Fenty Emerges From D.C. Pack

Six years ago, 64 percent of voters thought redevelopment was "mainly good" for the poor; only 35 percent think so now. And nearly half of black voters think gentrification has been harmful for African Americans.

"Those of us that work in the city who don't make $100,000 still should be able to live in this city," said C. Tyson, 62, who owns a home in the District's Brookland neighborhood. Tyson said his 28-year-old daughter can't afford to move out of his house unless she leaves the District. And for him, the rising pressure of property taxes has become a "sacrifice."

"At the rate this is going down, all these people are going to be pushed out," Tyson said. "And I don't think that's fair to those of us who have lived here and paid taxes for 32, 35 years."

Other voters surveyed had similar concerns. One in four worry they might be forced to move because of redevelopment in their neighborhood, and half say they would have to look beyond the District's borders to find something affordable. Seventy percent of renters in the survey say they would have to move to the suburbs to buy a home.

"We're running low-income and moderate-income families out of the city," said David C. Ruffin, a freelance journalist who lives on Capitol Hill.

Ruffin, former president of D.C. Habitat for Humanity, has a professional interest in affordable housing. But he's got a personal interest, too: His landlord, he said, is trying to push him and his neighbors out of the apartment building where he has lived for 20 years so it can be rehabbed and sold as condominium units or rented for much more money.

The building boom "means more revenue for the city and all that. And it's good for the tax base," Ruffin said. "But this should be a city that has a diverse population with a broad range of incomes. It shouldn't mean that moderate or low-income people are relegated to living outside the city."

Concern about society's most vulnerable was a recurring theme in the poll, best captured by one startling statistic: Seventy percent of voters give the District government failing marks for its treatment of the disadvantaged and the poor.

Assistant polling director Claudia Deane contributed to this report.