President Donald Trump packed the commission that will need to sign off on his massive White House ballroom addition with close allies with little to no public planning experience.
Despite tearing down the East Wing, the White House has not submitted blueprints to the National Capital Planning Commission, which by law must approve construction for most federal buildings.
Some commissioners worry that once the committee–which is closed during the government shutdown—finally reviews the project, it will be greenlit without any public debate about the project design or historic preservation aspects, The Washington Post reported.
That’s partly because most of the members are Trump appointees and congressional allies who are well aware of Trump’s record of punishing people who challenge him, two unnamed commissioners told the Post.
The 12-person commission is made up of presidential appointees, Cabinet members, congressional committee leaders, and local officials, though senior officials and lawmakers traditionally send a representative instead of attending themselves.
Its members have traditionally been architects, urban planners, and other people with expertise in civil planning, but Trump has appointed a lawyer, a political aide and consultant, and an expert in natural resources, all of whom are unusually close to the president, according to the Post.
Already Trump appointee Will Scharf, the White House staff secretary who leads the commission, has claimed that its members didn’t need to weigh in on the East Wing demolition, just vertical construction.
The federal law that governs the NCPC, however, says the commission was created to “preserve the important historical and natural features of the National Capital” and defines it as the government’s “central planning agency.”
The president has been secretive about plans for the new $300 million addition, which experts say suffers from serious design flaws.
The 90,000-square-foot addition would be nearly twice the size of the existing mansion where presidents and their families typically live, and renderings show windows that open out onto one another and a staircase leading directly into a brick wall.
Architect Andrew Kerr wrote in a viral social media post that the size and cost didn’t make any sense, and that the interior and exterior renderings didn’t match.
The interior ballroom images show a 20,000-square-foot space—which would comfortably accommodate 1,000 guests—with about a 20-foot ceiling. Even an additional 10,000 square feet for pre-function spaces and another 10,000 square feet for ballroom support functions would come out to less half of Trump’s proposed footprint.
The exterior renderings nevertheless show a building with a 90,000-square-foot footprint and a 70-foot roof. At $300 million, the price per square foot would be $3,333.
“No building costs anywhere near that. $1,000 per square foot is astronomical,” Kerr wrote.
The White House did not respond to questions about criticisms of the design. The plans will be submitted to the NCPC “at the appropriate time,” an official said.
The National Capital Planning Commission’s members see the appeal of adding more space to entertain dignitaries and VIPs, but some question whether a 90,000-square-foot space for 1,000 guests is really needed, according to the Post.
The National Park Service, which manages the White House and its grounds, normally leads construction and renovation projects but has been shut out of the ballroom building, one commissioner told the paper.
Scharf’s predecessor Teri Hawks Goodman told the Post that the commission should have reviewed the project ahead of demolition regardless of the legal requirements.
“What assurances does the country have that he won’t continue to demolish more of the White House,” she said. “The public trust continues to be eroded by this President and his unprecedented actions.”
Originally, the president had said the renovation would not affect the existing structures.
Photos of demolition crews razing part of the “People’s House” sparked a massive backlash from historians, preservationists, and other critics who opposed Trump’s unilateral destruction of an American icon.
The administration has dismissed the blowback as “manufactured outrage” from “unhinged leftists.”
A YouGov America survey, however, found that the ballroom was deeply unpopular with voters. Just 33 percent of respondents approved of the project.
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