WCP | Construction Companies Open East-of-the-River Offices to Win Lucrative Contracts

February 1, 2019 The Advoc8te

The Advoc8te was rushing to get out of the country and didn’t really have time to share some recent WCP articles, including this cover story from last week. I’m taking a moment to do so now, I highly recommend you read them all. Very informative (and at times depressing) reporting on several east of the river issues and happenings.

Full Disclosure: You would have to be living under a rock to not know that The Advoc8te has had her own issues with the Entertainment and Sports Arena and as such, has banned them from appearing on this site. That said, this is relevant info so I will share it. It does not make me happy at all to see proof of what I was concerned about all along, east of the river small businesses being shut out of the economic prosperity this project was supposed to bring.

Last week’s Washington City Paper included some pretty damn good investigative reporting

Most recently, Saxon Collaborative won a $4.7 million contract to work on the Entertainment and Sports Arena, a 4,200-seat stadium in Ward 8’s Congress Heights. Building the arena, whose cost eventually ballooned to $69 million, was a coup for the District—officials estimate that the anticipated return on tax dollars invested will be 4-to-1. The 80,000-square-foot arena will serve as the Washington Mystics’ home court and practice space for the Wizards, and it’s expected to attract 350,000 unique visitors annually. Residents of the surrounding neighborhood helped negotiate a community benefits agreement that, ostensibly, helps ensure that residents of the ward get a slice of the arena’s anticipated financial benefits. Greg O’Dell, president of Events DC—the publicly subsidized company that manages sites like the Walter E. Washington Convention Center and RFK Stadium—has boasted about the number of Ward 7 and 8 businesses, and residents, that benefited from the project, emphasizing that Ward 7 and 8 CBEs were awarded $10 million in contracts. Events DC initially provided over $27 million in funding for the arena, with the District paying another $23 million. With the final cost rising by nearly 25 percent, the District will be on the hook for the bulk of that additional money. But quarterly reports summarizing the payments made to subcontractors on the project, produced by DSLBD, show that Events DC and District officials publicly exaggerated the anticipated financial benefits that the construction of the Entertainment and Sports Arena would create for residents of wards 7 and 8 and the businesses they run. City Paper received these reports through the Freedom of Information Act. City Paper identified over $6 million in contracts awarded to companies that are registered as Ward 7 or 8 CBEs, but have headquarters outside of those neighborhoods or separate offices outside of the District altogether. (A spokesperson for Events DC declined to make available the list of companies that received the $10 million. O’Dell says he would tell the companies to independently call City Paper. They did not.)

MORGAN BASKIN, WASHINGTON CITY PAPER