On October 10, Ward 3 Councilmember Matt Frumin announced a proposal to purchase the former Intelsat Headquarters, which is located at 4000 Connecticut Avenue NW, is currently on the market.
Frumin’s proposal not only includes the purchase of the building, but also new ideas for its use, including senior wellness and early education centers, and possible relocation of MacArthur High School, currently located on MacArthur Boulevard. The building’s proximity to the Van Ness Metro Station and Rock Creek Park allows for more practical transportation access for DCPS students.
Frumin had already been considering this idea before he was elected earlier this year. He has shown this space to other government officials, including DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson.
“It has enormous potential for all different kinds of things,” Frumin said.
The building and property is owned by the government but is currently on a long-term lease to developer Harry Skydell, whose last tenant was the Whittle School & Studios: a global school with a partnership in China, from 2019 to 2022.
Whittle had planned to build dormitories on campus for 2500 students, but financial restraints restricted construction. Skydell had fronted the construction cost of turning the building into a school as part of his lease agreement with Whittle – about $200 million – in exchange for $30 million yearly rent. However, construction was only about 60% completed before the money ran out, and Whittle never gained the necessary student population to pay their rent. The school was never larger than 180 students. Whittle filed for bankruptcy while Skydell lost money and was forced to restructure his mortgage. There are currently lawsuits taking place.
Since Whittle, the building has been mostly sitting empty except for one or two floors that MedStar uses for offices.
Still, the area has remained preserved. The walls inside are glass and soundproof.
“There’s a gym, black box theater, music studio, [and] a green room,” said Frumin. The anonymous source added that “you have the classroom spaces, lab spaces, and the administrative spaces for about 600 students already built. And they are world class.” They also highlighted that if you consider all the sport amenities, including basketball and volleyball courts, spin rooms, and yoga studios, 8-10 athletic classes could run simultaneously on the top floors.
The source estimates that each floor of the school costs about $1 million. “Chris Whittle [worked] with international educators and a famous architect named Renzo Piano to create what was supposedly the school of the future. He spared no expense,” they said.
In terms of funding for the building, Frumin has several plans. He mentioned “finding the money in next year’s budget,” or from the relocation of MacArthur. MacArthur has just begun its second phase of renovations, and using time and money on relocation instead of renovation could be an alternate solution. According to Frumin, this could free up around $125 million that could help purchase the building.
“Before you can do either of those things you need the Mayor and her team to take a hard look at all of those possibilities,” he said.
As of last summer, Skydell was looking for a long-term tenant that would pay $250-300 million, though commercial real estate investment has declined since. In comparison, the 2015 Duke Ellington renovation, the city’s most expensive high school renovation, costed $178 million.
The finances of the building are more complex than just the rent though. A former Whittle staff member who wishes to remain anonymous said that because the building is not fully built, it would be $70-80 million just to finish the space. It also currently does not have functioning life safety systems, sprinklers and smoke alarms, as the IT infrastructure never properly ran. “Whittle ran a firewatch because to get just those life safety systems up and running is $30 million,” said the anonymous source. A firewatch is a system where qualified individuals walk around the building constantly to monitor for fires. Maintenance, to fix the leaky glass ceilings and old boiler system, is also expensive.
Frumin also explained that another alternative the city is interested in would be having the building be a central food processing facility supported by federal money. To execute this plan would take extra money to redo/build out amenities accordingly considering that the space was previously intended for educational and arts purposes. “It has been built as a school so to change it into anything else involves a ton of money,” said the Whittle source.
While Frumin has gotten support from the MacArthur community about this proposal, there are some that worry this is too much change for a new school.
“I completely understand that this would look like an awful lot of change and the whole idea of what I’m doing is trying to get folks to focus on the possibilities. Who knows where people come out once they focus on the possibility,” Frumin said.
