In Ward 8, A Hunger for Better Days
No one needs to remind Monica Swann of all the troubles of Congress Heights, her home for the last four years. Too many police sirens, too many unhealthy children, too many young men without jobs.</br></br>Swann, a 25-year-old graduate student studying sociology across town at Howard University, hears and sees it all week after week as she drives along nearby Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE.</br></br>"Because sometimes this is still the best country-living in the city," Swann said the other day on her front steps before heading downtown. "I know my neighbors. This is a real community, and we all want to turn it around. Too many people just go to the suburbs. I am committed to not doing that."</br></br>A neighbor, Clara Joyner, made the same vow two decades ago. Today, her garden remains the jewel of a block lined with rustic wooden homes with spacious porches. But she is as pensive as ever about her struggling community. "There's just so much out here that needs to be done," Joyner said.</br></br>No, it's not any secret by now that Southeast Washington's Congress Heights and its surrounding neighborhoods, known politically as Ward 8, have a large share of the District's worst social problems. Many of the ward's 72,000 residents, however, are not yet close to throwing in the towel.