Plans are currently underway to eradicate what some call the "last affordable housing” in the District of Columbia, the Barry Farm Dwellings public housing community. Redevelopment plans by New Communities Citywide Initiative have raised concerns for longtime residents that Barry Farm’s demolition will intensify DC’s homelessness problem, forcing native Washingtonians out of the District and disrupting residents’ homes and livelihoods.

This wouldn’t be the first time redevelopment efforts disturbed residents of Barry Farm. Since its founding, Barry Farm went from a free, thriving community to an overlooked public housing community ravaged by landlord code violations, tenant neglect, subhuman property conditions, and now, displacement.

In 1867, Barry Farm was established as a post-Civil War community for freed blacks and former slaves by the Freedmen’s Bureau. Under this act, blacks finally had an opportunity to purchase land. A community of freedmen acted collectively to build homes, schools and churches and transform Barry Farm into a thriving community.

Over the years, the District of Columbia grew, bringing more businesses and white residents into the city. The government searched for ways to house the black working poor who lived in the alleys of Georgetown and Foggy Bottom. In 1943, the National Capitol Housing Authority developed the Barry Farm Dwellings public housing units, segregating the poorest blacks into Ward 8, disrupting the harmony of the established black community.

The introduction of this unsettled population into "the Farms” challenged the sense of safety and home residents once felt. Tensions rose. Crime, violence and poverty intensified. Middle-income blacks who could afford to move away left Barry Farm, leaving the poorest residents behind.

Despite the challenges of poverty, crime, employment and living conditions, Barry Farm residents continued to develop a sense of community, leaning on one another for support.

Today, the Barry Farm community is facing disruption once again. The New Communities Citywide Initiative has plans to redevelop the 654 existing, low-income homes in the Barry Farm and Park Chester communities and add mixed-income, affordable housing units, creating 1,110 new units total.

Residents will need to relocate while redevelopment takes place. However, history has shown that in similar, urban redevelopment efforts, public housing units that were demolished were not replaced one-to-one, leaving fewer properties for low-income residents.

When the Ellen Wilson Dwellings near Capitol Hill were redeveloped, “of 134 total units in the new development, only 33 of those [were] reserved for the lowest-income families who make up the majority of public housing tenants.” According to the DC Fiscal Policy Institute, the District now has half as many low-cost units as in 2002.

Once redevelopment is completed, residents fear that only those who meet criteria such as credit approvals and criminal background checks will be eligible to return—if units are available for their family size. Urban studies of similar communities, indeed, show that residents who are displaced often move to lower-income or higher-poverty areas.

“I’m having anxiety attacks wondering if these people are going to have a place to stay,” a woman from Barry Farms said, referring to the opposing efforts of the Barry Farms Tenants and Allies Association and community advocates.

Dominic Moulden is a community organizer with ONE DC, who works with public housing residents across the District of Columbia to advocate for tenant rights. Moulden said the District is not addressing the problem of racial, gender and class inequity in redevelopment plans, but instead, “moving poor, black, working-class women out of DC and masking it with terms like ‘mixed-income communities’ and ‘affordable housing.’”