Support Affordable Housing in Chevy Chase

In March, DC held a meeting about the Chevy Chase Civic Core. Developers presented options for the redevelopment, including a new state-of-the-art library, community center, vibrant outdoor space, and much-needed housing with dedicated affordable units.

• DC is in a housing crisis - Housing prices in DC continue to rise because we are not building enough housing to meet demand. The Institute of Labor Economics estimates that in order to meet current demand, DC would need to add another 100,000 housing units.
• DC should maximize housing on this site - Proposals ranged from 113 to 206 housing units. Many teams did not build to the legal height limit or included step-backs in their design that eliminated potential units. Whichever team is picked to redevelop the site should maximize the housing units being built.

• Parking on the site should be minimized - NIMBYs in the room insisted that the designs do not include enough parking, even though several proposals even exceeding the legal requirements. Every additional parking space adds significant cost to a project, and higher costs means less money to subsidize affordable units and higher rents for market-rate units.
• We need more affordable housing in Ward 3 - Chevy Chase has a history of using exclusionary zoning and racial covenants to keep out people of color, and the area has produced less than 12% of the target affordable housing units since 2019.
• Consider market-rate housing - DC needs an all-of-the-above approach to building more housing, and market-rate housing is a part of that. Including some market-rate housing in the project can also help make affordable housing units available to people with lower area median incomes and ensures the project can still proceed even if there are cuts to federal programs that subsidize affordable housing.