Families Displaced By 2008 Fire Return As Building Reopens With Affordable Housing

In 2008, a five-alarm fire destroyed the Deauville apartment building in Mount Pleasant, leaving nearly 200 people without a home.

The 85 unit-building has been plagued by issues, from mold to broken heating, with more than 7,000 code violations issued in the years before the blaze.

Those issues are nowhere to be seen outside or inside the building at 3145 Mount Pleasant Street NW. Tenants who will return to the building, and the advocates, city leaders and non-profit partners who helped them get there, today gathered at what's now known as the Monsenor Romero apartments to celebrate its opening.

"Today we have a new beginning," said Rob Richardson, development manager of the The National Housing Trust-Enterprise Preservation Corporation, which partnered with 3145 Mount Pleasant Street Tenants Association to redevelop the building.

Financing for the $19 million building came from the D.C. Department of Housing and Community Development ($4.137 million for an acquisition loan), Capital One Bank ($9.7 million for a construction loan) and through Low Income Housing Tax Credits sold to investors.

"Without the loan," Richardson said of DHCD's contribution, "it could not have happened to bring back the residents who used to live here."

With construction completed 16 months after groundbreaking, 38 of the families who were displaced will move back into what's now a 61-unit affordable building.

"We're here today for the phoenix that has risen quite literally from the ashes," Mayor Vincent Gray said at the ribbon cutting. "This is the completion of a ten-year journey. It shouldn't take that long to be able to reserve and restore and bring people back, but it did. In one context, I'm glad it did take ten years because it might have been never."

Among the credit spread around for bringing the building back online, much of it went to Yasmin Romero-Latin of the 3145 Mount Pleasant Street Tenants Association which banded together to to keep the building affordable.

Scott Kline of the NHT-Enterprise Preservation Corporation said he was unsure about the project's success until meeting Romero-Latin. "This project can't fail. This project won't fail with a leader like this," he said.

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Families Displaced By 2008 Fire Return As Building Reopens With Affordable Housing