GSA TRIES TO CONSOLIDATE FBI HEADQUARTERS

FROM: U.S. GENERAL SERVICES ADMINISTRATION

GSA Seeks to Develop Federal Triangle South Area and Consolidate FBI Headquarters

Dec. 3, 2012
WASHINGTON -- Today, the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) issued two Requests for Information (RFIs) for development projects in the Washington, DC area. GSA is seeking ideas from the commercial real estate industry and other interested parties to redevelop one of the largest clusters of federal buildings in Southwest Washington near L’Enfant Plaza, known as Federal Triangle South. A second RFI seeks responses from the development community on exchanging the old Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) headquarters for a new, consolidated headquarters. This action supports President Obama’s directive to shrink the federal real estate footprint.

"GSA is aggressively working to find new and innovative ways to save money and increase efficiency," said GSA Acting Administrator Dan Tangherlini. "An exchange of the FBI headquarters not only saves money, but it also promotes efficiency by consolidating staff into a single state-of-the-art facility, shrinking the federal real estate footprint and eliminating multiple leases. With Federal Triangle South, we will contribute to a more sustainable neighborhood by creating opportunities for development, while at the same time saving taxpayer dollars by redeveloping outdated and underutilized properties."

The FBI RFI is an innovative approach to property disposal that has been championed by GSA Acting Administrator Tangherlini in order to make more efficient use of the government's real estate assets while also disposing of excess properties. The exchange would replace the outdated and overcrowded J. Edgar Hoover building, a 2.4-million-square-foot facility, located on Pennsylvania Avenue, NW in Washington, DC, for the construction of a new and consolidated FBI headquarters. The full National Capital Region, which includes the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia, is under consideration for the potential new FBI headquarters.

GSA is aligning its vision for Federal Triangle South with the National Capital Planning Commission’s Southwest EcoDistrict -- a sustainable community stretching from the National Mall to the Southwest Waterfront. The project would include a number of federal buildings and seeks to reduce costs by overhauling these outdated and underutilized assets, developing state-of-the-art green facilities; and encouraging mixed-use and improved infrastructure.