“We Really Don’t Want a Situation Where a Homeowner Can’t Make Minor Changes”

The following was written by PoPville contributor David McAuley, founder of Short Articles about Long Meetings.

1627 Monroe Street, after and before. Credits (after): Photo taken at ANC meeting, (before) from propertyquest.dc.gov

At its regular monthly meeting on June 26, Advisory Neighborhood Commission 1D/Mount Pleasant voted unanimously to support a homeowner who does not want to rip out newly-installed front windows to comply with historic preservation requirements.

The owner of 1627 Monroe Street NW asked the ANC for support after the staff of DC’s historic preservation authorities recentlyrecommended against giving the homeowner retroactive approval for his windows. The matter is now on the agenda of the next meeting of DC’s Historic Preservation Review Board(HPRB), scheduled for today (June 28). The HPRB has jurisdiction over this matter because the house is in the Mount Pleasant Historic District.

The problem is that the new window is twice as wide as the window that was there before (see photo above). In other respects, it is quite similar.

The homeowner, who spoke at the meeting, bought the house last year after moving to Mount Pleasant from Germany. He said that his agreement with the contractor (which he held up for all to see) stated that the contractor was responsible for getting all necessary permits and permissions. The contractor assured the homeowner that he had done all the necessary paperwork. Furthermore, the homeowner noted, the window is not visible from the street for much of the year due to a “green wall”, meaning, a large tree in the home’s front yard (see Google Street View photo from July 2017).

via Google Street View

ANC1D Chair Jon Stewart (Commissioner for district 01) said he lived in a similar house very near 1627 Monroe Street (which is also in his district), and his house was quite dark inside.

“I recognize the rationale for why you want to make this alteration,” Stewart said.

Stewart also said that, after the work on 1627 Monroe occurred, “I didn’t notice it”. A neighbor eventually reported the unauthorized windows to Stewart and asked Stewart to report the homeowner to the HPRB. Stewart refused. Nevertheless, soon afterward, the HPRB learned of the windows and the homeowner received a notice in his letterbox.

Commissioner Jack McKay (district 03) also supported the homeowner, saying historic preservation didn’t mean that all buildings had to look “the same as 1935”. McKay said the mission of HPRB was to prevent incongruous development, not to prevent all development.

“We really don’t want a situation where a homeowner can’t make minor changes to his own home,” McKay said.

The HPRB report itself says that the house is part of a “nondescript” row of houses, and that “the proposal might have been the beneficiary of the Board’s application of flexibility had the proposal preceded the work”.

The ANC’s resolution said the homeowner’s failure to seek advance approval was “the determining factor in recommending denial”. While the ANC recognized “legitimate concerns about moral hazard,” it went on to recommend that “[t]his case should be evaluated as all others, and it is not the Board’s job to mete out punishment for unpermitted construction”.

Before ANC voted to support the homeowner, Commissioner Stewart noted that DC’s Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs was the proper agency for enforcing city regulations in cases like this.