The Impact of Underutilized Federal Real Estate on Cities in America

THIS EVENT WAS HELD ON NOVEMBER 8, 2023 AND THE VIDEO RECORDING MAY BE ACCESSED HERE. 

 

Please join us for an open dialogue on the federal government's underutilized real estate and its impact on local communities.  

 

Agenda: 

8:30     Coffee & Bagels

9:30     Panel Discussion

10:45   Adjourn

 

Speakers: 

Nani Coloretti, Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Former Deputy Secretary, Department of Housing and Urban Development
Anthony Williams, Executive Director, Federal City Council, Former Mayor of the District of Columbia
Marcel Acosta, Executive Director, National Capital Planning Commission
Keith Cunningham, Assistant Director for Physical Infrastructure, Government Accountability Office

Peter Otteni, Executive Vice President, Boston Properties
 

Opening Remarks and Moderator:

Uwe S. Brandes, Faculty Director, Georgetown Global Cities Initiative

Norman Dong, Lecturer, Georgetown Urban and Regional Planning Program; Partner, FD Stonewater

 

In July of 2023, the U.S. Government Accountability Office released a report that found that Federal agency headquarters buildings in Washington are currently utilized on an average of 25%.  The challenge of underutilized Federal properties is not limited to the post-pandemic "work from home" era.  For decades the Federal government has struggled to take meaningful action to reposition property assets that are highly underutilized or no longer needed. 

 

As the Federal government continues to offer employees significant workplace flexibility, utilization of the Federal real estate portfolio has plummeted. Based on experiences here in Washington, D.C. and in cities across the nation, Federal buildings that sit largely empty have measurable impacts on the local economy and often represent significant unrealized potential to introduce active uses in local communities.

The panel discussion will explore the impact of underutilized Federal buildings on our nation’s cities, including: 

1. The historic role of Federal facilities in civic placemaking;

2. The chronic challenge of underutilized or vacant Federal buildings;

3. Federal workplace flexibility before and after the Covid-19 public health emergency; 

4. The relationship between the Federal real estate strategy and the Administration’s broader urban policies.

 

This in-person event will take place on Wednesday November 8 from 9:30am to 11:00am.  Attendees must RSVP.  The event will be recorded and made available in the following days on this webpage.  Coffee and bagels will be served for an informal networking sesssion in advance of the formal panel.  

 

This program has been organized by the Georgetown Global Cities Initiative, in collaboration with the following:  

Georgetown Department of Government

Georgetown Urban & Regional Planning Program

Georgetown Masters Program in Real Estate

McCourt School of Public Policy

The Georgetown Project on State and Local Government Policy and Law at the Georgetown Law Center

The Georgetown Capitol Applied Learning Labs

Federal Real Property Association

 

SPEAKER BIOGRAPHIES

 

Nani Coloretti
Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Former
Deputy Secretary, Department of Housing and Urban Development

Nani A. Coloretti is currently the Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget, where she works on issues across the federal government to fund and implement the President’s agenda to improve the lives of all Americans. Ms. Coloretti has over 25 years of experience leading public, private and non-profit organizations to achieve outstanding results. She has deep expertise on the federal budget and extensive federal agency management experience. She also has leadership, budget and policy
experience at the local level, as well as in the non-profit and private sectors.

Most recently, she led financial strategy and operations at the Urban institute, an independent policy
research organization and think tank dedicated to using evidence, insight, and analysis to inform policy
decisions that improve opportunity for all Americans. Prior to the Urban Institute, Ms. Coloretti served in
the Obama administration for eight years, most recently as deputy secretary of the US Department of
Housing and Urban Development (HUD). As the second-most senior official at HUD, she managed the
department’s day-to-day operations and cross-cutting program initiatives, including a $45 billion annual
budget and approximately 8,000 employees.

Before joining HUD, she spent five years in senior management roles at the US Department of the
Treasury. As the assistant secretary for management and acting chief financial officer, she oversaw all
operational areas including the development and execution of the department’s budget, performance,
and strategic plan; procurement; human resources; information technology; and management of
Treasury’s headquarters and bureaus. She managed the development of Treasury’s systems to track
and report spending and implementation under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2019.
She helped create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), serving as its first chief operating
officer, and within six months hired initial agency staff in all areas, including enforcement, compliance
and technology; and created the capacity for CFPB’s consumer complaint data base.

Before joining the Obama administration in 2009, she served as policy advisor and budget director
for San Francisco City and County working with Mayor Gavin Newsom, where she balanced its then
$6.5 billion budget during the tumult of the Great Recession. Coloretti’s prior experience includes work
in San Francisco to improve the lives of children, youth, and families; budget analysis in the Clinton
administration’s Office of Management and Budget (as a Medicaid analyst, a Presidential Management
Fellow, and in rotation to the Senate Finance Committee), work on the State of Hawaii budget; and
economics consulting.

She has been independently recognized for her management results and holds a BA in economics
and communications from the University of Pennsylvania and an MPP from the University of California,
Berkeley. Ms. Coloretti was raised in Hawaii and currently lives in Bethesda, Maryland with her husband,
and together they have a son in college.

 

 

Anthony Williams
Executive Director, Federal City Council, Former Mayor of the District of Columbia

Tony Williams, the former Mayor of Washington, D.C. (1999 – 2007), is the current Chief Executive Officer of the Federal City Council, an organization focusing the creative and administrative talents of Washington’s business and professional leaders on major problems and opportunities facing the
District. He is widely credited with leading the comeback of Washington D.C. during his two terms as Mayor, restoring the finances of our nation’s capital, and improving the performance of government agencies, all while lowering taxes and investing in infrastructure and human services.

In addition to his duties with the Federal City Council, Mayor Williams is a Senior Advisor to King and
Spaulding, LLP. He serves on several company boards as well as the boards of the Howard Hughes
Corporation, the Urban Institute and the National Geographic Society.

Prior to Federal City Council, he led the Global Government Practice at the Corporate Executive Board
in Arlington, Virginia. He also taught public finance and urban leadership as the William H. Bloomberg
Lecturer in Public Management at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government while coordinating
programs for the Municipal Innovation Program at the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and
Innovation.

Before his election as Mayor, he was the independent Chief Financial Officer of the District from 1995
to 1998, working with and on behalf of local officials, the D.C. Financial Control Board, and the U.S.
Congress. Before his service in local Washington, Tony worked in a variety of positions in federal, state,
and local government, including as the first CFO for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, appointed by
President Bill Clinton and confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

He holds a BA from Yale, an MPP from the Harvard Kennedy School, and a J.D. from the Harvard Law
School, as well as a number of awards and honorary degrees, including Governing Magazine Public
Official of the Year in 1997 and the 2020 ULI Prize for Visionaries in Urban Development. He is a fellow
of the National Academy of Public Administration and former President of the National League of Cities.

 

 

Marcel Acosta
Executive Director, National Capital Planning Commission

As executive director of the federal government’s central planning agency, Marcel Acosta leads a team of urban planners, architects, historic preservationists, and other professionals committed to preserving
and enhancing the extraordinary qualities of America’s capital city and the national capital region. Marcel also chairs the Urban Design and Preservation Division of the American Planning Association. The National
Capital Planning Commission provides long-term planning guidance for federal land and buildings in the region. Through its design review process, the Commission approves memorials and museums on the National Mall, civic and federal buildings in the nation’s capital, federal installations, and
public spaces and parks. Before joining NCPC in 2001, Marcel served as senior vice president of planning and development for the Chicago Transit Authority and deputy commissioner for the Chicago Department of Planning and Development. He received a master’s in Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and was appointed a Loeb Fellow of Advanced Environmental Studies at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.

 

 

Keith Cunningham
Assistant Director for Physical Infrastructure, Government Accountability Office

Keith B. Cunningham is an Assistant Director of physical infrastructure issues at the United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), the investigative and audit arm of the U.S. Congress. Mr. Cunningham has developed a broad expertise in real property policy and management issues during his 25 years at GAO—having led the work for more than 40 GAO reports and testimony statements. Mr. Cunningham’s recent work on federal real property includes reports on various issues related to property ownership, realignment, leasing, disposal, and financing. Prior to government service, Mr. Cunningham directed research on worldwide military base closure and reuse efforts for the Bonn International Center for Conversion in Germany and Business Executives for National Security. Mr. Cunningham holds a Masters of Policy Studies from Johns Hopkins University and a BS in Social Science from Miami University, Ohio.

 

Peter Otteni
Executive Vice President, BXP

Pete Otteni serves as Executive Vice President, Co-Head of the Washington, DC Region. Prior to his appointment to this position in May 2021, Mr. Otteni served as Senior Vice President, Development. Mr. Otteni joined the Company in 2000 and progressed through the Development department, assuming his role as Senior Vice President and Head of Development in 2016. Mr. Otteni was responsible for more than four million square feet of development in Washington DC, Northern Virginia, and Maryland, including the completion of the Urban Core at Reston Town Center as well as the currently under development next phase of Reston Town Center. Mr. Otteni received a BS in Commerce from the University of Virginia and an MBA
from the University of North Carolina, Kenan-Flagler Business School.

 

Norman Dong
Lecturer, Georgetown Urban & Regional Planning Program; Partner, FD Stonewater

Norman Dong is a partner at FD Stonewater, where he plays a leading role within the firm’s third-party advisory and principal development platforms with a primary focus on federal, state and local government real estate transactions. He serves on the faculty of the Georgetown Urban and Regional Planning program where he teaches a course on the nexus Federal real estate and community impact. As the former Commissioner of the GSA Public Buildings Service, Mr. Dong managed the nationwide asset management, design, construction, leasing, building management and disposal of approximately 372 million square feet of government-owned and leased space.

 

In addition, Mr. Dong served as Acting Controller at Office of Management and Budget, where he was responsible for Federal real property management, and as Chief Financial Officer of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In addition to his Federal experience, Mr. Dong has held leadership
positions at the state and local levels of government, including Deputy Mayor for Operations and City
Administrator for the District of Columbia. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from Yale University and a
Master’s degree from the Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government.