The District closed 7th Street to vehicular traffic on weekends in the wake of the April 2007 fire at the Eastern Market under emergency powers enacted by Mayor Fenty. This was done initially to accommodate farmers and the arts and craft vendors who were dislocated from their usual spaces in front of the market and on the Hine playground. One year later the Eastern Market Community Advisory Committee (EMCAC) voted unanimously to accept the recommendation of the Office of Property Management (OPM) to continue the closure so that the District’s Dept of Transportation (DDOT) could begin streetscape work in August. The work finally got underway in the late winter of 2009.

With the streetscape moving toward completion and the market scheduled to reopen in mid-summer, the issue of the street closing is again moving to the contentious forefront. Significant numbers of residents and many of the arts and craft vendors want 7th St. to remain closed. However, most of the bricks and mortar businesses on 7th St. as well as an overwhelming number of merchants in the East Hall and an unknown number of residents want 7th St. returned to its pre-fire status – open from Pennsylvania Ave. through to N. Carolina Ave. Bricks and mortar operators contend that their overhead and dramatically reduced revenue is crushing them economically compared with the lesser costs of weekend stall rentals, and that they need patrons to be able to park along the street. The farmers have always resisted the closure insisting on their proximity to their parked trucks to supply their stalls.

Larry Kamins of Prudential Carruthers Realty on 7th St. opposes the closing, and predicts that the harm will continue: “The businesses are part of a three legged stool. As stakeholders Market Row has been left out. It is hell on wheels for them with 60 to 70 per cent of their customers coming on weekends. The closure has hurt us dramatically.”

The Market Row Association met on April 17 and passed a resolution stating in part that as soon as the work on the street and the renovation of the Eastern Market is finished that 7th St. should be re-opened immediately.

According to Kamins, a copy of the resolution will be sent to Mayor Fenty as well members of the City Council, ANC 6B and the affected District government agencies. Kamins does suggest a more conciliatory fallback position offering to re-open the issue if there is “a comprehensive plan that includes management of 7th street by the Market Manager and some resolution to the long-standing problem of parking at the Market. “

Daphne Gemmill, a 30 year resident of the Hill wonders why “ there been no community input on the street closings and no real communication with the community” on this matter as there was in what she describes “as the great community meeting that was held in the wake of the Market fire.”

The normal process for closing a street permanently is for an application to be made at the District’s Office of the Surveyor. All impacted District departments then weigh in.

Since it is a “matter of significance” to Hill residents, ANC 6B will exercise its prerogative of being given “great weight ” in this decision. According to Bob Meyers of the Surveyor’s Office, this process ordinarily takes “about one year.” At the end of this period, the City Council either approves or denies the application. The question which remains unanswered is whether 7th St. will continue to remain closed on weekends during this process and under what authority.

Bill Rice of OPM, responding to inquiries, said that the decision “will be made by DDOT.” Attempts to reach DDOT were unsuccessful.

Ward Six City Council member Tommy Wells, who has pushed hard for a “livable, walkable” neighborhood and initially supported the closing, noted that many of the young people who have moved to the Hill support the closure. Nevertheless, as Wells quickly points out, there is a process for resolving this issue, once the executive branch’s emergency order is lifted. Wells favors community input and indicated that “ if the ANC voted against it (the street closing), I would not likely support it.”

Donna Scheeder, Chair of EMCAC, indicating that the issue would be addressed once the streetscape was finished, offered this comment: “We want to make an information-based decision, not one based on emotional arguments.”

Adding to the bricks and mortar business community’s continued unhappiness , a March 5 promise by DDOT to post signage in return for supporting immediate street closure to accelerate the streetscape work has yet to fully materialize. A recent visit to 7th St. found a “Businesses Are Open” sign totally obscured in the midst of the construction. The promise of free customer parking at Hine on weekdays, offered to soften the blow of the closure, still lacks its promised signage. Meanwhile, the Hine lot is filled each day with savvy Virginia and Maryland commuters who park and use the nearby Eastern Market Metro, with no apparent enforcement on the part of DDOT. The streetscape work is scheduled for completion in June.

Temporary Property Tax Relief
Wells introduced emergency legislation to the Council on April 7 deferring  property taxes due on March 31 for those businesses that have been severely impacted by the 7th St. closing and postponing payment until September 15. Although this unanimously enacted legislation offers temporary relief to cash strapped businesses, many operators lease these properties precluding any direct relief to business. And, of course, taxes, as March ended, had presumably been paid.

In April 2007, the 13 South Hall merchants received relief with more punch when the District government offered tax forgiveness on sales taxes collected in the previous quarter.

Market Finances Cloudy
Barry Margeson, OPM’s Interim Market Manager reported at an EMCAC meeting that the Enterprise Fund, once the repository of funds set aside for capital improvements  and now used as the operating fund for Market revenues and expenses, has been “freed for use. ” Margeson added that OPM will “start making payouts” and that “the District has been paying expenses and re-imbursements are due.”

The Enterprise Fund had a balance at the end 2008 of approximately $81,000. Under the newly unified management structure with revenue from the arts and crafts now being collected as part of Market revenue along with the rents paid by the farmers and East Hall merchants totaling $60,000 monthly, the Market may well be moving to meet its statutorily required mandate of being self sustaining. 

Larry Gallo, the non-food representative of EMCAC as well as its Treasurer has made fuller financial disclosure from OPM a constant theme in his questioning of Margeson at previous EMCAC sessions. Margeson had been reporting revenues and stall counts under the new collections procedures and has promised to provide more financial information. Gallo continued to request financial updates of Margeson at a recent EMCAC meeting, saying: “ We need a picture right now. I am asking for this again.”