Friends of Jelleff Rec. Center Announce Renovation, Halloween Party Plans
By • October 12, 2022 0 1728
Big plans are afoot at the Jelleff Recreation Center at 3265 S St. NW. “The District finally has contracted with the DRL Architects Group to design the construction plans for the $37 million Jelleff Recreation Center and public pool renovation project,” Georgetown, Burleith Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Kishan Putta informed The Georgetowner on Oct. 7. “We hear that a team has already begun scanning and touring the site to determine engineering data for the construction plans.”
Putta’s announcement came just five days after he had complained at the Oct. 3 ANC meeting that it had been over a year since D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser confirmed in May 2021 that the city budget for the renovation of Jelleff had been vastly enlarged from $7 million to $37 million. The project feasibility study approved at the time showed that the current single well-used basketball court, presently accessible only by a staircase, would be expanded to two courts. New additions would include handicapped accessibility to the courts and modernized locker rooms in a vastly enlarged and redesigned building with room for a kitchen and community educational and recreational activities for all ages. The site’s swimming pool and parking lot would also be reconfigured.
“We had been promised to be kept in the loop when an architect was contracted and plan designs were begun,” Putta said at the meeting. “Now this is the first we have heard.”
In the year gone by, Putta and ANC Commissioner Elizabeth Miller have organized a Jelleff Community Friends group that has been meeting regularly and includes representations from Georgetown Village, Burleith Citizens Association, Citizens Association of Georgetown, ANC 2E, the Glover Park community, and others from the Girls and Boys Club as well as stakeholders who use the facility regularly. “A letter has been sent that a pre-construction plan approval meeting be set up for this group as the scanning process takes place and a citizens’ town hall is organized.”
Community roller skating is in the works! Courtesy Amazon.
A community roller skating and children’s Halloween costume party and parade are also being planned at the site on October 29 by the Citizens Association of Georgetown and the Jelleff Friends group. Refreshments, prizes and Fall games are being organized for the 3-5 p.m. event. The Friends group hopes such events will establish the Jelleff Center as a growing Georgetown area recreational and meeting resource.
