The latest court ruling could open the door for demolition at McMillan. But it probably won't.
In the yearslong legal battle over the redevelopment of the McMillan Sand Filtration Plant, the project’s backers picked up a victory Friday — but like so many others in the long-stalled project, the victory may be short-lived as opponents ready another flurry of appeals.
D.C. Superior Court Judge Kelly Higashi declined to grant an injunction barring demolition at the site, theoretically clearing the way for some progress on a development more than a decade in the making. Critics of the massive development challenged the demolition permits in August, and were hoping the court would bar the developers — a team of Trammell Crow, EYA and Jair Lynch Real Estate Partners — from starting the work.
Alas, it wasn't so simple. Higashi only ruled against the challengers, the activist group Friends of McMillan Park, on procedural grounds. And she teed up their next appeal by suggesting that District officials might have broken the law in issuing demolition permits for the site. To allow time for the challengers to file said appeal, she ordered a prohibition on construction on the project for another 10 days.
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A key take-away for our community is that now the clock is ticking and the meter is running. When they say that every day of delay costs the city $6,500 that translates to the "taxpayer." Do the vast majority of us living here sit quietly and watch this charade continue ad nauseam or do we speak up and demand an end to these legal manueveringd that help none of us and simply keep this place a wasteland? The activists group need to be held accountable for the cost and the losses to our community by their efforts to block and delay construction. If there is anyone out there who could help mount a legal action against these groups and hold them accountable for the cost of their exploitation of our courts now would be a good time to get organized. These next 10 days of delay is costing $65,000. Do we want this to be the future for Bloomingdale and the surrounding neighborhoods? It's time for the discussions about history to end. We really need to deal with the present and our future.
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