Protecting your tax dollars: WRAL Investigates empty state-owned office space

Post-pandemic, the workplace will likely never be the same. The state, like any other employer, is trying to find the right balance between remote and in-person work for its employees.

"What these agencies need from their work spaces is in a state of flux, and we’re trying to keep up with that," Chief Deputy Secretary of the North Carolina Department of Administration Mark Edwards told WRAL Investigates.

While many jobs can’t be done remotely, like state troopers patrolling the roads and caretakers in prisons and state hospitals, more and more work can be done without coming to a state building.

WRAL Investigates wanted to know: Is all the space in state buildings and offices being used efficiently?

"That’s a great question," Edwards said. "And what we’re finding is there are degrees, varying degrees with it."

In his role with the Department of Administration, Edwards oversees state buildings. He describes the new challenge, "State agencies have different missions, so one solution that works for one probably might not work for the other one."

WRAL Investigates found that’s the case after surveying various agencies.

Based on employees who turned in a workplace survey, the Department of Public Instruction reports more than 90% of its employees are working hybrid or fully remote.

The North Carolina Department of Commerce, which shares a building with DPI, reports 63% of employees are teleworking.

Contrast that the Department of Corrections where the number of remote workers is less than 4%.

Meeting the needs of the state and employees is especially challenging for the Department of Health and Human Services, the state’s largest agency. DHHS now estimates 20% of employees can work at least partially remote, which is a key recruiting tool at a time when it’s hard to hire.

"We’ve certainly embraced remote work in a way that we didn’t before the pandemic," DHHS Secretary Kody Kinsley said. He points out that the vast majority of his 18,000 positions must be on-site for care-giving, lab work or inspections.

However, Kinsley says other positions have some wiggle room.

DHHS is asking questions like, "What we’re doing as a department is trying to be intentional. When do we need to be together, for what purposes, how do we make the most strategic value of that? When does the flexibility of remote serve the same purpose," he says.

DHHS is already in transition, moving from the Dorothea Dix campus to a site off Blue Ridge Road that’s set to open in 2025.

Figuring out who can and can’t perform their job duties remotely is not the only struggle. Edwards says the workforce and workplace are evolving.

"What we’re finding is that agencies are being able to reduce their footprint in their office space, but just reducing it is not enough. We have to look at converting that office space to be more functional in a hybrid work situation," he said.

"We’re here to serve the public and that’s why I think it’s important to have people here everyday," insists Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey, who is no fan of remote work. Recently, he relented to allow one day of telework per week.

"My feeling is people are more productive in the office and you have that camaraderie," he says.

While some state offices have thinned, the Department of Insurance is feeling the squeeze. DOI moved into the Albemarle building downtown in 2017, a more than $40 million renovation for them. Now, the department’s state fire marshal and engineering teams have been cleared out of two floors to make way for the State Auditor’s Office.

Causey says that caused more headaches. "It was very disruptive," he told us.

Typically, the Department of Administration guides decisions on state building usage, but in an unusual move, the General Assembly’s Legislative Services Office is reaching well beyond the walls of legislative building. Lawmakers are ordering agencies to pay for efficiency studies. DOI’s cost $100,000.

"The signal it’s sending to us was send people home, you know, get more people to work from home," Causey said of the study results.

In addition to the Albemarle building shakeup, lawmakers plan to level the Department of Administration building and replace it with a complex for UNC General Government, Public Instruction, Community Colleges, Commerce and Administration.

As for existing buildings, balancing use with remote work is an ongoing challenge. Edwards says his agency is doing all they can to make sure tax dollars — for rent, utilities and upkeep — are being spent wisely.

"That’s our mission, and that’s what we’re making sure we’re doing right now with our time and our studies to make sure these buildings are being used efficiently," he said.

The state is also nearing the end of a 20-year plan to make state-owned buildings more energy efficient.

WRAL Investigates examined electricity costs during the pandemic, when most workers were ordered to stay home. We found most power bills stayed flat or went down only a fraction, because agencies had to spend more on upgrades to improve air circulation in buildings for workers who had to come to the office.