Poplar Point Prospects Prompt Dialogue

Soccer Stadium Among Possibilities

The plans are the talk of Southeast Washington.

The District government publicly unveiled several proposals last month to turn Poplar Point, a 110-acre swath of parkland along the Anacostia River, into a regional attraction. Since then, the possibilities for jobs and development have a lot of people expressing an opinion as the area moves another step closer to a plan being realized.

At least two plans include options for a soccer stadium, an idea that has enjoyed the backing of D.C. Council member Marion Barry (D-Ward 8) but doesn't have as much support across the city. A Washington Post poll of 1,000 residents conducted last week showed that 36 percent favored using public funds for a soccer stadium, but 60 percent opposed it.

A soccer stadium is just one of a number of issues about Poplar Point's future that have energized the discussion in Anacostia.

In a small community center, the Historic Anacostia Block Association held an hour-long discussion about the plans and the community's future. At a church, Barry gathered residents to hear their input. On the Web, a blog devoted to Anacostia news is conducting a poll of residents on the proposals.

"For the most part, folks are generally excited about what they're seeing," said Charles E. Wilson, co-founder of the block association, who moderated the discussion. "It's always good to have healthy discussion. We're not trying to come to consensus. We're trying to see how people feel."

The future of Poplar Point has been on the minds of Ward 8 residents for more than three years, ever since District officials announced plans to acquire the property from the federal government. But now that Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) has said he will choose a "master developer" this month to partner with the city, the project has taken on a sense of urgency in a community that has grown impatient with the city's pace.

Last week, the Fenty administration narrowed the competition to three development teams: Clark Realty Capital, Forest City and a joint effort from Archstone Smith and Madison Marquette. A winner could be announced next week, administration officials said.

Neil O. Albert, Fenty's deputy mayor for economic development, has said that the selection will be based largely on which developer has the expertise and finances to pull off a massive project that is rife with challenges. The city must relocate the National Park Service from the site and prepare the land for construction. It could take two more years before a developer breaks ground on the shops and restaurants that residents are so eager for, and a decade before the majority of the project is complete, city officials said.

Ultimately, Albert said, whichever developer is selected almost certainly will be asked to change plans several times. For residents, regardless of the winning selection, key factors are jobs and business opportunities in the city's poorest ward, where unemployment has hovered around 12 percent, the highest in the District.

"I'm willing to work with whoever wins," said M.J. Lee, an advisory neighborhood commissioner. "But we will be holding people accountable because, in the past, the government has failed in terms of awarding people jobs."

Under the terms of the competitive bid process established by the Fenty administration, the developers were asked to agree that 51 percent of all new jobs created by the Poplar Point development would go to District residents, with 20 percent reserved for residents of Ward 8. In addition, 35 percent of the contracts awarded by the master developer must go to small, disadvantaged businesses, including 10 percent located in Ward 8.