Mass. Department Of Public Health Slashes Boston Office Space
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health is set to move out of its Downtown Crossing office, making it the latest state agency to do so.
The DPH will leave its longtime home at 250 Washington St., vacating 112K SF, The Boston Globe reported. The department plans to reduce its footprint by more than half with a 51K SF lease at 100 Cambridge St. Its current lease was up for renewal.
The cutback is expected to save the agency $2M a year. The move will impact roughly 800 DPH employees.
The 100 Cambridge St. site is better known as the Saltonstall building. The roughly 600K SF space is managed by Intercontinental Real Estate on behalf of its investors. The building is also home to the Massachusetts Department of Energy and the Department of Environmental Protection.
The space that the DPH is vacating could become part of an office-to-residential conversion project. The owner of the Washington Street office, Ruben Cos., filed plans to convert the space into 110 residential units, with 20% of those units set aside for income-restricted tenants.
Under the administration of Gov. Maura Healey, Massachusetts agencies have been consolidating space. In 2024, state agencies collectively reduced their footprint by 24K SF, achieving a 19% savings on average in annual rent, the Globe reported.
