The Uplands apartments in Washington Highlands are part of a multi-phase redevelopment.
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This story was supported with funds from Spotlight DC—Capital City Fund for Investigative Journalism.
When Martina found out there was an eviction case filed against her last September, she thought it was a scam.
“How can you be evicted from a place that doesn’t exist?” she says.
Belmont Crossing Partners sought to remove Martina, who asked to be identified by her first name, from a two-bedroom apartment at 4386 7th St. SE in Washington Highlands, where she lived from 2020 to 2022. That’s when she and her family were temporarily relocated with the promise that they could return after the building was demolished and a new one was built. In the eviction filing, Belmont Crossing claimed she owed almost $30,000 in unpaid rent between summer 2022 and summer 2024—a time period when Martina no longer lived on 7th Street, in an apartment that no longer exists.
Belmont Crossing Partners relocated more than 100 other tenants to new apartments to facilitate the multi-phase demolition and reconstruction of the 275-unit garden-style complex, Belmont Crossing, into the 518-unit affordable housing Barnaby & 7th project.
In a now-deleted portion of their website, accessed through the internet archive, the landlord pledged: “At Barnaby & 7th, we are committed to ensuring that our former Belmont Crossing residents return to a community they are proud to call home. Our Right-to-Return policy, priority unit selection, and white glove services are just a few ways we are putting our residents first during this exciting time of redevelopment.”
Martina says her landlord at Belmont “promised they would not go up on our rent, even if the building had units that cost more.” She paid $1,095 for a two-bedroom apartment, and since the landlord relocated her, Martina says no one has reached out about returning to the new building. “My phone number hasn’t changed,” she says. “My email address hasn’t changed.”
The terms of these tenants’ return to a new building—including that their rents would remain largely stable—were spelled out in an agreement where tenants signed over their rights under the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act, which gives tenants the right of first refusal when a building goes up for sale. The agreement stipulated that tenants would return to the new units as construction, which was made possible with significant government funding, was completed.
Belmont Crossing Partners won a default judgment in its eviction case against Martina after she failed to show up for an initial court hearing. In January, the judge issued a writ of execution—a legal document that allows the US Marshals to expel a tenant from their home—in this case, a home that no longer exists.
The eviction notice was also sent to the nonexistent apartment, and when it was returned as undeliverable, a magistrate judge canceled the scheduled April eviction. In July, a different magistrate, Judge Stephan Rickard, ordered the landlord to explain why the judgment should not be nullified and the case dismissed.
The judge’s order questioned the legality of serving documents by posting them at Martina’s current address, asserting that legal requirements mandate posting only on the leased or sought-after premises. The landlord’s attorney, Mark Raddatz, said that other judges had recommended this alternative posting, according to court records; and he argued that the eviction filing was intended to “prevent the defendant’s return to the 7th Street unit upon reconstruction.”
A spokesperson for Belmont Crossing Partners LLC, the owner of Barnaby & 7th, says via email that tenants who have been relocated but fall behind on rent could lose their right to return to the new building.
“While the buildings may be torn down and the tenants have been relocated, both the landlord and the tenants have reciprocal obligations to each other to make sure that the rent is paid and that their rights are preserved,” the spokesperson says via email. “The property has taken legal action against tenants who have failed to meet their legal obligation to secure, not only physical possession of the units, but legal possession.”
Judge Rickard dismissed the case in July.
But other tenants haven’t been as fortunate. Raddatz has filed more than 20 eviction cases on behalf of affordable housing providers against tenants who were relocated after their buildings were razed.
These tenants, most of whom do not have legal representation during the eviction proceedings, have been forced to navigate a surreal and confusing legal process; some have been ordered by judges to make monthly rent payments into a court registry for phantom apartments; the rates range from $725 to $1,025 per month, according to City Paper’s review of the cases.
This strategy from affordable housing providers has real and often bewildering consequences for tenants. One relocated tenant continues making payments to the court in her eviction case and mistakenly believing the payments are for her rent in her current apartment. In a recent hearing in her case, Raddatz stated his preference for a swift resolution, adding that his client, the landlord, “is not willing to make a payment plan under any circumstances.”
At the June ribbon cutting for Barnaby’s first phase, the 169-unit building they call The Uplands, D.C. Department of Housing and Community Development Director Colleen Green said “this project exemplifies the District’s commitment to collaborating with proactive tenants dedicated to preserving affordability. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s leadership inspires us to find innovative financial solutions, ensuring long-time District residents can remain in the city.”
“This is an opportunity to keep folks who have lived in the community in the community,” said Alexander Marte, senior development manager of Gilbane Development, one of the developers of Barnaby & 7th.
While city officials and developers celebrated the new development as a success for affordable housing, a deeper look reveals a troubling pattern of legal actions against the tenants who were promised its benefits.
An internal document that a Barnaby employee inadvertently emailed to a former Belmont Crossing tenant, which was shared with City Paper, lists almost 45 relocated tenants on an “eviction suit list.” The massive spreadsheet, which contains troves of personal tenant data including contact information, income, disability status, and housing subsidy information, was shared via a publicly accessible Google Drive link.
According to the spreadsheet, rents for approximately 150 potentially returning tenants ranged from $615 to $1,893.
The internal documents reveal that for tenants hoping to return to the new building, rental rates are, on average, 44 percent lower than market rate, while proposed rates for other tenants are more expensive—an average of only 12 percent below market.
Tenants whose names appear on the “eviction suit list” feel they’ve been given the run-around about when they can return; some tell City Paper they’ve been told they couldn’t return due to outstanding rental balances.
Nicole, a relocated Belmont Crossing tenant whose last name is being withheld to protect her privacy, says she loses sleep at night over her family’s precarious situation.
Nicole, along with her husband and their five daughters, were relocated to a temporary three-bedroom apartment in Kingman Park in early 2024. Belmont Crossing Partners promised to relocate the family to a “decent, safe, and sanitary temporary home,” according to a 2017 agreement retrieved from the Department of Buildings’ online database. But the family faced immediate and significant problems, including rodents, roaches, and regular shootings, Nicole says.
By November 2024, Nicole alerted Barnaby & 7th management that “the neighborhood isn’t safe for us to be in.” Weeks later, she inquired about “any penalties of moving out of our dangerous environment.” She followed up again in December as her desperation grew: “It’s not safe at all,” she wrote, asking if breaking their lease would constitute a “violation.”
“We would rather stay at a shelter,” she wrote.
For the next six months, Nicole repeatedly contacted Barnaby and 7th management about returning to the property—where the family would pay close to their original $1,395 for a three-bedroom apartment. Until then, Belmont was covering the $820 rent differential for the apartment where her family was relocated, Nicole says. But in May she received the notice that Belmont would cease payments starting in June.
“They never told us that they were going to stop paying before we move back,” Nicole says. She says she secured a loan from her job to cover her June rent. That same month, the family received an eviction notice for their former unit at Belmont Crossing, which no longer exists.
Belmont Crossing tenants aren’t the only ones facing phantom evictions; affordable housing provider Wesley Hawaii LLC, also represented by Raddatz, has filed at least seven similar eviction cases against tenants who were relocated out of 1 Hawaii Ave. NE, which was razed; a new building is currently under construction.
City officials have lauded the One Hawaii project as a success for tenant rights and affordability.
“One Hawaii shows the promise and potential of the District’s TOPA laws that empower residents to be in the driver’s seat of development projects,” Ward 5 Councilmember Zachary Parker shared at the groundbreaking in 2024. The press release notes that all former 1 Hawaii residents “in good standing” will have the right to return to the new community with rent increase protections.
That promise stands in stark contrast to the experiences of some relocated tenants. Legal Aid DC attorney Brian Rohal, who represents at least two Hawaii Ave tenants, argued for a dismissal in one eviction case. Wesley’s attorney acknowledged that the relocated tenant did not have possession of the razed unit and that the case had been filed to terminate the tenant’s right to return in a previous hearing, according to court records.
In the other case, Rohal requested reconsideration of a protective order that had forced the tenant to pay rent into a court registry for a non-existent apartment. “Put simply, there can be no suit for eviction if there is no place from which to evict the Defendant,” Rohal argued in court records.
Jacqueline West-Spencer, senior vice president of real estate at Wesley Housing, tells City Paper that the tenant association reached an agreement in 2017 for the property’s redevelopment, which included temporary relocation for residents during construction. Residents were responsible for paying their original rent amount while Wesley Housing covered the difference in rent for the temporary units.
Eviction proceedings are initiated against residents who failed to pay their portion of the rent, in some cases for several years, West-Spencer says. She clarifies that the agreements tie residents back to their original units at one Hawaii, and non-payment of rent at the temporary units constitutes a breach of contract.
But one eviction case filed against a relocated tenant leaves questions about the accuracy of Wesley’s record-keeping. The tenant, who was sued for $1,153 in unpaid rent, showed up to court with money order receipts as evidence that they had in fact paid; Wesley dismissed the lawsuit shortly after.
The tenant, whose name is being withheld out of concern for their safety, says the property management company told them “that there was a miscommunication between the staff and that they weren’t receiving the payments.”
In a report released last week by the D.C. Courts Civil Legal Regulatory Reform Task Force addresses the access-to-justice gap for low- and moderate-income D.C. residents. High percentages of civil cases, especially evictions, involve unrepresented parties, the report found.
“It’s critical—to the extent we can—to try to get people who have these fundamental legal challenges whatever assistance we can from people who are properly supervised and trained,” D.C. Court of Appeals Judge Roy McLeese says in a press release accompanying the report, asking for public feedback on plans to fill the gaps in legal representation.
Nicole, for her part, says she feels abandoned by Belmont Crossing. She chokes back tears as she describes the prospect of walking into court without a lawyer to fight an eviction from a building that doesn’t exist. And because Belmont has stopped helping with her rent in the apartment where she was relocated, she’s scared she’ll be evicted from there, too.
“It’s not affordable,” she says. “We try to pay for something that we can’t afford in a neighborhood that is not worth it.”
Still, she’s praying for a return to the new Belmont Crossing and all that it signifies. “A lot of tenants wanted to come back to something new and fresh, and to start all over,” she says. “A nice new beginning.”