AGO’s Seattle office space rental costs double in a decade

(The Center Square) – Costs of renting office space for hundreds of employees in the Washington State Attorney General’s Office has more than doubled in the last decade, according to an analysis of fiscal data by The Center Square.

The largest recipient of AGO spending, according to fiscal.wa.gov, for the past several biennia has been BPP 800 Fifth REIT LLC, which operates 800 Fifth Avenue in downtown Seattle. There, the AGO rents out 133,000 square feet of workspace for 647 of its staff members.

In the 2023-25 biennium, the AGO paid $16.6 million, though the AGO Deputy Communications Director Mike Faulk offered The Center Square separate figure of $15.4 million. According to Faulk, costs for renting that office space in the 2015-17 biennium was $6.6 million, while the space rented increased from 122,000 square feet to 133,000 square feet, to accommodate increased staffing levels.

The building, which has 437,173 square feet of rentable office space, is currently owned by Perform Properties, which is a Blackstone real estate portfolio company. It was sold in 2019 for more than $500 million.

According to Faulk, “staff follow costs closely and look for ways to save. The lease was last renegotiated in the middle of the pandemic when the market was competitive and favorable to tenants.”

He added that “over the years, there have been numerous discussions with DES (Department of Enterprise Services) and OFM (Office of Financial Management) about whether there are suitable state-owned facilities that would work for the office’s purposes. At the time of this lease renewal, no feasible options had been presented.”

According to the building’s website, it is a LEED Platinum-rated building. The company also has a DEI Task Force that “includes volunteers from within all levels of management in our company,” though the link for more information is to Google’s main search page. It also has Sustainability and Social Impact Reports released annually; the latest report pushes for “diversity in terms of gender, race, and ethnicity as well as populations such as the LGBTQ+ community and individuals with disabilities or neurodivergences.”

The report also states that the company has “increased the number of small businesses owned by women and members of racial and ethnic minorities within our vendor base.”