D.C. Recreation Center Rich With Restrooms

The North Michigan Park Recreation Center opened two years ago and neighborhood activist Cynthia Reid is still riled up about the number of restrooms in the $3 million building.

Reid and others say the one-story center has so many restrooms -- six with 38 stalls -- that two are being used for storage. In fact, they say, the city spent $400,000 on the additional restrooms but left the center without enough meeting space and no money to build a playground.

"There's no excuse," said Reid, who started a group of concerned neighbors in 1998 to ensure that the size and structure of the new recreation center would be adequate. "They can fund all this other stuff, but you can't get a playground."

Before the center opened, residents who were touring the building with Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D) discovered that the contractor was using the entire 2,000-square-foot expansion that residents had requested for more restrooms.

"The mayor came over and said, 'What is this, MCI Center?'" Reid recalled. "We were raising hell. We demanded they rip them down. We didn't care how much it cost because they had no business building them."

Yet, when the center opened, the restrooms were finished but the playground wasn't. The city is now trying to find funds to redesign portions of the center and has cleared a few trees to make room for the outside play area.

During a recent D.C. Council oversight hearing, Timothy Thomas, an advisory neighborhood commissioner, asked council member Kathy Patterson (D-Ward 3) for funds to eliminate the center's unused restrooms.

Patterson, chairman of the council's Committee on Education, Libraries and Recreation, said she was aware of the problem. After two years of complaining, Thomas said, the community wants the government to correct its mistake.

The center has eight rooms, including a game room with bookshelves, a pool table and a piano; a mirrored weight room; a computer lab; and three offices. A restroom is just a few feet from any corner of the building.

About 170 residents a day attend the center's programs, including 100 senior citizens and 70 children who participate in after-school programs that offer homework help and clubs. Weekends, basketball leagues attract as many as 200 players and spectators.

Even when the center is crowded, there's never a need to use all of the restrooms, according to center workers, who use the extra space for storage.

In one restroom, filing cabinets block stalls and boxes are stacked almost six feet high. Another is filled with athletic equipment, colorful exercise balls and a big-screen television.