This week, the Advisory Neighborhood Commission[PDF] and the Burleith Citizens Association/Citizen’s Association of Georgetown[PDF] filed their final responses to the University’s latest appeasement efforts with the Zoning Commission. And nothing’s changed. All three organizations want all students on campus, and all of the University’s actions have been nothing but ineffective posturing. But let’s jump into the interesting parts of their monstrous filings.

• First Vox is going to question the legality of the ANC’s filing. A resolution affirming this filing on behalf of the ANC 2E was not adopted at a public meeting, and Commissioner Jake Sticka (COL ’13) told Vox that Georgetown Metropolitan’s post was the first he saw of this. This was probably written by Commissioners Jeff Jones, Ron Lewis, and Ed Solomon (who included personal testimonies at the end). This wouldn’t be the first time certain ANC2E commissioners engaged in some misrepresentation of authorship.

• The BCA/CAG filing has multimedia by our favorite wanna-be paparazzi Stephen R. Brown, who included a youtube video of a student house in Burleith. Although still creepy as ever, Vox is happy he is expanding his artistic horizons. Maybe next he’ll shoot in 3D. Surroundsound? 60FPS?

• Not only have Georgetown’s efforts been ineffective, but they’ve actually made the problem worse! “The GU trash collection efforts (1.5 tons of trash per day, according to GU!) has [sic] perversely lead to even greater student disregard for trash collection times and container requirements.”

Also, those reimbursable details the University is paying for? They don’t just ignore the problem houses, but their very employment by the University means they can’t be hired by BCA/CAG. “This situation recently lead CAG to terminate its own reimbursable detail and rely instead on patrols by private security officers.” The ANC adds on that “moreover, the officers know they are sponsored and paid by GU, an institution that has demonstrated a disturbing lack of enthusiasm for effective MPD enforcement against student misconduct and noise.”

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Earlier today, University President Jack DeGioia sent out an email addressed to “Friends,” asking them (well, us) for support on the much-disputed Georgetown Campus Plan.

After reminding his readers that the Campus Plan’s final hearing is on November 17, and that a ruling by the Zoning Commission will soon follow (Editor’s Note: What are we going to post about after that?!), so now is the time to take action in the Plan’s support. He also cites the measures that the University has taken to address neighbors’s complaints, like the trash pick-ups and extra Metro Police Department officers, and that we even have the Washington Post on our side.

The email includes a link where supporters can sign a petition in favor of the Plan, which is described as “a modest plan to address strategic priorities that meet our mission and allow us to strengthen our position as a world class university.” Supporting it means supporting four main aspects of the University, including its economic contributions to the District of Columbia and the off-campus work of Georgetown students, faculty, and staff.

Read DeGioia’s full email after the jump!

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Earlier this week, when the Washington Post‘s editorial board got in the University’s corner for the battle royale that is “D.C. vs. Georgetown,” pretty much everybody anticipated that our friendly neighbors would be less than thrilled with this endorsement. Today, as reported by the Georgetown Dish, the Citizens Association of Georgetown published a very angry letter about the newspaper’s assertions that the University’s neighbors are attempting to stunt the intellectual and economic growth of the city.

“We strongly support planned and thoughtful growth,” the letter states. “We strongly oppose, however, the objectionable results an expansion of more than 4,000 students in the past 10 years has had on the communities surrounding Georgetown University.”

CAG goes on to defend its position that an Arlington satellite campus is a valid solution to the student overpopulation problem, and ends by foreseeing the impending doom of the District as a whole if Georgetown goes through with its plan.

“If Georgetown University is allowed to continue to expand irresponsibly, the danger exists that valued residential neighborhoods will become predominantly student housing,. Such a development would be a significant loss not only to the residents but also to the city as a whole.”

But despite CAG’s discontentment about the University’s newfound support, other neighbors are, much to our pleasant surprise, not quite so upset about the University’s expansion. In a letter submitted to the Northwest Current, a handful of residents of Georgetown, Burleith, Foxhall, and other surrounding areas came out in support of GU’s recent efforts to make itself more neighborly. Citing the new trash patrols, police officers, and M Street Shuttle, the signers assert that Georgetown isn’t the all-consuming entity that some of their neighbors think it is. They also mention that Georgetown students might actually have something to contribute to D.C. besides noise pollution and beer bottles:

“GU undergraduates and graduate students provide countless hours of volunteer public service to District residents each year at free health clinics, soup kitchens, and other social service agencies.  Overall, Georgetown University’s positive impact on our city is broad and deep.  When the University prospers, it enhances all of our lives.”

Aw stop, you’re making us blush.

Full text of the letters, as published by Georgetown Dish, after the jump!

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Yesterday, the Editorial Board of the Washington Post came out in support of Georgetown University in the ongoing Campus Plan hearings. Pitching the struggle between the University and its neighbors as a crisis of urban planning, WaPo asks that the zoning commission not place unnecessary constraints on D.C.’s largest employer.

“What’s most troubling about the city’s posture is the notion that an increase in young people, particularly those in search of an education, is somehow undesirable,” writes the WaPo editorial board. “What happened to the idea that these are the very kind of people that should be lured to make the District their home?” Also, the suggestion that Georgetown should build a satellite campus for its undergraduates was called “laughable.”

While the Washington Post is calling the Office of Planning hypocritical for restricting growth, a Washington City Paper blog is putting the blame right at the top, with a couple jabs at D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray.

Gray has pushed students to get involved in district affairs, but at the same time wants to restrict the “creeping” presence of the University.

Edit: Spelling

In a recent joint press release by the Burleith Citizens Association and the Citizens Association of Georgetown, respective presidents Lenore Rubino and Jennifer Altemus remind whomever is listening that they do not like students in their neighborhoods.

It’s nice that some things never change.

In the letter, Rubino and Altemus cite that the “proposed mitigations for the adverse impacts students living off campus have on the community,” which include daily trash pick-up and the M Street Shuttle, miss the point.

These “limited initiatives” fail to address the most important issue: students live off campus. And no number of daily trash pick-ups can fix that (we think).

So what’s the solution? It’s a shocker: House 100% of students on campus.

The full letter is after the break. Read the rest of this entry »

Last night’s ANC2E meeting had a higher attendance than was usual, due to a visit by D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray. “We’ve had a standing invitation for months,” said Commissioner Ron Lewis, and it happened that last night’s meeting fit Gray’s schedule. By the start of the meeting, all of the seats in seats were filled, a sizable group of people stood in the back.

Mayor Gray took the podium to a loud round of applause after being introduced by Councilmember Jack Evans. The Mayor thanked Evans, and quickly remarked on the “Taxation Without Representation” sticker on the laptop of Commissioner Jake Sticka. Gray went on to reiterate his stance on Georgetown’s 2010 Campus Plan. “I support the community,” he said, followed by applause from the attendees.

Mayor Gray then described his four priorities in detail—fiscal stability, commitment to education, safety, and turning around unemployment in the District.

For the city’s budget for the 2012 fiscal year, Gray stated his desire to build a budget with “structural integrity.” “We won’t spend any more money then we take in,” he said.

As for education, Gray described how he supported universal pre-K services and made Washington, D.C. the only city in the country with them available. He wishes to extend the program to infants and toddlers. “If I could get a fetus into a program, I would,” he said.

Gray wishes to hire 300 new police officers this year to both replace an estimated 180 officers who will leave, and add an additional 120 officers to the force. He added that homicides were down 17% in the District, and were on track to be at a 42-year low.

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Friday, At large Council-member Phil Mendelson (yes the same one who says the current redistricting plan is discriminatory) filed a letter to the Zoning Commission opposing the 2010 campus plan. He further writes that he is in agreement with ANC2E and the Office of Planning in that Georgetown should house 100% of students on campus.

Just like last year, Vox is helping you get on top of “news you can use” with an excessively comprehensive review of last year’s important news stories. Today, we cover the off-campus issues that made headlines; noise, cronyism, and cannabis come after the jump.

We’ve got the campus plan blues

Every ten years, Georgetown must submit a campus plan to the D.C. Zoning Commission detailing proposed construction and land-use on its property.

Before the Zoning Commission approves the plan, it must hold hearings where civic associations in nearby Burleith, West Georgetown, and Foxhall Village can air their many grievances.

Neighborhood associations are irate [PDF] because some Georgetown students are loud and drunken. If the Zoning Commission doesn’t force us on-campus, they say, the neighborhood will become a “student ghetto.” To support this cause, which has gained the endorsement of several D.C. councilmembers, they are putting up yard signs, forming coalitions, and speaking out in public forums.

These activists also have recourse to a unique form of hyper-local government called the advisory neighborhood commission. There are 38 ANC’s throughout the city that provide official community input on everything from liquor licenses to traffic and land-use planning. In keeping with its history, Georgetown and Burleith’s ANC 2E opposes the 2010 Campus Plan. Because of clever gerrymandering of the dorms, there is only one student commissioner, Jake Sticka (COL ’13), on that commission.

The University, for its part, has tried reaching out to neighbors and stumping for support across the city. Georgetown has also ceded to several neighborhood demands, from scrapping graduate housing just off-campus to turning the Leavey Center Hotel into a dorm, in hopes of winning the endorsement of city agencies.

The D.C. Office of Planning didn’t return the love; they recommended a hard cap on undergraduate admissions and 100-percent on-campus residency. The Zoning Commission is due to issue its ruling in November. Depending on the verdict, neighborhood groups or the University will petition the D.C. Court of Appeals to reverse the directive.

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