Testimony of Larry Martin
Sierra Club District of Columbia Chapter
Hearing on the Robert F. Kennedy Campus Master Plan Small Area Plan
Committee on Transportation and the Environment
September 30, 2026
Good afternoon. My name is Larry Martin, and today I am representing the DC Chapter of the Sierra Club, working in coalition with RFK for All. The redevelopment of the former RFK stadium site along the Anacostia River is indeed a once-in-a-generation opportunity for the District. However, the design and infrastructure we lay down to support it will affect the quality of life in adjacent communities and the Anacostia ecosystem for lifetimes to come. Done well, it will deliver affordable homes and improved public spaces, protect water quality and create stronger connections to the Anacostia river, and advance sustainable development and long-needed resources to surrounding neighborhoods. The master plan does not presently assure that outcome. While it advances commendable goals, there are gaps, and conditionalities will permit underachievement of those goals.
The revised RFK Master Plan was released six days ago. The public has had less than a week to critically review over 180 pages. This timeline robs the public of meaningful input, and would suggest that the opportunity for public input to this hearing is window-dressing. The Sierra Club and our coalition partners provided 26 pages of comments with over 50 specific recommendations for improvement to the draft plan. We have scrambled to the best of our ability to see where our comments led to improvements. For the record we want to register our criticism of this process, and we seek additional time to work with the Office of Planning and Council to further refine the RFK Master Plan before a Council vote to approve it. There remain oversights and insufficient attention to important environmental outcomes.
Illustrative of the recommendations we made that were not addressed in the revised Master Plan are:
· Revising Goal 4 of the Sustainability Guidelines (pg.141) to “establish a complete, full-site stormwater management plan to guide currently planned and future development.” A full-site stormwater management plan is necessary so that incremental development does not drive piece-meal stormwater management that is sub-optimal and unsustainable, and likely to degrade Anacostia water quality.
· Amending the Utilities sub-section of the Implementation Section to highlight compliance with the District’s climate laws. “The District must develop an entire campus plan that runs on clean energy. This requires an early analysis of the utility build-out at the site so that, as required by DC’s net zero law, every building on site is all-electric and that new construction across the site will be subject to compliance with District building codes and climate laws that bar any fossil fuel combustion to heat buildings and to generate energy.” The master plan must be unequivocal with respect to supporting the District’s clean energy and greenhouse gas reduction goals.
· Encroachments and Watercourse Alterations: The 19 acres of Riverfront District lies almost entirely in the 100 year floodplain of the Anacostia River. The Master Plan infers infill for the Esplanade and buildings to elevate them above floodwaters – this in direct conflict with Campus Wide Sustainability Goal #1: Protect and Restore the Anacostia Riverfront Ecosystem (pg. 139). Title 20 DCMR § 3103.4, states that building permits must ensure that no encroachment, alteration, or improvement of any kind will reduce the flood-carrying capacity of the watercourse. The Master Plan ignores the compliance risk from the structural footings of the Esplanade and buildings pinching the Anacostia River's natural flood flow and consequently displacing floodwaters into nearby adjacent neighborhoods – Including Kingman Park and Hill East. The design will then violate local non-encroachment rules. The Master Plan must preserve the floodplain of the Anacostia and address this critical design problem.
We implore the Council and the Commanders to get the Master Plan right. We are willing partners to redeveloping RFK into a truly sustainable development.