Last Wednesday and Thursday, the DC Council’s Government Operations Committee and Transportation & the Environment Committee approved budgets making landmark investments in Washington DC's Ward 5 Ivy City community. Ivy City is a small, thriving neighborhood with a rich history, bounded by New York Avenue on the northwest, West Virginia Avenue on the east, and Mount Olivet Road on the south.

The Committees’ budgets include desperately needed funding to stabilize the structure of the Crummell School, a historic property in the center of Ivy City currently in disrepair, and to convert the property into a community center. Ivy City residents have raised their voices for decades in support of a community center, despite ongoing actions by the District to park idling buses from Union Station in the school’s parking lot.

The Committees’ budgets will also repair and build new sidewalks, plant trees, and maintain treeboxes, and will create a Clean Team to clean neighborhood streets. Ivy City has few sidewalks and trees, which contributes to poor air quality and some of the highest asthma rates in the District.

As you consider the Fiscal Year 2015 budget, please remember Ivy City and preserve funding for:

1) Transformation of the historic Crummell School into a community center: $1.925 million in Fiscal Year 2015 and $7 million in Fiscal Year 2016;

2) Streetscaping in Ivy City: $500,000 in Fiscal Years 2015 and 2016; and

3) A new Clean Team operated by the Department of Small and Local Business Development along New York Avenue and the surrounding residential streets: $100,000 in recurring funds.