Community Control DC is a campaign to build independent, community-governed power in Southeast DC. Our platform is rooted in a simple reality: the conditions of our lives are shaped by power, not access, representation, or cosmetic reform. For decades, Black and working-class communities have been governed through surveillance, displacement, criminalization, and exclusion—while decisions about our safety, health, land, and resources are made by institutions that do not answer to us.
We reject the idea that justice will come from better management of systems designed to control and contain our people. Instead, this platform advances a framework for collective self-determination: transferring governing authority over land, safety, health, budgets, education, and infrastructure directly into the hands of residents most impacted by harm and disinvestment.
These demands are not symbolic. They establish enforceable standards for legitimacy and accountability. Any institution, agency, or elected official claiming alignment with this platform must demonstrate real compliance through binding commitments, public reporting, and community-controlled enforcement. Our objective is not inclusion within existing structures, but the construction of durable, democratic alternatives capable of meeting our needs, defending our communities, and reshaping the conditions that produce harm in the first place.
Community Control DC is about building power from the ground up—power rooted in organized people, collective governance, and material control over the resources that shape our lives. This platform is an invitation to struggle, organize, and build together toward a city governed by those who live here.
Community Control DC is not a symbolic platform—it is a tool for building organized, collective power. This campaign only becomes real if people put it into motion. There are multiple ways to get involved, depending on your capacity and how you want to contribute.
