In its leadership to reduce spending sharply and reduce the government, the Trump administration has put up effective marks on some of the most famous buildings in the federal government in the center of Chicago.
The General Services Department, which runs real estate for the federal government, has released an online list of 443 “non -core” properties across the country. This included two high loop: Federal buildings Kluczynski and Metcalfe.
But on Wednesday, GSA surprised the list and said that the building of the buildings offered for sale was “soon.”
Also in the initial list of Chicago features that the administration was ready to empty the American post office station station at Federral Plaza and the regional office of social security management, according to the GSA website.
In general, GSA says she is ready to sell 11 properties in Chicago. The largest of them is the Kluczynski building, at 230 S. Dearborn St. , Which contains more than 1.1 million square feet of office space. Among the Kluczynski tenants are the Ministry of Labor, the Drug Control Department, the internal revenue service, the GSA offices and the offices of provinces in the Illinois Democratic Senators, Dick Dorbin and Tami Dakrith.
On Tuesday, GSA said on its website, “We define buildings and facilities that are not essential for government operations, or non -essential real estate to get rid of them.”
“Selling guarantees that taxpayers dollars are no longer spent on vacant or unexploited federal areas,” GSA said. “Elimination of these assets helps to eliminate costly maintenance and allows us to re -invest in high -quality work environments that support the agency's tasks.”
A spokesman for the Great Lakes office in GSA in Chicago did not respond to a request from WBEZ.
On Tuesday evening, GSA has reduced its “non -core” characteristics list incomprehensible to 320 buildings from the original 443, but all the 11 real estate remained in Chicago, which was initially distinguished as for sale in the agency database online to the entire list on Wednesday.
The Trump administration has set a target to sell half of the buildings owned by the federal government and ending half of the lease contracts for the offices used by federal agencies throughout the country. He did not say what he would do with federal employees and offices working in these buildings.
On Monday, WBEZ reported that GSA is traveling to cancel lease contracts for about 30 out of 112 private properties that the federal government in the Chicago region, including the old furniture depot in the northwestern suburbs where the national archives were stored and numbering Barack Obama's papers.
Trump's new ally, Elon Musk, boasted about government efficiency, or Doug, by ending this deal that would provide taxpayers more than $ 1.4 million annually, but GSA records show that the deal for the growing building on the Golf Road in Hoffman Estitz was already expected to end on December 31, because the Obama Library will be digital.
The huge real estate movements with regard to the property owned by the Federal Union and the area that were rented from the government come as the Chicago region office market is already highly vacant, but the new Trump administration is looking to significantly reduce the number of federal employees, and even eliminate some American government agencies.
US MP Mike Kigly, Di Il, who boycotted Trump's speech in a joint congressional session on Tuesday, criticized the decision to close many large federal buildings.
“It is sometimes right in the right size, but this is not the way to do so-some kind of bones, without any thinking, any analysis, that is, a study,” said Kogeley.
He said that the closure of important government offices will have a negative impact on the paid public, which raises questions about the place where federal employees will perform their jobs.
“I think it will be a tragic lesson in the civilian people, a reminder that federal workers are doing important things,” Kuigley said, noting that the closure of Chicago will also affect the US Environmental Protection Agency.
Kigly Dog criticized, claiming that the aim of the effort was not to reduce the burden on taxpayers because he was truly directed to protect the wealthy musk, by getting rid of agencies achieved in his commercial interests.
“This is not the cost reduction – it is corruption,” said a member of Congress.
A noticeable exemption from the Federal Real Estate List in Chicago for sale is the American Dirksen Court in 219 S. Dearborn. But the plan developed by GSA will wipe a large part of the government offices complex that have been assembled for decades around the Federal Plaza, which was a recently common place to gather against the protests against Trump and Moses.
The 45 -storey KlusZynski Federl building was built in 1974 and was designed by the famous architect Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe.
Near -placed, the Metcalfe Federal building is 28 stories at 77 W. Jackson Blvd. It was built in 1991, in the same elegance as the Kluszynski Federl building, the second largest government real estate in Illinois, which the Trump administration decided to surplus for requirements, with more than 700,000 square feet of office area.
The Metcalfe Federal Building is the Environmental Protection Agency, the US Housing and Urban Development Agency, the US Department of Agriculture, the Ministry of Health and Humanitarian Services and the commodity futures trading committee, according to the GSA website.
The Metcalfe Federal building is slightly larger than the third largest building in the state in the newly unveiled platform list, the Harold Washington Social Security Center. This structure takes the entire city block in the western episode, at 600 W. Madison St.
Other federal buildings include Chicago that is now being sold now The Customhouse of 12 -storey, built in 1932 in 610 S. Canal St.
GSA also said that she is looking to empty three other buildings in Illinois, in East Saint Louis, Carpenell and Queens.
Dan Mihalopoulos is an investigation correspondent for the WBEZ team for government and politics.
