I'm calling to order this hearing.

This is a public hearing of the Committee of the Whole of the Council of the District of Columbia.

I am Phil Mendelssohn, Chair of the Council and Chair of the Committee of the Whole.

Today is Tuesday, April 21st, 2026.

The time is 5.23 in the afternoon.

We're having this hearing in the Council Chambers Room 500 of the Johnny Wilson Building.

And this hearing is being recorded and will be available on the Council's website, which is WW.dccouncil.gov.

The subject of this hearing is Bill 26-625 entitled the RFK Campus Small Area Plan Amendment Act of 2026.

Which was submitted by the mayor on March 6th.

In her letter, transmittable letter, she said this bill is necessary to facilitate the timely zoning and development of the RFK campus, which cannot proceed until the future land use map covering the site is amended to allow mixed use development.

Under this bill, the future land use map could be amended in connection with the approval of the RFK campus small area plan.

Amending the future land use map would still require legislative approval by the council, but the planning process associated with the map change would be more focused than for a comprehensive plan amendment.

Significantly, this bill would ensure the development of the RFK campus benefits from, would ensure the development of the RFK campus benefits from the extensive community input and detailed planning that comes with a small area plan.

And to read from the hearing notice the stated purpose of the bill is to amend the Comprehensive Plan Act of 1984, Land Use Element Amendment Act of 1984 to modify the requirement for preparing and submitting a small area plan for the RFK Memorial Stadium campus.

This bill is intended to facilitate the next steps in zoning for the RFK campus to allow for development of a new stadium and mixed use development resulting from the Robert F.

Kennedy Campus Redevelopment Act of 2025 adopted by the Council last year.

The record in this matter will be open for two weeks.

That is, it will close at 5 p.m.

on May 1st, Tuesday, May 1st, excuse me, May 5th, 2026.

I'll just add that the council, after extensive or intensive public awareness and participation, adopted the RFK Campus Act last August.

I think it was August 1st was final reading.

No, August 1st was first reading.

To allow for the construction of a stadium to house the Washington Commanders football team, and also to allow for substantial mixed-use development on much of the rest of the campus.

And that site under the current future land use map is designated as I believe Parks and Open Space, and so that designation needs to change for the mixed-use development.

And that's what this is about.

So we have a number of witnesses before I get to the government.

Well after four.

So let me call the witnesses who've registered.

We'll see who's here.

Ashley Ruff, who's a ANC Commissioner, ANC 7F, William Jordan, Antonio Myers, Parissa Naruzi, who is Executive Director of Empowered DC, Regina Tatum, Sarah Francis Morris, and Michael Rodriguez, who is Chief Executive Officer of St.

Coletta of Greater Washington.

So I believe a couple of the witnesses are online.

And I see Mr.

Jordan at the table.

I know Ashley Ruff was in the chamber earlier, but that was while the council was meeting.

So since she's not online and she's not here, I'll turn to Mr.

Jordan, Europe.

Good evening.

I would urge the council to not pass this legislation and allow the plan to move through the normal comp plan rewrite process.

And I wanted to share a few reasons why I believe it should.

One, I really have no confidence in the Office of Planning.

And I'm sharing this from a hearing earlier this year where the director, when questioned by Councilmember White about the number of three-bedroom housing needed in the city, basically punted on the issue and didn't answer why we need three bedrooms, and so we didn't.

Also, when talking about displacement in the production of housing units, basically said that they don't count how many people have left.

They only look at the number of people and the number of units produced and not the number of units lost.

So if they're not even counting the total impact of policy, to me that's really insane.

And then they talked about the old soldiers' home and said they were still counting the units that are going to be developed at the whole soldiers' home as part of the city's planning, and that project has died twice on the bond and doesn't even exist anymore.

So I don't have any confidence that the Office of Planning takes this process seriously.

The other is we're really creating a moral hazard here.

And we've been doing it over and over.

You know, it's always a rush.

We're telling the commanders or whoever, whatever the developer is that they don't have to go through a community process.

In the last 20 years, they've been truncating the process from land disposition to planning, zoning, even the zoning comp plan, PUD process.

They've been truncating it and making it harder for people to defend and develop their communities.

So he was just fined by the judge 30 million dollars for basically using the project that was supposed to be under DIMPED Oversight as a kind of money laundering.

So he was caught for 30 million.

He refinanced over a hundred million, and we don't know what happened with that money.

That was a city developed project.

The project never met the community benefits that were required, and we were so pumped up about getting development and doing things, we didn't do any oversight, and nothing has changed.

So 100 million dollars laundered through a project, and we were still awarding that same developer new projects.

Now he's gone, and his family wants to sell the rights to a project in Hill East.