What Empty Government Properties Are Really Costing You

One of the realities of post-COVID life is that the long accepted pattern of workers commuting to offices five days a week is broken. That may be a good thing for individual workers (who can avoid costly commutes) but it threatens to crash the business models, and bank accounts, of the landlords who own all those office buildings. Fewer workers heading to the office means employers don’t need all that office space or the rent that goes with it.

One of the biggest commercial real estate owners in the U.S. – the federal government – is confronting similar challenges to the private sector. New work patterns are dramatically undercutting the need for all that office space, and the costs that go with it.

According to a recent Government Accountability Office report, the occupancy rate at 17 federal agency headquarters buildings was just 25 percent. And even at the ”high end,” occupancy rates are still less than 50 percent.

It all comes at a staggering annual cost to taxpayers:

Federal agencies spend about $2 billion a year to operate and maintain federal office buildings regardless of the buildings’ utilization. In addition, agencies spend about $5 billion annually to lease office buildings. Any reduction in office space could reduce these costs.

The sensible course would seem to be cutting down on unused space – starting with the buildings that are rented. Money could be saved, or used for other needs. But as with many things in government, bureaucrats aren’t willing to share with others. Particularly sharing office space with other federal bureaucrats:

One official said their leadership is reluctant to share headquarters space with other agencies because it could lower their perceived standing as a cabinet-level agency.

It almost seems like the government is just a grown-up version of high school. But somehow worse and definitely more expensive.

There’s also the dreaded bureaucratic “silos” that prevent anyone from thinking of how to rearrange the office:

Eight agency officials also ranked inner-agency silos as the first or second biggest challenge to increasing headquarters utilization. For example, the Department of Energy noted that groups of seats in its headquarters are assigned to departmental elements based on their funding, customers, and workspace needs. Some agency officials said that individual bureau leadership protected spaces assigned to them, including offices, conference rooms, and specialized spaces like secure rooms. They said no current mechanism exists to share those spaces more broadly throughout their agencies.

That’s a polite way of saying bureaucrats were more concerned with protecting their actual, physical turf than saving time, effort or money. Even when that turf was a sea of empty desks.

The General Services Administration, which oversees all that federal real estate, said it’s eager to work with agencies to find ways to maximize use of space…but that it also needs billions of additional dollars for maintenance and refurbishing costs. Which completes the iron bureaucratic triangle of identifying a problem, ducking it and then demanding more money to (maybe) fix part of it. Those are your tax dollars at work.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.

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