From the DC Office of Advisory Neighborhood Commissions:
Advisory Neighborhood Commissions are advisory boards made up of neighborhood residents who consider a wide range of policies and programs affecting their neighborhoods, including traffic, parking, recreation, street improvements, liquor licenses, zoning, economic development, police protection, sanitation and trash collection, and the District’s annual budget.
The ANCs present their positions and recommendations on issues to various District government agencies, the Executive Branch, and the Council. They also present testimony to independent agencies, boards, and commissions, usually under the rules of procedure specific to those entities. By law, the ANCs may also present their positions to Federal agencies.
Although they are not required to follow the ANCs’ advice, District agencies are required to give the ANCs’ recommendations “great weight.” Moreover, District law says that agencies cannot take any action that will significantly affect a neighborhood unless they give the affected ANCs 30 days’ advance notice. This includes zoning, streets, recreation, education, social services, sanitation, planning, safety, budget, and health services.
What is ANC SMD "4B05"?
This neighborhood is part of ANC 4B. Each ANC is subdivided into a number of smaller areas called "Single Member Districts" (SMD's), and each of those is represented by a commissioner that sits on the ANC. Each SMD consists of about 2,000 people. The neighborhood I'm running in is known as ANC 4B05. You can see its boundaries here.
What does an ANC Commissioner do?
The ANC Commissioner participates in the actions of the ANC. They also serve as the liaison between members of the community and that ANC. Additionally, they are a point of contact that can help resolve residents' concerns, primarily by helping them leverage city services or calling city agencies' and officials' attention to problems that need to be resolved.
What is the "great weight" afforded to ANC actions?
Our local laws require that agency actions afford "great weight" to ANC resolutions and activities related to those actions. That means agencies must give ANC's prior notice before actions affecting the area take place, and then afford "great weight" to actions the ANC takes in response to those notices.
"Great weight" is not binding on the agency, and it is not required to adopt the decision or recommendation of the ANC. This is a common misperception. Agencies must show, however, that they paid close attention to those recommendations and took them into account when they made their decision.