Wilson Building Bulletin: A push to stop a stadium at RFK

A group of progressive activists say they are planning a push to put a measure on the D.C. ballot that, if approved by voters, would prohibit the 174-acre RFK site from being used for a new football stadium. The proposed ballot initiative – tentatively titled “Homes Not Stadiums” – would specify that the site would have to be zoned instead for housing, retail, parks, and recreation.

“We’re trying to prioritize things for housing. We have a whole generation of young people giving up on the American dream, giving up on finding a place to live in D.C.,” says Adam Eidinger, a veteran activist who in the past has spearheaded ballot initiatives to legalize marijuana, repeal the tipped minimum wage, and bring ranked-choice voting to the city. “We’d like to see a new neighborhood that has affordable housing.”

Mayor Muriel Bowser has been clear about what she wants to see at the site, which D.C. gained additional authority over earlier this year after Congress approved a bill expanding the range of uses for the federal parcel. The large swath of land will offer the city a rare opportunity to create a whole new neighborhood along the banks of the Anacostia River – but the mayor believes the stadium is a necessary part of any future development. “The site needs an anchor to kickstart the development, and our vision is that anchor would be an NFL stadium,” she said at a community meeting in February, while adding that the site is large enough to also include housing, retail, parks, and recreation. 

The proposed ballot initiative – which was first reported by WAMU’s Alex Koma – could be filed as early as next week, kickstarting a process that would involve collecting signatures from tens of thousands of D.C. voters in a six-month window to put the issue on the ballot for a future election.

It also comes as Bowser is negotiating with the Washington Commanders over a possible return to D.C. and finalizing her budget for the upcoming fiscal year, which could potentially include public funding for the construction of a new stadium. While no firm details have been made public around what type of taxpayer funding would be provided, Bowser has said in the past that she could foresee the city paying to prepare the RFK site for development.

At Audi Field in Southwest, the city paid to prepare the site and D.C. United’s owners paid to build the stadium. Nationals Park, though, was fully paid for by D.C. taxpayers. 

Bowser has said that in a moment of economic uncertainty for the city, D.C. has to invest in new drivers of economic development. Her administration calls a new Commanders stadium at RFK a “once in a generation placemaking opportunity” that could produce more than $1 billion in additional revenue for the city on a yearly basis.

But critics say that claims of increased revenue from stadiums are questionable, even more so for football stadiums that are used less frequently – and could cost more than $1 billion to build. 

“It’s so sad that we get this opportunity and she has one idea. It’s just frustrating. There’s so many better ideas,” says John Capozzi, an organizer with the No Billionaire’s Playground campaign who is working with Eidinger on the initiative. (Two decades ago they both similarly opposed public funding to build what eventually became Nationals Park in Navy Yard.) 

“The initiative process is important because people should get to decide what happens at RFK,” he adds. “If people got a chance to sign a petition and vote on it, that would make sense for a decision on one of the biggest parcels of land in the District.”

The proposed initiative is taking aim at the zoning of the RFK site – the rules designating what the site could be used for – because D.C. law prohibits initiatives from directing how the city can or cannot spend money. It still faces formidable challenges, including collecting signatures from 5% of registered voters across the city, including in at least five of the city’s eight wards.

“It’s totally grassroots,” Eidinger of the nascent campaign. “It’s time to put our foot down. We don’t want to subsidize billionaires.”

A timely initiative

If you hate changing your clocks twice a year, this will appeal to you. An Adams Morgan resident is floating his own ballot initiative that, if passed, would require D.C. to stick either with standard time or daylight saving time (when clocks move forward an hour from March until October).

“Many D.C. residents find time changes disruptive to their daily lives, health, and productivity. This initiative seeks to provide stability and consistency in our schedules while giving residents a voice in choosing their preferred time,” proposer Daniel Bernier told me.

Arizona and Hawaii currently are the only two U.S. states that have opted out of the annual daylight saving time clock changes. National lawmakers have also advocated for picking one time or the other, but President Trump recently avoided taking a stance on it because he said it’s a “50-50 issue.”

New bills: Ticket scalpers and tenant protections

Tickets: It wasn’t exactly Kid Rock in the Oval Office, but the stagecraft was still on point. On Tuesday Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen appeared on stage at The Anthem, not to sing a ballad but rather to unveil a bill aimed at limiting how much concert and show tickets can be resold for on the secondary market. (That’s the same reason Kid Rock was at the White House last week.) The bill – which is backed by a number of local venues, including I.M.P., which operates The Anthem, 9:30 Club, the Lincoln Theatre, and others – would limit resale prices to face value plus 10% and prohibit services like StubHub from listing tickets before they’re actually put on sale by a venue. Large ticket resellers are likely going to fight Allen’s bill; they argue that if they’re targeted, ticket scalping will merely move back into less safe unregulated spaces. 

Tenants: D.C.’s Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA) has been on the books since 1980, offering tenants across the city first shot at buying their building when the owner wants to put it on the market. Now Ward 1 Councilmember Brianne Nadeau says she wants to strengthen and modernize it. A new bill she introduced Thursday would impose consequences on bad actors who try to game TOPA, establish new timelines to get deals moving more quickly, and require that the D.C. government take certain steps to make the TOPA process easier and more transparent. But in a nod to building owners and investors, her bill would also exempt any new building from TOPA for its first three years, allowing it to be resold or transferred to new ownership more easily. Nadeau’s bill comes as the D.C. Council is navigating how to balance the city’s tenant protections with a complex residential housing market that investors say is becoming harder to navigate. It also responds to a bill introduced by Bowser in February that would limit TOPA’s application, exempting market-rate buildings from its provisions.