Griffin told listeners that its development pipeline is 54% leased--including a recent aggregate 375,000 square feet in deals for threebuilding leases. "With all of our buildings under construction orunder development being government or defense IT buildings, we believethis concentration is unique among office REITs and positions us wellfor growth that helps offset somewhat the recession impact," Griffinsaid.

In addition, he added, the REIT recently signed a small lease for aDefense Information Systems Agency contractor for space atColumbia Gateway, "which is the first evidence of DISA contractordemand outside of the national business park.

At the same time, a number of development opportunities have becomeavailable from developers unable to secure financing for theirprojects, Griffin noted.

"We have been working to selectively pursue those opportunities thatfit our super core strategy and would now expect that several of theseopportunities will be finalized in the first half of 2010. These majorprojects would represent both submarket and geographic expansion."

All together, COPT is reporting that, at year-end, its portfolioconsisted of 249 properties, totaling 19.1 million square feet, that is90.7% occupied and 91.3% leased, according to comments made during thecall by Roger Waesche, COPT's EVP and COO.

COPT's occupancy was down 0.2% quarter-over-quarter. During the fourthquarter the REIT leased 610,000 square feet, of which 408,000 squarefeet were renewals, 101,000 square feet was retenanting, 69,000 squarefeet was first-time lease-up of previously acquired space and 32,000square feet was development. For all of 2009, it leased just under 2.6million square feet, of which 1.76 million square feet were renewals,441,000 square feet was retenanting, 247,000 square feet wasfirst-time lease-up of previously acquired space, and 111,000 squarefeet was development space.