To the editor:

I can’t figure out how to answer the Alexandria Times’ online poll, but add my vote for razing the former Carver Nursery School and replacing it with William Cromley’s contemplated live-work studios.

Many of the neighborhood people want the building razed. Many neighborhood residents, including longtime residents, spoke before city council and the board of architectural review in favor of tearing it down.

They reminded both bodies that for many years — as an American Legion hall — the building housed a nuisance (drunken brawls, disruptive behaviors, a homicide even), eventually leading to the revocation of its liquor license. Your reporter can review the records of these hearings.

It is a few neighborhood people and many former residents who wanted the building preserved. Arguably, many of those who moved elsewhere did so because integration facilitated mobility and neighborhood transformation.

Although their nostalgia for their former neighborhood is moving, your reporting should note this distinction.

– Dino Drudi
Alexandria