The National Park Service (NPS) has collaborated with the Fallen Journalists Memorial Foundation for a new monument in Washington, D.C., honoring the pursuit of truth, courage, and the sacrifices made in journalism. The proposed design features a collection of transparent glass sculptures. These elements form a cylindrical space, with all paths leading to a central Remembrance Hall, where the First Amendment is inscribed on a glass “lens.” The memorial will be softly illuminated at night, with a view of the U.S. Capitol dome to symbolize journalism’s role in democracy.

Everything you need to know about the Fallen Journalists Memorial

The site for the memorial, chosen in mid-2023, is Reservation 201, which is located near the Capitol and the Voice of America headquarters. A virtual public scoping meeting will be held on October 16, 2024, from 6:30 to 8 p.m. to present the design and gather feedback. All public comments will be taken into account as part of an environmental assessment to evaluate the new memorial’s impact on the environment and other historical features.

You can view a video walkthrough of what the memorial will look like on the Fallen Journalists Memorial website. Comments can be submitted on the website or by mail to:

Laurel Hammig
National Park Service
1100 Ohio Drive, SW
Washington, DC 20242
ATTN: Fallen Journalists Memorial EA

This memorial will be funded entirely by private donations. The total cost of the memorial is still being measured, and it will depend on the size and design of the memorial itself, the cost of materials and construction, as well as the approval and permitting process. At least 10 percent of the funding will go to the National Park Service since they will be maintaining the memorial after its completion.

“We are basically homeless now. We’re homeless.”

It’s been nearly two weeks since a gas explosion forced Angel Requeno from his Columbia Heights apartment, and he says many of his neighbors are worried about what’s next.

“We have only had enough time to take out personal belongings, like clothing, medications,” he said

The blast on September 20 left the apartment complex too dangerous to be inhabited.

And in the days following the explosion, Requeno and his 16-year-old pitbull, Peggy, were forced to sleep in his car, and his beloved birds left out in the elements.

District leaders say dozens of families were forced from their homes.

Wednesday evening, those residents got some answers about what’s next, with reps from several agencies holding a town hall.

The District says currently 100 displaced residents are staying in hotels, and they will cover those rooms until October 17.

“Where can we go? You know a lot of places we go, the rents are from 1800 to over $2000 and you know for us to provide that type of rent, we are going to have to literally work day and night,” Requeno said.

The Department of Buildings says it is the owner’s responsibility to make those repairs, but damage to the complex is so bad, it will take months before it’s safe enough to turn on utilities. That’s if the landlord doesn’t appeal, and officials say they have been “less than responsive.”

“We have rights as tenants, and they pointed that out,” Requeno said. “However, the landlord is not responding.”

In the meantime, the District is helping residents with supplies and transportation to move their stuff into storage, as well as a long list of resources to find temporary housing.

Requeno says thankfully, he and Peggy are now staying in a hotel. But he says he doesn’t know what he’s going to do once that time is up.

“Only God knows,” he said. “Only God knows.”

The emergency action on Tuesday aimed to reduce the burden on housing providers in crisis due to an influx of unpaid rent and delayed eviction cases.

ERAP is a government program that provides low-income residents with subsidized housing. People earning less than 40% of the area median income receive government assistance for overdue rent, late fees, and court costs for households facing evictions, according to the District of Columbia Department of Human Services.

Tweaks made to the program in 2022 prohibited landlords from evicting tenants who held unpaid rent if they had pending applications for ERAP funds and placed heavy restrictions on judges’ ability to weigh in on eviction appeals from landlords.

Council Chairman Phil Mendelson said this week that, under the ERAP policies, housing providers have run into a wall of financial challenges.

“What we are seeing is, on an aggregate basis, these affordable housing providers are carrying tens of millions of dollars in uncollected rent, and that is not sustainable,” Mendelson said.

With landlords losing millions of dollars in unpaid rent, the council’s emergency legislation reversed eviction policies, empowered courts to process eviction proceedings even if a tenant had a pending ERAP application, and allocated $80 million in Housing Production Trust Fund money as bridge loans to prevent subsidized affordable housing providers from declaring bankruptcy.

The council’s legislative action is a temporary measure. However, the mayor’s office is seeking permanent actions to remedy the housing fiasco.

“Comprehensive, permanent legislation and continued robust investment in the system will be needed to protect our investments and progress,” Mayor Muriel Bowser said Tuesday evening.

The district’s affordable housing market is facing a “looming crisis,” according to a June report published by the Apartment and Office Building Association of Metropolitan Washington. The report found that ERAP policies had put affordable housing providers “on the verge of financial insolvency.”

Earlier this spring, Laura Green Zeilinger, the director of the D.C. Department of Human Services, the agency that oversees ERAP, worried that the program was not a sustainable solution to the housing affordability crisis. She warned that the injection of federal funds into ERAP during the pandemic “created an expectation that [DHS] cannot meet.”

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“ERAP is never going to have a budget of $300 million, and we need to be honest with residents that they need to do everything they can to pay their rent,” Zeilinger said.

The ERAP announced this year that due to its funds being “exhausted,” it is closing the application portal for new beneficiaries for fiscal 2025.