The General Services Administration last week announced that after a yearlong search, the Cleveland-based Forest City Enterprises Inc. has been selected to develop the 42-acre Southeast Federal Center site along the Anacostia River with a mixed-use development, consisting of 1.8 million square feet of office space, in addition to housing and recreational venues.

The site, which stretches along M Street Southeast from South Capitol Street to the Navy Yard, is the largest undeveloped usable parcel of federal land in the District. Its development, authorized by the Southeast Federal Center Public-Private Development Act of 2000, represents the first time private development has been allowed on federal land in the United States.

The 11 acres adjacent to the center will be the home of the new Transportation Department’s headquarters. Construction on that project is set to begin sometime this month.

LOC Explores Cape Verde, Mozambique

The Library of Congress will host “Contemporary Lusophone African Literatures and Cultures: A Colloquium on Cape Verde and Mozambique” from 1:30 to 5 p.m. Friday in Room LJ 119 of the Library’s Thomas Jefferson Building.

Fernando Henrique Cardoso, former president of Brazil and distinguished visiting scholar at the John W. Kluge Center, will deliver the keynote address.

And a slate of international experts on the culture and literature of both Cape Verde and Mozambique will take part in the discussion, including Cape Verde Ambassador José Brito and Mozambique Ambassador Armando Panguene.

The event is free and open to the public, but attendees should contact (202) 707-2003 to register.

George Washington Documents Go Online

In what represented its final digital release of George Washington’s writings, the Library of Congress last week added 45 digital images of the first president’s papers to its American Memory Web site (memory.loc.gov/ammem/ gwhtml/gwhome.html).

Dating from 1763 to 1797, the documents are part of the Addenda to the Washington Papers, a manuscript which was acquired after much of the Washington collection had been processed and microfilmed, and includes correspondence between Washington and wordsmith Noah Webster, as well as with Gen. John Cadwalader.

All in all, the Library — which boasts the largest collection of Washington documents in the world — has 65,000 items spanning nearly 60 years of his life.

— Bree Hocking