A Subject Matter Summary for "Historic District (Contributing Building)"

The District of Columbia Historic Landmark and Historic District Protection Act of 1978 {1} ("the Act") authorizes the creation of historic districts to "safeguard the city’s historic, aesthetic and cultural heritage." {2} A historic district is an area of the city comprised of properties that are thought to be culturally, historically or architecturally significant, worthy of protection and designated as such by the DC State Historic Preservation Officer (SHPO) after a public hearing before the Historic Preservation Review Board (HPRB). {3} The Act protects those properties that contribute to the character of a historic district, by strictly limiting demolition. {4} The Act also encourages their current use, and ensures that alterations and new construction within the historic district are compatible with the character of the district as a whole. {5}

The act of historic district designation imposes a framework of historic preservation regulations on owners of contributing properties in the district. A contributing property is one that adds to the district’s sense of time and place and historical development. {6} Owners of contributing properties must apply to the Mayor for a permit to alter, demolish, subdivide, or build new construction within the district. {7} Even front yard fences that impede the "rhythm and character of the historic district" by obstructing clear vistas and open views could fall victim to the Act. {8} Not every building within the district may contribute to its architectural, historical, or cultural fabric. Buildings that add "to the district’s sense of time and place and historical development" are called "contributing buildings"; those that do not are called "non-contributing buildings." {9} There are no preservation controls on demolishing a non-contributing building. {10}

In addition, there is stronger protection under the Act for contributing buildings within a pending historic district than for a pending landmark. The Act’s protections temporarily apply to a proposed historic landmark immediately upon the filing of a landmark application (and permanently upon landmark designation), but the protections of the Act apply to properties within a proposed historic district only after the Historic Preservation Review Board (the "Board") designates the district and the State Historic Preservation Officer nominates or issues a written determination to nominate the district to the National Register of Historic Places. {11}

Applications for a new historic district can be made by only by an owner(s) of the affected property(ies),the Board, a public agency, governmental unit or department, Advisory Neighborhood Commission, or a historic preservation organization. {12} In designating a historic district under either the D.C. Inventory criteria {13} or the National Register of Historic Places criteria, {14} the proposed historic district must convey significance in American or District of Columbia history, architecture, archaeology, and culture as well as possess integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling, and association with significant historical events, persons, or artistic values.

It is now well settled that the mere act of including a property in an historic district or landmarking it does not create a justiciable controversy under the First Amendment. {15}

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{1} D.C. Code §6-1101 et seq.

{2} D.C. Code §6-1101(a)(2).

{3} D.C. Code §6-1102(5) ("‘Historic district’ means an historic district: (A) Listed in the National Register of Historic Places as of the effective date of this subchapter; (B) Nominated to the National Register by the State Historic Preservation Officer for the District of Columbia; or (C) Which the State Historic Preservation Officer for the District of Columbia has issued a written determination to nominate to the National Register after a public hearing before the Historic Preservation Review Board.").

{4} See 10C DCMR §401.1.

{5} D.C. Code §6-1101(b)(1).

{6} 10C DCMR §9901.

{7} See D.C. Code §6-1104, 6-1105, 6-1106, 6-1107.

{8} Application of Robert and Sofia Bassman, HPA No. 11-400 (June 14, 2012) at 1-2.

{9} See 10 DCMR §9901.

{10} See 10C DCMR §305.1.

{11} 10C DCMR §200.2.

{12} 10C DCMR §203.1.

{13} 10C DCMR §201.1.

{14} 10C DCMR §202.1.

{15} Metro. Baptist Church v. D.C. Dep’t of Consumer & Reg. Affairs , 918 A.2d 119 (D.C. 1998); see also Church of St. Paul & St. Andrew v. Barwick , 496 N.E.2d 183 (2d Cir. 1986), cert. denied , 479 US. 985 (1986) (rejecting church’s free exercise challenge to landmark designation where church had not yet applied for a permit).

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