Today, after years of planning and negotiating, D.C.’s Zoning Commission will officially begin considering Georgetown’s final 2010 campus plan, the decennial review of plans for expansion and growth that all District universities must submit. In looking at the University’s proposal, the Commission must remember that Georgetown, the District’s largest private employer, has gone to great lengths to consider and address the complaints of the local neighborhood organizations that have spoken out so vehemently against the plan.
The District’s interests are inextricably linked with the University’s, especially since Georgetown employs almost 4,000 D.C. residents. If Georgetown’s growth is halted, the city’s economy will suffer. In theory, city officials would want to encourage a large economic engine to grow, but groups like the Advisory Neighborhood Commission have so vocally opposed any expansion that Mayor Vincent Gray has condemned the proposal.
The University has been more than just a stable employer for thousands of D.C. residents. Georgetown students volunteer to tutor the District’s less-privileged students, and countless more volunteer in other roles that serve the city. University students put on concerts and theatrical performances, and many University facilities and areas, including Lauinger Library, are open to all D.C. residents.
The positive benefits that Georgetown brings to D.C. aside, the campus plan will simply not harm the surrounding neighborhoods. The campus plan is a reasonable proposal, one that respects the neighbors’ desires by trying to limit student presence off-campus while acknowledging the fact that students need to live somewhere, and the limited space on campus simply is not sufficient
The truth is that uncompromising neighborhood groups such as the Burleith Citizens Association and the Citizens Association of Georgetown will be unsatisfied with any plan that does not move every single undergraduate into on-campus housing. Despite the University’s efforts to mollify neighbors’ concerns—including the nixing of proposed shuttle routes, the elimination of plans for the development of the 1789 housing block, and the abandonment of the environmentally beneficial extension of the power plant smokestack—neighborhood groups have shown no willingness to reciprocate.
The University’s efforts to craft a workable campus plan deserve praise, even if the concessions have not changed the opinions of certain neighbors. The Zoning Commission must take note of the University’s reasonable behavior throughout this process, in contrast to the stubborn and insane behavior of the organizations that falsely claim to represent the best interests of Georgetown’s neighbors.
