The Detroit News to leave Fort Street office, seek new space
Posted By: Detroit News on October 2, 2024. For more information, please click here to read the source article.
The Detroit News is looking for a new home after being recently notified by its building owner that it will need to leave its space in the former Federal Reserve building by the end of the year.
The business unit for the newspaper has leased space at 160 W. Fort St. since October 2014. Dan Gilbert and his firm Bedrock own the building.
The current lease for the Detroit Media Partnership, which includes The Detroit News and Detroit Free Press operations, was set to expire at the end of October. The Partnership anticipated a 14-month extension through 2025 for two of five floors included in the initial lease.
This summer, The News moved its newsroom from the 3rd floor to a smaller space on the 7th floor, while the Free Press moved from the 2nd floor to the 8th floor. Last month, Bedrock real estate firm notified the Detroit Media Partnership, also known as Michigan.com, that it had other plans for the building and that it would not finalize the 14-month extension.
“We would have been quite happy to sustain our current building for at least another 14 months,” said Gary Miles, editor and publisher of The News. “But we were informed that that’s not possible. We’ll look forward to finding new space over the next several weeks.”
Bedrock has not revealed its plans for the former Federal Reserve building. It is also unclear if other tenants in the building will be asked to vacate.
In an emailed statement Tuesday, Bedrock CEO Kofi Bonner said, “Bedrock actively engages with a variety of new and existing tenants to ensure that we help create an optimal live, work, play and stay experience in downtown Detroit. Business terms for each tenant must ultimately make sense for all parties involved and enable tenants to succeed; however, the specifics are not something that we have or can publicly discuss.”
Late this summer, the Maru sushi restaurant in the first-floor lobby closed, saying it would continue to operate four locations elsewhere in the state.
The Detroit News and Free Press operate under a joint operating agreement that could expire at the end of 2025 if the owners of either newspaper move to terminate it, or could automatically renew for five-year periods. The News is owned by MediaNews Group and has a staff of about 85 people. The Free Press is owned by Gannett. The newspapers have not announced if the agreement will be extended.
Prior to its move to 160 W. Fort, The News was housed in its longtime building at 615 W. Lafayette, which it had shared with the Free Press since the late 1990s.
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