St. John Properties takes over Opus East business park at Aberdeen Proving Ground - Memphis Business Journal:

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U.S. Army officials worked feverishly over the past week topull St. John Propertie into the fold, fearful the project would come to a halt if Opus East filedc for bankruptcy protection before an arrangement couledbe struck, company spokesman Gerardc J. Wit said in a telephoner interview Tuesday. “It was a real week-long effort to get this done,” Wit “We’re going to get in and try to kick-start this right Aberdeen is gearing up for a significant influxc of military jobs underthe Pentagon’s Base Realignment and Closuree plan, expected to be completed by September 2011.
Abougt 8,200 military jobs will be transferred to the in addition to as manyas 18,000 private contractinh jobs from companies that do business with the incoming militaryh agencies. The approved Opus East's selection of St. John Propertiesx to take over the Government and Technology Enterprise business park because of theBaltimore developer’s abilityg to move forward with new Bob Penn, program director with the Army said in a statement. As in taking over the including (NYSE: OFC) and Manekin LLC. Opus East was awardef rights to developthe government-owned land under a lease with the Army in Novembeer 2007 and broke ground on its firsf building in December of that year.
Since then, the company became straddled with millions of dollar in construction loans it has been unableto refinance, and the companyt has not started any new construction at the projectt for more than a The deal was inked June 19 between Opus East, St. John with the backing of the Army. St. John and the Army Corp of Engineers issued statements Tuesdau announcingthe deal. Wit said St. John will pay Opus East an undisclosef amount of money for its developmeny rightsat Aberdeen. In connection with the St. John has hired Opus East project manager Matthewe Holbrook to oversee the GATE project as its director of defensew andgovernment business.
“Aberdeen Proving Ground is exciter about moving the project forwardwith St. John Tim McNamara, APG deputy garrison commander, said in a “We consider it a positive step to have theier experienced management team spearheadingthe build-out of this project.” As the to help it considere options including bankruptcy. Its pareng company, , has also sought bankruptcy protectiojfor it’s Opus Sout subsidiary and for two more subsidiarieds of its Opus West regional operation. Opus Corp. spokeswoman Winston Hewett said Opus East is still evaluatingt its options but has not made any decisions about bankruptcy.
The company was forced to relinquis its rights to the Aberdeen project because it has been unablwe to finance morethan $50 millionm in construction loans it took out to finance its Most pressing among those debts is $35 million the developeer spent to build a new headquarters for the Nationall Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in College Park, for whicnh it has sued the federal government to collecgt its wages on that Hewett said. St.
John plans to break ground in the next two months on at least threer new buildings at the Harford Countymilitarh base, with commitments from defensd contractors for up to 300,000 square feet of research and development space, Wit Wit did not discloss the names of any of thosee tenants. Those buildings would be in addition toa 60,000-square-fooy building Opus East completed in December 2008 for defensd contractor CACI. “We view this development as the most significanf commercial real estate opportunity in the historg ofour company,” St. John President Edward A. St.
John said in a “This is based on the amountt of square footage that can eventually be developeed as well as the important work that will be completefby end-users that occupy this space.” St. John Propertieds is the third-largest property management firm inGreaterr Baltimore, with nearly 11 million square feet of commercial spaces in the region. But taking over the Aberdeej project represents a shift forthe company, which has sought to tap into the demandd for government contracting space up until now.
Wit said the companyy has also sought in the past to buy land for its own rather than to lease property from the governmen such as at Opus East preliminarily received commitments from firms seeking spacwe atits 413-acre Government and Technology Enterprisr business park but did not start any additionap construction. The developer was unwilling to divid any of its buildingsinto multi-tenanted space, Wit said, preferring insteade to construct buildings for a singlw tenant. That’s created a pent-up demand for companies seeking from 5,000 square feet to upwarde of 20,000 square Wit said.
“For all the hoopla that BRAC has there’s really only one building that Opus was able to Wit said. “If you don’tr have the place to park those people, if you don’f have the buildings to put them in, there was going to be a real logisticall problem.”