Talk:Wikimedia Foundation headquarters

Efficiency

It seems sensible to reduce the office space. Nice to hear about the LEED gold certification. For international comparison, is there a measure in terms of kWh/m²-annum of the energy consumed by the new office? What are the sources of energy for the heating? (I've read [1] but there's no such information.) --Nemo 15:18, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

Are these the relevant certification cards? 2009, 2014 (says platinum even), future.

The 2014 one reads "On-site and off-site renewable energy 0/6" so I guess that would answer my question on energy source. There's a 15/18 for "Optimize energy efficiency performance" which per https://www.usgbc.org/credits/existing-buildings/v2009/eac1 implies in the best case an EPA ENERGY STAR Energy

Performance Rating of 89, which if I read [2] correctly means an energy intensity equal to about 42 % of the reference value, which according to [3] may be the median from a national survey of building stock, which before 2018 per [4] should be CBECS 2003.

Speaking of kWh, [5] provides a conversion table. Nemo 18:22, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Ownership

To avoid future speculation, it could be useful for some people to know who owns the place and will profit from the rent. I did read that the managers are Cushman & Wakefield of California, Inc.; but I suppose you also performed some checks on who the owners are etc. --Nemo 15:18, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

@Nemo bis: Thank you for your questions. However, they do not appear to be related to a community matter and will not impact a decision which has already been made and acted upon. Additionally, we do not have information on usage which only began a day ago. As a result, we are respectfully opting not to spend paid time responding further to this inquiry. --Gregory Varnum (Wikimedia Foundation) (talk) 20:04, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

@Nemo_bis: Yes, Cushman & Wakefield of California are indeed the managers of the building. (This message has been provided to you using non-paid time.) odder (talk) 09:16, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Odder for the additional PDF. Gregory, your response seems to have nothing to do with my question: I didn't ask about usage, nor to change a decision, nor to find new information, but merely to share considerations which I assume have already been made. I also have no idea what "related to a community matter" might mean. As a result, I respectfully consider your defensive response to be quite a waste of paid and unpaid time. --Nemo 15:42, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

Lease commencement

@GVarnum-WMF: 2024 is when the lease ends, not when it commences, isn't it? --Yair rand (talk) 23:20, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

@Yair rand: Apologies - I misread it, and have updated the wording to be clearer. --Gregory Varnum (Wikimedia Foundation) [he/him] (talk) 23:26, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

New offices

So, uh, was there going to be announcement somewhere that the WMF now has offices in Washington DC? (And possibly New York City as well?)

I feel like this was a pretty big failure in transparency. Can someone from the WMF post some information? --Yair rand (talk) 07:40, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

I did pick up some information about this in the last few months, but I don't remember whether it was non-public information or whether it was buried in some public information about new hires and public policy and stuff. So I won't tell what I know, for now, until I check (not that it's anything particularly shocking).

I do agree it would be interesting, in particular, for the WMF to provide an update on how its practices towards remote workers have evolved in the last few years. That's something that matters a lot to our movement for a lot of reasons, including the WMF's ability to work well with our very global and interconnected community. Nemo 22:06, 3 March 2020 (UTC)