DID YOU KNOW THAT YOU’RE LIVING NEXT DOOR TO A HIGH CRIME AREA?

According to the District of Columbia Crime Policy Institute (as quoted in American University’s own student newspaper, The Eagle) areas surrounding AU, including it’s Main Campus, are considered a high crime area.  A high crime area is one with 25 or more crimes per year.
 
High crime areas are defined in terms of census blocks.  The two blocks cited in the report include AU’s core campus - bordered by Massachusetts Ave, Nebraska Ave, Rockwood Parkway, Glenbrook Road, Quebec Street and University Avenue - and one including the Berkshire Apartments and bordered by Massachusetts Ave, Nebraska, Van Ness Street, Wisconsin Ave and 39th Street.

And now American University wants to spread that high crime area even further into the community! By expanding it’s Tenley campus, and creating a so-called ”East Campus” of 700 student high rise dormitories and retail establishments on it’s Nebraska Avenue parking lot, they are widening the boundaries of the high crime area that has at it’s core their Main Campus.

By engulfing Nebraska Avenue as the main route through the middle of their envisioned future campus, they are effectively extending the tentacles of high crime into the very heart of our surrounding communities!

Here are some of the statistics published on AU’s own web site in their Annual Public Safety Report and this is just a small sampling:
CRIME                                                     2009            2010      1st qtr. 2011
Forcible Sex Offenses                               3                3                  2
Aggravated Assaults                                  6                 8                  2
Burglaries                                                   40              72                17
Defacing Property                                     n/a             130               39

And this doesn’t include the 514 alcohol and 112 drug violations for the same period.

SO WHAT CAN I DO?

It’s essential to stop AU and it’s attendant crime problems from engulfing all of us.  Write Mayor Vince Gray at 1350 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Suite 316, Washington, DC 20004, or go to dc.gov, click on Ask the Mayor and e-mail him.  Tell him you’re opposed to the AU expansion plan.

Write to Harriet Trigoning, Director of the DC Office of Planning, 1100 4th St. SW, Suite E650, Washington, DC 20024 or call (202)442-7600.  Tell her you’re opposed to the AU expansion plan.

If the Zoning Board approves AU’s expansion plan, we’ll all suffer.  Now is the time to stop it!  Tomorrow may be too late.

For more information on the issue of  AU expansion, and other things you can do to help, visit Neighbors for a Livable Community.  NLC is a coalition of community groups in the Spring Valley, Wesley Heights and Tenleytown areas.