City Desk » Robert Parker http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk 68.3 Square Miles of D.C. News and Opinion Tue, 14 Feb 2012 15:45:42 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 Neighborhood Watch: Shaw Residents vs. The Park Service http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/09/02/neighborhood-watch-shaw-residents-vs-the-park-service/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/2009/09/02/neighborhood-watch-shaw-residents-vs-the-park-service/#comments Wed, 02 Sep 2009 16:00:07 +0000 Lois Kapila http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/citydesk/?p=31090 The issue: Shaw residents are infuriated by delays at the National Park Service (NPS). They want the agency to hurry up and develop three vacant, rundown properties in the neighborhood, including the Carter G. Woodson Home National Historical Site. Is NPS doing all it can?

No: Irate resident Ray Milefsky writes on the Shaw listserv: "You, the Park Service, are dissing the Shaw community and the City by keeping these buildings as magnets for vagrancy, trash, and criminal activity...We are fed up and angered at being told to look for the pie-in-the-sky when all we can smell is the defecation at your doorstep in OUR neighborhood."

Yes: Robert Parker, NPS Site Manager, stresses the need for planning, management, planning, resources, and...planning: "There is a process. It takes time, resources and planning. We're currently working out a general management plan with a directional format for...how we plan to manage the resources."

He anticipates that work on the site will start around 2012.

Brian Smith sets out his own time frame in the listserv debate: "...this will continue until Malia Obama is 40 years old."

Next step: A general update of the vacant properties question will be presented at the ANC2C meeting tonight.

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