Earlier this yr, housing advocates in Alexandria celebrated one in all their greatest victories but when metropolis lawmakers had put their cash and votes behind a plan to construct a 475-unit inexpensive residence complicated in Arlandria, an space of Central American immigrants that had lengthy been seen as a major goal for growth.
Washington
Catholic diocese sues Alexandria over affordable housing development
Three months later, that plan is going through a authorized problem by one in all its neighbors, which additionally occurs to serve most of the residents who would possibly profit from the two-building complicated: the native Catholic church.
Bishop Michael Burbidge, who oversees parishes throughout Northern Virginia from the Catholic Diocese of Arlington, filed a lawsuit on April 8 in opposition to town of Alexandria, alleging that it didn’t correctly vacate an alley that divides the event from a non-public Catholic college and a 72-year-old church constructing.
The lawsuit, which has not but been served, argues that Saint Rita Catholic Church has a non-public proper to make use of the alley above that of most of the people. Metropolis lawmakers successfully took that instantly, he claims, and handed it on to the nonprofit Alexandria Housing Improvement Company, which is constructing the complicated.
“The present plans negatively influence the power of the parish and the varsity to serve its members and the area people and diminishes its authorized rights and property pursuits,” Billy Atwell, a spokesman for the Arlington Diocese, mentioned in an announcement. “The Diocese needed to take sure steps below the legislation, due to timing constraints, to guard its property rights now and into the longer term.”
Andrea Blackford, a spokeswoman for town of Alexandria, mentioned in an announcement that town doesn’t touch upon pending litigation. “We’ve got reviewed the grievance and if the lawsuit is served we’ll reply appropriately,” she mentioned.
Jonathan Frederick, president of the Alexandria Housing Improvement Company, mentioned in an announcement that the nonprofit “seems ahead to persevering with our work to ship a lot wanted inexpensive housing to this neighborhood.”
As a result of the lawsuit has been filed however not but served, some fear that it’s a last-ditch effort to additional delay a much-needed inexpensive housing undertaking, one which has already been years within the making and that will be amongst largest sources of dedicated inexpensive items in Alexandria.
If that’s the case, the lawsuit would mark a stark departure from a regional pattern. Throughout Northern Virginia and nationwide, church buildings have more and more been giving up some and even all of their land as a method to fight a scarcity of inexpensive housing. In some instances, these offers have additionally served as a method for church buildings with quickly shrinking congregations to maintain their doorways open.
About 4 miles away within the Beauregard space of town, an Episcopal congregation voted to construct a 113-unit residence constructing for low-income renters on its land. Simply over the border in Baileys Crossroads, there’s a push to construct senior housing on the surplus land adjoining to a mainline Protestant church. Additional west, a Presbyterian congregation in Fairfax Metropolis is working with Habitat for Humanity to show a part of its parcel right into a set of inexpensive townhouses.
In Arlandria, nevertheless, some say the church is standing in the best way of inexpensive housing — though Saint Rita is a serious neighborhood establishment for working-class Latino immigrants in Arlandria, lots of whom attend its twice-weekly Spanish mass. The world is usually known as Chirilagua, after the Salvadoran city the place many neighborhood members can hint their roots.
Atwell mentioned that each the diocese and Saint Rita Catholic Church, which counts almost 1,000 households amongst its parishioners, assist including inexpensive housing choices to the world, together with via mixed-use growth subsequent door.
He famous that many Catholics in Alexandria assist packages that present housing to at-risk people and direct monetary help to underserved communities to pay for hire, utilities and different primary wants. That’s the reason others within the Northern Virginia metropolis are upset, or at the very least stunned, that the church is now asking courts to overview the undertaking.
With the brand new Amazon headquarters just some miles away, change is already coming to Arlandria. A few mile away, the brand new Potomac Yard Metro station being constructed to accommodate the approaching inflow of latest expertise employees within the space officers have dubbed “Nationwide Touchdown.”
“Even earlier than Amazon’s announcement, that is an space that has been within the crosshairs of sturdy financial pressures driving costs up,” mentioned Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson (D). “It is a website that was all the time going to redevelop.” (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Publish.)
The housing undertaking was seen as a robust effort to make sure that native residents wouldn’t be priced out. The deliberate two-building complicated, on the nook of West Glebe Street and Mount Vernon Avenue, would provide an unusually deep degree of affordability. 1 / 4 of items could be saved for renters making 40 % or much less of the world median earnings, whereas half could be for these making 60 % or much less.
About 95 % of neighborhood residents earn lower than 40 % of the world median earnings, in response to a 2019 survey carried out by Tenants and Staff United, a neighborhood activist group. Rising rents and redevelopment initiatives have slashed choices for these residents: Between 2000 and 2017, Alexandria misplaced about 90 % of its inexpensive housing inventory.
Earlier than the undertaking got here to a vote by town council, some residents affiliated with Saint Rita spoke in opposition to it. Many expressed worries that it would enhance visitors, or that the 2 towers of the housing complicated would possibly solid a shadow on the Saint Rita college playground. Land-use issues relating to the alley had been largely averted within the debate, and council members voted unanimously to approve the undertaking.
Alongside the lawsuit, although, Atwell mentioned the church “has additionally taken steps to make sure that the events concerned now have enough time to debate and resolve excellent points, so it might proceed serving its parishioners and the area people.”
Ingris Moran, the lead organizer for Tenants and Staff United, mentioned she was “shocked” to listen to concerning the lawsuit. Whereas Moran has usually stayed residence on Sundays with a new child child, her husband attends mass nearly each weekend at Saint Rita.
The undertaking “actually does have the intention of assembly the necessity of the present residents who’re on this neighborhood,” she mentioned. “Something that’s going to cease or delay this undertaking is regarding.”