just as Capital One Arena \u2014 then the MCI Center \u2014 did in Chinatown.
\n After D.C. Mayor Muriel Bower announced St. Elizabeths East would host the new Wizards practice facility, Monumental Sports & Entertainment and Events D.C., the city\u2019s convention and sports authority, teamed up make sure residents knew that the project would change the area for the better, bringing jobs and economic opportunity during the construction and operation phases.
\n\u201cWard 8, generally speaking, has been slow in terms of seeing investment coming to that community,\u201d Events D.C. CEO Greg O\u2019Dell says.. \u201cPeople make promises and not necessarily deliver on them.\u201d
\nAs the District\u2019s sports venue operator, Events D.C. is the landlord for the St. Elizabeths Entertainment and Sports Arena, leasing the space to Monumental for 19 years. Of the $65 million construction price tag, Events D.C. paid $37 million, the city paid $23 million and Monumental paid $5 million.
\nWhen it was announced St. Elizabeths East would be the location of the new Wizards training facility, O\u2019Dell said residents were skeptical the project would come to fruition or help the community as promised even if it did deliver. O\u2019Dell says his team was intentional with its community outreach early in the process, having an event every 45 days or less to update residents on the project and reinforce its benefits.
\nThe project exceeded its initial certified business enterprise goal with more than 65 percent of the contracts awarded to CBEs \u2014 small or disadvantaged businesses \u2014 and more than $10 million in contracts awarded to Ward 7 and 8 businesses.
\nLocated a block from the Congress Heights Metro, the facility also serves as the home venue for the Washington Mystics and Monumental Sports\u2019 new G-League basketball team, the Capital City Go-Go. The 4,200-seat arena was also built with the intent of exploring the untapped market of esports.
\nThe arena is projected to produce $90 million in new tax revenue across 20 years and attract more than 380,000 annual visitors to Congress Heights. Monumental also agreed to invest $10 million in the St. Elizabeths East campus and surrounding community over the nearly two-decade lease term.
\nTo celebrate the arena\u2019s debut, Events D.C. hosted three grand opening concerts featuring Grammy-nominated artists \u2013 Wale, Mary J. Blige and Cage the Elephant \u2014 over two weekends in October.
\nQ&A with Greg O\u2019Dell, president and CEO, Events D.C.
\nWhat\u2019s one thing you wish was different about the process? I\u2019ve been on these projects long enough, and I think the public scrutiny that we get is required and warranted when we spend dollars like this on a project. But having said that, this is an area that has not seen investment in a while. So frankly, I would\u2019ve hoped that there would have been less discussion about the size of investment and more figuring out how we can actually invest more in this community.
\nWhat were the high points of the project? When we were finally able to commit, show that the project was real and that community had bought in. Always on a project when you see the structures come out of the ground is a high point because people could then also see this was a real structure, how it would look and be positioned in the community.
\nDID YOU KNOW?
\nThis arena is unique as one of the only facilities in the country designated as a full-size NBA practice facility and entertainment\/concert venue.
\nThe big number
\n>50%
\nMore than half of Events D.C. employees working at the arena are from wards 7 and 8
\n\u201cThe new Entertainment and Sports Arena is a catalyst in the redevelopment of St. Elizabeths East campus. Today we celebrate a milestone of transforming this long-vacant project into a thriving and vibrant community.\u201d
\nBrian Kenner, deputy mayor, at the arena ribbon cutting in September
\nThe Entertainment and Sports Arena at St. Elizabeths East
\nAddress: 1100 Oak Drive SE, Washington
\nDeal type: Delivery
\nLandlord\/owner: Events D.C.
\nTenant\/development partner: Monumental Sports & Entertainment
\nProject management: Brailsford & Dunlavey
\nArchitecture and engineering: Washington Area Design Group \u2014 ROSSETTI & Marshall Moya Design Group (now Michael Marshall Design)
\nContractor: Smoot\/Gilbane Sports
\nSize: 120,000 square feet
\nCost: $65 million ($68.8M)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This was originally posted to the Adams Morgan Listserv on April 28, 2019, as message #51000, groups.yahoo.com\/neo\/groups\/AdamsMorgan\/conversations\/messages\/51000 The Washington Business Journal recently announced its Best Real Estate Deals awardees. DC’s Entertainment and Sports Area or “Wizard’s Practice Facility” in Ward 8 was awarded the “Game Changer Award”. So, taking a cue from CM McDuffie’s Racial […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-housingarchive"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}