DHS HQNew DHS headquarters delayed 5 years and $500 million over

The latest Congressionally-approved budget for DHS will delay the building of the agency’s new headquarters by at least five years and cost an additional $500 million.

Lawmakers allocated $56 million to complete the Coast Guard’s headquarters, but did not approve enough funds to continue work on other facilities that will eventually house DHS’s many agencies.

Originally DHS had planned to consolidate its scattered campuses into a single building located at the former St. Elizabeth’s hospital in southeast Washington D.C. by 2016. Now with Congressional funding cuts, the project will not be completed until 2021 and cost $3.96 billion, more than $500 million over its initial cost of $3.45 million.

For 2011 DHS and the General Services Administration (GSA), which is overseeing the building’s construction, requested $668 million for the project, but only received $77 million, or 12 percent of its original request.

Again for the 2012 budget, lawmakers only allocated $56 million to DHS and $50 million to GSA for new construction projects when they had requested $376 million.

The new Coast Guard headquarters is expected to be completed in the spring of 2013 and DHS has relied heavily on $200 million in stimulus funding.

It is currently the only DHS construction project that is currently on schedule.