WASHINGTON, DC—The search for a new headquarters for the Federal Bureau of Investigation has seemed interminable, but on Friday evening the US General Services Administration announced it has issued Phase II of the Request for Proposals to the short-listed bidders who will submit proposals for the projects per the requirements posted in Federal Business Opportunities. 

It also announced that $1.4 billion in construction funding will be included in President Obama's fiscal 2017 budget, which will be released on February 9, 2016.

Over the past year it seemed that GSA's vision of exchanging a newly-constructed to 2.1-million-square foot FBI headquarters for the J. Edgar Hoover Federal building on Pennsylvania Ave., was simply not going to materialize in the end despite the selection of Greenbelt MD, Landover MD, and Springfield, VA as the three potential sites.

Funding was a concern and questions about the proposed swap still lingered.

But then events started to move for the project a few months ago.

In October, the short-listed bidders were notified that they had been tapped for Phase II.

In November GSA released the draft Environmental Impact Statement and has held public meetings in each of the three local jurisdictions. It is in the process of reviewing public comments.

In December, Congress provided $390 million for the project in its fiscal 2016 omnibus spending bill. 

There was also a separate but tangentially-related development in December when GSA announced that it was seeking a new building to house the US Labor Department and issued a Notice of Intent "exploring an exchange of the current headquarters and the underlying approximately 10.5-acre parcel." In short, GSA proposed to use its exchange authority again to get a new headquarters for the Labor Department. Presumable it, at least, sees this process working, albeit very slowly.