Giant Food (which is essentially a Stop & Shop) announced today that they will step up to the plate and build a grocery store east of the Anacostia River.

For those of you from out of the area, DC is divided into eight wards, two of which lie east of the Anacostia (DC’s other river). Residents of Wards 7 and 8 are almost entirely African American and many of them are poor, and they regularly complain that they are the city’s forgotten. To be completely honest, they nearly are.

They have not had a full-service grocery store on the other side of the river in seven years, which means the city’s poorest families have to take some form of public transportation to the grocery store and then have to take the long ride back over the river while laden down with all their shopping.

Meanwhile, plans move ahead to convert an old roller-rink two miles from The Burrow into an upscale grocery store. That would make it the seventh grocery store within two miles of my mostly white, generally child-free neighborhood.

Cheers to Giant for finally taking the first step. May they finish the job quickly.

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