Springfield business owner John Chiang received a letter March 10 that landlords dread: a tenant is breaking its lease.
The tenant is the U.S. government’s Department of Labor, which rents office space on the second floor of the building at 3161 W. White Oaks Drive. The building is owned by Chiang, 82, who also owns the information technology company Novanis that operates out of the same building.
“In Springfield, the commercial real estate market is not so great. It could take a while to fill this vacancy,” he said.
No reason is given for terminating the lease. But one need only read the national news headlines to know the driving force behind the cut: the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.
The initiative is being headed by Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, and is designed to reduce the number of employees working for the federal government as well as the amount of office space it leases and to trim other expenses. The Trump administration has announced its intention to cancel 50% of its leases with private property owners, in addition to closing half of the properties the government owns.
The “wall of receipts” on the DOGE website displays lists of grants, contracts and real estate that have been canceled, along with the purported savings. Under the real estate heading, there is a list of 748 lease terminations for more than 9.5 million square feet of space nationwide that DOGE claims will total $468 million in savings. However, it’s unclear what will happen to the employees of these offices slated for closure, particularly since the new administration has also emphasized that federal employees are to return to the office, rather than working from home.
The Labor Department’s lease is one of four in Springfield that are being terminated, according to the DOGE website. The website is less than transparent about what agencies are being affected. Cuts are listed by the square footage of the lease being eliminated and the projected cost savings. But addresses and agencies involved are not always listed.
“These are just indiscriminate cuts being made to the workforce,” U.S. Rep Nikki Budzinski, D-Springfield, said. “I think the DOGE approach to this has been completely wrong, and you’re seeing this across the workforce.”
She said members of Congress have not been informed on the specifics of the cuts.
“Interestingly, DOGE posted on a website around 10 different federal facilities within the 13th Congressional District that were on the chopping block to be closed. And then, almost in the middle of the night, that website went dark. Now we’ve gotten indications that the website could potentially be going up again,” she said.
Because of the opaque nature of the website postings, it is difficult to discern what offices are slated for closure.
But Illinois Times has confirmed the Wage and Hour Division of Department of Labor, at 3161 W. White Oaks Dr. Suite 203, is to be closed. According to the DOGE website the office has 2,128 square feet and is leased for $42,058 annually. It is listed as “termination via mass mod,” which means the change was part of a revision to multiple contracts at once. But it was posted on the website for more than a week before Chiang said he received notification of the cancelation.
Employees within the office said they weren’t allowed to speak to reporters. Designated representatives for the agency and the union representing the employees could not immediately be reached for comment.
The Small Business Administration office at 3330 Ginger Creek Drive also appears to be on the chopping block. The 2,022-square-foot office leases for $34,756 annually, according to the DOGE website. The office was locked with no employees present the morning of March 11. However, landlord Zach Bromley said he has not received any notification of a lease termination.
Charles White, who was the lender relations specialist for the Springfield branch office, sent a farewell email to his business contacts on Feb. 26 stating that he had “opted to accept President’s Trump deferred resignation.” He provided two names of other employees who would be “contact points with SBA moving forward.” According to the SBA website, those individuals work out of the Chicago office, which is the only other SBA office in the state. White did not respond to inquiries from IT seeking further comment.
A “departmental management IG” office was also listed for closure on the DOGE website. The U.S. Inspector General has a Springfield office at 1124 Rickard Road, but a spokesperson for the landlord said March 11 that they have not received any notification of a lease termination. The website lists the office to be closed as 3,253 square feet with a $63,848 annual lease.
Three of the Springfield properties listed on the DOGE website are categorized as “terminated via mass mod.” The fourth, described as a “public buildings service – field office,” states a lease termination notice was sent Jan. 30 with a termination effective date of April 29. The site is described as 3,860 square feet with a $62,102 annual lease.
“This is a reckless approach to how they’re trying to address efficiencies,” Budzinski said. “They’re making a lot of mistakes. People are losing their jobs, and people are also losing access to critical public services.”
Budzinski said it is unclear just how many people may lose their jobs because of the cuts.
“We’re looking for answers to confirm the list that was preliminarily posted on a website – if the Trump administration is taking the next steps to actually close them. But the uncertainty is that they took that website down,” she said.
“We’re going to continue to ask questions, and we’re going to continue to advocate that each of those offices remain open as we believe constituents are taking advantage of accessing public government services at each of those locations,” Budzinski said.
Budzinski added she supports cutting waste and making government more efficient but said there needs to be a more deliberative process in reaching these goals.
She added, “This is a chainsaw effort when it should be more of a scalpel approach to taking on government efficiencies.”
This article appears in Best Places To Work 2025.