The Van Ness South Tenants Association today sent a letter to Brian Hanlon, Director of the DC Department of Buildings (DOB), asking that he accelerate the pace of inspections at 3003 Van Ness and that he imposes and collect fines for housing code violations.

Recently, it was discovered that the Department of Buildings has cited Equity Residential for more than 700 housing code violations over the past year, totaling more than $1.2 million in fines. However, it has been reported that only one-third of the units have been inspected so far in DOB’s proactive inspection of the property, which began in August 2023.

If the inspection process were to proceed more quickly, and if approximately the same number of violations per unit were found, the total fines could exceed $3 million.

The letter to DOB raises questions about whether DOB policies regarding fines provide adequate incentives to force rental housing management companies like Equity Residential to keep their buildings in compliance with the housing code. Evidence suggests that DOB assesses fines but does not move aggressively to collect them — and in fact forgives them if the company remediates the code violation.

The letter to Director Hanlon from VNSTA president Harry Gural concludes:

“I strongly request that you take whatever steps necessary to move forward quickly with proactive inspections of the remaining two-thirds of units at 3003 Van Ness. Moreover, I ask that you seek full payment for all fines for all housing code violations that are discovered – and that you impose additional fines on those codes that are cited and subsequently not remediated.”