FBI HQ in PG!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an agent and said there’s a lot of unhappy people today. He said no one wanted MD. Landover is a dump and Greenbelt, while perhaps slightly better than Landover, is a PITA to get to relative to where most of the workforce lives. Truth be told, people wanted to stay in DC. However, given that wasn’t an option, Springfield was the clear preference.

Ah. Your poor DH. Find another job. He’s not indispensable. I remember when the Department of Navy decided to move from Crystal City to the Washington Navy Yard and the civilians boo-hoo-hooed. Some found other jobs while others retired. The majority showed up at the newly renovated Navy Yard and all was well. The entire region blew up with the reopening of the one rat infested, crime ridden area. I wish the same for Greenbelt.

Now it's a spot for carjacking Congressmembers.

No it’s nice, but I recall Springfield robberies were on a tear a few years back. Is that mall still standing, or had it finally closed due to all the criminals using it as a feasting place to conduct their a.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an agent and said there’s a lot of unhappy people today. He said no one wanted MD. Landover is a dump and Greenbelt, while perhaps slightly better than Landover, is a PITA to get to relative to where most of the workforce lives. Truth be told, people wanted to stay in DC. However, given that wasn’t an option, Springfield was the clear preference.

Ah. Your poor DH. Find another job. He’s not indispensable. I remember when the Department of Navy decided to move from Crystal City to the Washington Navy Yard and the civilians boo-hoo-hooed. Some found other jobs while others retired. The majority showed up at the newly renovated Navy Yard and all was well. The entire region blew up with the reopening of the one rat infested, crime ridden area. I wish the same for Greenbelt.

Now it's a spot for carjacking Congressmembers.

No it’s nice, but I recall Springfield robberies were on a tear a few years back. Is that mall still standing, or had it finally closed due to all the criminals using it as a feasting place to conduct their a.

Navy Yard? It's fabulous except for the crime...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an agent and said there’s a lot of unhappy people today. He said no one wanted MD. Landover is a dump and Greenbelt, while perhaps slightly better than Landover, is a PITA to get to relative to where most of the workforce lives. Truth be told, people wanted to stay in DC. However, given that wasn’t an option, Springfield was the clear preference.

Ah. Your poor DH. Find another job. He’s not indispensable. I remember when the Department of Navy decided to move from Crystal City to the Washington Navy Yard and the civilians boo-hoo-hooed. Some found other jobs while others retired. The majority showed up at the newly renovated Navy Yard and all was well. The entire region blew up with the reopening of the one rat infested, crime ridden area. I wish the same for Greenbelt.

^ Show some basic sympathy. It's human to have preferences about where your workplace is, especially if it changes from whatever your current life is built around.

Nope. People have choices. I’m sure her husband will make the best choice for himself. You people act like only Virginians work for the FBI. I’m here to tell you that’s a figment of your DCUM fantasy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Greenbelt location is $1B cheaper to build. Sorry, but a cost differential like that is going to be the determinant.

But by all means cry harder about NoVA.

Uh huh. Does that cost savings include the infrastructure requirements? Expanding the Wilson Bridge?

Anyway, all the criteria point towards Springfield. It was shenanigans that moved it to Greenbelt, not cost savings.

Who is crying? I don't prefer one place to another but I want what's best for the FBI. Not what's best for WMATA.

I'm sorry, but the Wilson Bridge does not need to be expanded for several thousand employees to cross the river and that's if all of the staff had to cross the river. But they don't There are about 10K employees and there are some that already live in MD and DC and would not be crossing from Virginia. Additionally, some of the Virginians will be taking the Metro since the Metro stop will be right across the parking lot from the new building. The Woodrow Wilson bridge handles about 250K cars daily. A few thousand more is not going to change much of anything.

No, it wasn't shenanigans to move it to Greenbelt. The GSA has now selected Greenbelt twice and a huge part of this is that it is impractical to relocate the existing government facilities on the Springfield location and it would cost the federal government $1B and several additional years to develop the Springfield site. The Hoover building is currently decaying and is not really safe for the employees to stay there. They need the building sooner, not 3 years later. And it's a waste of taxpayer money to spend all that extra money just because a few thousand people choose to live in Virginia instead of Maryland.

The decision will be reversed and the new FBI facility will be constructed in Springfield.

[Anonymous]

Poplar Point in DC would be a sound compromise location that makes a lot of sense.

[Anonymous]

Not sure why Biden announced this before the election. This will hurt him bigly in NOVA where he needs to over perform.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not sure why Biden announced this before the election. This will hurt him bigly in NOVA where he needs to over perform.

What election? Do you mean the election twelve months from now?

[Anonymous]

It doesn't make sense logistically to choose a location that much farther away than Quantico.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not sure why Biden announced this before the election. This will hurt him bigly in NOVA where he needs to over perform.

The decision came out Wednesday.

[Anonymous]

This whole thing continues to be a mess.

Nina Albert’s unilateral move to reverse the the GSA board’s decision on Springfield — even if legal — will cause a Congressional investigation. Given that this issue is already a political football on Capitol Hill and Congress has to appropriate funds, it’s fair to predict a few things will happen:

1) Further delay in any finalized plan.
2) Relocation of some FBI operations currently at HQ to other cities in order gain support from key members of Congress.

The bottom line is that there’s a very low probability Maryland ultimately gets all the FBI jobs currently in DC that will move with the new HQ. The best Greenbelt can realistically hope for is a smaller HQ. And there’s risk that MD could get nothing at all when this all comes out of the political wash.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH is an agent and said there’s a lot of unhappy people today. He said no one wanted MD. Landover is a dump and Greenbelt, while perhaps slightly better than Landover, is a PITA to get to relative to where most of the workforce lives. Truth be told, people wanted to stay in DC. However, given that wasn’t an option, Springfield was the clear preference.

Ah. Your poor DH. Find another job. He’s not indispensable. I remember when the Department of Navy decided to move from Crystal City to the Washington Navy Yard and the civilians boo-hoo-hooed. Some found other jobs while others retired. The majority showed up at the newly renovated Navy Yard and all was well. The entire region blew up with the reopening of the one rat infested, crime ridden area. I wish the same for Greenbelt.

^ Show some basic sympathy. It's human to have preferences about where your workplace is, especially if it changes from whatever your current life is built around.

Nope. People have choices. I’m sure her husband will make the best choice for himself. You people act like only Virginians work for the FBI. I’m here to tell you that’s a figment of your DCUM fantasy.

Everyone knows FBI employees live in Va, Md, and DC, and some subset of employees will be unhappy with the relocation. Moving from Va to suburban Maryland is a big deal, just like the opposite would be be for people living in Maryland.

A good compromise would be to keep a central/Va field office for senior officials and Va residents for 10-20 years while staff turns over and eventually moves to the new location.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:See pp 3 here: https://www.gsa.gov/system/files/FBI%20HQ%20Site%20Selection%20Decision%20Fact%20Sheet%20%282%29.pdf

If you excluded the equity and sustainability score only for Greenbelt, keep these originally weighted scores for the other two sites, Greenbelt would still come out ahead.

Those are not the panel’s scores. Those are the ratings as modified by the SSA. She downgraded Springfield for a few criteria and increased Greenbelt’s ratings for others.

It’s shocking that one person — a political appointee — can overturn a career panel and make a decision this huge.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The report and FBI response are available online.

https://www.gsa.gov/reference/freedom-of-information-act-foia/foia-library

I thought PPs were exaggerating but one person really did change the weight of certain criteria and ratings in a way that favored Greenbelt. At the very least, she shouldn’t have been the Site Selection Authority due to conflicts of interest.

It was completely within her purview to do so. And the changes were made with the knowledge of the higher ups at GSA. So while she made the decision, the rest of the GSA executive administration concurred with her assessment.

Despite the "conflict of interest" there was nothing wrong with what happened. She weighed different factors and came to a conclusion that saved the federal government a lot of money and time.

The GSA administration is standing by the assessment and decision and they have the final say. Even if there is a inspector general or congressional investigation, there is no legal argument for overturning this decision. This is just a huge waste of time for Congress when they have much more important things to do, like appropriation bills and funding the government.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Greenbelt location is $1B cheaper to build. Sorry, but a cost differential like that is going to be the determinant.

But by all means cry harder about NoVA.

Uh huh. Does that cost savings include the infrastructure requirements? Expanding the Wilson Bridge?

Anyway, all the criteria point towards Springfield. It was shenanigans that moved it to Greenbelt, not cost savings.

Who is crying? I don't prefer one place to another but I want what's best for the FBI. Not what's best for WMATA.

I'm sorry, but the Wilson Bridge does not need to be expanded for several thousand employees to cross the river and that's if all of the staff had to cross the river. But they don't There are about 10K employees and there are some that already live in MD and DC and would not be crossing from Virginia. Additionally, some of the Virginians will be taking the Metro since the Metro stop will be right across the parking lot from the new building. The Woodrow Wilson bridge handles about 250K cars daily. A few thousand more is not going to change much of anything.

No, it wasn't shenanigans to move it to Greenbelt. The GSA has now selected Greenbelt twice and a huge part of this is that it is impractical to relocate the existing government facilities on the Springfield location and it would cost the federal government $1B and several additional years to develop the Springfield site. The Hoover building is currently decaying and is not really safe for the employees to stay there. They need the building sooner, not 3 years later. And it's a waste of taxpayer money to spend all that extra money just because a few thousand people choose to live in Virginia instead of Maryland.

The decision will be reversed and the new FBI facility will be constructed in Springfield.

by whom?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Greenbelt location is $1B cheaper to build. Sorry, but a cost differential like that is going to be the determinant.

But by all means cry harder about NoVA.

Uh huh. Does that cost savings include the infrastructure requirements? Expanding the Wilson Bridge?

Anyway, all the criteria point towards Springfield. It was shenanigans that moved it to Greenbelt, not cost savings.

Who is crying? I don't prefer one place to another but I want what's best for the FBI. Not what's best for WMATA.

I'm sorry, but the Wilson Bridge does not need to be expanded for several thousand employees to cross the river and that's if all of the staff had to cross the river. But they don't There are about 10K employees and there are some that already live in MD and DC and would not be crossing from Virginia. Additionally, some of the Virginians will be taking the Metro since the Metro stop will be right across the parking lot from the new building. The Woodrow Wilson bridge handles about 250K cars daily. A few thousand more is not going to change much of anything.

No, it wasn't shenanigans to move it to Greenbelt. The GSA has now selected Greenbelt twice and a huge part of this is that it is impractical to relocate the existing government facilities on the Springfield location and it would cost the federal government $1B and several additional years to develop the Springfield site. The Hoover building is currently decaying and is not really safe for the employees to stay there. They need the building sooner, not 3 years later. And it's a waste of taxpayer money to spend all that extra money just because a few thousand people choose to live in Virginia instead of Maryland.

The decision will be reversed and the new FBI facility will be constructed in Springfield.

by whom?

By public opinion. That was the point of Wray's strongly worded letter.