Press Release: With the Bowser Administration on Track to Meet the #36000by2025 Goal, Department of Housing and Community Development Director Polly Donaldson to Retire at the End of September

News Release — Executive Office of the Mayor, Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development, and DC Department of Housing and Community Development

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

September 10, 2021

CONTACT:

LaToya Foster (EOM)

Shayne Wells (DMPED)

Richard Livingstone (DHCD)

(WASHINGTON, DC) – Today, Polly Donaldson announced that at the end of September, she will retire from her position as the director of the Department of Housing and Community Development. Since 2015, Donaldson has led the design and implementation of Mayor Muriel Bowser’s housing strategy. This strategy has produced over 14,250 units of affordable housing with another 12,300 under construction or in the pipeline and has preserved over 1,500 units of existing affordable housing. In 2019, the Mayor’s strategy expanded to set the goal of producing 36,000 new units of housing, 12,000 of which to be affordable.

“When I came into office and committed to investing at least $100 million into the Housing Production Trust Fund every year, I knew we would need a leader with a true passion for affordable housing to get those funds out the door and into our community — and Polly was the right person for the job,” said Mayor Bowser. “Then, two years ago, when we set a bold goal to build 36,000 new homes by 2025, with a least a third of them affordable, I was confident that Polly would have a plan to make it happen. She leaves DC Government with our city on track to meet that goal, and for that we are grateful and we celebrate her service to our city.”

Donaldson’s stewardship of the Housing Production Trust Fund (HPTF) invested over $600 million in affordable housing developments across the District since 2015 and paved the way for the unprecedented $400 million HPTF investment in the FY21 and FY 22 budgets. Donaldson chaired the Mayor’s Housing Preservation Strike Force, which resulted in the creation of the Housing Preservation Fund, which has leveraged $30 million of District funds with $90 million of private capital to preserve the District’s affordable housing stock.

Director Donaldson is the longest serving Director of DHCD and was instrumental in leading the department’s successful efforts to revitalize and grow the District’s partnership with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Donaldson continued her service on the Interagency Council on Homelessness, co-chaired its Housing Solutions Committee for the past seven years, and insured that permanent supportive housing for homeless families and individuals was embedded in all HPTF-funded production developments.

Donaldson supported Mayor Bowser’s national leadership on housing policy and programs through her work with the National League of Cities’ Housing Task Force, the Rose Fellowship and the Enterprise Community Partners’ High Cost Cities Housing Forum. She was proud to accept the Urban Land Institute’s prestigious Robert C. Larson Housing Policy Leadership Award in 2017, on behalf of Mayor Bowser in recognition of the Mayor’s multi-pronged approach to tackling issues on housing the city’s residents. This included the establishment of a significant housing trust fund to support production and preservation and improved programs to encourage homeownership and facilitate attainment for those who would otherwise remain renters.

Together with the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development (DMPED), the Office of Planning, and the housing agency partners, Director Donaldson helped devise the Housing Framework for Equity and Growth that led to Mayor Bowser setting neighborhood level goals for the equitable distribution of affordable housing in the District, making DC the first jurisdiction in the nation to do so. This major policy commitment will shape housing policy and investments for many years to come and have long-lasting positive impact for District residents.

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