In February, the County Board approved a site plan for property owned by Melwood Horticultural Training Center, in the Aurora Highlands neighborhood. As with many redevelopment proposals, this one opens up many political issues, and much local history.  

Let’s start with a little history of the site, which is located at the corner of 23^rd Street South and Grant Street, about a block away from a cluster of restaurants and commercial establishments. In the 1920’s an elementary school was built on this corner, named for Nelly Custis, the granddaughter of Martha Custis Washington. The original building was added onto over the decades, until it met its fate in the late 1970s: declining enrollment led to the closure of Nelly Custis. 

The property was part of a land a swap with the County in 1981, with the Sheltered Occupational Center of Northern Virginia (SOC), which owned property near the Ballston Metro Station. SOC was a work center for people with disabilities, and ever since the 1980’s, the property has been used as a facility that provides support services and educational training opportunities to persons with a range of disabilities. In 2018 SOC (later re-named Linden Resources) conveyed the property to Melwood, which continues the supportive work for people with disabilities.  

In 2021 Melwood started the process that, four years later, culminated in a site plan approval for a five-story residential building with over 100 units, and 22,000 square feet of space for the community services provided by Melwood. Wesley Housing plans to develop the property with committed affordable rental units; about 30% of the units would be set aside for people with disabilities. 

This story has two familiar Arlington aspects to it: (1) non-profit organizations being creative; and (2) opposition to development by some neighbors.  Let’s start with the opposition, as the story shifts, in a strange way, to the sad history of Arlington’s resistance to integration. 

The connection is that an application had been filed with the Historical Affairs and Landmark Review Board (HALRB), seeking designation of the parcel as a local historic district. In June of 2024, the HALRB reviewed the application, listened to public comment, and had a robust discussion. One of arguments in favor of historic preservation was that the school was one of the last elementary schools to be desegregated. 

This claim led me back to the history books. It might surprise you to know that this history involves a shameful busing plan put forth in 1971 by the Arlington School Board. In 1971, of the 30 elementary schools in the County, four schools had no Black students, owing in large part to segregated housing patterns. These four schools were Custis, Jamestown, Madison, and Woodmont. 

This was 12 years after the first Arlington school had been desegregated. The School Board was dragging its feet, and Arlington citizens once again had to sue the County. Unfortunately, the result was disappointing. The School Board produced a plan, approved by the court, to close the two majority Black elementary schools, and to disburse those 704 students to 21 schools.  Their plan carefully made sure that those schools would have no more than a 12% Black enrollment in each school, a plan which, in turn, disrupted the lives of one of Arlington’s vibrant Black communities. 

The School Board plan chopped up the Green Valley neighborhood into over a dozen tiny sections. Children within those geographic sections were then sent to over a dozen schools. A child being sent to Barcroft might have one friend across the street being sent by bus to Jamestown, and another close friend being sent to Nottingham School. 

Nowhere in this history does Nelly Custis School appear to be worthy of a special historic designation based on the history of desegregation. 

Last June, the HALRB authorized staff to begin the process that could lead to the designation of the Melwood parcel for historic preservation, which would effectively kill the redevelopment project.  Will that happen? I will take on that question next week, along with a bit more history about schools, lawsuits, and historic designation requests.