Construction of The Girard Street Senior Residences, an affordable senior building at 1545 Girard Street NE, begins the end of this month. The new four-story, 25-unit building should be finished in 12 months, says Bo Menkiti, principal of The Menkiti Group. Menikiti and Dantes Partners are co-developers of the project.
The building will have mostly one-bedroom units, a demonstration kitchen for cooking classes, an exercise/yoga studio, walking trails in a garden and a few parking spots. District agencies will determine rents, eligibility and tenant selection.
Menkiti says the building, at the corner of 16th and Girard Street NE, was the result of work his company has done in Brookland and Woodridge. “There are a lot of elderly and they wanted to stay in the neighborhoods. But unless they aged in place in their [existing] homes, there was nowhere for them to go,” he says.