PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The fate of Germantown’s Colored Girls Museum is no longer up in the air after a favorable ruling from the Zoning Board of Adjustment.
After nearly a year, the board has granted museum founder Vashti DuBois a variance that permits her to continue operating the 8-year-old museum out of its original Germantown location at 4613 Newhall Street.
Dubois and several community members testified at a board hearing last November, discussing the unique role the museum plays in honoring the stories of ordinary Black women and girls.
“We’re here, I truly believe, because the community showed up with such force and in such numbers,” she told KYW Newsradio.
Last April, the city told her that the museum was in violation of two zoning laws: that the museum couldn’t double as her private residence and that it could not reside in a twin house. DuBois volunteered to move out of the 140-year-old Victorian home that houses the museum but will stay on as its head.
“We’re just really, really in a state of gratitude,” said DuBois, who indicated that the museum will reopen in March, calling it a new beginning. March will also see the start of a fundraising campaign focused on a new garden installation.
DuBois says the zoning board victory is fitting, given Philly’s penchant for being a trend-setting city.
“We have the first Black female mayor, a Harriet Tubman statue … we have the first museum centering Black women and girls. It should all go together.”