{"id":351,"date":"2020-07-17T21:46:13","date_gmt":"2020-07-17T21:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/?p=351"},"modified":"2020-12-24T20:41:35","modified_gmt":"2020-12-24T20:41:35","slug":"wilcox-asks-other-at-large-council-candidates-to-support-defund-mcmillan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/dc\/351","title":{"rendered":"Wilcox Asks Other At-Large Council Candidates to Support #DeFund McMillan"},"content":{"rendered":"
For Immediate Release: \u00a0July 17, 2020
Contact: Ann Wilcox: 202-441-3265,\u00a0Ann1Wilcox@gmail.com<\/a><\/a><\/font><\/p>\n

<\/b>Wilcox Asks Other At-Large Council Candidates to Support
#DeFund McMillan<\/b>
<\/font>Use $ for Public Housing, Health, Education <\/font><\/b><\/i><\/p>\n

Ann Wilcox, the Statehood\/Green Party candidate for an at-large DC City Council seat, today asked all other candidates in the At-Large race, to join her call to the DC City Council to #Defund McMillan.\u00a0 Wilcox calls for defunding the $75.5 M in the Mayor\u2019s FY21 budget for the McMillan demolition and \u201credevelopment.\u201d \u00a0DC should instead use the money to meet the health, education and housing needs of McMillan\u2019s neighbors and Ward 5 and citywide residents.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\n
\u201cI ask my fellow-candidates to stand with me and a group of Ward 5 McMillan neighbors who, in resonance with the Black Lives Matter movement for racial equity, recently appealed to their Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie to Defund McMillan,\u201d said Wilcox. She added: \u201cLike the residents, I want the $75M used for critically-needed public housing repairs, rehabilitation of Crummell School, funding larger family-sized units at Brookland Manor, public health services, and preparing schools for Covid-19 response – not to pay downtown lawyers, architects and consultants to design and defend this bad plan.\u201d<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
<\/div>\n
Wilcox pointed to the many deficiencies in the city\u2019s McMillan plan: \u00a0turning 25 acres of irreplaceable public, open space into a suburban-style \u201ctown center\u201d with 2+ million sq. ft., of generally market-rate housing, offices and medical buildings \u00a0– all without the requested library; jamming North Capitol Street and Michigan Avenue with traffic; generating air, noise and possibly asbestos pollution; destroying most of the historic water-filtration silos and caverns.\u00a0 Historic Frederick Law Olmstead architecture would be destroyed, and no Environmental Impact Statement was produced.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

Most egregiously, the project was excused from legal obligations under a bill sponsored by CM McDuffie in 2014, to require that when public land is sold or leased for development of at least 10 residential units, 20 percent of those units must be set aside as affordable housing.\u00a0 If the site is near public transportation (such as the North Capitol St bus-line), 30 percent of the units must be affordable.\u00a0 This requirement was WAIVED for McMillan planners.\u00a0 In recent remarks to the City-wide Planning Coalition, McDuffie proudly discussed his bill \u2013 but left out the huge exception given for McMillan.
In addition to the lack of affordable housing and burdens on the environment, breathtaking views of monumental Washington will be blocked by 120-foot buildings.\u00a0 Blocked will be the view from Lincoln\u2019s Cottage, where the Civil War president gazed upon the US Capitol, as he composed the Emancipation Proclamation.<\/p>\n

The Ward 5 neighbors\u2019 letter stresses that McMillan was an integrated park, where they freely gathered to picnic, play sports and watch July 4th fireworks.\u00a0 It was fenced off for security reasons in WWII and never reopened. It is especially needed now to help meet Covid-19\u2019s social distancing mandates, and preserve healthy, green spaces on North Capitol Street.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter Defunding, an international design competition should be convened, tasked with preserving more than half as open space,\u201d said Wilcox. This was supported in a 2002 Office of Planning report and in a recent DC Sierra Club resolution.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Wilcox called on all other 2020 Candidates to communicate support for #DeFund McMillan to the City Council, in advance of budget votes on Tuesday, July 21.<\/p>\n

\u00a0** END **<\/b>
<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For Immediate Release: \u00a0July 17, 2020 Contact: Ann Wilcox: 202-441-3265,\u00a0Ann1Wilcox@gmail.com Wilcox Asks Other At-Large Council Candidates to Support#DeFund McMillanUse $ for Public Housing, Health, Education Ann Wilcox, the Statehood\/Green Party candidate for an at-large DC City Council seat, today asked all other candidates in the At-Large race, to join her call to the DC City […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,14,13,49,3,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dc","category-historic-sites","category-mcmillan-park","category-public-property","category-w1","category-w5"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=351"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":354,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351\/revisions\/354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.dcfeedback.com\/fit2print\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}