DC Council approves $70 million in revenue bonds for Howard University to renovate Tubman Quad dorms, two historic LeDroit Park homes

A proposal to issue nearly $70 million in DC revenue bonds for the renovation of historic Howard University dormitories won approval from the DC Council this week. The measure will also provide a boost to long-awaited restorations of two vacant LeDroit Park homes owned by the university and tied to key figures in the civil rights movement.

The resolution authorizing the bonds was approved without debate Tuesday, a week after the Committee on Finance and Revenue endorsed it.

The bonds will fund upgrades to the Harriet Tubman Quadrangle on Howard’s main campus at 2455 and 2350 4th St. NW. Howard students had complained about living conditions in the quad’s residence halls before the university announced the renovation plans last fall.

The legislation allows remaining funds from the $69.82 million total in bonds to go toward other improvement projects at Howard, including redevelopment of two notable university-owned residences in LeDroit Park: the Robert and Mary Church Terrell House at 326 T St. NW, once the home of civil rights activist and suffragist Mary Church Terrell; and the Walter E. Washington House at 408-410 T St. NW, the former home of the District’s first elected mayor under home rule. Neighborhood groups have long pressed for the university to restore the homes to productive use.

Last year, the National Trust for Historic Preservation highlighted the Terrell House after the university received federal grants to help pay for restoration of the “quirky, abandoned, asymmetrical Queen Anne home,” which was included on the DC Preservation League’s Most Endangered Places List in 1999.

The Terrell House is slated to be a “student-focused resource and amenity space within the LeDroit Park neighborhood,” and the Washington House will serve as “a university guest house for visiting scholars and VIPs,” according to Anthony Freeman, a senior real estate adviser for Howard. Freeman added that renovation of both properties is scheduled to commence this summer.

The federal grant of $500,000 from the U.S. Department of the Interior and the National Park Service will aid in the preservation of both properties and is part of $12.6 million awarded last year to “highlight stories related to the African American struggle for equality in the 20th century,” according to the National Park Service website.

With the revenue bonds approved this week, the primary beneficiary is the Harriet Tubman Quad project. At a May 21 hearing, the council’s finance committee heard testimony in support of the legislation, which Chairman Phil Mendelson introduced at the request of Mayor Muriel Bowser. No one spoke in opposition.

The quad named after the famous abolitionist consists of five residence halls housing female freshmen. Three of those buildings — the oldest dorms on campus — were constructed in 1929, and the others were built in 1951. Construction has been ongoing since November, with a slated reopening for fall 2019.

Council approval of the Howard Tubman Bond Approval Resolution of 2019 allows the District to issue tax-exempt revenue bonds to Provident Group-Tubman Quad Properties Inc. in an amount “not to exceed $69,820,000” for financing, reimbursing and other costs associated with the quad project and other improvements at Howard.

DC’s Revenue Bond Program has issued more than $11.5 billion in industrial revenue bonds to manufacturers, nonprofits and other eligible businesses since 1994, according to the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development’s website. The bonds — available at interest rates lower than those for traditional commercial loans — are used to finance a variety of projects, including health care, educational and sports facilities. Past recipients have included the International Spy Museum, National Public Radio and multiple universities.

In her May 21 testimony on the Howard bonds, Keisha Garrick, counsel to Provident Group-Tubman Quad Properties, said the quad’s dorms are “an integral component to Howard’s first-year experience,” as the university requires all freshman students who don’t commute to live on campus.

Garrick said the renovation will increase the number of beds in the quad from 614 to 661. As of fall 2017, she said, the quad had exceeded its intended capacity by approximately 121 percent — forcing some students to triple up in dorm rooms intended for two people.

Renovations will focus on infrastructure improvements to the quad’s residence halls — Baldwin, Crandall, Frazier, Truth and Wheatley — as well as upgrades to individual rooms, communal restrooms and recreational spaces, according to a Howard release last year. During the construction period, more than 1,000 female freshmen were transferred to two nearby residence halls: Mary McLeod Bethune Annex and College Hall North.

In the months before the renovation was announced, student concern had been mounting over the quad’s deterioration. At a town hall meeting last winter, students cited poor living conditions such as broken heaters and water problems, according to Howard’s student newspaper, The Hilltop.

In that article, dean of residence life Wilson Bland said the quad would get “its own individualized boiler to ensure that there is always heat and hot water as well as ensuring that all the air conditioning and heaters work.”

Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1B — whose boundaries include Howard’s campus as well as LeDroit Park and lower Georgia Avenue — and the Pleasant Plains Civic Association are among the local groups that expressed support for the bond proposal, which also had the backing of Ward 1 Council member Brianne Nadeau.

“So far, Howard University developments like this have had only positive consequences for the surrounding community,” Daren Jones, president of the Pleasant Plains association, said in an interview. “They have brought more young people and vibrancy to the neighborhoods and more foot traffic for the businesses.”

Jones noted, however, that past developments have not always been completed on schedule. He said his association will be monitoring construction to ensure its timely conclusion.

Alonda Thomas, director of public relations for Howard University, wrote in an email that the quad renovations are on track to allow all students to move in this fall.