Inside The Old Philadelphia Quartermaster: Defense Center Looking For A Little Respect

Natalie Kosteini at the Philadelphia Business Journal offers a piece on the company that owns part of the old Philadelphia Quartermaster in South Philadelphia.

Joe Righter has a problem.

He’s tired of the Defense Center being treated, as he says, like "the step child to the Navy Yard.”

In 2000, Righter’s Sky Management bought a million square feet of buildings on 23 acres at 2800 South 20th St. in Philadelphia that was part of the Defense Center. The property has a unique spot in the city’s history.

The Defense Center got its start in 1880 as the Schuylkill Arsenal located at Grays Ferry Avenue and Washington Avenue. It produced clothing and other supplies for the military. The factory was eventually renamed the Philadelphia Quartermaster Depot and relocated during World War I to its current location. At one point, it was called the Defense Personnel Support Center. By 1993, the facilities no longer produced clothing and the military closed the operations in 1994 and it was decommissioned. 

... Righter scored two tenants from which he believes will create some momentum for the Defense Center. The Department of Labor signed a 20-year lease on 88,000 square feet. Sky Management invested $8 million gutting and redeveloping space for the agency. Then Homeland Security signed a 20-year lease on 50,000 square feet. Skyview put up $12 million to totally renovate its space.

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/blog/real-estate/2013/06/defense-center-looking-for-a-little.html?page=all

You can also read an earlier post on the history of the Philadelphia Quartermaster - and my personal history there, as I worked at the Quartermaster for 25 years - via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2010/06/philadelphia-quartermaster-revisited.html

And you can read my Counterterrorism magazine piece on the Delaware Valley Intelligence Center that is located at the old Quartermaster via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2010/08/connecting-dots-at-local-level-fusion.html