Business

The state government is scaling back its office space in downtown Boston

The Baker administration has plans to shed approximately 355,000 square feet of office space by 2024.

By Christopher Gavin

1 minute to read

Add the Massachusetts state government to the list of employers now rethinking and scaling back its office space in downtown Boston.

According to The Boston Globe, Gov. Charlie Baker’s administration has started vacating office space in the heart of the city, as the state government embraces hybrid and remote work options for employees.

As of spring of 2021, the executive branch leased almost 900,000 square feet of office space for its nearly 10,000 employees downtown, the Globe reports.

Now, there are plans to vacate approximately 355,000 square feet by 2024, with another 96,000 square feet still being questioned but likely to follow suit, according to the newspaper.

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Those numbers also don’t take into account an additional 210,000 square feet in the state-owned Hurley building, the Cambridge Street property closed off for redevelopment.

Baker administration officials say the move is aligned with a larger reimagining of state offices, especially as nearly half of the entire executive branch shifted to remote work in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic with few hiccups.

“Maybe incoming governor Maura Healey will have different ideas,” Jon Chesto, the Globe‘s business columnist, writes. “But the Baker administration sees an opportunity to save tens of millions of dollars in rent costs in the coming years, while also attracting talent in a tight labor market, by providing more work-from-home options.”

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Still, downtown Boston has yet to reach its pre-pandemic liveliness.

Foot traffic statistics logged by the Downtown Boston Business Improvement District show the city’s business-centric inner core is projected to see 32 million daily visits this year — about half of the 60 million tracked in 2019.

“The retrenchment raises a legitimate question about how much of a role state government should play in anchoring an important business district, especially at a time when downtown Boston could use the help,” Chesto writes.

Read the full Boston Globe report.

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