Georgia Avenue Has Already Awakened
Businesses, Residents and the D.C. Government Have Joined Forces to Fight the Blight

Sunday, February 4, 2007

The Post recently informed readers about the hundreds of millions of dollars in future investment along the District's historic Georgia Avenue. I'd like to inform readers of the many good things already happening on Georgia Avenue.

Those good things were overshadowed, I think, by the portrayal in the article and accompanying photographs of Georgia Avenue as a place of extremes. A place of either coming gentrification (mixed-use density) or existing dilapidation (shanty storefronts and desperate patrons seeking beer), with nothing in between. A place where racial minorities sit in hair curlers and members of the majority population preside over wine tastings and business openings.

The Avenue has many layers, many facets and many good things happening:

· The Washington chapter of the American Institute of Architects awarded my organization, the Gateway Georgia Avenue Revitalization Corp., its 2003 Catalyst Award for upgrading 33 rundown storefronts. Since then, 12 new businesses have opened, including two designer fashion stores, a neighborhood restaurant, an upscale day spa, an art gallery, a furniture store, a boutique crafts store and two national chains.

· Locally owned Ledo Pizza selected Georgia Avenue for its second District store. Since opening last August, Ledo has hired 20 young adults from surrounding neighborhoods and has been a business success. The pizzeria has also hosted parties for the neighborhood soccer team, the Coolidge High School PTA and Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

· Manoukian Brothers Oriental Rugs, a certified rug appraiser, recently opened a store. The longtime District retailer was attracted to upper Georgia Avenue's stable middle-income households, which boast an aggregate yearly income of $240 million, and a $93,015 average household income.

· The National Trust for Historic Preservation declared the D.C. Georgia Gateway corridor a National Main Street in 2003. Since then, local businesses, residents and the District government have joined forces to eradicate graffiti, organize business grand openings, install 37 new lamppost banners, organize spring plantings and negotiate agreements with some property owners to landscape and install public art.

· Beverley East regularly teaches a class for first-time authors at Georgia Avenue's Juanita E. Thornton/Shepherd Park public library. A District resident and published author, East teaches aspiring writers how to land their first publishing contract. Her students are completing books on a range of topics: aging parents, church folk, "work camps" and memoirs of city life through the eyes of native Washingtonians. The library also hosts a speakers' series for published authors living along the Georgia Avenue corridor. A writers' colony is emerging along upper Georgia Avenue.

· Over the past two years, community leaders Jourdinia Brown, Tom Black and Steve Whatley successfully ended single-beverage sales of alcohol at liquor stores along upper Georgia. These pioneering leaders negotiated agreements with local business owners. Their work and that of others has eliminated blight along vast stretches of The Avenue.

Yes, good things are happening along Georgia Avenue in the District. Come and see for yourself.

-- Marc D. Loud

Washington

The writer is executive director of the Gateway Georgia Avenue Revitalization Corp. His e-mail address isgatewaycdc@aol.com.