This week, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser publicly defended her $660 million plan to build seven new homeless shelters in the city, even as her administration looked for a consultant to conduct a cost-benefit analysis of it, reports The Washington Post.
According to documents obtained by the Post, D.C.’s new Office of Public-Private Partnerships issued the request on Friday. The solicitation seeks a company to conduct a “value-for-money analysis … to assist the District in assessing the true public benefit” of the plan and alternatives, including doing nothing to replace a rundown family shelter at D.C. General Hospital.
The price tag of the mayor’s 30-year, $660 million plan has been a point of contention. An independent analysis could support Bowser’s case that the plan is in the best interest of D.C. taxpayers. But Council Chairman Phil Mendelson questioned whether the rushed process could actually produce a thorough review. He estimated a good study would take four to six weeks, at least.
“What I’d like to see,” Mendelson told the Post, “is a ‘reasonableness assessment’ of this plan, because I can’t tell you how many people I’ve talked to who find the costs unreasonably high.”
The plan calls for the city to lease five parcels of land and to build shelters on two others already owned by the District, creating approximately 280 units for homeless families. D.C. has placed hundreds of families in need of shelter in motels over the years.
Most council members have committed to support Bowser’s plan in order to close D.C. General, a dilapidated, overcrowded mega-shelter, by the end of 2018.
The Post has also raised questions about the sites chosen for the new shelters. Most of the private properties selected to lease are owned or partially controlled by major donors to the mayor’s campaigns. According to some experts, they stand to benefit mightily. From the Post:
The District would pay at least $4,500 on average per apartment, per month, each year for at least the next 20 years under Bowser’s plan.
According to one estimate circulating among D.C. Council members, the combined assessed value of all the land the city would lease under Bowser’s plan is roughly $14.5 million. But the market value of those properties would multiply tenfold to about $147 million because of the leases. And when the terms expire, the city would not own most of the facilities it paid to construct.
Jen Kinney is a freelance writer and documentary photographer. Her work has also appeared in Philadelphia Magazine, High Country News online, and the Anchorage Press. She is currently a student of radio production at the Salt Institute of Documentary Studies. See her work at jakinney.com.
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