Rita Chappelle, The Examiner
2007-05-22 07:00:00.0
Current rank: Not ranked

BALTIMORE -

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s plans to purchase the Anacostia Gateway building in Southeast D.C. fell through due to the group’s inability to sell its 54,000 square-foot national headquarters in Baltimore in time to meet the developer’s timeline. The property is now back on the market to the next highest bidder.

“It was always a very aggressive time frame that [former NAACP President Bruce Gordon] set,” spokesman Richard McIntyre said. “The purchase was always contingent on our ability to sell our current location and the developer knew that. [Gordon] had thought we would have been able to purchase it by late summer, early fall.”

In December, the organization announced it would leave Baltimore.

The Anacostia site would have involved the organization in the rebirth of the community, once home to Frederick Douglass. D.C. officials had seen the deal as a major coup to spur growth there.

“Nobody wants a vacant building in the neighborhood. We can’t sit on the sidelines and wait for the NAACP to get all their ducks in a row,” Albert Hopkins Jr., chief executive officer of the Anacostia Economic Development Corporation, told Washington Business Journal.

D.C. officials say they still will provide the NAACP with $3.5 million to locate in the city. The Gateway building and land was on the market for $25 million.

“The NAACP remains committed to moving its headquarters to D.C. and we will do so, but we right now we have recalibrated our plans and timelines,” McIntyre said. “Our Baltimore location is being shown several times a week and there has been great interest in the property. We will continue to move forward with our plans to move to D.C.”

rchappelle@baltimoreexaminer.com