Arlington changed its plans for improving an intersection after a challenge to an effort to take a home by eminent domain.
The Newman family moved into a house in the Arlington View neighborhood near the Pentagon almost a century ago when it was an African American enclave known as Johnson Hill. With the surviving daughter now disabled, cousin Sandy Fortson is the conservator. When county officials told her in 2021 they wanted to buy the house on Columbia Pike as part of the project, she said no.
“My heart said you can’t sell that house,” Fortson said. “Aunt Lorene loved that home. This was their family home. It has historical value; it has generational value. I said, ‘I can’t do it.’”
After the county board voted unanimously in March to take the home by eminent domain, Fortson launched a public campaign to alert the community and try to save the home, putting up signs and starting a petition. More recently, the NAACP Arlington Branch joined the fight, accusing county leaders of failing to follow their own equity guidelines.
“It’s time for our county leaders to live the values that we have elected them to live,” branch President Michael Hemminger said.
He sent a letter to the county, writing in part, “The County cannot claim to be fighting the monster of systemic racism while continuing to feed it.”
Fortson appeared before the board this month, urging it to reconsider, and the campaign seems to have worked.
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In a statement, the board chair wrote, “The County Board heard testimony from the property's conservator, and others, and therefore decided not to pursue eminent domain to acquire the home.”
Instead, the county may seek an easement to use some of the property, Fortson said.
The NAACP is glad the home can be saved, but Religious Affairs Committee Chair Rev. DeLishia Davis said, “The county board needs to be held accountable for the things that are happening, the actions that are taking place toward persons of color.”
They want a public apology.
“Apologize to the family, apologize to the NAACP, apologize to the community,” former President JD Spain Sr. said. “They got it wrong.”
