NYC Housing Preservation Requests 22K-SF Office at 215 West 125th Street
By Isabelle Durso February 20, 2025 1:57 pm
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New York City’s Department of Housing Preservation & Development (HPD) is seeking new office space at Harlem’s 215 West 125th Street.
The HPD, which oversees the development of affordable housing in the city, wants to move to 22,217 square feet on part of the third floor of Cogswell Realty’s six-story office building, according to a filing with the Department of City Planning this week.
The deal would be a relocation of HPD’s Division of Code Enforcement (DCE), which has been at 3280 Broadway in West Harlem since 1990, according to the filing. The HPD requested that its new space at 215 West 125th include 10 reserved parking spaces in a “secure garage” for the staff’s “day-to-day operations.”
The filing, submitted by the Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS), which handles leasing for the city, claims the DCE needs the parking upgrade, as its current street-parking situation at 3280 Broadway has been “subject to occasional vandalism.”
Spokespeople for HPD, DCAS and Cogswell did not immediately respond to requests for comment. It’s unclear who’s brokering the proposed deal, which was first reported by the New York Business Journal.
The DCE’s 76 full-time employees are responsible for enforcing the city’s housing codes and making sure buildings follow standards for heat, hot water, mold, pests, gas and fire safety, the filing said. During 2024 alone, the DCE responded to more than 700,000 housing maintenance problems in the city.
The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York, landlord of the HPD’s office at 3280 Broadway, does not wish to extend the HPD’s current lease when it expires in June, causing the agency to search for new space, according to the filing.
The HPD is seeking 78 offices, six conference rooms, two kitchen areas, two storage rooms, two locker rooms and a wellness room in its new office at 215 West 125th, the filing said.
The Central Harlem building between Adam Clayton Powell Jr. and Frederick Douglass boulevards is also home to another city government entity, Manhattan Community Board 10, as well as the state’s Workers Compensation Board, the Bank of America Financial Center and Lenox Hill Radiology.
Isabelle Durso can be reached at idurso@commercialobserver.com.
