SL Green to Launch COVID-19 Testing Sites Across NYC

One Vanderbilt. Image courtesy of Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates

Manhattan’s largest office landlord is among a roster of property owners that are making room for COVID-19 testing services, as employers eye a careful return to the city’s mostly empty offices.

SL Green Realty Corp. announced it is making at least 21 locations available for use free of charge as temporary testing centers. The REIT worked with New York State and City to identify the sites, totaling more than 200,000 square feet of space across its entire New York City portfolio. SL Green has contracted occupational health provider Mobile Health to roll out the new testing program, which will be offered to the landlord’s nearly 900 tenants from April 8.

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The company said in a statement that it has negotiated preferable testing rates for all of its tenants, describing the program as “an additional measure to instill confidence in the safety of returning to offices.” New York City is currently conducting more than 200,000 COVID-19 tests per day on average.

SL Green is among eight commercial landlords in the city that have joined the New York Forward COVID-Safe Offices partnership, which aims to provide space and easier access to testing services for interested tenants. The group of property owners, together representing more than 100 million square feet of office space in the city, also includes Brookfield Properties, L&L Holding Company, Related Cos., RXR Realty, Rudin Management Co., Tishman Speyer and Vornado.

A total of 21 property owners across the state have decided to participate in the program, which has other sites in Buffalo, the Capital Region, Rochester and Syracuse. The program is designed for companies that are looking to conduct regular diagnostic testing of their employees and builds upon the New York Forward Rapid Test Program, a public-private partnership that was launched last month to set up rapid testing locations across the state.

All aboard

Offices in the New York metro area were 15.6 percent occupied as of March 10, up 0.7 percent from the previous week, according to access control data from Kastle Systems. The average across 10 major U.S. cities tracked by Kastle was 25 percent.

Bucking the trend in New York, SL Green said its entire team has been safely back in the office since last June, while all of its office buildings have remained open to tenants through the pandemic. The company launched its “SL Green Forward” initiative last year, which includes significant investments in each property’s environment, cleaning and air filtration, technology and other elements in response to the viral outbreak.

The REIT, which held interests in 88 buildings totaling 38.2 million square feet as of year-end 2020, recently moved its headquarters from 420 Lexington Ave. to its new One Vanderbilt skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan. The new space measures 70,000 square feet across the 27th and 28th floors of the 77-story tower, which is now nearly three-quarters leased.